The Physiology of Taste (56 page)

All that is changed now.

In any house that prides itself on being highly fashionable, lackeys distribute to the guests, toward the end of dessert, bowls full of cold water in each of which is placed a goblet of water that has been warmed. There, in plain sight of one another, everybody plunges his fingers into the cold water in pretense of washing them, and drinks up the heated water, with which he gargles noisily, and which he then spews out into the goblet or the bowl.
¹²

I am not the only one who rebels against this new fashion, which is equally useless, indecent, and disgusting.

It is
useless
, because the mouth of anyone who knows how to eat properly is clean at the end of a meal: it has been refreshed either by fruit or by the last tastes of wine which it is the custom to drink with the dessert. As for one’s hands, they should not be so used that they grow soiled, and what is more, does each guest not have a napkin to clean them with?

It is
indecent
, because it is a generally accepted principle of behavior that physical cleanliness is maintained in the privacy of the dressing room.

It is above all a disgusting innovation, because the prettiest and the freshest of mouths lose all their charms when they usurp the functions of the excretory organs: what are they then if neither fresh nor pretty? And what can we say of those hideous caverns which open only to display seemingly bottomless emptiness, if it were not for the rotting tooth stumps that occasionally rear up in them?
Proh pudor!

Such is the ridiculous position we have been placed in by an affectation of pretentious cleanliness which has no real place in either our tastes or our morals.

When certain limits of behavior have been overstepped, it is impossible to know what will be the next move, and I cannot prophesy what new purification will be imposed upon us.

Since the first appearance of these fashionable bowls, I have invoked day and night against them. A second Jeremiah, I deplore the aberrations of high style and, made too knowing by my travels, I cannot even enter a drawing room any more without shuddering at the prospect of finding there the abominable
CHAMBERPOT
.
*

A few years ago the papers announced to us the discovery of a new perfume, extracted from the
Hemerocallis
, a bulbous plant which does indeed have a very pleasant odor resembling that of jasmine.

I am deeply curious as well as something of a loiterer, and these two things combined to draw me as far as the Faubourg Saint-Germain, where I could find the new scent, “the nostril-sorcerer” as the Turks put it.

I was welcomed with all the honors due an enthusiast, and from the inner sanctum of a very well supplied pharmacy a little box was produced for me, thoroughly wrapped, and seeming to contain some two ounces of the rare crystallization. This politeness was recognized on my part by an expenditure of three francs, following the laws of compensation whose sphere and principles are daily enlarged by the studies of M. Azaïs.
¹³

An addlepate would have torn open the package then and there, and sniffed and tasted of it. A professor behaves differently: I felt that in such a case as this the best thing to do was retire; therefore I went back to my home at my accustomed pace, and soon, tucked expectantly upon my sofa, I prepared myself to experience a new sensation.

I drew from my pocket the odorous box, and unwrapped from it the papers that still bound it. They were three different printed sheets, all discussing the Hemerocallis, its natural history, its culture, its blossom, and the unusual pleasures to be drawn from its perfume, whether it be concentrated in lozenge form, mixed with toilet preparations, or dissolved for our tables in alcoholic liqueurs or blended in frozen puddings. I read these three papers attentively: I, to repay myself for the expenditure to which I referred higher up;2, to prepare myself properly for the appreciation of this new treasure extracted from the vegetable kingdom.

Then I opened, with due reverence, the box which I supposed to be full of lozenges. But oh surprise, oh shock! I found, first of all, a second copy of the three advertisements, and, apparently as a secondary benefit, about two dozen of the troches whose power had led me on the long walk to our noble suburb.

First of all I tasted one, and I must be just and say that I found these little pastilles most agreeable; but this made me even more annoyed that, in spite of the outer appearance of the box, they were so few in number. The more I thought about it, really, the more puzzled I became.

I got up with the firm intention of taking the box back to its inventor, even if he kept what had been paid for it. At that moment, though, a mirror reflected back at me my greying head: I could but laugh at my own liveliness and sit down again, containing my annoyance. Plainly enough, I still feel it.

Another thing restrained me: it too concerned a pharmacist, and not four days before I had been witness to the complete imperturbability of the members of this respectable profession.

It makes one more anecdote which my readers should know: I am today (17 June 1825) in the process of storytelling, and may God preserve us from its becoming a public calamity!

Well then, I went one morning to pay a visit to my friend and fellow native of Belley, General Bouvier des Éclats.

I found him pacing his rooms in agitation, and crumpling in his hands some writing which looked to me like poetry.

“Look at this,” he said, handing it to me. “Tell me your opinion of it: you are a good judge.”

I took the paper, and having run through it was highly astonished to see that it was a bill for medicines: it was not my qualities as a poet that the General called upon, but my studies as an amateur pharmacist.
¹⁴

“Well, after all, old fellow,” I said as I gave him back the paper, “you know the customs of the profession to which you have entrusted yourself. It is true that they may have over-stepped the limits a bit, but on the other hand why do you sport a beautifully ornamented coat, and three official decorations, and a cocked hat with tassels? There alone are three extenuating circumstances, and you are not going to be able to ignore them.”

“Be quiet,” he said angrily to me. “This is really a dreadful state of affairs! What is more, you are going to see my swindler. I’ve summoned him here, he’s on his way, and you must back me up.”

