and cherry and raspberry waters, all of which were refreshing, and were principally used in summer; and, lastly, tisane, sold by the confectioners of Paris, and made hot or cold, with prepared barley, dried grapes, plums, dates, gum, or liquorice.  This tisane may be considered as the origin of that drink which is now sold to the poor at a sous a glass, and which most assuredly has not much improved since olden times.

It was about the thirteenth century that brandy first became known in France; but it does not appear that it was recognised as a liqueur before the sixteenth.  The celebrated physician Arnauld de Villeneuve, who wrote at the end of the thirteenth century, to whom credit has wrongly been given for inventing brandy, employed it as one of his remedies, and thus expresses himself about it:  “Who would have believed that we could have derived from wine a liquor which neither resembles it in nature, colour, or effect?....  This eau de vin is called by some eau de vie, and justly so, since it prolongs life....  It prolongs health, dissipates superfluous matters, revives the spirits, and preserves youth.  Alone, or added to some other proper remedy, it cures colic, dropsy, paralysis, ague, gravel, &c.”

At a period when so many doctors, alchemists, and other learned men made it their principal occupation to try to discover that marvellous golden fluid which was to free the human race of all its original infirmities, the discovery of such an elixir could not fail to attract the attention of all such manufacturers of panaceas.  It was, therefore, under the name of eau d’or (aqua auri) that brandy first became known to the world; a name improperly given to it, implying as it did that it was of mineral origin, whereas its beautiful golden colour was caused by the addition of spices.  At a later period, when it lost its repute as a medicine, they actually sprinkled it with pure gold leaves, and at the same time that it ceased to be exclusively considered as a remedy, it became a favourite beverage.  It was also employed in distilleries, especially as the basis of various strengthening and exciting liqueurs, most of which have descended to us, some coming from monasteries and others from chateaux, where they had been manufactured.

The Kitchen.

Soups, broths, and stews, &c.—­The French word potage must originally have signified a soup composed of vegetables and herbs from the kitchen garden, but from the remotest times it was applied to soups in general.

As the Gauls, according to Athenaeus, generally ate their meat boiled, we must presume that they made soup with the water in which it was cooked.  It is related that one day Gregory of Tours was sitting at the table of King Chilperic, when the latter offered him a soup specially made in his honour from chicken.  The poems of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries mention soups made of peas, of bacon, of vegetables, and of groats.  In the southern provinces there were soups made of almonds, and of olive oil.  When Du Gueselin went out to fight the English knight William of Blancbourg in single combat, he first ate three sorts of soup made with wine, “in honour of the three persons in the Holy Trinity.”