4 DECEMBER 1841, Page 13

THE PHILOSOPHY OF CAUDLE.

THERE are more traces of primite simplicity to be found in the Royal state of England than remain in any other court of Europe. The Beef-eaters still survive, to remind us of the time when the Sovereign was too poor to afford animal food to all his attendants, and the upper and strictly menial domestics were classified as those who ate and those who did not eat beef. The distribution of caudle on the birth of a Prince and Princess is another relic of those homely times, when the Queen, like any citizen's matron, kept her household on such short-commons that her handmaidens availed themselves of the period of her secession from the duties of active superintendence of the household to prepare a surplus of the savoury and strengthening slops prescribed for her, in order that some might be left for themselves, and when dainties were so rare that all the neighbours flocked together to get a taste of the good things provided for the lady in the straw. The retention of these almost rustic distinctions and practices in so polite a court, carries back the memory to the gallant Prince of whom Iago sings- " King Stephen was a worthy peer;

His breeches cost him but a crown: He held them sixpence all too dear; With that he called the tailor lown."

The influence of exalted station in lending a grace to things in themselves not very graceful, is truly wonderful. Furosh, in Arabic and Persian, means a drudge employed to sweep out apartments, dust horse-clothes, and do any other menial work too low for a common domestic. Furoshes of this kind are to be found in plenty in every Persian army ; but when the traveller comes to Medina, he finds the highest dignitaries of the town strutting about quite vain of the distinguished title—" Furosh." They are no common wielders of brooms, but the sweepers of the temple. So it is with candle. The dish in itself is rather of the homeliest. One re- ceipt for its composition gives directions to " Mix two large spoonfuls of finely-ground oatmeal in water, two hours previous to using it ; strain it from the grits and boil it ; sweeten and add wine and seasonings to taste"; another—" Make as above, only using mild sweet small-beer instead of water "; and a supple. mentary note intimates that "Candle may be made of rice-flour, or wheat-flour, with milk-and- water, sweetening it to the taste."* This delectable slop would scarcely have attracted such a succession of the mighty of the land, from the premier Duke and Dutchess down to the Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress—running to snatch their re- spective mouthfuls like the poultry of a farmer's yard when their modicum of barley is thrown down to them of a morning—by its own intrinsic deliciousness. Una himself would in vain at- tempt to attract visiters by announcing the distribution of caudle. But it was royal caudle ; and those who would have Wined up their noses at the liquor on any other occasion, slobbered it up for the sake of ,the dish in which it was presented.

The effects, too, of royal caudle are passing strange : it has already converted the "damning with faint praise," the cold con- ventional loyalty of the Conservatives, into glowing and chivalrous devotion for Queen VICTORIA. We read in old poets of the cup of Circe, which produced such a wondrous metamorphosis on all who tasted it. One man alone is recorded to have abstained from the draught, and escaped ; and that man, we are told, was father to Circe's son. Now Circe was queen of an island; and the father, whose ears have just been gladdened by the report that " to him a son is born," may be supposed to be little caring for mere " crea- ture comforts"—or the husband may be supposed to be so cloyed with matrimonial sweets, that the mawkish addition of the caudle- cup would be, if any thing, distasteful. There can be little doubt, therefore, that the celebrated cup of Circe was none other than her candle-cup. Even in our days we have seen caudle transforming the most truculent Conservative into a sleek courtier—an Epicuri de grege porous.

* Vide "Cook and Housewife's Manual," by Mistress Margaret Dodds, of the Cleikum Inn, St. Ronan's. Sixth edition. P. 398.