The Physiology of Taste (54 page)

Then, finally, does the banquet for ordinary mortals begin, for there can be no veritable festivals when the people are not a part of them.

Tables which seemingly never end are set up in all the streets, in every square, and before every great building. A man can sit down wherever he may find himself: chance brings differing age and social rank and religion together, and everywhere are seen the cordial handclasp of true friendliness, and its open unsuspicious face.

In spite of the fact that the whole city is for a time no more than one great dining hall, generous private citizens have guaranteed plenty for all, while a paternal government watches with solicitude so that order may be maintained and the outer limits of sobriety not be overstepped.

Soon gay and lively music can be heard: it is time for dancing, that beloved pastime of all youthful people.

Immense ballrooms and portable outdoor floors have been prepared everywhere, and floods of every kind of refreshment.

People flock to them, some to dance and others to watch and lend encouragement. It is amusing to see more than a few old fellows, stirred by a fleeting fire of passion, offer their feeble homages to beauty; but the worship of the goddess and the significance of the festival excuse every such absurdity.

This merriment continues for many a happy hour. Pleasure is everywhere, and movement and gaiety, and it is hard to hear midnight sound the signal for repose. And nevertheless every one listens to it: the night has been spent in honest decent pleasure, and it is time now for each citizen to retire to his bed, pleased with his celebration and full of high hopes for the happenings of a year which begins under such good auspices.

1.
In 1947, in the workrooms of Lurçat-Aubusson where the art of tapestry weaving had sprung into new and dynamically exciting life, a tapestry of enormous size was being woven for the Museum of the Wines of France. It was destined to be hung in the room of the Dukes of Burgundy, and to glorify their wines, as do the fifteen “ambassadors of wine” who meet there every year to dine, drink, speechify, and recite poetry in praise of that liquid which most makes glad the hearts of men.

2.
This mention of
flamme électrique
so excited Nimmo and Bain in 1884 that they exclaimed with unusual abandon: “Oh, my prophetic soul, my uncle, as Shakespeare says. Electric light in 1826.—Tr.” They did not allow themselves to go so far as an exclamation point, it should be noted.

3.
Here the Professor, with his obvious love of exotic and romantic words, says
Halel
, which is an Arab word meaning “to pray.”

4.
This subtle prescription for gastronomical bliss was beautifully followed in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1947, by a group of people hopefully labeling themselves members of The Wine and Food Society. In a perfect mixture of luncheon club naïveté and what Philip Wylie might label incipient momism, the height of the celebration was, according to the news reporter, somewhat as follows: “A. D. (Bud) Eubank … presided at the dinner and introduced what he called ‘the Eisenhower shift’ … which preceded the third and fourth courses and consisted of each man taking his glass of wine and moving into the seat of the third man to the right of him. Thus, the women had different dinner companions for a large part of the evening, and they thought that was a bright idea. Of course, it developed that such diners as Karl K …, Ed M …, Frank W …, and D. D. D …, to mention a few, apparently couldn’t count to three and invariably plopped into the wrong seat. At the beginning of the last course, Eubank announced, sternly: ‘Now, home to mama.’ That was the cue for the men to sit once more beside the wives they had brought, and give the correct fillip to the evening.” (On rereading this simply told tale, it seems even sadder than at first, and that is saying a great deal. Perhaps it is cruel to add that “sparkling Burgundy” was being served as the gallants plopped into their new seats.)

IF I HAVE BEEN
read up to this point with the attention which I have hoped for and have tried to stimulate, it has been observed that in my writing I have had a double purpose which I have never lost to view: the first part of it has been to set forth the basic theories of
gastronomy
, so that it could assume the rank among the sciences which is incontestably its own; the second, to define with precision what must be understood by
gourmandism
, and to separate from this social grace, once and for all, the gluttony and intemperance with which it has for so long and so unfortunately been linked.

This equivocation has been instigated by intolerant moralists who, led astray by their extravagant zeal, have pleased themselves to find excess where there was but an intelligent enjoyment of the earth’s treasures, which were not given to us to be trampled underfoot. It has further been twisted and falsified by uncongenial grammarians, who have uttered their definitions in black incomprehension and sworn to them
in verba magistri
.

It is time to wipe out such error, for by now anybody understands the word; this is so true that while everyone will admit a certain trace of gourmandism in himself and will even boast a bit of it, there is still nobody who can be accused, without insult, of being gluttonous, voracious, or intemperate.

On these two cardinal points it seems to me that what I have written up to this point is as clear as actual demonstration might be, and will suffice to persuade all those readers who are open to conviction. I could therefore lay down my pen, and consider as finished the task which I have set myself, but during the exhaustive studies I have made of subjects which are a vital part of man’s existence, I have recalled many things which I should
enjoy writing about: anecdotes which have certainly never yet been told, epigrams which took form before my own eyes, a few recipes of high distinction, and other such literary tidbits.

They would have broken up the main line of thought, if I had scattered them through the theoretical part of my book, but thus assembled at its end, I hope that they will be read with real pleasure, for all the while that they may be found amusing, they still offer more than a few experimental truths and useful developments.

I have wanted, too, as I have already warned, to give a little personal history which can arouse neither discussion nor commentary. I have found the reward for all my labor in this part of the book where I see myself once more among my friends. It is above all when life is about to escape our grasp that we become important to ourselves, and our intimates are a part of that final I AM.

However, I cannot hide the fact that on looking over the parts I have written about myself, I have felt a little uneasy.

These qualms are the result of my very latest readings, of personal memoirs which are by now in everybody’s hands, and of the carping comments I have heard made about them.

