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Title: Ode To W. Kitchener, M.D.
Author: Thomas Hood [
More Titles by Hood]
Ode To W. Kitchener, M.D.
AUTHOR OF "THE COOK'S ORACLE," "OBSERVATIONS ON VOCAL MUSIC," "THE ART OF INVIGORATING AND PROLONGING LIFE," "PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS ON TELESCOPES, OPERA-GLASSES, AND SPECTACLES," "THE HOUSEKEEPER'S LEDGER," AND "THE PLEASURE OF MAKING A WILL."
"I rule the roast, as Milton says! "--_Caleb Quotem_.
[Note: Hood, for obvious purposes, slightly departs from the true spelling of Dr. Kitchiner's name. He was an M. D. of Glasgow, who, having been left a handsome fortune by his father, abandoned the active practice of his profession, and devoted himself to science, notably to that of optics, as well as to gastronomy, being himself eminent as a gourmet. He was the author of a once famous Cookery Book, _The Cook's Oracle_; and an improved kitchen range still bears his name.]
Oh! multifarious man!
Thou Wondrous, Admirable Kitchen Crichton!
Born to enlighten
The laws of Optics, Peptics, Music, Cooking--
Master of the Piano--and the Pan--
As busy with the kitchen as the skies!
Now looking
At some rich stew thro' Galileo's eyes,--
Or boiling eggs--timed to a metronome--
As much at home
In spectacles as in mere isinglass--
In the art of frying brown--as a digression
On music and poetical expression,
Whereas, how few of all our cooks, alas!
Could tell Calliope from "Callipee!"
How few there be
Could leave the lowest for the highest stories, (Observatories,)
And turn, like thee, Diana's calculator,
However _cook's_ synonymous with _Kater_!
Alas! still let me say,
How few could lay
The carving knife beside the tuning fork,
Like the proverbial _Jack_ ready for any work!
II.
Oh, to behold thy features in thy book!
Thy proper head and shoulders in a plate,
How it would look!
With one rais'd eye watching the dial's date,
And one upon the roast, gently cast down--
Thy chops--done nicely brown--
The garnish'd brow--with "a few leaves of bay"--
The hair--"done Wiggy's way!"
And still one studious finger near thy brains,
As if thou wert just come
From editing some
New soup--or hashing Dibdin's cold remains;
Or, Orpheus-like,--fresh from thy dying strains
Of music,--Epping luxuries of sound,
As Milton says, "in many a bout
Of linked sweetness long drawn out,"
Whilst all thy tame stuff'd leopards listen'd round!
III.
Oh, rather thy whole proper length reveal,
Standing like Fortune,--on the jack--thy wheel.
(Thou art, like Fortune, full of chops and changes,
Thou hast a fillet too before thine eye!)
Scanning our kitchen, and our vocal ranges,
As tho' it were the same to sing or fry--
Nay, so it is--hear how Miss Paton's throat
Makes "fritters" of a note!
And how Tom Cook (Fryer and Singer born
By name and nature) oh! how night and morn
He for the nicest public taste doth dish up
The good things from that _Pan_ of music, Bishop!
And is not reading near akin to feeding,
Or why should _Oxford Sausages_ be fit
Receptacles for wit?
Or why should Cambridge put its little, smart,
Minc'd brains into a _Tart_?
Nay, then, thou wert but wise to frame receipts,
Book-treats,
Equally to instruct the Cook and cram her--
Receipts to be devour'd, as well as read,
The Culinary Art in gingerbread--
The Kitchen's _Eaten_ Grammar!
IV.
Oh, very pleasant is thy motley page--
Aye, very pleasant in its chatty vein--
So--in a kitchen--would have talk'd Montaigne,
That merry Gascon--humorist, and sage!
Let slender minds with single themes engage,
Like Mr. Bowles with his eternal Pope,--
Or Haydon on perpetual Haydon,--or
Hume on "Twice three make four,"
Or Lovelass upon Wills,--Thou goest on
Plaiting ten topics, like Tate Wilkinson!
Thy brain is like a rich Kaleidoscope,
Stuff'd with a brilliant medley of odd bits,
And ever shifting on from change to change,
Saucepans--old Songs--Pills--Spectacles--and Spits!
Thy range is wider than a Rumford Range!
Thy grasp a miracle!--till I recall
Th' indubitable cause of thy variety--
Thou art, of course, th' Epitome of all
That spying--frying--singing--mix'd Society
Of Scientific Friends, who used to meet
Welch Rabbits--and thyself--in Warren Street!
V.
Oh, hast thou still those Conversazioni,
Where learned visitors discoursed--and fed?
