CHAPTER XIII.

And what this flood of deeper brown, Which a white foam does also crown, Less white than snow, more white than mortar? Oh, my soul! can this be Porter? _The Déjeunè._ P raised and caress’d, the tuneful Philips sung O f Cyder fam’d, whence first his laurel sprung; R ise then, my muse, and to the world proclaim T he mighty charms of Porter’s potent name: E ach buck from thee shall sweetest pleasure taste, R evel secure, nor think to part in haste. _An Acrostick._ _PORTER AND STOUT. — CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH LED TO THEIR INTRODUCTION. — VALUE TO THE WORKING CLASSES. — ANECDOTES. — “A POT OF PORTER OH!”_ Before the Blue Last, an old public-house situate in Curtain Road, Shoreditch, there formerly hung a board which bore this legend:—“The house where porter was first sold.” Whether this was true or false we cannot say; certain it is, however, that the drink which has made London and Dublin brewers famed far and wide had its birthplace not far from this spot. It appears that in the early years of last century the lovers of malt liquors in London were accustomed to regale themselves upon three classes of these beverages; they had ale, beer, and twopenny. Many who preferred a more subtle combination of flavours than either of these liquors {366} alone could impart, would ask for _half-and-half_, that is, half of ale and half of beer, half of ale and half of twopenny, or half of beer and half of twopenny. Others again—and these were the real connoisseurs of malt liquors—would call for a pot of three threads, or three thirds, _i.e._, one-third of ale, one-third of beer, and one-third of twopenny. The drawer would therefore have to go to three different casks, and through three distinct operations, before he could draw a pint of liquor. But the hour had come—and the man. One Ralph Harwood, whose name is too little known to an ungrateful posterity of beer-drinking Britons, some time about the year 1730, kept a brewhouse on the east side of High Street, Shoreditch. In that year, or perhaps a little earlier, as this great man brooded over the inconvenience and waste occasioned by the calls for the “three threads,” which became more and more frequent, he conceived the idea of making a liquor which would combine in itself the several virtues of ale, beer, and twopenny. He carried the idea into action, and brewed a drink which he called “Entire,” or “Entire Butts.” It was tasted; it was approved; it became the fruitful parent of a mighty offspring; and from that day to this has gone on increasing in name and fame. Visitors to the great brewery in Brick Lane are shown a hole from which steam issues to the accompaniment of awful rumbling noises. “In there once fell a man,” they are told—“a negro. Nothing but his bones were found when the copper was emptied, and it is said that the beer drawn off was of an extraordinary dark colour. Some say this was the first brew of porter. Oh yes” (this in answer to a question), “we soon learnt how to make it without the negro.” We must confess that we have some doubts as to this account of the origin of porter. We do not believe that brew could have been much darker on account of the accident, though no doubt, under the circumstances, it contained plenty of “body.” A similar tale is told of nearly every London porter brewery, and later on it will be found in verse. It seems to be to some extent a moot point among the learned how porter obtained its present name, for no record seems to have been kept of its christening. Harwood, no doubt, stood godfather to his interesting infant, but, as we have seen above, he called it “Entire;” and how or when it came to be known as porter is not quite clear. There are several theories on the subject, each more or less plausible. One is that being a hearty, appetizing, and nourishing liquor, it was specially recommended to the notice of the porters, who then, as now, formed a {367} considerable proportion of the Shoreditch population. Pennant, in his _London_ seems, to have held this view; he calls it “a wholesome liquor, which enables the London porter-drinkers to undergo tasks that ten gin-drinkers would sink under.” Another explanation of the origin of the name is that Harwood sent round his men to his customers with the liquor, and that the men would announce their arrival and their business by the cry of “Porter”—meaning, not the beer, but the bearer. Be this how it may, the embodiment of Harwood’s great idea had not attained its majority before it was known far and wide by its present name. * * * * * In _The Student_ (1750) is thus related the first appearance of porter at Oxford—. . . “Let us not derogate from the merits of porter—a liquor entirely British—a liquor that pleases equally the mechanic and the peer—a liquor which is the strength of our nation, the scourge of our enemies, and which has given _immortality_ to aldermen. ’Tis with the highest satisfaction that we can inform our Oxford students that _Isis_ herself has taken this divine liquor into her protection, and that the _Muses_ recommend it to their votaries, as being far preferable to Hippocrene, Aganippe, the Castalian spring, or any _poetical water_ whatever. Know, then, that in the middle of the High Street, at the sign of the King’s Arms, opposite to its opposite, Juggins’s Coffee House, lives Captain Jolly; who _maugrè_ the selfish opposition of his brother publicans, out of a pure affection to this University, and regardless of private profit, reduc’d porter from its original price of Sixpence, and in large golden characters generously informs us that he sells “London Porter At Fourpence a Quart. “As the Captain is a genius and a choice spirit he meets with the greatest encouragement from the gown, and sends porter to all the common-rooms. He therefore intends shortly (in imitation of the great Ashley, of the Punch House, Ludgate Hill) to have the front of his house new vamp’d up, and decorated with the following inscription:— “Pro bono academico. Here lives Captain Jolly who first reduced Porter to its’ present price and Brought that liquor into University esteem.” {368} Though we fear the great Harwood does not fill the niche in the Temple of Fame to which he is entitled, yet his praises are not entirely unsung. Gutteridge, himself a native of Shoreditch, has commemorated the discovery of porter in these lines:— Harwood, my townsman, he invented first Porter to rival wine, and quench the thirst: Porter, which spreads its fame half the world o’er, Whose reputation rises more and more; As long as Porter shall preserve its fame, Let all with gratitude our Parish name. “It is not in my power,” says Pennant in the work we have before quoted, “to trace the progress of this important article of trade. Let me only say that it is now a national concern; for the duty on malt from July 5th, 1785, to the same day 1786, produced a million and a half of money to the support of the State, from a liquor which invigorates the bodies of its willing subjects, to defend the blessings they enjoy. One of these Chevaliers de Malte (as an impertinent Frenchman styled a most respectable gentleman of the trade) has, within one year, contributed not less than fifty thousand pounds to his own share.” The person to whom the Frenchman applied the title of Chevalier de Malte was Humphrey Parsons, a brewer of last century, and the incident which gave rise to the name has already been referred to. Pennant gives a list of the chief porter brewers of London at the end of last century, with the