I am afraid that some malicious soul, after a night made sleepless by his bad digestion, might say of me: “And here’s a professor for you who doesn’t treat himself too badly! Here’s a professor who is not afraid to spend his whole time patting his own back! Here’s a professor who … Here’s a professor …!”

To which I can only say in advance, putting myself on guard as it were, that anyone who does not hurt his fellow men has the right to be treated with a certain amount of indulgence, and that I cannot see why I, always a stranger to any hateful sentiments, should exclude myself from my own generosity.
¹

After this response, which is indeed realistic enough, I believe that I can count on being let alone, well protected under my philosopher’s hood, and those who may still plague me I shall call bad sleepers.
Bad Sleepers!
It is a newinvective, for which I plan to take out a copyright, since I am the first to have discovered that it holds within it a veritable excommunication.

1.
It is faintly possible that the Professor has idealized himself, but the strange fact that in a most gossipy age almost nothing was written about him adds a protective cape to his somewhat smug remark. Dr. Richerand and Balzac wrote of his kindliness and honesty with almost gushing fervor. On the other hand the waspish Marquis de Cussy in his
L’ART CULINAIRE
said: “Brillat-Savarin ate copiously and ill; he chose little, talked dully, had no vivacity in his looks, and was absorbed at the end of a repast.” (Nimmo and Bain here note loyally: “… he was like the rest of the world—he had his good and his bad days.”) And in 1807 the great orator and revolutionist Camille Jordan wrote to Madame de Staël from Lyons: “Say to (Madame Récamier) that I doubt not that she very cordially recommended me to her relative the judge; that I thank her heartily for her good intentions, but that never were intentions followed by less effect; that, far from finding favor in his eyes, my family have not even obtained justice at his hands, that, in the discharge of functions where it was his duty to confine himself to weighing impartially the evidence, he manifested toward us an amount of prejudice and ill-will which was the scandal of all who witnessed it.” This was written by a hard-pressed patriot about a man who had already been ground fine in the mill of exile, a man who, as Balzac later wrote, did not let politics trouble his digestion … but even so it makes a small chink in the Professor’s self-tailored armor of perfection.

EVERYONE KNOWS THAT
Madame R …
¹
has for twenty years held title without contradiction to the Parisian throne of beauty. And everyone knows that she is extremely charitable, and that at one time she was interested in almost every enterprise which had for its purpose the relief of human misery, which sometimes is much worse in this great city than anywhere else.
*

Needing to confer on this subject with the curate of …, she went one day about five o’clock to his house, and was highly astonished to find him already at table.

The lovely resident of the Rue du Mont-Blanc believed that all Paris dined at six, and did not know that in general the ecclesiastics begin much earlier, since many of them make a light collation at night.

Madame R … wanted to withdraw, but the Cure insisted that she stay, perhaps because the business they were to discuss was not the kind to spoil his dinner, perhaps because a pretty woman is never a kill-joy for anyone, no matter what his state, or perhaps finally because he realized that all he needed to make a true gas-tronomical Elysium of his dining room was someone to talk to.

Indeed, his table was laid with an admirable elegance: an old wine gleamed in a crystal decanter; the white porcelain was of the highest quality; the plates were kept hot over boiling water;
and a maid, at once canonical and neatly dressed, stood ready to follow out his orders.

The meal balanced itself between frugality and refinement. A thick crayfish soup was just being removed, and spread out upon the table were a salmon trout, an omelet,
³
and a salad.

“My dinner will prove to you what you perhaps did not realize,” the priest said smilingly. “Today we must not eat meat, according to the laws of the Church.” Our friend nodded agreement, but private information has it that she blushed a little, which did not prevent the Cure from continuing his repast.

He had already been served with the upper half of the trout and was in the process of enjoying it. Its sauce looked skilfully concocted, and an expression of inner bliss appeared on the pastor’s face.

After this dish, he attacked the omelet, which was round and big-bellied and cooked to the exact point of perfection.

At the first touch of the spoon, the paunch let flow from the cut in it a thick juice which was as tempting to look at as to smell; the platter seemed aflood with it, and our dear Juliette admitted to herself that it made her own mouth water.

This instinctive movement on her part did not escape a priest used to observing the passions of his fellow men, and as if he were answering a question which Madame R … had in reality taken great care not to ask, he said, “It is a tuna omelet. My cook is a marvel with them, and few people taste them without complimenting me.”

“I am not surprised,” the resident of the Chaussée d’Antin replied. “An omelet as tempting as that never appears on the tables of the laity!”

Next came the salad. (I can recommend this dish to all who have confidence in me: salad refreshes without weakening, and comforts without irritating, and I have a habit of saying that it makes us younger.)

Conversation was not interrupted by the act of dining: they talked of the business which had caused the visit, and discussed the war then raging, current happenings, the Church’s hopes and expectations, and other table topics which make a bad meal pass quickly and a good meal taste even better.

Dessert arrived at its proper time. It consisted of a Septmoncel cheese, three Calville apples, and a pot of jam.

Finally the maid brought in a little round table, the kind that long ago was used for the card game of 100, upon which she placed a cup of Mocha so steaming hot and so crystal clear that its perfume filled the room.

After having
SIPED
⁴
it
(siroté)
, the Curé said grace, and remarked as he arose from the table, “I never drink strong liqueurs. They are a little extra treat which I always offer to my guests, but which I myself abstain from completely. I feel that I am thus reserving a final pleasure for my extreme old age, if the good God permits me to reach it.”

While all this took place, time had sped by, and it was six o’clock. Madame R … hurried into her carriage, for she had invited several guests to dine with her that evening, myself among them. She arrived late,
according to her usual custom
, but at least she did arrive, finally, still full of excitement about what she had just seen and sniffed at.

There was no topic of conversation throughout our dinner but the Cureé’s earlier one, and especially his tuna omelet.