From The Spectator. THE EPICURE IN CHINA. 99 The observations of the eminent Cook now in China establish another interesting fact Nations as well as individuals may unfit from whom we purchase our tea. Thus we ascertain a remarkable confusion of crudity "DE gustibus non disputandum est,"-a and maturity in the cuisine of different epochs dictum which means that tastes are not sus- and countries, establishing the important fact ceptible of the definition requisite for discus- that cookery is an art but not yet a science, sion. Yet feasts may be described,-witness its fundamental principles being still unsetBruce and his Abyssinian experiences, Pere- tled. grine Pickle's "feast after the manner of the ancients," and even the uneaten feast of the Barmecide; and witness most especially the ⚫ feast of the Chinese as described by a born themselves for retaining the freshness and historian-cook in the Times. "De gustibus healthiness of their tastes. The staples of there may be no dispute, but "de dapibus" the Chinese feast appear to have consisted the controversy is eternal: the feast is the of soups, meats boiled to a degree that made test by which each nation knows its own it impossible to identify them, mouthfuls superiority, and even each class in a country. minced to bonbons, and hot wines in microThe Abyssinian pities the man who knows neither raw beef nor the vegetable that corrects the effects of that jockey-in-training's diet. The Chinese, like the French, hold that we are barbarous for eating our meats raw; but they excel the model nation in their sense of our savageness, for they find that we do the work of the slaughterhouse at table, and cut up the corpses of our food in presence. They rank us with the aborigines of Formosa. scopic glasses. They accuse us of dining at the butcher's; we might suspect them of living at the pastrycook's. They glory in the too obvious effects of repletion and predigestion. They are a nation whose literature is couched in intricate diagrams, and whose Venus de' Medici is made perfect by breaking the metatarsal joint of the toes. Their habits incapacitate them for exercise; want of exercise incapacitates them for digesting; and their whole cuisine has to accommodate itself to the tastes and capacities of an invalid nation. How much of our own over-refinement of diet proceeds from similar causes ! There are some points in any survey of international cookery that are not without interest. Stewed snails are a luxury in China; but the Chinese do not seem to fatten them like the countrymen of the elder Plinius, The Romans objected to feasts for less who would have exhibited shells containing than three or more than nine-fewer than many quarts. In modern Italy, among other the Graces or more than the Muses-with a modes of cooking, they fry their snails; and preference for seven. Some poets, both in then the morsel resembles the very gem prose and verse, have imagined the sweetest of a mouthful from the most perfect part of feasts to be tête-à-tête, like that in the story a knuckle of beautifully roasted mutton. of Noureddin Ali and the Fair Persian; but Disraeli the Elder complains that our meat- perhaps when the Fair Persian bit the half gorging population ignores the art of pre- of a grape held in the teeth of Noureddin, paring vegetables; whereas ancient cooks the taste of the fruit might be lost in discould transmute turnips into fish, as a master tracting influences. The coddled Chinese, of the art did to satisfy the longing palate of by the by, with their broken feet, have a a King of Bithynia in a war against the Scy- dread of fruit. Though the most exquisite thians. But in the days of Disraeli the conversation, living poems, may pass at feasts Younger we see vegetables compressed in tête-à-tête, yet undoubtedly average converslabs for long keeping, and used for our army sation is best promoted by a "third party "in the Crimea, or employed in thrifty house- a quincunx or a heptarchy or any number holds at home to make exquisite soup, frag- which does not offer a "tie" of votes or rant enough to astonish Sinon-the cook, drown individualism in chorus. But we are not the traitor; and cheap enough to "rile" assuming that conversation is essential to Cobbett of the Rejected Addresses, not the the feast. The ancients thought so; our Register. This cheap soup seems to be alto- modern morals have but recently emerged gether more fragrant than the birds-nest from the barbarism of "silence at meals." soup of those highly-cultivated philosophers 3 The accomplished traveller in China says The salon was more like a slice of a veIts front was open to nothing of the good things exchanged at randah than a room. table, perhaps he has not yet mastered the the narrow street. The table was laid with the preliminary trifles provocatives to the jeux-d'esprit uttered in monosyllables arranged in diagrams; but it appears that the coming repast. There was a small square tower built up of slices from the breast of a Celestial etiquette makes a point of exchang-goose, a tumulus of thin square pieces of ing slugs, which the polite feaster must thrust into the mouth of his neighbor. It seems to be the Chinese mode of hobnobbing-the equivalent for the grape divided between Noureddin and his Fair Persian. 