number of barrels of strong beer they brewed from Midsummer, 1786, to Midsummer, 1787. Samuel Whitbread heads the list with 150,280 barrels, and among the others may be noted Calvert, now the City of London Brewery; Hester Thrale, now Barclay and Perkins; W. Read; and Richard Meux. Most of the other names, though famous in their day and generation, are not familiar to the modern reader. The total amount produced by some twenty-four of the chief London brewers was considerably over one million barrels. It is interesting to contrast the state of the Brewing trade a hundred years ago with the proportions to which it has attained to-day. According to a Parliamentary return made in 1884, there are now six brewers of the United Kingdom who produce annually over three and a half million barrels of malt liquor, and who pay to the revenue in Licence and Beer duty nearly one million and a half sterling per annum. {369} A fine flavour has occasionally been given to stout by extraordinary means, as witness the following legend, entitled PATENT BROWN STOUT. A Brewer in a country town Had got a monstrous reputation; No other beer but his went down. The hosts of the surrounding station, Carving his name upon their mugs, And painting it on every shutter; And though some envious folks would utter, Hints that its flavour came from drugs, Others maintained ’twas no such matter, But owing to his monstrous vat, At least as corpulent as that At Heidelberg—and some said fatter. His foreman was a lusty Black, An honest fellow; But one who had a ugly knack Of tasting samples as he brewed, Till he was stupefied and mellow. One day in this top-heavy mood, Having to cross the vat aforesaid, (Just then with boiling beer supplied), O’ercome with giddiness and qualms he Reel’d—fell in—and nothing more was said, But in his favourite liquor died, Like Clarence in his butt of Malmsey. In all directions round about The negro absentee was sought, But as no human noddle thought That our fat _Black_ was now _Brown Stout_, They settled that the rogue had left The place for debt, or crime, or theft. Meanwhile the beer was day by day Drawn into casks and sent away, Until the lees flowèd thick and thicker, When, lo! outstretched upon the ground, Once more their missing friend they found, As they had often done before—in liquor. {370} “See,” cried his moralising master, “I always knew the fellow drank hard, And prophesied some sad disaster: His fate should other tipplers strike, Poor Mungo! there he welters like A toast at bottom of a tankard!” Next morn a publican, whose tap, Had help’d to drain the vat so dry, Not having heard of the mishap, Came to demand a fresh supply, Protesting loudly that the last All previous specimens surpass’d, Possessing a much richer _gusto_ Than formerly it ever us’d to, And begging, as a special favour, Some more of the exact same flavour. “Zounds!” cried the brewer, “that’s a task More difficult to grant than ask; Most gladly would I give the smack Of the last beer to the ensuing, But where am I to find a Black And boil him down at every brewing?” Professor Wilson, writing on brewing,[68] thus relates his conversion to the porter-drinker’s creed. [68] _Blackwood’s Magazine_, vol. xxi. * * * * * “From ale we naturally get to porter—porter—drink ‘fit for the gods,’ being, in fact, likely to be, now and then, _too potent_ for mere mortals. With porter we are less imbued than with ale (not but that for some years we have imported our annual butt of Barclay); and this we hold to be one of the great misfortunes of our life. We were early nurtured in love and affection for ‘good ale’ by our great aunt, with whom we were a young and frequent visitant. Excellent old Aunt Patty! She was a Yorkshire woman, and cousin (three times removed) to Mr. Wilberforce (the father). She too hated _rum_ as the devil’s own brewage, but then she loved sound ale in the same ratio. Thus it happened, as we derived our faith in malt liquor from her, that we {371} penetrated not the mysteries of porter until our elder days. Our heresy was first effectually shaken by Charles Lamb, who, in his admirable way, proved to us that, in a hot forenoon, a draught of Meux or Barclay is beyond all cordial restoratives, and after a broiling peregrination (the stages were all full) from Coleridge’s lodgings at Highgate to town, gave us a specimen of the inspiring powers of porter in a perspiration, which we shall remember until the day of our death.” Lamb was known by all his friends to have an amiable weakness for porter, and the poet, in _An Ode to Grog_, thus commemorates the fact:— The spruce Mr. Lamb (’pon my word it’s no flam) With Whitbread’s Entire makes his Pegasus jog; I’ll grant he’s a poet, but then he don’t show wit, In thinking that Porter is better than grog. Burns was fond of porter, as of all other extracts of malt. He addressed the following lines to his friend Mr. Syme, along with a present of a dozen of bottled porter:— O, had the malt thy strength of mind, Or hops the flavour of thy wit, ’Twere drink for first of human kind, A gift that e’en for Syme were fit. We have given what we believe to be a correct historical account of the origin of porter. Peter Pindar, in the _Lamentations of the Porter Vat_, a poem in which he celebrates the bursting of a mighty porter vat at Meux’s Brewery, gives a somewhat less prosaic account:— Here—as ’tis said—in days of yore, (Such days, alas! will come no more), Resided Sir John Barleycorn, An ancient Briton, nobly born, With Mrs. Hop—a well-met pair, For he was rich, and she was fair. Yet they—like other married Folke, When their past vows they can’t revoke— Were opposite in disposition, And quarrell’d without intermission; For He alone produc’d the _Sweets_, Which She, with _Bitters_ only, meets! {372} Howe’er by dint of perseverance, By gentle conjugal endearance, The _Sweets_ predominating most, In strength excelling, _rul’d the roast_; Whilst she, obedient, did her duty— That greatest ornament of beauty. Her _Bitters_, thus by him controll’d, Their wholesome properties unfold, And give to him superior pow’rs— Superior charms for social hours; As _Beauty_, with persuasive tongue, Tempers the mind, by _passion_ wrung. At length, from this domestic Pair, Was born a well-known Son and Heir; Whose deeds o’er half the world are fam’d, By Britons, Master Porter, nam’d. Meux’s great vat then contained about 3,555 barrels, and was 22 ft. high. In October, 1814, owing to the defective state of its hoops, it burst, and the results were most disastrous. The brewery in the Tottenham Court Road was at that time hemmed in by miserable tenements, which were crowded by people of the poorer classes. Some of these houses were simply flooded with porter, two or three collapsed, and no less than eight persons met their death, either in the ruins or from drowning, the fumes of the porter, or by drunkenness. At the inquest the jury returned the verdict: “Death by Casualty.” Seven huge vats—the largest holding 15,000 barrels—now take the place of the one that burst. The _Times_ of April 1, 1785, says, “There is a cask now building at Messrs. Meux & Co.’s brewery in Liquorpond Street, Gray’s Inn Lane, the size of which exceeds all credibility, being designed to hold 20,000 barrels of porter; the whole expense attending the same will be upwards of £10,000.” About this time the London porter brewers vied with each other in building large vats, a practice they have now discontinued. * * * * * It would be difficult to imagine a liquor more suitable for the working