Meals. No flesh which had ever walked about upon four feet was dressed in the cloister kitchen or served in the cloister refectory. But fowls were eaten, and eggs were a staple of monastic diet. The monks had wine and beer for drink, according to the custom of the country. In the book of signs—DeSignis—which shows how the monks of Ely indicated their wishes at the silent table, four gestures are set down to mean beer: signifying good beer, bona servisia, small beer, mediocris sermsia, smaller beer, debilis servisia, and a very common beer called skagmen. In the "Mirroure of Our Ladye," the sister of Sion House who desired an apple was directed to "put thy thumb in thy fist, and close thy hand, and move afore thee to and fro"; for milk, "drawthy left little finger in the manner of milking"; for mustard, "hold thy nose in the upper part of thy right fist, and rub it"; for salt, "philip with thy right thumb and his forefinger over the left thumb";
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