3 tripe, hard-boiled eggs of a dark speckled color, which had been preserved in lime, and whose delicacy is supposed to be proportioned to their antiquity; berries and other vegetable substances preserved in vinegar, a curious had been taken from its shell and cut in thin pile of some shell-fish, to me unknown, which Per-slices, prawns in their natural, or rather in their artificial red state, ground nuts, ginger, and candied fruits. He is the greatest artist who produces the largest effect with the smallest means. haps the most exquisite cookery is that which is simplest and purest; but perhaps also the most exquisite part of the feast, all the world over, cannot be put even into a stewpan, perhaps in all countries a feast can be made out of "a dinner of herbs"; though it is difficult to imagine that where the Fair Persian has broken feet and Noureddin broken digestion. From The Correspondence of The Times. A CHINESE STATE DINNER. NINGPO is famed throughout all China for the excellence of its learning and the perfection of its cookery-excellences which, if my recollection of Oxford kitchens is not as rusty as my memories of its lecture-rooms, do not always go together. There is an examination at Pekin at which the Cambridge competitive system is adopted, and a sort of Senior Wrangler of the whole empire is declared. Some years ago Ningpo had the honor of producing the successful candidate, and great was the joy of Ningpo. The Ellis, or Lovegrove, of Ningpo, was then about erecting a hotel, and, instead of calling it "The Imperial Dragon," or "The Ten Thousand years," he called it "The Gallery of the Imperial Academician." Under that title it holds repute of having, out of Pekin, the best cuisine in China. To this hostelry, in reparation for our disappointment at the hands of the Shantung Guild, I invited, in September last, a good portion of the beauty and fashion of Ningpo, accompanying the invitation with a pair of chopsticks for preparatory exercise. After some deliberation the enterprise was thought worthy of patronage, for novelties at Ningpo are not numerous, and the invitation was accepted. A room was prepared, and the dinner ordered under grave advice; and on the day appointed eight chairs, four of them containing English ladies, duly guarded by their lords, proceeded in procession through the city gate and deposited their burden at "The Gallery of the Imperial Academician." 52 Every thing was excellent of its kind, and flavor. I am afraid to say that the tripe, the unknown shell-fish particularly good in boiled to an almost gelatinous softness, was a creditable piece of cookery, but I know many Englishmen who would have devoured the small heap with great avidity. There was at first an air of suspicion in the manner we wandered over this light collation, but this soon gave way as the fruits, the pickles, or the shell-fish commended themselves to the several tastes. And now we sat down to the serious business of the day. Each guest was supplied with a saucer and a porcelain spoon-they had brought their own chopsticks. A folded towel, just saturated with hot water, was placed by each saucer-this is the Chinese napkin-and two tiny metal cups, not so large as egg-cups, were allotted to every guest. At my side, to share our feast, and see that the "rites "were properly performed, sat the gravest of Chinamen. He wore his Mandarin Summer cap, for he was the interpreter at one of the consulates. The first dish was, in accordance with all proper precedent, the birds'-nest soup. I believe some of us were rather surprised not to see the birds' nests bobbing about in the bowl, and to detect no flavor of sticks or feathers or moss. What these birds' nests are in their natural state I do not know, for I have no book on ornithology and have never been birds'-nesting in the Straits. Their existence at table is apparent in a thick mucilage at the surface of the soup. Below this you come to a white liquid and chickens flesh. It was objected that this was a fade and tasteless delicacy. But remark that these two basins are only the suns of little systems. The same hands that brought them in scattered also an entourage of still smaller basins. These are sauces of every flavor and strength from crushed fresh chillies to simple soy. Watch the Chinaman, How cunningly he compounds. "But, Sir, you do not mean to say that you ate this mucilage' with your chopsticks ?" who, having once experienced its many flavors, chose to attempt it a second time; and the ordinary wine, which is so like sherry negus that any one who can drink that preparation may be very well satisfied with its Chinese substitute. The Chinaman had drunk with each of the convives almost in English fashion, but