Luxury - Gluttony: Two of the Seven Cardinal Sins

"Holland.— Anisette, 1821; Curacao red, 1805; White Curacao, 1820; Genievre, 1799.

"Italy.— Lacryma Christi, 1803; Imola, 1819.

"Greece.— Chypre, 1801; Samos, 1813.

"Ionian Islands.— Marasquin de Zara.

"Spain.— Val de Penas, 1812; Xeres dry, 1809; Sweet Xeres, 1810; Escatelle, 1824; Tintilla de Rota, 1823; Malaga, 1799.

"Portugal.— Po, 1778.

"Island of Madeira.— Madeira, 1810; having made three voyages from the Indies.

"Cape of Good Hope.— Red and white and pale wines, 1826."

While Dom Diégo was looking on with profound interest, Doctor Gasterini said to his nephew:

"My boy, do you recollect the price at which some celebrated wine-cellars have been sold?"

"Yes, dear uncle," replied Michel, "the Duke of Sussex owned a wine-cellar which was sold for two hundred and eighty thousand francs; Lafitte's wine-cellar sold in Paris for nearly one hundred thousand francs; the one belonging to Lagillière, also in Paris, was sold for sixty thousand francs."

"Well, well, Dom Diégo," said Doctor Gasterini to his guest, "what do you think of it? Do you believe all this to be an abomination, as that wag Abbé Ledoux, who is observing us now with such a deceitful countenance, declares? Do you think the passion, which promotes an industry of such importance, deserves to be anathematised only? Think of the expenditure of labour in their transport and preservation that these wine-cellars must have cost. How many people have lived on the money they represent?"

"I think," said the canon, "that I was blind and stupid never to have comprehended, until now, the immense social, political, and industrial influence I have wielded by eating and drinking the choicest viands and wines. I think now that the consciousness of accomplishing a mission to the world in giving myself up to unbridled gluttony, will be a delicious aperient for my appetite, — a consciousness which I owe to you, and to you only, doctor. Oh, noble thinker! Oh, grand philosophy!"

"This is the science of gastronomy carried to insanity," said Abbé Ledoux. "It is a new paganism."

"My Lord Diégo," continued the doctor, "we will speak of the gratitude which you think you owe me, when we have taken a view of this last shop. Here is an industry which surpasses in importance all of which we have been speaking. The question is a grave one, for it turns the scale of gluttony's influence upon the equilibrium of Europe."

"The equilibrium of Europe!" said the canon, more and more dismayed. "What has eating to do with the equilibrium of Europe?"

"Go on, go on, Dom Diégo," said Abbé Ledoux, shrugging his shoulders, "if you listen to this tempter, he will prove to you things still more astonishing."

"I am going to prove, my dear abbé, both to you and to Dom Diégo, that I advance nothing but what is strictly true. And, first, you will confess, will you not, that the marine service of a nation like France has great weight in the balance of the destinies of Europe?"

"Certainly," said the canon.

"Well, what follows?" said the abbé.

"Now," pursued the doctor, "you will agree with me, that as this military marine service is strengthened or enfeebled, France gains or loses in the same proportion?"

"Evidently," said the canon.

"Conclude your argument," cried the abbé, "that is what I am waiting for."

"I will conclude then, my dear abbé, by saying that the more progress gluttony makes, the more accessible it becomes to the greatest number, the more will the military marine of France gain in strength and in influence, and that, my Lord Dom Diégo, I am going to demonstrate to you by begging you to read that sign."

And just above the door of this last stall, the only one not occupied by a niece or nephew of Doctor Gasterini, were the words "Colonial Provisions."

"Colonial provisions," repeated the canon aloud, looking at the physician with an interrogating air, while the abbé, more discerning, bit his lips with vexation.

"Do I need to tell you, lord canon," pursued the doctor, "that without colonies, we would have no merchant service, and without a merchant service, no navy for war, since the navy is recruited from the seamen in the merchant service? Well, if the lovers of good eating did not consume all the delicacies which you see exhibited here in small samples, — sugar, coffee, vanilla, cloves, cinnamon, ginger, rice, pistachios, Cayenne pepper, nutmeg, liquors from the islands, hachars from the Indies, what, I ask you, would become of our colonies, that is to say, our maritime power?"

