[Illustration:  Fig. 95.—­State Banquet.—­Serving the Peacock.—­Fac-simile of a Woodcut in an edition of Virgil, folio, published at Lyons in 1517.]

Game.—­Our forefathers included among the birds which now constitute feathered game the heron, the crane, the crow, the swan, the stork, the cormorant, and the bittern.  These supplied the best tables, especially the first three, which were looked upon as exquisite food, fit even for royalty, and were reckoned as thorough French delicacies.  There were at that time heronries, as at a later period there were pheasantries.  People also ate birds of prey, and only rejected those which fed on carrion.

Swans, which were much appreciated, were very common on all the principal rivers of France, especially in the north; a small island below Paris had taken its name from these birds, and has maintained it ever since.  It was proverbially said that the Charente was bordered with swans, and for this same reason Valenciennes was called Val des Cygnes, or the Swan Valley.

Some authors make it appear that for a long time young game was avoided owing to the little nourishment it contained and its indigestibility, and assert that it was only when some French ambassadors returned from Venice that the French learnt that young partridges and leverets were exquisite, and quite fit to appear at the most sumptuous banquets.  The “Menagier” gives not only various receipts for cooking them, but also for dressing chickens, when game was out of season, so as to make them taste like young partridges.

There was a time when they fattened pheasants as they did capons; it was a secret, says Liebault, only known to the poultry dealers; but although they were much appreciated, the pullet was more so, and realised as much as two crowns each (this does not mean the gold crown, but a current coin worth three livres).  Plovers, which sometimes came from Beauce in cart-loads, were much relished; they were roasted without being drawn, as also were turtle-doves and larks; “for,” says an ancient author, “larks only eat small pebbles and sand, doves grains of juniper and scented herbs, and plovers feed on air.”  At a later period the same honour was conferred on woodcocks.

Thrushes, starlings, blackbirds, quail, and partridges were 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.