in strict obedience to the Chinese rites, and ungallantly challenging the male part of the company first. "No, Madame, we scooped it with our saucers and ate it with our porcelain spoons." The next course was expected with a very nervous excitement. It was a stew of seaslugs. As I have seen them at Macao they are white, but as served at Ningpo they are green. I credit the Imperial Academician's as the orthodox dish. They are slippery, And now we became clamorous for bread and very difficult to be handled by inexperi- or rice. After a succession of not by any enced chopsticks; but they are most succu- means gross, but certainly nutritious and lent and pleasant food, not at all unlike in mucilaginous dishes, the palate and the stomflavor to the green fat of the turtle. If a ach craved some farinaceous food. Nothing man cannot eat any thing of a kind whereof was easier to procure. The boys, our own he has not seen his father and grandfather boys, accustomed to wait at our English dineat before, we must leave him to his oysters, ners, brought in loaves at the lightest intimaand his periwinkles, and his crawfish, and tion; but our arbiter edendi interposed. not expect him to swallow the much more Bread at a Chinese feast is contrary to the comely sea-slug. But surely a Briton who" rites." has eaten himself into a poisonous plethora We consoled ourselves by throwing at him upon mussels has no right to hold up his decisive and unanimous opinion that this hands and eyes at a Chinaman enjoying his was the weak point of Chinese gastronomy. honest well-cooked stew of bêches de mer. The porcelain bowls in their courses, like During the discussion of this dish our the stars in their courses, continued in unChinese master of the ceremonies solemnly pausing succession. The next named was, interposed. We were neglecting the rudi-"The Rice of the Genii," meaning, I supments of politeness. No one had yet offered pose, the food of the genii, for there was no to intrude one of these sleek and savory del- rice in the composition. It was a stew of icacies, deeply rolled in sauce, into the mouth plums and preserved fruits, whose sweets of his neighbor. Efforts were made to re- and acids were an agreeable counterpoise trieve the barbarian honor, but with no great to the fish and meat dishes already taken. success; for the slugs were evasive, and the Then we had a dish of boiled hairy vegetable, proffered mouthful was not always welcome. very like that stringy endive which they call The next dish was sturgeon skull-cap-in France "Barbe de Capuchin"-then rare and gelatinous, but I think not so peculiar in its flavor as to excuse the death of several royal fish. This dish being taken from its brazen, lamp-heated stand, was succeeded by a stew of shark fins and pork. The shark fins were boiled to so soft a consistency that they might have been turbot fins. The Chinaman must have smiled at the unreasonable prejudices of the Occidentals when he saw some of us tasting the pork, but fighting shy of the shark. He probably, however, did not know that the same Occidentals would eat with a relish of a fish which they had themselves enticed to their angle by a worm or a maggot. Next in order came a soup composed of balls of crab. I have tasted this better prepared at Macao. It assumes there the form of a very capital salad, made of crab and cooked vegetables. Meanwhile the minister ing boys flew and fluttered round the table, for ever filling the little wine glasses with hot wine from the metal pots. There were three kinds, the strong samshu for very occasional "spike;" the medicated wine, for those a stewed mushrooms from Manchuria. Then we relapsed into another series of fish and meat entrées, wherein vegetables of the vege table marrow species and a root somewhat between a horseradish and a turnip were largely used. There was a bowl of ducks tongues, which are esteemed an exquisite Chinese dainty. We were picking these little morceaux out with our chopsticks (at which we had now become adepts, for the knack is easily acquired), when we were startled by a loud Chinese "Ey Yaw." This imprudent exclamation drew our attention to the open front of our apartment. The opposite house, distant perhaps across the street about eight feet from us, presented the spectacle of a small crowded playhouse seen from the stage. It was densely crowded with halfnaked Chinamen. They were packed in a mass upon the gallery, and they were squatted upon the roof. I believe they had paid for their places. They had sat orderly and silent all this time to see the barbarians dining. We might have dropped the grass blinds, but it would have been ill-natured; the Chinese did us no harm, and the blinds would have kept out the air, so we went on eating, jovens in which other dinners were then being So we continued our attentions to the ducks' tongues, and passed on to deers' tendons-a Royal dish. These deers' tendons come, or ought to come, from Tartary. The Emperors make presents of them to their