ere in equal
repute according to the season. The _bec-figue_, a small bird like a
nightingale, was so much esteemed in Provence that there were feasts at
which that bird alone was served, prepared in various ways; but of all
birds used for the table none could be compared to the young cuckoo taken
just as it was full fledged.

As far as we can ascertain, the Gauls had a dislike to the flesh of
rabbits, and they did not even hunt them, for according to Strabo,
Southern Gaul was infested with these mischievous animals, which destroyed
the growing crops, and even the barks of the trees. There was considerable
change in this respect a few centuries later, for every one in town or
country reared domesticated rabbits, and the wild ones formed an article
of food which was much in request. In order to ascertain whether a rabbit
is young, Strabo tells us we should feel the first joint of the fore-leg,
when we shall find a small bone free and movable. This method is adopted
in all kitchens in the present day. Hares were preferred to rabbits,
provided they were young; for an old French proverb says, "An old hare and
an old goose are food for the devil."

[Illustration: Fig. 96.--"The way to skin and cut up a Stag."--Fac-simile
of a Miniature of "Phoebus, and his Staff for hunting Wild Animals"
(Manuscript of the Fifteenth Century, National Library of Paris).]

The hedgehog and squirrel were also eaten. As for roe and red deer, they
were, according to Dr. Bruyerin Ohampier, morsels fit for kings and rich
people (Fig. 96). The doctor speaks of "fried slices of the young horn of
the stag" as the daintiest of food, and the "Menagier de Paris" shows how,
as early as the fourteenth century, beef was dished up like bear's-flesh
venison, for the use of kitchens in countries where the black bear did not
exist. This proves that bear's flesh was in those days considered good
food.

Milk, Butter, Eggs, and Cheese.--These articles of food, the first which
nature gave to man, were not always and everywhere uniformly permitted or
prohibited by the Church on fast days. The faithful were for several
centuries left to their own judgment on the subject. In fact, there is
nothing extraordinary in eggs being eaten in Lent without scruple,
considering that some theologians maintained that the hens which laid them
were animals of aquatic extraction.

It appears, however, that butter, either from prejudice or mere custom,
was only used on fast days