Then there was God knows what ‘à l’Allemande,’ ‘A l’Espagnole,’ ‘timballe,’ and ‘salpicon’— With things I can’t withstand or understand, Though swallow’d with much zest upon the whole; And ‘entremets’ to piddle with at hand, Gently to lull down the subsiding soul; While great Lucullus’ Robe triumphal muffles (There’s fame) young partridge fillets, deck’d with truffles. What are the fillets on the victor’s brow To these? They are rags or dust. Where is the arch Which nodded to the nation’s spoils below? Where the triumphal chariots’ haughty march? Gone to where victories must like dinners go. Farther I shall not follow the research: But oh! ye modern heroes with your cartridges, When will your names lend lustre e’en to partridges? Those truffles too are no bad accessaries, Follow’d by ‘petits puits d’amour’—a dish Of which perhaps the cookery rather varies, So every one may dress it to his wish, According to the best of dictionaries, Which encyclopedize both flesh and fish; But even sans ‘confitures,’ it no less true is, There’s pretty picking in those ‘petits puits.’ The mind is lost in mighty contemplation Of intellect expanded on two courses; And indigestion’s grand multiplication Requires arithmetic beyond my forces. Who would suppose, from Adam’s simple ration, That cookery could have call’d forth such resources, As form a science and a nomenclature From out the commonest demands of nature? The glasses jingled, and the palates tingled; The diners of celebrity dined well; The ladies with more moderation mingled In the feast, pecking less than I can tell; Also the younger men too: for a springald Can’t, like ripe age, in gormandize excel, But thinks less of good eating than the whisper (When seated next him) of some pretty lisper. Alas! I must leave undescribed the gibier, The salmi, the consommé, the purée, All which I use to make my rhymes run glibber Than could roast beef in our rough John Bull way: I must not introduce even a spare rib here, ‘Bubble and squeak’ would spoil my liquid lay: But I have dined, and must forego, Alas! The chaste description even of a ‘bécasse;’ And fruits, and ice, and all that art refines From nature for the service of the gout— Taste or the gout,—pronounce it as inclines Your stomach! Ere you dine, the French will do; But after, there are sometimes certain signs Which prove plain English truer of the two. Hast ever had the gout? I have not had it— But I may have, and you too, reader, dread it. The simple olives, best allies of wine, Must I pass over in my bill of fare? I must, although a favourite ‘plat’ of mine In Spain, and Lucca, Athens, every where: On them and bread ’twas oft my luck to dine, The grass my table-cloth, in open-air, On Sunium or Hymettus, like Diogenes, Of whom half my philosophy the progeny is.