28
THE FLOWING BOWL
draw it into bottles. Be sure that 'tis fine when
'tis bottled ; after 'tis bottled six weeks 'tis fit to
drink.
Fancy drinking Mead with your soup !
Morat was made of honey flavoured with
mulberry juice ; and Pigment—which might be
drunk at the Royal Academy banquets—was a
sweet and rich liquor evolved from highly-spiced
wine flavoured with honey.
Metheglin
was also called Hydromel and Oinomel. " The
best Receipt whereof," writes an authority, " that
I have observed to be made by them is thus :
They take rasberries which grow in those parts
{i.e. Swedeland, Muscovia, Russia, and as far as the
Caspian Sea) and put them into fair water for two
or three nights (I suppose they bruise them firstl
that the water may extract their taste and colour
Into this water they put of the purest honey, in
proportion about one pound of honey to three or
four ofwater. Then to give it a fermentation they
put a tost into it dipp'd in the dregs or grounds of
beer, which when it hath set the metheglin at work
they take out again, to prevent any ill savour it may
give ; if they desire to ferment it long they set it in
a warm place ; which when they please to hinder or
stop, they remove it into a cool place ; after it hath
done fermenting they draw it off the lee for present
use ; to add to its excellency they hang in it a little
bagg, wherein is cinnamon, grains of paradise, and a
few cloves.
This may do very well for present
drinking. But if you would make your metheglin
of the same ingredients, and to be kept (time melior-