The Inner Man.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2084, 24 June 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

The Inner Man.

Dining with the Sultan of Morocco is more of an honor than a pleasure, according to the account of a recent visitor connected with the French Embassy. The Sultan is even more of a spiritual than a temporal monarch, a sort of crowned saint, ex officio, and therefore it is beneath his sacred dignity to dine in person with his guests, and he deputes a representative from his suite. The palace also la too sacred a shrine to be the scene of such festivity, and the dinner is usually served in the garden of the summer palace, outside the town of Fez. When the narrator dined in this second-hand way with his sacred majesty the weather was hot, and the dinner was served in the town-palace garden, beneath orange, lemon, and pomegranate trees, where the buttercups, cornflowers, and daisies grew so tall that they mingled with the boughs, and the guests had hard work to fight their way on horseback to the table, or rather tray. A drum-major, like a steward with a baton, beaded the procession of slaves bearing the food on trays of wood with deep borders and conical covers of straw. The removal of these covers disclosed a frightful spectacle of fricassees of sheep and chickens, prepared with honey, sugar, syrup, and fruits, and all imaginable and unimaginable horrors possible to cookery. The only dishes which a European could eat was one of mutton (which was terribly greasy) and the consoousson. The slave who held this, awkwardly spilled it into his sleeves and bosom, and then conscientiously turned it out on the plate again. This upset the European stomachs and desire to indulge in it though they found that the slave knew etiquette. The proper way to eat consconssou is to take a quantity in the palm of the hand, eat it as best you may, and return the remainder—for the whole never will quit the palm—into the common dish, lest the other guests should be deprived of the choice delicacy. At Blerwich, in Holland, honor is about to be done to the memory of a great Dutchman whose name and whose achievements are probably unknown to the rest ot Europe. This month will mark the fifth centenary of the memorable discovery of William Buckles, Buckles was a Zealand fisherman, and his discovery was simply this, that salt fish will keep, and that fish that can be kept, can be packed, and can be exported, Before bis time, herrings bad to be consumed within a few days of their capture. Buckles salted them. It does not sound like a great discovery, One rather wonders that the system bad not been applied from the beginning. However in 1386 William Buckles salted the first hundred of herrings, and having salted them he packed them in barrels. This execcise of common sense resulted in a singular development of the resources of the country. The English fisheries were not as prominent five hundred years ago as they are now, and Holland had for a time almost a monopoly ot a market which she was able to create and supply. Buckles bad not to wait five hundred years to have his claim to public gratitude recognised. Charles V. had a statue erected to the mackerel salter who became the benefactor of his country. Queen Mary of Hungary, however, paid him even greater honor. During her residence in Holland she discovered his tomb, and, seated upon it, ate a salted herring. And this month his fifth centenary is to be duly celebrated,

The artichoke, which originally came from Barbary, is not a botanical species, but a variety of the thistle, which grows spontaneously all along the African coast of the Mediterranean from Morocco to Palestine. It is now cultivated extensively in France, where those which come from Brittany and Algeria are the species most highly esteemed. Even of thesetbere are many varieties, such as the Camus artichoke of Brittany, the bronzed artichoke of Boscoff, the big green artichoke of Laon, and the violet artichoke of Provence. There are also varieties which come from Italy, Spain, India, and Canada, to say nothing of the Jerusalem artichoke, famous for the enormous size of its leaves. In the south of France, where the crop is abundant, the heads are carefully picked of all their leaves, and the “ hearts" dried in the sun, put up in sacks and stored away for winter use. These hearts when boiled in water, or in a rich beef broth, become soft and recover their form, color, and flavor. They are then taken from the pot, the water and broth strained awa£, the centre is filled with forced meat, and they are then either fried or baked The heads, with their pale green, long, narrow, and pointed leaves clustered around the top of a tall stalk, give the plant a very elegant appearance. Each head, if allowed to mature, bears a purple violet flower, which gives a great richness of color to a field of artichokes.

The Paris Oafe is losing ground, There arc, to be sure, as many establishments of refection on the boulevards as ever, and most of the old-time places are still in existence, but their character is changing, and when they have not already become brasseries, or beer shops, the perverted taste of their customers is slowly but surely bringing about the dreaded transformation. The Figaro printed some statistics a month ago showing that in 1685 only one-half as much wine was drunk in France as in 1884. This estimate may be excessive, but the fact remains that in Paris at any rate the consumption of Germany’s amber fluid has increased enormously. Twenty years back the spectacle of a Parisian, pur sang, seated at a table on the boulevard and holding converse with a chops would have gathered a crowd, "Now the frequenters of cafes, from the most stylish to the humblest, call for little else, and nothing is lacking but an array of squares of felt on the marble and an occasional por-celain-bowled pipe to suggest to the lookeron that a fragment of Berlin or Vienna has been planted by magic in the heart of the brightest and liveliest of the world’s greatest cities.

A statement appeared in print, the other day, that nine-tenths of the fancy cheeses, such as Nonfchatel, Camembert, Brie, Limburger, Munster, or Swiss, were now made in America. The fancy cheese business has been developing in a more remarkable way within the last two years than many people are aware of. A large number of new factories have been erected recently, and one of these, that of John Bloomers, in Chenango County, N.Y., is turning out over one hundred thousand pounds a year. Mr. Bloomers has obtained the processes of manufacture used abroad, and is able now to compete with the foreign makers in a variety of fancy brands. Several other large factories have also been built in Ohio and other States. Most of the Italian fancy cheeses, the English, Swiss, and such French kinds, for instance, ns Roquefort, which is made of sheep's and goat’s milk, are still imported, but the majority of others mentioned are made in the United States. Ttis would indicate an industry for Australia of similar nature. The bill of fare for the Christmas dinner at the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, at Dayton, U.S, affords some interesting figures. It is as follows: Oyster soup, 700 gallons; roast turkey, 3,200 pounds; giblet dressing, 80 gallons; mashed potatoes, 34 bushels; cranberry sauce, 7 barrels; celery, 200 dozen; lima beans, 300 pounds; pickles, 30 gallons; bread, I,ooopounds; crackers, 200 pounds; butter 250 pounds ; cheese, 300 pounds; mince pie, 1,200 pies; coffee, 100 gallons : oranges, 450 dozen. Chantilly is seldom mentioned without a thought of the Prince of Oonde’s cook, Vatcl, who killed himself because the fish did not arrive in time for the great dinner his master was to give to Louis XIV. But this story is incorrect. Le Oatdois has it on authority that Vatel was not the cook, but the steward ; he was negligent in providing food for the guests, so that indeed some had to go without even bread and meat; and he killed himself to escape merited disgrace and dismissal.