favored subjects. Yek's father at Canton recently received some from his Sovereign, and gave a feast in honor of the present. These must have been boiled for a week to bring them down to the state of softness in which they came up to us. Correspondence of The London Daily News. DISEMBARKATION OF ELEPHANTS AT CALCUTTA FROM BURMAH. CALCUTTA, Dec. 24, 1857. Two cargoes of elephants from Burmah have been landed at Calcutta since.the last ma left. One arrived in the ship Tubal Cain, consisting of twenty elephants; the other in the Belgravia, and numbered fifty eleExhausted, or rather repleted nature could phants. The process of hoisting these most do no more. When a stew of what the Chin- gigantic of existing quadrupeds from their ese call the ear shell fish was placed upon berths on board ship, and getting them on the table no one could carry his experiments shore, was a novel and curious sight. The further. An untouched dish is a signal for arrival of the elephants was mentioned in the close of the feast. The maitre d'hotel the newspapers, and many persons were atprotested that he had twenty more courses tracted to witness their disembarkation. It of excellent rarity, but our Chinese master took place at the Government dock-yard. of the ceremonies was imperative, and so about half a mile below Fort William. were we. Plain boiled rice, the rice of Strange to say, there is no wharf at this Szechuen, was brought round in little bowls, dock-yard alongside of which the vessel and of this we all ate plentifully. Confec- could be brought, so that they had to be tionery and candied fruits, and acanthus ber-moored about fifty yards off from the shore. ries steeped in spirits, followed, and then tea. No uncooked fruit is allowed at a Chinese dinner. They have a proverb that fruit is feathers in the morning, silk at noon, and lead at night. I was assured b competent authority that nothing had been placed upon the table which was not in the highest degree wholesome, nutritious, and light of digestion. We certainly so found it; for, adjourning to the house of one of the convives, we made an excellent supper that night. They were, however, brought near a jetty at the extremity of which is a large crane, and by means of this crane, and the tackle on board ship, all the elephants were safely landed. The first party in the Tubal Cain were landed in a somewhat different manner from the other in the Belgravia. When the animals were hoisted up from between decks the hoisting tackle was connected with the crane chains, and the crane being then turned slowly round, each elephant in sucThe master of the ceremonies now looked cession was lowered and deposited on the round him with a swollen and satisfied air, bank of the river. This plan gave too much and-eruscit mons: from his mouth came liberty to the elephants after reaching terra forth a loud sonorous noise, which a certain firma; for, as some of them chose to indramatist has not scrupled to bedeck with dulge in a roll and a bath in the shallow knighthood, and to christen Sir Toby. He, water after their voyage, time was lost bethe Chinaman, seemed proud of his perform-fore the drivers could manage to lead them ance. We sat uncomfortable on our chairs, did not know which way to look, and some of us would have run away had there been anywhere to run to. Some one who could speak his language gave him a hint which made him declare emphatically that it would be an insult to the founder of the feast if this testimony was not loudly given to the sufficiency of the entertainment, and the pletion of the guests. It was with some difficulty that he was prevailed upon to turn over this chapter of the book of rites. And thus ended our Chinese dinner. Be fore we entered our chairs we walked through the whole establishment, saw the reservoirs for preserving all the curious creatures we had been eating, and examined all the processes of preparation, and the casseroles and away. It was therefore found more convenient and expeditious to lower each elephant into a barge alongside the ship, and to land him afterwards by drawing the boat the short distance to the shore. The fifty elephants in the Belgravia were all brought between decks, part on the main deck, and the remainder in the orlop deck below. Not many vessels would have the necessary height between decks—from eight to ten feet; and there was only just space enough in the Belgravia for the larger animals to stand upright without touching the timbers of the deck above. The elephants were ranged on each side of the ship, strong beams being placed so as to confine them from rolling towards the centre while the ship was in motion. Everything was left as open as possible for the purposes of ventila- | descent into the lighter. One is hardly led tion, but yet the congregation of so many to anticipate much adroitness from such a large animals caused the atmosphere to be bulky creature, not merely on account of its very hot and oppressive. Some of the more size, but also