200
The Dunciad.
Book IV.
555 Another (for in all what one can shine?[R 1])
Explains the Seve and Verdeur[R 2] of the Vine.
What cannot copious Sacrifice attone?
Thy Treufles, Perigord! thy Hams, Bayonne!
With French Libation, and Italian Strain,
560 Wash Bladen white, and expiate Hays's stain.[R 3][R 4]
Knight lifts the head, for what are crowds undone
To three essential Partriges in one?[R 5]
Gone ev'ry blush, and silent all reproach,
Contending Princes mount them in their Coach.
Explains the Seve and Verdeur[R 2] of the Vine.
What cannot copious Sacrifice attone?
Thy Treufles, Perigord! thy Hams, Bayonne!
With French Libation, and Italian Strain,
560 Wash Bladen white, and expiate Hays's stain.[R 3][R 4]
Knight lifts the head, for what are crowds undone
To three essential Partriges in one?[R 5]
Gone ev'ry blush, and silent all reproach,
Contending Princes mount them in their Coach.
Remarks.
- ↑ Ver. 555. in all what one can shine?] Alludes to that of Virgil, Ecl. 3.
——— non omnia possumus omnes.
- ↑ Ver. 556. Seve and Verdeur] French Terms relating to Wines. St. Evremont has a very pathetic Letter to a Nobleman in disgrace, advising him to seek Comfort in a good Table, and particularly to be attentive to these Qualities in his Champaigne.
- ↑ Ver. 560. Bladen—Hays] Names of Gamesters. Bladen is a black man. Robert Knight Cashier of the South-sea Company, who fled from England in 1720, (afterwards pardoned in 1742.)—These lived with the utmost magnificence at Paris, and kept open Tables frequented by persons of the first Quality of England, and even by Princes of the Blood of France.
- ↑ Ibid. Bladen, &c.] The former Note of Bladen is a black man, is very absurd. The Manuscript here is partly obliterated, and doubtless could only have been, Wash Blackmoors white, alluding to a known Proverb. Scribl.
- ↑ Ver. 562. three essential Partriges in one?] i.e. two dissolved into Quintessence to make sauce for the third. The honour of this invention belongs to France, yet has it been excell'd by our native luxury, an hundred squab Turkeys being not unfrequently deposited in one Pye in the Bishopric of Durham: to which our Author alludes in ver. 593 of this work.
tion'd, of dissolving whole Oxen and Boars into a small vial of Jelly; nay it is expresly said, that all Flesh is nothing in his sight. I have searched in Apicius, Pliny, and the Feast of Trimalchio, in vain: I can only resolve it into some mysterious superstitious Rite, as it is said to be done by a Priest, and soon after called a Sacrifice, attended (as all ancient sacrifices were) with Libation and Song.
Scribl.
This good Scholiast, not being acquainted with modern Luxury, was ignorant that these were only the miracles of French Cookery, and that particularly Pigeons en crapeau were a common dish.