classes than good porter—taken in moderation, of course. Not only does it afford the slight stimulant which, in another place, we have shown to be beneficial to the human body, but it also contains much {373} nutritive matter, both organic and inorganic, together with saccharine. The old writer who spoke of ale as being meat, drink, and clothing probably had no highly scientific knowledge of the chemical properties of the liquor he was extolling, but the statement—based, no doubt, on experience—can be called an exaggerated one. Very satisfactory is it to know that in Ireland porter is steadily displacing whisky. Even in the western portions of the island, the younger generation—excepting, perhaps, on holidays, at fairs, and on other festive occasions—are taking most kindly to their “porther.” It will be a happy thing for that country when “porther” shall have altogether displaced poteen. The whisky sold at threepence for each small wine-glassful in most of the country spirit shops in Ireland, and always taken neat by the natives, is of a most injurious character, being new, and consequently containing much fusel oil. Far be it from us to say a word against good, well-matured whisky, which, taken in moderation, is a most wholesome drink; but, good or bad, it is not the drink for working men who require a more sustaining and less expensive liquor. What have the total abstainers to suggest? _Water_, the diffuser of epidemics, and hardly ever obtained pure by the labouring classes; _tea_, which is almost as injurious as spirits to the nervous system, which lacks nutritive properties, and which is by no means an inexpensive liquor; _coffee_ and _cocoa_, both hot drinks and most unsuitable to slake the thirst of a labouring man; various effervescing drinks, all more or less injurious to the digestive organs, when taken habitually, and of whose composition no man hath knowledge, save the makers, and _temperance wines_, certain vendors of which were not long back prosecuted for attempting to defraud the revenue, when this abstainer’s tipple was found to contain some twenty per cent. of alcohol. One liquor, alone, have the teetotal party invented, which is nourishing, inexpensive, and wholesome. This we may term _oatmeal mash_, or cold comfort. It consists of scalded oatmeal, water, and some flavouring matter. For harvesters working in the almost tropical heat of an August sun, this is, no doubt, a wholesome drink, but it can hardly be called palatable. As a matter of fact, no non-alcoholic substitute has been put forward by the teetotal party which is in the least likely to take the place of porter; and until such beverage is invented—an event which we feel perfectly certain will never come to pass—the porter and stout brewers of the United Kingdom will have every opportunity of continuing to confer on the working classes the benefits of cheap and wholesome liquor. {374} One temperance drink we had almost overlooked—herb-beer. In the House of Commons, on May 6, 1886, Mr. Fletcher asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer why the Excise officers had interfered with the sale of herb-beer, a non-intoxicating beverage. To this the Chancellor of the Exchequer replied, that the Inland Revenue did not interfere with any liquors which contained less than three degrees of proof spirit, though legally no beer could be brewed under the name of herb-beer which had more than two degrees of alcohol. Some of these non-intoxicating liquors, sold as temperance drinks, had been found to be of considerably greater strength than London porter. For the protection of the revenue it was necessary—and so on. Comment is needless. As illustrative of the sustaining powers of brown beer, we may mention an instance which recently came under our notice. A valuable horse belonging to a member of the firm of Truman, Hanbury, Buxton, & Co. had a serious attack of influenza, with slight congestion of the lungs, and was so ill that it could take no food, and was evidently dying. As a last resource it was offered stout, which it drank greedily. For two weeks it entirely subsisted on this novel diet, and at the end of that time the bad symptoms had almost disappeared. The horse subsequently recovered. The name Stout was used originally to signify strong or stout beer. This excellent brown beer only differs from Porter in being brewed of greater strength and with a greater proportion of hops. Swift thus mentions the liquor:— “Should but the Muse descending drop A slice of bread and mutton chop, Or kindly when his credit’s out, Surprise him with a pint of stout; Exalted in his mighty mind He flies and leaves his stars[69] behind.” [69] Cf. Horace’s “_Sublimi feriam sidera vertice_,” which was once construed by an ingenuous school-boy, “I will whip the stars with my sublime _top_ ! !” Many actors, actresses and singers imbibe largely of porter, both for its excellent effects upon the voice and for its restorative and sustaining powers. Fanny Kemble used frequently to apply herself to a vulgar pewter pot of stout in the green room both during and after her {375} performances. Peg Woffington was president of the Beefsteak Club, then held in the Covent Garden Theatre; and after she had been pourtraying on the stage “The fair resemblance of a martyr Queen,” she might have been seen in the green room holding up a pot of porter, and exclaiming in a tragic voice, “Confusion to all order, let liberty thrive.” Macklin, the actor, who lived to be a centenarian, was accustomed to drink considerable quantities of stout sweetened with sugar, at the Antelope, in White Hart Yard, Covent Garden. Porson used to breakfast on bread and cheese and a pot of porter. A favourite mixture of modern Londoners is known by the name of “Cooper,” and consists of porter and stout in equal proportions. The best account of the origin of this name is one which attributes it to a publican by the name of Cooper, who kept a house in Broad Street, City, opposite to where the Excise Office stood. Cooper was a jolly, talkative host, and associated a good deal with his customers—principally officers of the Excise, bankers’ and merchants’ clerks, and men of that stamp. His guests found on bits of broken plates, pieces of beef steak and mutton chops already priced with paper labels. These they had but to choose, mark their name on the ticket, and carry to the cook at the gridiron, which was in the room in which they dined. Cooper drank and recommended a mixture of porter and stout, the fame of which spread very rapidly. The combination became the fashion in the City, and finally it was brewed entire. An equally plausible but more invidious derivation of the name is given by Andrew Halliday in his _Every-Day Papers_. His account is that “Some brewers who are jealous for the reputation of their beer employ a traveller, who visits the houses periodically, and tastes the various beers, to see that they are not reduced too much. This functionary is called the ‘Broad Cooper.’ When the Broad Cooper looks in upon Mr. Noggins, and wants to taste the porter, and the porter is below the mark, Mr. Noggins slyly draws a dash of stout into it; and this trick is so common, and so well known, that a mixture of stout and porter has come to be known to the public and asked for by the name of ‘Cooper.’” It has been well observed that “Porter-drinking needs but a beginning: whenever the habit has once been acquired, it is sure to be kept up. London is a name pretty widely known in the world; some nations know it for one thing, and some for another. But all nations know that London is the place where porter was invented: and Jews, Turks, Germans, Negroes, Persians, Chinese, New Zealanders, {376} Esquimaux, copper Indians, Yankees and Spanish Americans, are united in one feeling of respect for the native city of the most universally favourite liquor the world has ever known.” When the Persian ambassador left England some years ago, many of his suite shed tears. One of them, struck with the security and peace of an Englishman’s life, when compared to a Persian’s, declared that his highest ideal of Paradise was to live at Chelsea Hospital, where for the rest of his life he would willingly sit under the trees and drink as much porter as he could get. Much as porter’s praises have been sung, one depreciatory remark is recorded to have been made by the late Judge Maule. “Why do you, brother Maule, drink so much stout?” he was asked by one of the judges. “To bring my intellect down to the level of the rest of the bench,” was the not very flattering reply. It may be mentioned that Judge Maule’s joke was not a new one, for L’Estrange has it thus: “One ask’t Sir John Millesent how he did so conforme himself to the grave justices his brothers when they mette. ‘Why, in faith,’ sayes he, ‘I have no way but to drink myselfe downe to the capacitie of the Bench.’” A song well known in the early part of the century is much heartier, and redounds with patriotic sentiment:— A POT OF PORTER OH! When to Old England I came home, Fal lal, fal lal la ! What joy to see the tankard foam Fal lal, fal lal la ! When treading London’s well-known ground, If e’er I feel my spirits tire, I haul my sail and look up around In search of Whitbread’s best entire. I spy the name of Calvert, Of Curtis, Cox, and Co.; I give a cheer and bawl for’t, “A pot of Porter, ho !” When to Old England I come home, What joy to see the tankard foam ! With heart so light and frolic high, I drink it off to liberty ! {377} Where wine or water can be found Fal lal, fal lal la ! I’ve travell’d far the world around, Fal lal, fal lal la ! Again I hope before I die, Of England’s can the taste to try; For many a league I’d go about To take a draught of Gifford’s stout; I spy the name of Truman, Of Maddox, Meux, and Co.; The sight makes me a new man,— “A pot of porter, ho !” When to Old England I come home, What joy to see the tankard foam ! With heart so light and frolic high, I drink it off to liberty. [Illustration] {378} [Illustration] _Chapter XIV._ Then hail, thou big and foaming bowl, Hail, constant idol of my soul; How laughingly the bubbles ride Upon thy rich and sparkling tide. _Brasenose College Shrovetide Verses._ This, I tell you, is our jolly _wassel_, And for twelfth-night more meet too. _Christmas Masque (Jonson)._ _BEVERAGES COMPOUNDED OF ALE OR BEER WITH A NUMBER OF RECEIPTS.—ANCIENT DRINKING VESSELS.—VARIOUS USES OF ALE OTHER THAN AS A DRINK._ Very few people, when warming themselves in the winter months with Mulled Ale, know that they are quaffing a direct descendant of that famous liquor known to our forefathers as the Wassail-Bowl, and near akin to Lambs-Wool, of which Herrick wrote in his _Twelfth Night_:— Next crowne the bowle full With gentle Lambs wooll, Adde sugare nutmeg and ginger, With store of ale too And thus ye must doe, To make the Wassaile a swinger. A beverage of still greater antiquity, but certainly a family connection, is Bragget or Bragot, which is, or was, until quite recently, drunk in Lancashire. The word, according to the writer of _Cups and their {379} Customs_, is of Northland origin, and derived from “Braga,” the name of a hero, one of the mythological Gods of the Edda. In its Welsh form of Bragawd, the drink is mentioned in a very ancient poem, _The Hirlas or Drinking Horn of Owen_, which has been thus rendered into English:— Cup-bearer, when I want thee most, With duteous patience mind thy post, Reach me the horn, I know its power Acknowledged in the social hour; _Hirlas_, thy contents to drain, I feel a longing, e’en to pain; Pride of feasts, profound and blue, Of the ninths wave’s azure hue, The drink of heroes formed to hold, With art enrich’d and lid of gold ! Fill it with _bragawd_ to the brink, Confidence inspiring drink;— We have been at no little trouble to discover the nature of the drink called bragot, bragawd, &c., and have come to the conclusion that the composition of the beverages bearing those names varied considerably. To define Bragot with any degree of preciseness would be as difficult as to give an accurate definition of “soup.” In the fourteenth century, according to a MS. quoted in Wright’s _Provincial Dialects_, “Bragotte” was made from this receipt:— “Take to x galons of ale iij potell of fyne worte, and iij quartis of hony, and put thereto canell (cinnamon) oz: iiij, peper schort or long oz: iiij, galingale (a sort of rush) oz: i, and clowys (cloves) oz i, and gingiver oz ij.” Halliwell tells us that Bragot was a kind of beverage formerly esteemed in Wales and the West of England, composed of wort, sugar and spices. It was customary to drink it in some parts of the country on Mothering Sunday. Bracket must at one time have been a liquor in common use in London, for in Mary’s reign the constables were ordered to make weekly search at the houses of the Brewers and “typlers,” to see whether they sold any ale or beer or _bracket_ above ½d. a quart without their houses, and above ½d. the “thyrdendeale”[70] within. {380} [70] The thyrdendale was a measure containing a pint and a half. In the _Haven of Health_ (1584) are directions for making bragot, which are similar to those in the fourteenth-century receipt. “Take three or four galons of good ale or more as you please, two dayes or three after it is cleansed, and put it into a pot by itselfe, then draw forth a pottle thereof and put to it a quart of good English hony, and sett them over the fire in a vessell, and let them boyle faire and softly, and alwayes as any froth ariseth skumme it away, and so clarifie it, and when it is well clarified, take it off the fire and let it coole, and put thereto of peper a pennyworth, cloves, mace, ginger, nutmegs, cinnamon, of each two pennyworth, stir them well together and sett them over the fire to boyle againe awhile, then being milke-warme put it to the rest and stirre all together, and let it stand two or three daies, and put barme upon it and drinke it at your pleasure.” Harrison (1578), in his Preface to _Holinshed’s Chronicles_, relates that his wife made a composition called Brakwoort, which seems to have been rather used for flavouring ale than as a distinct beverage. It contained no honey. In _Oxford Nightcaps_ metheglin, mead, and Bragon, or Bragget, are all mentioned as being compounded of honey. Idromellum, which by-the-by did not always contain honey,[71] was sometimes spoken of as Bragget. In Chaucer’s _Miller’s Tale_ is mention of Braket:— “Hire mouth was sweete as braket or the meth.” [71] See p. 53. The Wassail Bowl, according to Warton, was the “Bowl” referred to in the _Midsummer Night’s Dream_:— Sometimes lurk I in a _gossip’s bowl_, In very likeness of a roasted crab, And when she drinks, against her lips I bob, And on her wither’d dewlap pour the _ale_. In _Hamlet_ our great dramatist uses the word “wassail”:— The King doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse, Keeps _wassail_, and the swaggering upspring reels. The chief ingredients of the ancient Wassail Bowl were, without doubt, strong ale, sugar, spices, and roasted apples. The following {381} receipt—the best of some half-dozen before us—is the one adopted at Jesus College, Oxford, where, on the festival of St. David, an immense silver-gilt bowl, which was presented to the college by Sir Watkin W. Wynne in 1732, is partly filled with this admirable composition, and passed round the festive board. Into the bowl is first placed half a pound of Lisbon sugar, on which is poured one pint of warm beer; a little nutmeg and ginger are then grated over the mixture, and four glasses of sherry and five pints of beer are added to it. It is then stirred, sweetened to taste, and allowed to stand covered up for two or three hours. Three or four slices of thin toast are then floated on the creaming mixture, and the wassail bowl is ready. Sometimes a couple or three slices of lemon and a few lumps of sugar rubbed on the peeling of a lemon are introduced. The slang term at Oxford for this beverage is “Swig.” In another receipt it is said that the liquor, when mixed, should be made hot (but not boiled), and the liquid poured over roasted apples laid in the bowl. In some parts of the kingdom there are, it is to be hoped, some few persons who still adhere to the ancient custom of keeping Wassail on Twelfth Night and Christmas Eve; and these, if they are orthodox, should ignore the toast of the Oxford receipt in favour of the roasted crab. Not that there is much virtue in either apple or toast, the excellence of the drink being due to the spices, sack, and quality of the ale. It can easily be understood that when ale was for the most part brewed without hops, and consequently rather insipid in taste, many people would have a craving for something more highly flavoured, and would put nutmeg, ginger and other spices into their liquor. It is not unlikely that the introduction of hops was the cause which ultimately led to beer cups going out of fashion. At the present day they are but rarely compounded, even at the Universities. From experience we can say that, if skilfully made, they are excellent, and some of the receipts given in this chapter are well worthy a trial. Lambs-wool is a variety of the Wassail Bowl. Formerly the first day of November was dedicated to the angel presiding over fruits, seeds, &c., and was called _La Mas ubal_ (The Day of the Apple-fruit), pronounced lamasool. According to Vallancey these words soon became corrupted by the country people into Lambswool, the liquor appropriate to the day bearing the same name. To make this beverage, mix the pulp of half a dozen roasted apples with some raw sugar, a grated nutmeg, and a small quantity of ginger; add one quart of strong ale made moderately warm. Stir the whole {382} together, and, if sweet enough, it is fit for use. This mixture is sometimes served up in a bowl, with sweet cakes floating in it. In Ireland Lambswool used to be a constant ingredient at the merry-makings on Holy Eve, or the evening before All Saints’ Day, and milk was sometimes substituted for the ale. It is now rarely or never heard of in that country, having been superseded by more ardent potations. _The Miller of Mansfield_ contains a reference to Lambswool:— Doubt not, then sayd the King, my promist secresye: The King shall never know more on’t for mee. A cupp of _lambswool_ they dranke unto him then, And to their bedds they past presentlie. Old writers frequently made allusion to the spicing of ale. In Chaucer’s _Rime of Sir Thopas_ occur these lines:— And _Notemuge_ to put in ale Whether it be moist or stale— and again, in _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_, by Beaumont and Fletcher:— Nutmegs and ginger, cinnamon and cloves, And they gave me this jolly red nose. The ale, apparently, had nothing to do with the colouration. Even the sublime Milton condescended to make allusion to spiced ale in his _L’Allegro_:— Till the livelong daylight fail Then to the _spicy nut-brown ale_. Wither, in _Abuses Stript and Whipt_ (1613), says:— Will he will drinke, yet but a draught at most, That must be spiced with a nut-browne tost. The last quotation is only one out of the many to be found in our literature having reference to the toast with which the spiced ale was so often crowned. Perhaps the most curious is one from Greene’s _Friar {383} Bacon_ (sixteenth century). The Devil and Miles are conversing on the pleasures of Hell, whence they soon afterwards proceed. “Faith ’tis a place,” says Miles, “I have desired long to see; have you not good tippling houses there?—May not a man have a lusty fire there, a pot of good ale, a pair of cards, a swinging piece of chalk, and a _brown toast_ that will clap a white waistcoat on a cup of good drink?” Even in the last century toast and spices were not uncommonly put into ale. Warton, in his _Panegyric on Oxford Ale_, wrote:— My sober evening let the tankard bless With _toast_ embrown’d, and fragrant _nutmeg_ fraught, While the rich draught, with oft-repeated whiffs, Tobacco mild improves. The Anglo-Saxon custom of drinking healths and pledging has been, at any rate, since the eighteenth century, termed _toasting_. In the twenty-fourth number of _The Tatler_ the word is connected with the toast put in ale cups. This is probably correct, though Wedgewood considers it a corruption of _stoss an!_ knock (glasses), a German drinker’s cry. The explanation given in _The Tatler_ of the connection between the two meanings of the word “toast” is, however, open to question. It runs thus: “It is said that while a celebrated beauty was indulging in her bath, one of the crowd of admirers who surrounded her took a glass of the water in which the fair one was dabbling and drank her health to the company, when a gay fellow offered to jump in, saying, ‘Though he liked not the liquor, he would have the _toast_.’” In the reign of Charles II. Earl Rochester writes:— Make it so large that, filled with Sack Up to the swelling brim, Vast _toasts_ on the delicious lake, Like ships at sea, may swim. A very ancient composition was ale-brue, called later ale-berry. It was composed of ale boiled with spice, sugar, and sops of bread. An old receipt (1420) for it is:— Alebrue thus make thou schalle With grotes, safroune and good ale. {384} Ale-brue was perhaps originally merely a brew of ale, but the word soon came to mean a peculiar beverage. It is mentioned in _The Becon against Swearing_ (1543): “They would taste nothing, no not so much as a poor _ale-berry_ until they had slain Paul,” and in Boorde’s _Dyetary_, “Ale brues, caudelles and collesses” are recommended for “weke men and feble stomackes.” The word also occurs in _The High and Mightie Commendation of the Vertue of a Pot of Good Ale_:— Their ale-berries, cawdles and possets each one, And sullabubs made at the milking pail, Although they be many, Beer comes not in any But all are composed with a Pot of Good Ale. Taylor, in _Drinke and Welscome_, says: “Alesbury (or Aylesbury), in Buckinghamshire, where the making of _Aleberries_, so excellent against Hecticks, was first invented.” This is probably only a punning allusion. All who have been at City festivities have tasted the Loving Cup, which, so it is stated in _Cups and their Customs_, is identical with the Grace Cup, a beverage the drinking of which has been from time immemorial a great feature at Corporation dinners both in London and elsewhere. Mr. Timbs, in _Walks and Talks about London_, says the Loving Cups are filled with “a delicious composition immemorially termed sack, consisting of sweetened and exquisitely flavoured white wine,” and Will of Malmsbury, describing the