The
tinemen and verderers have not forgotten me yet, and my larder is
ever full. Blow three moots on the horn, Mary, that the varlets
may set the table, for the growing shadow and my loosening belt
warn me that it is time."
XII. HOW NIGEL FOUGHT THE TWISTED MAN OF SHALFORD
In the days of which you read all classes, save perhaps the very
poor, fared better in meat and in drink than they have ever done
since. The country was covered with woodlands--there were
seventy separate forests in England alone, some of them covering
half a shire. Within these forests the great beasts of the chase
were strictly preserved, but the smaller game, the hares, the
rabbits, the birds, which swarmed round the coverts, found their
way readily into the poor man's pot. Ale was very cheap, and
cheaper still was the mead which every peasant could make for
himself out of the wild honey in the tree-trunks. There were many
tea-like drinks also, which were brewed by the poor at no expense:
mallow tea, tansy tea, and others the secret of which has passed.
Amid the richer classes there was rude profusion, great joints
ever on the sideboard, huge pies, beasts of the field and beasts
of the chase, with ale and rough French or Rhenish wines to wash
them down. But the very rich had attained to a high pitch of
luxury in their food, and cookery was a science in which the
ornamentation of the dish was almost as important as the dressing
of the food.
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