Pertinax willingly partook of pheasant, but on condition that they cost his miserly sensuality nothing. Heliogabalus would only eat them three times a week. Alexander Severus reserved them for solemn occasions.[XX-16] They were sacrificed each morning to the statue of Caligula,[XX-17] at the foot of which the vile troop of courtiers prostrated themselves at the very time even when Cæsar, in a fit of sanguinary monomania, wished that the Roman people had but one neck, that he might sever it at a blow.[XX-18] It is especially from the commencement of the 14th century that the pheasant, better appreciated in Europe, has resumed in banquets that remarkable place,[XX-19] constantly assigned to it throughout this new era, in which our taste maintains it, and from which our posterity will never remove it, if they inherit that wonderful sentiment of the good and beautiful which so eminently distinguishes the epicures of the present day. Let us add, for the comfort of weak stomachs, that the medical light of Pergamo--the illustrious Galen--recommends them the use of the flesh of pheasants;[XX-20] that he prescribed it for himself, and found it a most delightful remedy. “Mingrelia, or the antique Colchis, is the cradle of pheasants, that species of birds being stronger and finer there than anywhere else, but it is seen, however, all over Europe, in Africa, and Asia, even in the cold countries of the north. This beautiful bird forms an article of commerce with the Chinese, who sell them frozen in the market of Kiakta.”--SONNINI. THE PARTRIDGE. The Greeks and Romans were acquainted with partridges, and eat them.[XX-21] The red, at first very rare in Italy, were, however, advantageously replaced by the white, which true amateurs procured at a great expense from the Alps.[XX-22] The Athenians were fond of seeing them fight, and raised them for this cruel sport.[XX-23] Alexander Severus also sought in these sanguinary struggles relief from the cares of royalty.[XX-24] Aristippus, a more humane, perhaps a more luxurious, philosopher, gave as much as fourteen shillings for a fine fat partridge,[XX-25] which, passing from the aviary to the kitchen, escaped the fatal vicissitudes of a desperate combat. In Greece, people who knew how to enjoy life thought much of the leg of this warlike bird.[XX-26] It was fashionable not to touch any other part. At Rome, when politeness was not of so much consequence, they sometimes ventured on the breast. We, barbarians, eat the entire partridge. THE QUAIL. The dead may be raised by the means of a quail, said the ancients. Now for the proof: Hercules having been killed in Lybia, Iolaüs took one of these birds, which fortunately happened to be at hand, and placed it beneath his friend’s nose. The hero no sooner smelt it than his eyes opened to the light, and Acheron was forced to give up his prey.[XX-27]