customs of Glastonbury soon after the Conquest, says that on certain occasions the monks had “mead in their cans, and _wine_ in their _Grace Cup_.” The Oxford Grace Cup, however, according to _Oxford Nightcaps_ (1835), contains ale. The receipt runs thus: “Extract the juice from the peeling of a lemon and cut the remainder into thin slices; put it into a jug or bowl, and pour on it three half pints of strong home-brewed beer and a bottle of mountain wine: grate a nutmeg into it; sweeten it to your taste; stir it till the sugar is dissolved, and then add three or four slices of bread toasted brown. Let it stand two hours, and then strain it off into the Grace Cup.” Many of the cups drunk by our forefathers had medicinal qualities attributed to them, and did in fact, often contain drugs of various descriptions. The famous Hypocras, for instance, was flavoured with an infusion of brandy, pepper, ginger, cloves, grains of paradise, ambergris, and musk. A Duchess of St. Albans has left us a receipt for making “The Ale of health and strength,” which, it sufficeth to say, was a {385} decoction of nearly all the herbs in the garden (agreeable and otherwise) boiled up in small beer. Old worthies, when induced to give up their receipts for the public good, described these drinks under the head of “Kitchen physic.” “I allowed him medicated broths, _Posset Ale_ and pearl julep,” writes Wiseman in his book on surgery. The name of the unfortunate Sir Walter Raleigh is dear to Britons in connection with tobacco and potatoes. He has yet another claim on our sympathy as the inventor of an excellent receipt for Sack Posset, which a high authority has declared to show full well the propriety of taste in its compounder. It runs thus:—“Boil a quart of cream with _quantum sufficit_ of sugar, mace and nutmeg; take half a pint of sack[72]” (sherry), “and the same quantity of ale, and boil them well together, adding sugar; these being boiled separately are now to be added. Heat a pewter dish very hot, and cover your basin with it, and let it stand by the fire for two or three hours.” [72] There were several kinds of Sack—Sherris, Malmsey, &c. The word is derived from _saco_, the skin in which Spanish wines were imported. “We’ll have a posset at the latter end of a sea-coal fire,” wrote Shakspere. A favourite drink of the seventeenth century was Buttered Ale. It was composed of ale (brewed without hops), butter, sugar and cinnamon. In _Pepys’ Diary_ for December 5th, 1662, “a morning draught of _buttered ale_,” is mentioned. There is also reference to it in _The Convivial Songster_:— And now the merry spic’d bowls went round, The gossips were void of shame too; In _Butter’d Ale_ the priest half drown’d, Demands the infant’s name too. At the beginning of the eighteenth century Beer Cups were much in vogue. Cuthbert Bede specifies, but does not describe, cups bearing the following names: Humpty-dumpty, Clamber-clown, Hugmatee, Stick-back, Cock Ale and Knock-me-down, and there were others called Foxcomb, Stiffle, Blind Pinneaux, Stephony and Northdown. Cock Ale was supposed to be, and no doubt was, a very strengthening and restorative compound. The receipt runs thus:—“Take a cock of half a year old, kill him and truss him well, and put into a cask twelve gallons of Ale to which add four pounds of raisins of the sun well picked, stoned, washed and dryed; sliced Dates, half a pound; nutmegs and mace two {386} ounces: Infuse the dates and spices in a quart of canary twenty-four hours, then boil the cock in a manner to a jelly, till a gallon of water is reduced to two quarts; then press the body of him extremely well, and put the liquor into the cask where the Ale is, with the spices and fruit, adding a few blades of mace; then put to it a pint of new Ale yeast, and let it work well for a day, and, in two days, you may broach it for use or, in hot weather, the second day; and if it proves too strong, you may add more plain Ale to palliate this restorative drink, which contributes much to the invigorating of nature.” Among the various beverages which good house-wives deemed it their duty to brew were Elderberry Beer, or Ebulon, Cowslip Ale, Blackberry Ale, China Ale and Apricot Ale. Their names indicate to a great extent their composition. China Ale, however, was not a term applied by wits to tea, as has been suggested, but was composed of ale flavoured with China root and bruised coriander seed, which were tied up in a linen bag, and left in the liquor until it had done working. The ale then stood fourteen days, and was afterwards bottled. This was the proper China Ale, but, according to an old cookery book, “the common sort vended about Town is nothing more (at best) than ten-shilling beer, put up in small stone bottles, with a little spice, lemon peel, and raisins or sugar.” Ebulon, which is said to have been preferred by some people to port, was made thus: In a hogshead of the first and strongest wort was boiled one bushel of ripe elderberries. The wort was then strained and, when cold, worked (_i.e._ fermented) in a hogshead (not an open tun or tub). Having lain in cask for about a year it was bottled. Some persons added an infusion of hops by way of preservative and relish, and some likewise hung a small bag of bruised spices in the vessel. White Ebulon was made with pale malt and white elderberries. Blackberry Ale was composed of a strong wort made from two bushels of malt and ¼lb. hops. To this was added the juice of a peck of ripe blackberries and a little yeast. After fermentation the cask was stopped up close for six weeks, the ale was then bottled, and was fit to drink at the end of another fortnight. In the _London and County Brewer_ (1744), is this receipt for Cowslip Ale: Take, to a barrel of ale a bushel of the flowers of cowslip pick’d out of the husks, and when your ale hath done working put them loose in the barrel without bruising. Let it stand a fortnight before you bottle it, and, when you bottle it, put a lump of sugar in each bottle. {387} The same book enlightens us as to the composition of “an ale that will taste like Apricot Ale”:—“Take to every gallon of ale one ounce and a half of wild carrot seed bruised a little, and hang them in a leathern bag in your barrel until it is ready to drink, which will be in three weeks; then bottle it with a little sugar in every bottle.” Egg Ale was a somewhat remarkable composition, and was doubtless highly nutritious. To twelve gallons of ale was added the gravy of eight pounds of beef. Twelve eggs, the gravy beef, a pound of raisins, oranges and spice, were then placed in a linen bag and left in the barrel until the ale had ceased fermenting. Even then an addition was made in the shape of two quarts of Malaga sack. After three weeks in cask the ale was bottled, a little sugar being added. A monstrously potent liquor truly! Can this have been one of the cups with which “our ancestors robust with liberal cups usher’d the morn”? Coming now to beverages more familiar, a word or two as to Purl, once, and not so long ago either, the common morning draught of Londoners. Tom Hood, in _The Epping Hunt_, thus puns upon the word:— Good lord, to see the riders now, Thrown off with sudden whirl, A score within the purling brook, Enjoy’d their “early purl.” According to one receipt, common Purl contained the following ingredients:—Roman wormwood, gentian root, calamus aromaticus snake root, horse radish, dried orange peel, juniper berries, seeds or kernels of Seville oranges, all placed in beer, and allowed to stand for some