He was still speaking when the door opened, and we saw coming toward us a man of about fifty-five years, dressed carefully; he was tall, and walked slowly, and his whole aspect would have had an air of severity, if the set of his mouth and his eyes had not had something sardonic about it.

He drew near the fireplace, refused a chair, and I found myself witness to the following dialogue, which I have faithfully remembered.

There the discussion ended. The general, embarrassed at being guilty of so many solecisms and at finding himself so ignorant of pharmaceutical terms, stuttered, forgot what he was about to say, and paid the full amount of the bill.

There once was, on the Rue de la Chaussée-d’Antin in Paris, a certain citizen named Briguet who, starting as a coachman, rose to be a horse dealer and ended by piling up a small fortune for himself.

He had been born at Talissieu, and when he decided to go back there he married a woman with a little money who had formerly been the cook at the establishment of Mademoiselle Thevenin, once known to all Paris as the “Ace of Spades.”

The chance arose to buy a small piece of property in his native village; he took it, and installed himself there with his wife toward the end of 1791.

In those days all the priests of the diocese used to meet together once a month, at the house of each one in turn, to confer upon ecclesiastical matters. They celebrated High Mass together, discussed their business, and then dined.

Such a reunion was always referred to as
the conference
, and the priest chosen to be host for it never failed to make great preparations in order to receive his brothers worthily.

When it was the turn of the Curé of Talissieu, it happened that one of his parishioners made him a present of a magnificent eel, caught in the limpid Serans waters, and more than three feet long.

Delighted to come into possession of such a noble fish, the priest felt grave doubts that his cook would be able to treat it with the skill it deserved, and went therefore to discuss the problem with Madame Briguet. He flattered her superior culinary knowledge, and begged her to lend her artistry to a dish which would be worthy of an archbishop himself and would give the greatest splendor to his dinner party.

His amenable parishioner agreed without too much difficulty, and with all the more pleasure as she said, because she still had a little collection of various exotic spices which she used to cook with at her former employer’s.

The eel was prepared with great care, and served impressively. Not only did the dish have an elegant appearance, but a most tempting odor, and once it had been tasted, there was no praise high enough for it. It vanished, sauce and all, down to the last tiny particle.

But, by the time for dessert, the worthy pastors felt themselves stirred in a most unaccustomed manner, and as a natural result of the effect of the physical state upon the moral, the conversation took on a somewhat wanton tone.

Some of the curés told high old tales of their adventures in the seminary; others teased their companions about various whispered parish scandals: in short, the table talk fixed itself permanently upon the most delightful of the seven deadly sins, and the remarkable thing was that the good men did not once realize it, so strong was the devil in them.

They broke up the banquet late, and my secret memoirs do not intrude further on their actions for that day. But at the next conference, when the curés met again, they were ashamed of what they had talked about, made their mutual apologies, and ended by blaming the whole sad business on the influence of the dish of eel. They decided that although Madame Briguet’s preparation was admittedly delicious, it would not be prudent to put her artistry to a second test.

I have searched in vain for information about the spice which produced such marvelous effects, the more so since there was no complaint that it was of a burning or otherwise dangerous nature.

The artist herself confessed that her dish contained a crayfish sauce which had been liberally peppered, but I am convinced that she did not tell all she could have.
¹⁷

One time it was reported to Monsignor Courtois de Quincey, bishop of Belley, that an asparagus tip of incredible size had poked up its head in one of the beds of his vegetable garden.

Immediately his whole household hurried to the spot to verify the news, for even in episcopal palaces it is amusing to have something to do.

The report was found to be neither false nor exaggerated. The plant had already broken through the crust of earth, and its tip could plainly be seen. It was rounded, gleaming, and finely patterned, and gave promise of a girth greater than a handspan.

Everyone talked excitedly of this horticultural triumph, and it was agreed that to the Bishop alone belonged the right to garner it. The neighboring cutler was ordered to make immediately a knife appropriate to the great occasion.

During the following days the asparagus increased in grace and in beauty; its progress was slow but continuous, and before long its watchers could see the white part where the edible portion of this vegetable ends.

The time for harvesting thus indicated, a good dinner was first served, and the actual operation took place after a postprandial stroll.

Then it was that Bishop Courtois advanced, armed with the official knife, kneeled down solemnly, and concentrated on cutting from its root the haughty plant, while the whole episcopal entourage seethed with impatience to examine the fibers and texture of the phenomenon.

But oh surprise, oh disappointment! And oh misery! The prelate rose from his knees with empty hands … The famed asparagus was made of wood.

This practical joke, which was perhaps carried a little too far, was the work of Canon Rosset, a native of Saint-Claude, who had wonderful skill as a turner, and painted most admirably as well. He had made the false plant a perfect copy of reality, had buried it secretly, and then raised it a little every day in imitation of natural growth.

Bishop Courtois did not know quite how to take this mystifying prank (which indeed it was); then, seeing hilarity already spreading over the faces of his household, he smiled. His smile was followed by the general explosion of truly Homeric laughter: the evidence of the crime was borne away, without bothering about the criminal, and for that evening, at least, the carved asparagus tip was admitted to the honors of exhibition in the drawing room.

The Chevalier de Langeac had a sizable fortune at one time, which melted away in the conventional extravagances expected of a man who is young, rich, and good-looking.