We are not to conclude that the above profusion was an every-day fact. There are hints here and there that this was by no means the case. Oatmeal is called the crown of the housewife's garland, as being the largest item of consumption in the household; and whigge (whey) is praised as an excellent cool drink, and as wholesome as any other with which to slake a labouring man's thirst the whole summer long. On the other hand, we know this whigge was looked upon in a somewhat similarly scornful light as that in which we regard small beer, because it was adopted to distinguish the political body opposed to the Tories. And the constant supervision of the mistress of the house over every undertaking would also be a surety against the practice of extravagance. Although there were good men-maltsters in the land, there was no beer to compare with that made by the mistress and her maids. These made both beer and ale; cider from apples; perry from pears; mead and metheglin from honey and herbs. The wines, too, were in her care. It is curious to note the kind of care they experienced at her hands. Every _fatt_ (vat) of foreign wine was dosed with several gallons of milk and eggs beaten up, and each was flavoured with some gallons of another, in a mode that must have much bewildered the palates of King Charles's lieges. If claret lost its colour, she stewed some damsons or black bullaces, and poured their syrup into the hogshead, when all came right again. If sack ran muddy, she took some rice, flour, and camphor, and popped that mixture into the butt; if any wine became hard, she knew how to make it mellow with honey and eggs: the same with muskadine and malmsey. The indefatigable mistress of the house was as omnipresent in the bakehouse as elsewhere, and saw to the making up the various kinds of bread, both for the family and the hinds or servants. There were several kinds in use; wheat bread, rye bread, rye and wheat mixed, and barley and wheat mixed: into the servants' barley-bread she adroitly mixed two pecks of peas and a peck of malt. She also looked in at the dairy, saw that it was kept as clean as a prince's chamber, and gave an eye to the profits. She could send several cheeses to table,--new milk cheese, nettle-cheese, floaten milk cheese and eddish or after-math cheese.