Oh, better no doubt is a dinner of herbs,
When season'd with love, which no rancour disturbs
read more

Oh, better no doubt is a dinner of herbs,
When season'd with love, which no rancour disturbs
And sweeten'd by all that is sweetest in life
Than turbot, bisque, ortolans, eaten in strife!
But if, out of humour, and hungry, alone
A man should sit down to dinner, each one
Of the dishes which the cook chooses to spoil
With a horrible mixture of garlic and oil,
The chances are ten against one, I must own,
He gets up as ill-tempered as when he sat down.

Would the cook were o' my mind!

Would the cook were o' my mind!

Digestion, much like Love and Wine, no trifling will brook:
His cook once spoiled the dinner of an Emperor read more

Digestion, much like Love and Wine, no trifling will brook:
His cook once spoiled the dinner of an Emperor of men;
The dinner spoiled the temper of his Majesty and then
The Emperor made history--and no one blamed the cook.

The capon burns, the pig falls from the spit,
The clock hath strucken twelve upon the bell;
read more

The capon burns, the pig falls from the spit,
The clock hath strucken twelve upon the bell;
My mistress made it one upon my cheek:
She is so hot because the meat is cold;
The meat is cold because you come not home;
You come not home because you have no stomach;
You have no stomach, having broke your fast;
But we, that know what 'tis to fast and pray,
Are penitent for your default to-day.

Let's carve him as a dish fit for the gods,
Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds.

Let's carve him as a dish fit for the gods,
Not hew him as a carcass fit for hounds.

I seem to you cruel and too much addicted to gluttony, when I
beat my cook for sending up read more

I seem to you cruel and too much addicted to gluttony, when I
beat my cook for sending up a bad dinner. If that appears to you
too trifling a cause, say for what cause you would have a cook
flogged.

I never strove to rule the roast,
She ne'er refus'd to pledge my toast.

I never strove to rule the roast,
She ne'er refus'd to pledge my toast.

The vulgar boil, the learned roast, an egg.

The vulgar boil, the learned roast, an egg.

A crier of green sauce.

A crier of green sauce.