There came Belzoni,
Fresh from the ashes of Egyptian dead--
And gentle Poki--and that Royal Pair,
Of whom thou didst declare--
"Thanks to the greatest _Cooke_ we ever read--
They were--what _Sandwiches_ should be--half _bred_"!
There fam'd M'Adam from his manual toil
Relax'd--and freely own'd he took thy hints
On "making _Broth_ with _Flints_"--
There Parry came, and show'd thee polar oil
For melted butter--Combe with his medullary
Notions about the _Skullery_,
And Mr. Poole, too partial to a broil--
There witty Rogers came, that punning elf!
Who used to swear thy book
Would really look
A _Delphic_ "Oracle," if laid on _Delf_--
There, once a month, came Campbell and discuss'd
His own--and thy own--"_Magazine_ of _Taste_"--
There Wilberforce the Just
Came, in his old black suit, till once he trac'd
Thy sly advice to _Poachers_ of Black Folks,
That "do not break their _yolks_"--
Which huff'd him home, in grave disgust and haste!
VI.
There came John Clare, the poet, nor forbore
Thy _Patties_--thou wert hand-and-glove with Moore,
Who call'd thee "_Kitchen Addison_"--for why?
Thou givest rules for Health and Peptic Pills,
Forms for made dishes, and receipts for Wills,
"_Teaching us how to live and how to die_!"
There came thy Cousin-Cook, good Mrs. Fry--
There Trench, the Thames Projector, first brought on
His sine _Quay_ non,--
There Martin would drop in on Monday eves,
Or Fridays, from the pens, and raise his breath
'Gainst cattle days and death,--
Answer'd by Mellish, feeder of fat beeves,
Who swore that Frenchmen never could be eager
For fighting on soup meagre--
"And yet, (as thou would'st add,) the French have seen
A Marshall _Tureen_"!
VII.
Great was thy Evening Cluster!--often grac'd
With Dollond--Burgess--and Sir Humphry Davy!
'Twas there M'Dermot first inclin'd to Taste,--
There Colborn learn'd the art of making paste
For puffs--and Accum analyzed a gravy.
Colman--the Cutter of Coleman Street, 'tis said
Came there,--and Parkins with his Ex-wise-head,
(His claim to letters)--Kater, too, the Moon's
Crony,--and Graham, lofty on balloons,--
There Croly stalk'd with holy humor heated,
Who wrote a light-horse play, which Yates completed--
And Lady Morgan, that grinding organ,
And Brasbridge telling anecdotes of spoons,--
Madame Valbreque thrice honor'd thee, and came
With great Rossini, his own bow and fiddle,--
The Dibdins,--Tom, Charles, Frognall,--came with tuns
Of poor old books, old puns!
And even Irving spar'd a night from fame,--
And talk'd--till thou didst stop him in the middle,
To serve round _Tewah-diddle_!
VIII.
Then all the guests rose up, and sighed good-bye!
So let them:--thou thyself art still a _Host_!
Dibdin--Cornaro--Newton--Mrs. Fry!
Mrs. Glasse, Mr. Spec!--Lovelass--and Weber,
Matthews in Quot'em--Moore's fire-worshipping Gheber--
Thrice-worthy Worthy, seem by thee engross'd!
Howbeit the Peptic Cook still rules the roast,
Potent to hush all ventriloquial snarling,--
And ease the bosom pangs of indigestion!
Thou art, sans question,
The Corporation's love its Doctor _Darling_!
Look at the Civic Palate--nay, the Bed
Which set dear Mrs. Opie on supplying
Illustrations of _Lying_!
Ninety square feet of down from heel to head
It measured, and I dread
Was haunted by a terrible night _Mare_,
A monstrous burthen on the corporation!--
Look at the Bill of Fare for one day's share,
Sea-turtles by the score--Oxen by droves,
Geese, turkeys, by the flock--fishes and loaves
Countless, as when the Lilliputian nation
Was making up the huge man-mountain's ration!
IX.
Oh! worthy Doctor! surely thou hast driven
The squatting Demon from great Garratt's breast--
(His honor seems to rest!--)
And what is thy reward?--Hath London given
Thee public thanks for thy important service?
Alas! not even
The tokens it bestowed on Howe and Jervis!--
Yet could I speak as Orators should speak
Before the worshipful the Common Council
(Utter my bold bad grammar and pronounce ill,)
Thou should'st not miss thy Freedom, for a week,
Richly engross'd on vellum:--Reason urges
That he who rules our cookery--that he
Who edits soups and gravies, ought to be
A _Citizen_, where sauce can make a _Burgess_!
[The end]
Thomas Hood's poem: Ode To W. Kitchener, M.d.
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