because its dull-looking loose mischievous were tethered by a chain at- hide conceals, in a great degree, that evitached to one or two of their legs, to pre-dence of life and passion which in the horse, vent them from annoying their neighbors. and most other animals, is so strongly marked When about to be removed from the ship, by starting veins and the rapid muscular each animal was brought under the main movements of its whole body. As soon as hatchway, the opening of which had of the elephant was in the lighter, the mahout course been lengthened and widened so as who had got down before him, at once to admit of their descent when they were jumped on his neck, and the animal immediembarked at Moulmein. Each elephant on ately yielded himself to the direction of his board had a mahout, or driver, and a coolie, accustomed master. Sometimes he would or servant, for feeding and cleaning him. appear a little nervous, putting his trunk To these men they had become accustomed, into the water to try its depth, with a view, and were greatly subjected to their influence. perhaps, to ascertaining if it were possible The elephant's mahout, assisted by the sail- to walk ashore; but generally he began ors, arranged a strong canvas sling, or girth, turning over some of the fresh grass placed edged with strong rope, round the animal's in the bottom of the boat to divert his attencarcass, and, the tackle being adjusted, the tion, and remained quiet until the boat was huge fellow was slowly raised off his feet, brought as near to the ground of the dockand the ascent was commenced. One of the yard as possible. Then, at a signal from the largest was said to weigh 3 tuns 2 cwt. mahout, after again leaning over and careThere was no opposition to the process of fully testing the depth of the water with his hoisting on the part of the animals, with one proboscis, he slowly raised one huge foot or two exceptions; indeed, for the most part over the boat's side, then the other, and in a they appeared anxious each to have his turn few minutes he was on his way to the place where the rest of his companions were picketed. as soon as possible, for they had sagacity enough to understand it was the means of quitting the ship, as it had been the means of bringing them into it. There was great excitement among the crowd on shore when the boatswain's whistle was heard directing the sailors at the capstan to hoist away, and as the falls or hoisting ropes, which were connected with the main and mizen masts of the ship, became strained and tightened, presently the rough, inert-looking mass of the animal's spine and back was seen above the deck; then part of the head, with which the animal from time to time prevented himself from being struck against the sides of the hatchway as he swung round on either side; the small sluggish eye, which seemed to be calmly surveying the surrounding scene; the active proboscis, forming by its constant movements a remarkable contrast with the rest of the passive frame; and finally, after the crane tackle had been connected the whole creature came into view, dangling in the air, and suspended by a couple of ropes which seemed like mere threads compared with the size of the animal which depended from them. He was then swung over the bulwarks, and lowered into the barge alongside. It was amusing to observe the quiet way in which the animal avoided the blow when his feet or legs were likely to strike against the side of the ship, and the way in which he assisted in taking off the strain of the ropes and raising himself when being passed over the bulwarks to make his All the elephants were of large size, and landed in excellent condition. It is expected that they will all suffer somewhat from fever after the confinement and close atmosphere they were subjected to during the voyage, but a little medicine will soon remove this. While on board ship they were fed on rations of rice, with an allowance of green fodder, a large proportion of which consisted of the stems and leaves of an immense species of pine-apple found wild in Burmah. After landing, the flies in the dockyard annoyed them greatly. Looking at their rough hides, it was not easy to understand how such a surface could be so sensitive. The plan they adopted to rid themselves of the annoyance consisted in gathering up in the hollow of the proboscis a quantity of dust and small gravel, which was either thrown over the head so as to fall in a shower along the back, or projected with force between the fore legs, so as to sweep away the intruders from the skin beneath. The Captain of the Belgravia brought a young ele phant, between four and five years old, and about the size of a pony, as a private speculation. It lived on the upper deck, near the Captain's cabin, and was remarkably tame. Four hundred rupees, or forty pounds sterl ing, was the price of this animal. The Government elephants were marched up to Barrackpore at night, leaving Calcutta at 10 p. m., after the traffic of the day was |