OLDEN TIME LUXURIES.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 23 March 1910, Page 3

OLDEN TIME LUXURIES.

SOME ASCERTAINED INDULGENCES. In former times there was much eating with little variety; at present, on the contrary, there is great variety, with more abstemiousness. Barbarous nations are fond of largo joints of meat. A wild boar was roasted whole as a supper dish of Antony and Cleopatra; and was stuffed with poultry and wild fowl. The hospitality of the Anglo-Saxon was sometimes displayed, for instance, by roasting am. entire ox. This practice prevailed even among the Romans: for it is related that it was a favourite dish at Rome, and was termed a Trojan boar, in <allusinn to the Trojan horso

"William of Malmesbu'ry, who wrote in the time of Henry 11.. says that "the English were universally addicted to drunkeii'iiess ; continuing over their cups day and night; keeping; open house, and spending the incomes of their estates in riotous feasts ; where eating and drinlcinig were carried to excess without any elegance." Hollingshed, writing of Henry VTIT.'s time, says: "Heretofore, there hath been much time spent in eating and drinking than commonly is in these days; for whereas of old we Lad breakfasts in the forenoon, beverages or muncheons after dinner, and thereto rear-suppers, when it was time to get to rest; now these old repasts, thanked be God, are very well left, and each one eontenteth himself with dinner and supper onlv."

In early times people were very plain in their household furniture. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, substantial farmers. slept on a straw pallet, with a log of wood to rest their heads on— a pillow being only thought fit for a woman who was ill. indeed if a man, in the course of seven years after marriage, could purchase a flock bed and a sa f, k ot chaff, as a substitute for a bolster, he thought himself as well as lodged as the lord of the town. Wooden spoons and wooden trenchers were generally used about the same period, pewter vessels being accounted great luxuries, and prohibited from being lured except an Christmas, Easter, St. George's Dav, and Whitsunday. My an Act of Parliament in Scothurl. passed in the year 142'J, none were permitted to wear silks, or costly furs, but knights and lords of two hundred merks yearly rent. My another Act, of 1457, the same dress was permitted to aldermen, bailies, and other good worthy men within burgh: and, bv a third Act, it was granted to gentlemen of £100 vearlv rent.

Hoilingshed exclaims against the luxury and effeminacy that prevailed in' his time. "In time past," lie says, "men contented to, dwell in houses builded of sallow, willow, plum-tree, or elm: so that the use of oak was dedicated to churches, religions houses, princes' palaces, noblemen's lodgings, and. .navigation But now these are rejected, and nothing but oak any whit regarded. And yet see the change; for when our houses were builded of willow, then had we oake,n men ; but now that our houses are made of. oak, our men are not only become willow, but many, through Persian delicacy crept in among us, altogether of straw, which is a sore alteration."