Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Glasse, Hannah
GLASSE, HANNAH (fl. 1747), was author of a popular treatise on cookery. The first edition is a thin folio, entitled ‘The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, which far exceeds any Thing of the kind ever yet Published. … By A Lady. London. Printed for the Author; and sold at Mrs. Ashburn's a China-Shop, the Corner of Fleet-Ditch, 1747.’ A list of nearly two hundred subscribers includes ‘Mrs. Glasse, Cary-Street,’ and ‘Mr. Glasse, Attorney at Law.’ In an address ‘To the reader’ the author declares, ‘I have attempted a Branch of Cookery which Nobody has yet thought worth their while to write upon,’ and continues: ‘If I have not wrote in the high polite Stile I hope I shall be forgiven; for my Intention is to instruct the lower Sort.’ The extravagance of French cooks is severely condemned. The volume has at the end ‘A certain Cure for the Bite of a Mad Dog, attributed to Dr. Mead.’ It became deservedly popular. In 1751 the fourth edition was issued in octavo. It contains a few pages of appendix, and has the autograph of H. Glasse engraved in facsimile across the title at the top of the beginning of the text. This autograph was printed in facsimile in the same place in subsequent editions. The ninth edition appeared in 1765, and many other editions succeeded. Mrs. Glasse was author also of ‘The Compleat Confectioner: or the Whole Art of Confectionary Made Plain and Easy, &c. &c. By H. Glasse, Author of the “Art of Cookery.”’ This is not dated, but is to be sold, like the ‘Art of Cookery,’ at ‘Mrs. Ashburner's China Shop.’ The introductory address, ‘To the Housekeepers of Great Britain and Ireland,’ has the facsimile autograph ‘H. Glasse,’ which is repeated at the beginning of the text as in the ‘Art of Cookery.’ The British Museum Catalogue suggests 1770 as its date of publication. Mrs. Glasse also published ‘The Servant's Directory, or Housekeeper's Companion,’ &c., London, 1770, 8vo. In the fourth edition of ‘The Art of Cookery,’ on the flyleaf opposite the title-page, is an elaborate advertisement in copperplate, announcing that Hannah Glasse is ‘Habit Maker to Her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales, in Tavistock Street, Covent Garden,’ &c. She may be identical with the ‘Hannah Glass of St. Paul's, Co. Garden, Warehouse-keeper,’ placed in the list of bankrupts for May 1754 in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ (xxiv. 244). A report is mentioned in Boswell's ‘Life of Johnson’ (1848, p. 592) that Mrs. Glasse's ‘Cookery’ was by Dr. John Hill, but the style of the book and the existence of the other works noted above are irreconcilable with this view. The attribution to Mrs. Glasse of the proverb ‘First catch your hare’ has occasioned some discussion. The proverb is not found in her ‘Art of Cookery,’ but her words ‘Take your hare when it is cased’ may have suggested it.
[Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. vi. 322, 444, viii. 206, xi. 264, 6th ser. xi. 90, 196; Brit. Mus. Cat. The Brit. Mus. copy of the Servant's Directory is unfortunately missing; Brewer's Dict. of Phrase and Fable.]