The two Dedications with which he ushers in the results of his "fifty years experience," are curious as well for the information they give concerning the Gourmands of that age, as for the humorous importance which he ascribes to the science of the kitchen. The first displays his gratitude
"To the Right Honourable my Lord Lumley, and my Lord Lovelace, and to the Right Worshipful Sir William Paston, Sir Kenelme Digby, and Sir Frederick Cornwallis, so well known to the Nation for their admired hospitalities.
"Right Honourable and Right Worshipful, He is an alien, a meer stranger to England that hath not been acquainted with your generous house-keepings: for my own part, my more particular tyes of service to you, my honoured Lords, have built me up to the height of this experience, for which this book now at last dares appear to the world: those times which I attended upon your Ho-