"I am amazed," cried the canon, "I am dizzy; at each step I feel myself expand a hundred cubits."

"And, zounds! you are right, lord Dom Diégo," said the doctor, "for indeed, when, after having tasted at dessert a cheese frozen with vanilla, to which will succeed a glass of wine from Constance or the Cape, you take a cup of coffee, and conclude of course with one or two little glasses of liquor from the islands, flavoured with cloves or cinnamon, ah, well, you will further heroically the maritime power of France, and do in your sphere as much for the navy as the sailor or the captain. And speaking of captains, lord canon," added the doctor, sadly, "I wish you to observe that among all the shops we have seen, this one alone is empty, because the captain of the ship which has brought all these choice provisions from the Indies and the colonies dares not show himself, while he is under the cloud of your vengeance. I mean, canon, my poor nephew, Captain Horace. He alone has failed to come, to-day, to this family feast."

"Ah, the accursed serpent!" muttered the abbé, "how adroitly he goes to his aim; how well he knows how to wind this miserable brute, Dom Diégo, around his finger."

At the name of Captain Horace, the canon started, then relapsed into thoughtful silence.

CHAPTER XIV

Canon Dom Diégo, after a few moments' silence, extended his fat hand to Doctor Gasterini, and, trembling with emotion, said:

"Doctor, Captain Horace cost me my appetite; you have restored it to me, I hope, for the remainder of my life; and much more, you have, according to your promise, proven to me, not by specious reasoning, but by facts and figures, that the gourmand, as you have declared with so much wisdom, accomplishes a high social and political mission in the civilised world; you have delivered me from the pangs of remorse by giving me a knowledge of the noble task that my epicureanism may perform, and in this sacred duty, doctor, I will not fail. So, in gratitude to you, in appreciation of you, I hope to acquit myself modestly by declaring to you that, not only shall I refuse to enter a complaint against your nephew, Captain Horace, but I cordially bestow upon him the hand of my niece in marriage."

"As I told you, canon," said the abbé, "I was very sure that once this diabolical doctor had you in his clutches, he would do with you all that he desired. Where now are the beautiful resolutions you made this morning?"

"Abbé," replied Dom Diégo, in a self-sufficient tone, "I am not a child; I shall know how to stand at the height of the rôle the doctor has marked out for me."

Then turning to the doctor, he added:

"You can instruct me, sir, what to write; a reliable person will take my letter, and go immediately in your carriage to the convent for my niece, and conduct her to this house."

"Lord Dom Diégo," replied the doctor, "you assure the happiness of our two children, the joy of my declining days, and consequently your satisfaction and pleasure in the indulgence of your appetite, for I shall keep my word; I will make you dine every day better than I made you breakfast the other morning. A wing of this house will henceforth be at your disposal; you will do me the honour of eating at my table, and you see that, after the professions I have chosen for my nieces and nephews, — with the knowledge and taste of an epicure, as I have told you, — my larder and my wine-cellar will be always marvellously well appointed and supplied. I am growing old, I have need of a staff in my old age. Horace and his wife shall never leave me. I shall confide to them the collection of my culinary traditions, that they may transmit them from generation to generation; we shall all live together, and we shall enjoy in turn the practice and philosophy of gluttony, my lord canon."

"Doctor, I set my foot upon the very threshold of paradise!" cried the canon. "Ah, Providence is merciful, it loads a poor sinner like myself with blessings!"

"Heresy! blasphemy! impiety!" cried Abbé Ledoux. "You will be damned, thrice damned, as will be your tempter!"

"Come now, dear abbé," replied the doctor, "none of your tricks. Confess at once that I have convinced you by my reasoning."

"I! I am convinced!"

"Certainly, because I defy you — you and all like you, past, present, or future — to get out of this dilemma."

"Let us hear the dilemma."

"If gluttony is a monstrosity, then frugality pushed to the extreme ought to be a virtue."

"Certainly," answered the abbé.

"Then, my dear abbé, the more frugal a man is, according to your theory, the more deserving is he."

"Evidently, doctor."

"So the man who lives on uncooked roots, and drinks water only for the purpose of self-mortification, would be the type and model of a virtuous man."