II The Precepts of Apicius
Apic. Hallo! Pistillarius and Abligurinus, make a fire with big logs on the hearth under the flue, and let them be as dry as possible.
Pist. Do you think you are at Rome? Here we have not stalls for the sale of dry wood from which dry logs can be got. But this which I have will be dry enough.
Apic. If you don’t get it dry enough, Abligurinus, you will, by your work of blowing up the flame, lose your eyesight.
Ablig. Then I shall drink so much the more freely. Curse the wine!
Apic. Curse the water! For you shall not touch wine to-day if I keep in my right mind. I am not going to let you overturn the vessels, and break the small pots to pieces, and ruin the food.
Ablig. This fire won’t burn!
Apic. Throw in a small bundle of sticks smeared in brimstone, and kindling-wood, together with some chips.
Ablig. It is quite gone out.
Apic. Run across to the next house with the shovel and bring us a great big firebrand and some good live coal.
Ablig. The master of that house is a metal-worker, nor does he let a single piece of coal be taken from his furnaces but he has his eye on it (citius oculum).
Apic. He is not a metal-worker, but a metal-cutter; go therefore to the oven. What are you bringing there? This is not a firebrand; it is rather a torch (titionem magis quam torrem).
Ablig. They have not got burning coal.
Apic. What bad coal! You should rather call it turf. Move these logs and stir the kindling wood with this poker so that it may gather flame. Use the pyrolabum (the tongs), you ass!
Ablig. What thing does that word signify?
Apic. Forceps ignaria (tongs for the fire), a pruniceps (a fire-stirrer).
Ablig. Why do you give me words in Greek, as if there were not Latin words for the things?
Apic. Are asses also grammarians?
Ablig. What wonder, since grammarians are certainly asses.
Apic. Make an end of wrangling. I want some coals or pieces of turf lighting for me on this hearth, for cooking the cakes baked in earthen cups. Hang the bronze vessel over the fire so that we can have plenty of hot water. Then throw into the cooking-pot that shoulder of mutton with the salted beef; add calf and lamb flesh, and stir the cooking vessel on the fire. In the chytropus61 we will thoroughly boil the rice.
Ablig. What shall we do with the chickens?
Apic. They shall be cooked in brazen pots which are lined with tin, so that they may have a more pleasant taste. But don’t bring them too soon; the meat-spits and the pans should be forthcoming about nine o’clock. Let this pike play about in the water a little, then skin him.
Ablig. Are there to be meat and fish at the same meal?
Apic. Decidedly, according to the German fashion.
Ablig. And is this approved by the doctors?
Apic. It is not in accordance with the art of medicine, but it will please the doctors. I thought this block of a man (stips) was merely a grammarian; he is also a doctor.
Ablig. Have you never heard of that question: Whether there are in a city more doctors or fools?
Apic. Who has thrust you into the kitchen, when you are such a salted herring (saperda)?
Ablig. My adverse fate.
Apic. Nay, what is quite clear,—it is thy sluggishness, carelessness, voracity, thy throat and thy stomach, thy degenerate and debased soul. Therefore must thou now run about with naked feet, half-clothed, in old torn garments which don’t cover you behind.
Ablig. What has my poverty got to do with you?
Apic. Nothing at all, and I should not like it to concern me. But to work! And outside of work let us have no more talk than necessary. Are my orders not sufficient? Nothing apparently can be enough for you in the way of closely laying down and insisting over and over again on what is to be done. Give me my cooking-trousers. I want to go out of doors, but I will soon be back. Give me also, please, the olive-crusher (tudicula), the badge of our art. This is my thunderbolt and trident.
Pist. Hallo, Abligurinus, place those jugs on the urn-table and wash this beef steadily, and give it a good rubbing in the basin.
Ablig. Have you any other orders to give? One commander is sufficient for one camp, but it does not seem to be sufficient for one kitchen. Do it all yourself. You are a sharper exactor of work than the master of the cook-shop himself. For the future I won’t call you Pistillarius (a pounder with the pestle), but a sharp sting (stimulus acutus).
Pist. Nay, rather call me Onocentron (the spur of asses). Cut up then this calf’s flesh on this flesh-board. Also powder the cheese so that we can sprinkle it over this dumpling.
Ablig. How? With the hand?
Pist. No, but with the grater. Pour a few drops of oil in from the cruse.
Ablig. Do you mean from this flask?
Pist. Place here the mortar.
Ablig. Which of them?
Pist. That brazen one with the pestle of the same metal.
Ablig. What for?
Pist. For grinding rock-parsley.
Ablig. This is done more satisfactorily in a marble mortar with a wooden pestle.