n presses made for the nonce. Certes
these two are very common in Sussex, Kent, Worcester, and other steeds
where these sorts of fruit do abound, howbeit they are not their only
drink at all times, but referred unto the delicate sorts of drink, as
metheglin is in Wales, whereof the Welshmen make no less account (and
not without cause, if it be well handled) than the Greeks did of their
ambrosia or nectar, which for the pleasantness thereof was supposed to
be such as the gods themselves did delight in. There is a kind of
swish-swash made also in Essex, and divers other places, with
honeycombs and water, which the homely country wives, putting some
pepper and a little other spice among, call mead, very good in mine
opinion for such as love to be loose bodied at large, or a little
eased of the cough. Otherwise it differeth so much from the true
metheglin as chalk from cheese. Truly it is nothing else but the
washing of the combs, when the honey is wrung out, and one of the best
things that I know belonging thereto is that they spend but little
labour, and less cost, in making of the same, and therefore no great
loss if it were never occupied. Hitherto of the diet of my countrymen,
and somewhat more at large peradventure than many men will like of,
wherefore I think good now to finish this tractation, and so will I
when I have added a few other things incident unto that which goeth
before, whereby the whole process of the same shall fully be
delivered, and my promise to my friend[5] in this behalf performed.

[5] Holinshed. This occurs in the last of Harrison's prefatory
matter.--W.

Heretofore there hath been much more time spent in eating and
drinking than commonly is in these days; for whereas of old we had
breakfast in the forenoon, beverages or nunchions[6] after dinner,
and thereto rear suppers generally when it was time to go to rest (a
toy brought into England by hardy Canutus, and a custom whereof
Athenaeus also speaketh, lib. 1, albeit Hippocrates speaks but of
twice at the most, lib. 2, _De rat vict. in feb ac_). Now, these odd
repasts--thanked be God!--are very well left, and each one in manner
(except here and there some young, hungry stomach that cannot fast
till dinner-time) contenteth himself with dinner and supper only. The
Normans, misliking the gormandise of Canutus, ordained after their
arrival that no table should be covered above once in the day, which
Huntingdon imputeth to their avarice