Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1900 edition. Excerpt: ... ENCHANTING COFFEE A Perfectly wise man is he who is fully expert and skilful in the true use of sensualities, as in all other duties belonging to life. In the household where wisdom rules, dinner, from savoury hors d'ceuvre to aromatic coffee, will be without reproach--or suspicion. The foolish devote their powers to this course or that, and in one supreme but ill-advised endeavour exhaust their every resource. Invention carries them no further than the soul; even discreet imitation cannot pilot them beyond the entr/e. With each succeeding dish their folly becomes more obvious, until it culminates in the coffee, which, instead of the divine elixir it should be, proves but a vile, degrading concoction of chicory. Here is the chief among gastronomic tests; the hostess who knows not how to prepare a cup of coffee that will bring new light to her guests' eyes, new gaiety to their talk, is not worthy to receive them; the guest, who does not know good coffee when it is set before him deserves to be cast into outer darkness and fed for evermore upon brimstone and treacle. Better far throw pearls before swine, than pour good coffee into the cups of the indifferent. The sympathies of the gourmand are all for the mighty ones of old--for an Epicurus in Greece, a Lucullus in Rome--to whom the gods had not yet given the greatest of their gifts, coffee. Sad indeed the banquet, dreamy the evening uncheered, unblessed by fragrant Mocha or mild Mysore. Poor mortals still stood without the gates of Paradise, never once foreseeing the exquisite joys to come, unconscious of the penalty they paid for living so much too soon. And while they thus dwelt in sorrowful ignorance, shepherds, leading their flocks through sweet pasture-land, paused in their happy...
