“Will you maintain, quoth Pantagruel, that the codpiece is the chief piece of a military harness? It is a new kind of doctrine, very paradoxical; for we say, At spurs begins the arming of a man. Sir, I maintain it, answered Panurge, and not wrongfully do I maintain it. Behold how nature, having a fervent desire, after its production of plants, trees, shrubs, herbs, sponges, and plant-animals, to eternize and continue them unto all succession of ages (in their several kinds or sorts, at least, although the individuals perish) unruinable, and in an everlasting being, hath most curiously armed and fenced their buds, sprouts, shoots, and seeds, wherein the above-mentioned perpetuity consisteth, by strengthening, covering, guarding, and fortifying them with an admirable industry, with husks, cases, scurfs and swads, hulls, cods, stones, films, cartels, shells, ears, rinds, barks, skins, ridges, and prickles, which serve them instead of strong, fair, and natural codpieces. As is manifestly apparent in pease, beans, fasels, pomegranates, peaches, cottons, gourds, pumpions, melons, corn, lemons, almonds, walnuts, filberts, and chestnuts; as likewise in all plants, slips, or sets whatsoever, wherein it is plainly and evidently seen, that the sperm and semence is more closely veiled, overshadowed, corroborated, and thoroughly harnessed, than any other part, portion, or parcel of the whole.”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
COFFEE. CHOCOLATE. TEA. PICKLES. BEER. GENERAL MAXIMS FOR HEALTH. HINTS TO PERSONS OF MODERATE FORTUNE [FIRST PUBLISHED IN THE MASSACHUSETTS JOURNAL.] FURNITURE. EDUCATION OF DAUGHTERS. TRAVELLING AND PUBLIC AMUSEMENTS. PHILOSOPHY AND CONSISTENCY. REASONS FOR HARD TIMES. HOW TO ENDURE POVERTY. APPENDIX TO THE AMERICAN FRUGAL HOUSEWIFE. CARVING. INDEX. APPENDIX.
Sources: The passage is from François Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel, tr. Motteux, Peter Anthony, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Child, The American Frugal Housewife of 1829, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — burgundy cloth, tankard stamp.