months. The writer who gives this receipt says a pound or two of galingale improves it—as if anything could improve such a perfect combination! According to an anecdote told of George III., a somewhat simpler beverage in his day went by the name of Purl. One morning the King, when visiting his stables, heard one of his grooms say to another: “I don’t care what you say, Robert, but the man at the Three Tuns makes the best _purl_ in Windsor.” “Purl, purl,” said the King; “Robert, what’s Purl?” The groom explaining that purl was hot beer with a dash of gin in it, in fact, the compound now known to ’bus conductors as “dogsnose,” the King remarked:— “Yes, yes; I daresay very good drink; but too strong for the morning; never drink in the morning.” {388} A mixture of warmed ale and spirits is called Hot-Pot in Norfolk and Suffolk, and a similar compound, to which is added sugar and lemon-peel, used to be called Ruddle. A somewhat remote ancestor of Purl, Dogsnose, Ruddle and other mixtures of ale or beer and spirits, was Hum, to which Ben Jonson refers in _The Devil is an Ass_:— —Carmen Are got into the yellow starch and chimney sweepers To their tobacco, and strong waters, _hum_, Meath and Obarni. And it is also mentioned in Beaumont and Fletcher’s _Wildgoose Chase_: “What a cold I have over my stomack; would I’d some _hum_.” In Shirley’s _Wedding_ is a reference to hum glasses, the small size being indicative of the potency of the liquor:— They say that Canary sack must dance again To the apothecarys, and be sold For physic in hum glasses and thimbles. Flip, once a popular drink, and not altogether without its patrons in the present day, is made in a variety of ways. The following receipt is a good one. Place in a saucepan one quart of strong ale together with lumps of sugar which have been well rubbed over the rind of a lemon, and a small piece of cinnamon. Take the mixture off the fire when boiling and add one glass of cold ale. Have ready in a jug the yolks of six or eight eggs well beaten up with powdered sugar and grated nutmeg. Pour the hot ale from the saucepan on to the eggs, stirring them while so doing. Have another jug at hand and pour the mixture as swiftly as possible from one vessel to the other until a white froth appears, when the flip is ready. One or two wine glasses of gin or rum are often added. This beverage made without spirits is sometimes called Egg-hot, and Sailor’s Flip contains no ale. A quart of Flip is styled in the _Cook’s Oracle_ a “Yard of Flannel.” There is a tale told of a Frenchman, who, stopping at an inn, asked for Jacob. “There’s no such person here,” said the landlord. “’Tis not a person I want, sare, but de beer warmed with de poker.” “Well,” said mine host, “that is flip.” {389} “Ah! yes,” exclaimed the Frenchman, “you have right; I mean Philip.” Purl, Flip, and Dog’s Nose have been immortalised by Dickens in his description of the Six Jolly Fellowship Porters. The tap and parlour of this hostel were provided with “comfortable fireside tin utensils, like models of sugar-loaf hats, made in that shape that they might, with their pointed ends, seek out for themselves glowing nooks in the depths of the red coals when they mulled your ale, or heated for you those delectable drinks, Purl, Flip, and Dog’s Nose. The first of these humming compounds was a speciality of the Porters, which, through an inscription on its door-posts, gently appealed to your feelings as ‘The Early Purl House.’ For it would seem that Purl must always be taken early; though whether for any more distinctly stomachic reason than that, as the early bird catches the worm, so the early purl catches the customer, cannot here be resolved.” Of other receipts for beer cups there are many—too many, indeed, to be given here; most of them differ from one another more in name than anything else. Brown Betty, an Oxford cup, deriving its name from its inventor, a bedmaker, is similar to the Oxford Wassail Bowl. The famous Brasenose Ale, which is by no means a modern institution and is introduced at Brasenose College on Shrove Tuesday, immediately after dinner, consists merely of ale sweetened with pounded sugar, and served with roasted apples floating on it. Not all the liquors Rome e’er had Can beat our matchless Beer; Apicius self had gone stark mad, To taste such noble cheer. Thus wrote an undergraduate of Brasenose Ale. A cup bearing the euphonious name of Tewahdiddle had the reputation of being most excellent tipple. It consists of a pint of beer, a tablespoonful of brandy, a teaspoonful of brown sugar, a little grated nutmeg or ginger, and a roll or very thinly-cut lemon-peel. Among beverages which hold a high place as cool summer drinks is The Parting Cup, which is made thus: Place in a bowl two slices of very brown toast, a little nutmeg, a quart of mild ale, and two-thirds of a bottle of sherry; sweeten the liquor with syrup, and immediately before drinking add a bottle of soda-water. Another good cup is made with two quarts of light draught beer, the juice of five lemons, and about three-quarters of a pound of sugar. The mixture should then be {390} strained and allowed to stand for a short time. If flat, a little carbonate of soda should be added. A very favourite summer drink at Oxford was Cold Tankard; and a certain fair damsel, who was skilful in the preparation of this pleasant beverage, was so honoured by the undergraduates that songs were written in her praise by the boating men and other frequenters of the riverside inn where she presided. She was, according to one poet, cheerful, blithe, merry, neat, comely, gay and obliging, and above all she excelled in making Cold Tankard. She looks up the oars, and the old tavern scores, And now and then cleans out a wherry; The sails she can mend, And the parlour attend, For obliging’s the Maid of the Ferry. She serves in the bar, and excels all by far In making Cold Tankard of Perry; How sweet then at eve, With her leave to receive A kiss from the Maid of the Ferry. Though “perry” is mentioned in the verse, Cold Tankard is also made with Ale or Cider. The ingredients are the juice from the peeling of one lemon, extracted by rubbing loaf sugar on it; two lemons cut into thin slices; the rind of one lemon cut thin, a quarter of a pound of loaf sugar, and a half pint of brandy. To make the cup, put the foregoing into a large jug, mix them well together, and add one quart of cold spring water. Grate a nutmeg into the jug, add one pint of white wine, and a quart of strong beer, ale, perry or cider, sweeten the mixture to taste with capillaire or sugar, put a handful of balm and the same quantity of borage in flower (_borago officinalis_) into it, stalk downwards. Then put the jug containing this liquor into a tub of ice, and when it has remained there one hour it is fit for use. The balm and borage should be fresh gathered. The use of Borage in cups is very ancient, and old writers have ascribed to the flower many virtues. In Evelyn’s _Acetaria_ it is said “to revive the hypochondriac, and cheer the hard student.” In Salmon’s _Household Companion_ (1710) Borage is mentioned as one of the four cordial flowers; “it comforts the heart, cheers melancholy, and revives the fainting spirits.” It may be doubted whether the comforting effects {391} of this inward application were rightly attributed to the borage alone. A modern writer has gone so far as to say that he never found any benefit apparent from the presence of Borage at Lord Mayor’s feasts and other such festive gatherings, beyond that of so stinging the noses of those other persons who have desired to drink deeply that the cup undrained has been. Though granting this undeniable advantage, we cannot concur that Borage possesses no other qualities, for it gives to cups a peculiarly refreshing flavour which cannot be imitated. In _Cups and their Customs_ are three Beer Cups which have not yet been mentioned. The first of these is Copus Cup. It consists of two quarts of hot ale, to which are added four wine glasses of brandy, three wine glasses of noyau, a pound of lump sugar, the juice of one lemon, a piece of toast, a dozen cloves, and a little nutmeg. Was it of such a cup as this that the lines were written?