Scott had a story of a topping goldsmith on the Bridge, who prided himself on being the mirror of Amphitryons, and accounted for his success by stating that it was his invariable custom to set his own stomach at ease, by a beefsteak and a pint of port in his back-shop, half an hour before the arrival of his guests. But the host of Castle Street had no occasion to imitate this prudent arrangement, for his appetite at dinner was neither keen nor nice. Breakfast was his chief meal. Before that came, he had gone through the severest part of his day's work, and he then set to with the zeal of Crabbe's Squire Tovell-- "And laid at once a pound upon his plate." No fox-hunter ever prepared himself for the field by more substantial appliances. His table was always provided, in addition to the usually plentiful delicacies of a Scotch breakfast, with some solid article, on which he did most lusty execution--a round of beef--a pasty, such as made Gil Blas's eyes water--or, most welcome of all, a cold sheep's head, the charms of which primitive dainty he has so gallantly defended against the disparaging sneers of Dr. Johnson and his bear-leader.[109] A huge brown loaf flanked his elbow, and it was placed upon a broad wooden trencher, that he might cut and come again with the bolder knife. Often did the _Clerks' {p.252} coach_, commonly called among themselves _the Lively_--which trundled round every morning to pick up the brotherhood, and then deposited them at the proper minute in the Parliament Close--often did this lumbering hackney arrive at his door before he had fully appeased what Homer calls "the sacred rage of hunger;" and vociferous was the merriment of the learned _uncles_, when the surprised poet swung forth to join them, with an extemporized sandwich, that looked like a ploughman's luncheon, in his hand. But this robust supply would have served him in fact for the day. He never tasted anything more before dinner, and at dinner he ate almost as sparingly as Squire Tovell's niece from the boarding-school,-- --"Who cut the sanguine flesh in frustums fine, And marvelled much to see the creatures dine." [Footnote 109: See Croker's _Boswell_ (edit. 1831), vol. iii p. 38.] The only dishes he was at all fond of were the old-fashioned ones to which he had been accustomed in the days of Saunders Fairford; and which really are excellent dishes,--such, in truth, as Scotland borrowed from France before Catherine de' Medici brought in her Italian _virtuosi_ to revolutionize the kitchen like the court. Of most of these, I believe, he has in the course of his novels found some opportunity to record his esteem. But, above all, who can forget that his King Jamie, amidst the splendors of Whitehall, thinks himself an ill-used monarch unless his first course includes _cocky-leeky_?