— Three cups of this a prudent man may take; The first of these for constitution’s sake, The second to the girl he loves the best, The third and last to lull him to his rest. Donaldson’s Beer Cup is of a more simple and lighter character. To a pint of ale is added the peel of half a lemon, half a liquor-glass of noyau, a bottle of seltzer-water, a little nutmeg and sugar, and some ice. “Hungerford Park” is an excellent beverage, and is especially suitable for shooting parties in hot weather. To make it—cut into slices three good-flavoured apples, which put into a jug; add the peel and juice of one lemon, a very little grated nutmeg, three bottles of ginger-beer, half a pint of sherry, two and a quarter pints of good draught ale, sweeten to taste with sifted loaf sugar, stir a little to melt the sugar, and let the jug stand in ice. “The addition of half a bottle of champagne makes it _awfully_ good,” wrote a certain Colonel B., in _the Field_, a few years ago. Freemasons’ Cup, which may be drank either hot or cold, is of a very potent character, and consists of a pint of Scotch ale, a similar quantity of mild beer, half a pint of brandy, a pint of sherry, half a pound of loaf sugar, and plenty of grated nutmeg. Freemasons must have strong heads. It will, no doubt, have been noted ere this that between mulled ale and the majority of hot beer-cups the distinction is rather in name than composition, and the various receipts for mulling ale so closely resemble the Wassail Bowl, Flip, &c., that it is quite unnecessary to quote any of {392} them. A word or two on cup making. Cups are easily made and easily marred. All the ingredients must be of good quality, and the vessels used sweet and clean. Everything required should be at hand before the mixing commences, and that important process should proceed as quickly as possible. Few servants can be trusted to brew cups, but if the matter is placed in their hands you cannot do better than caution them in terms similar to those addressed by Dr. King to his maid Margaret:— O Peggy, Peggy, when thou go’st to brew, Consider well what you’re about to do; Be very wise—very sedately think That what you’re going to make is—drink; Consider who must drink that drink, and then What ’tis to have the praise of honest men; Then future ages shall of Peggy tell, The nymph who spiced the brewages so well. Yet two more beverages compounded of ale or beer, and then this portion of the subject is completed. First, Shandy Gaff, the very writing of which word brings to us visions of a shining river, of shady backwaters, of sunny days, of two-handled tankards, and of deep cool draughts well earned. For the sake of the unfortunate few who are unacquainted with the beverage, the receipt is given: One pint of bitter beer, one bottle of the old-fashioned ginger-beer mixed together, and imbibed only on the hottest summer days, after rowing. Why, we cannot say; but Shandy Gaff always seems to us out of place anywhere but on the river. Secondly and lastly—Mother-in-law, which, also, to some of us may bring visions—but of another kind. The drink of this name is composed of equal proportions of “old and bitter.” If there is one season of the year more appropriate than another to hot beer-cups, be they Wassail Bowls, Lambswool, Flip or Mulled Ale, it is Christmas. Edward Moxon, a poet who flourished about the commencement of this century, presents in his _Christmas_ a charming picture of the merry circle gathered round the crackling yule log, regaling themselves with mulled ale:— Right merry now the hours they pass, Fleeting thro’ jocund pleasure’s glass, The yule-log too burns bright and clear, Auspicious of a happy year: {393} While some with joke and some with tale, But all with sweeter _mullèd ale_, Pass gaily life’s sweet stream along, With interlude of ancient song— And as each rosy cup they drain, Bounty replenishes again. From the excellent beverages compounded of ale or beer, concerning which so much has been said in this chapter, let us turn to the cups, flagons, horns, bowls and other vessels used by ale drinkers, and in some of which these beverages were compounded. “Come troll the jovial flagon, Come fill the bonny bowl, Come, join in laughing sympathy Of soul with kindred soul.” A few pages must suffice for a very short notice of this interesting part of our subject. [Illustration: Anglo-Saxon Tumblers.] Mr. Sharon Turner, in his _History of the Anglo-Saxons_, gives many instances of the high estimation in which cups and drinking vessels were held by our Teutonic forefathers. Even in very early times the precious metals were largely used in their construction, and gold and silver cups are frequently the subjects of Anglo-Saxon bequests. In the old poem _Beowulf_ evidence may be found bearing upon this point. One of the treasures in the ancient barrow guarded by the dragon Grendel is “The solid cup, the costly drinking vessel (_drync fœt deore_).” Drinking vessels are frequently found in Anglo-Saxon tombs. The cups represented in the cut are made of glass, and were found chiefly in barrows in Kent. They are of the “tumbler” species, _i.e._, on being filled they must be emptied at a draught, and cannot be set down with any liquor in them. Mr. Wright suggests that the example to the left represents the “twisted” pattern mentioned in _Beowulf_. The savage custom, observed both by the Celts and Saxons, of drinking ale or mead from {394} a cup made out of the skull of a fallen foe, has left a trace in mediæval times in the word “scole,” signifying a cup or bowl, and may probably still be recognised in the provincial word “skillet,” which has the same meaning. Henry, in his _History of England_, relates that the Celtic inhabitants of the Western Islands of Scotland spoke in their poetical way of intoxicating liquors as “the strength of the shell,” from the fact that they used shells as drinking vessels. Returning to the Anglo-Saxons—besides metal and glass cups, they used drinking horns, and cups or bowls of wood, and in some respects the horn was the most important of their drinking vessels. Investiture of lands was frequently made by the horn both among the Saxons and Danes. The celebrated Horn of Ulphus, kept in the Sacristy of York Minster, was, according to Camden, given to the Cathedral by a noble Dane named Ulphus, who, when his sons quarrelled as to the succession to his estate, cut short the dispute by repairing to the Minster, and there enfeoffed the Cathedral with all his lands and revenues, draining the horn before the high altar as a pledge and evidence of the gift. The Mercian King Witlaf gave a drinking horn to the Abbey of Croyland “that the elder monks may drink from it on feast days, and remember the soul of the donor.” [Illustration: Cup found in the Ruins of Glastonbury Abbey.] The peg-tankards of the Anglo-Saxons have been already referred to in