Dantzic
Not much of a town for beauty, but it has one great title to fame in the world of art: it has produced the liqueur which is the most beautiful of all to look at-gold-water, a bright colourless liquid like water, with chips of gold-leaf floating in it. Unfortunately, as made in Dantzic this beautiful drink is somewhat fiery, and ladies, who in general love the liqueurs, rarely touch it, preferring the sweeter and softer imitations made in Amsterdam and elsewhere. The fact is, that though the liqueur is nearly always to-day associated with the name of Dantzic, it is of Italian origin, and is perhaps the oldest extant liqueur in Europe. The Italians brought it into France in the time of Catherine de Medici. See Acqua d'Oro.
DARIOLE is one of the most interesting words in the Dariole English language, and it is a pity to see it going out of use because it is not understood. It is much more used in France than in England, but the French authorities declare that it is a perfect mystery to them-its origin utterly unknown. In England it seems to be regarded as a new-fangled French name for a cheesecake, and too foreign as well as too new for common use. It is in fact one of the oldest words in the English language, and is frequently to be found in the cookery books of Chaucer's time. It means as nearly as possible a maid of honour; and it is curious to imagine how the word dariole should survive for more than five centuries in a kind of lost language, its meaning unknown, and how it should turn up on Richmond Hill correctly translated into maid of honour. The clue to the meaning of the word is given by Junius under the word dairy, the first syllable of which he declares to be identical with the first syllable of Dariole. Now we get puzzled, and have to ask, What is the first syllable, and how do we account for the succeeding ones? All the information given by Junius is that a dairy means a milk-house, and that a dariole means something made of milk. There we are left hanging in the air, and have to find solid earth for ourselves. at It is well known that in the West of England a dairy is or was till lately called a dey-house; and it has been supposed that dey must mean milk. Even those who see in the word a different meaning-namely, maid-confess that through some links which have not clearly been traced out it may have some connection with Swedish and Danish words which mean suckling, as well as with the English dug which yields the milk. That however is obscure, and we may dismiss it to dwell upon what is clear.
We are dealing with one of the most venerable words in human speech, which has been singularly preserved in languages far apart. The English child born in India has Dariole a nurse called a da'i. Some who read this page may remember Mrs. Sherwood's nursery tale of Lucy and her Daye. If any one will look into Shakespear's Hindustani dictionary he will see that while in one dialect this word means a nursemaid, in another it means more generally a maidservant. In the Northern dialects of Europe-in Swedish, in Danish, in Icelandic-it will be found that the cognate word means sometimes generally a maid, sometimes more particularly a milkmaid or a nursemaid. In the Scotch dialect a dey is a milkmaid. In old English the word meant either a maid or a milkmaid. In the wide sense of maid or woman it remains to this hour in the second syllable of la-dy-the bread-maid. How the same word should mean properly a maid, and yet in some cases should be applied particularly now to a milkmaid and now to a nurse, will be apparent in the history of another word-say groom, which means a young man, a lad, and is recognised as such in bridegroom, but which is also applied specially to a stable-lad, on board ship to a cabin-boy (grommet), and in French to a winemerchant's man (gourmet). A dairy or deyry is the place for the deys or maids, as faery is the place of the fays and eyrie is the nest for the eggs.
Let us now return to Dariole, which Junius identifies with dairy, and declares to mean something made of milklaitiron. As a matter of fact it is made of milk-it is a cheesecake; but this is not necessarily expressed in the word. The root is da or dey, a maid-the final syllable of lady. And what is the rest of the word? The old spelling is Daryol or Daryal, and it means Da-royal, a maid of honour. If any one should be surprised at the application in those early times of so fanciful a name to a cheesecake, he has only to look into any cookery book of the period that of Chaucer and he will find in close proximity to Maids of honour, a Douce âme, which is after all but a stewed fowl.
Dariole There is a curious fact about this word which has yet to be explained, and which raises it into something like a literary landmark. The French have a word Dariolette, the name for a lady's maid, and they profess to derive it from the lady's maid of the Princess Elisene in the romance of Amadis of Gaul, who was called Dariolette. Now this romance, which was spared from the flames by the licentiate in Don Quixote, is generally considered as of either Spanish or Portuguese origin. Southey insists on the Portuguese knight Vasco Lobeira, who died 1403, being its author. How came from the pen of a Portuguese writer the Anglo-Norman word Dariolette? A French writer, the Comte de Tressan, has attempted to prove that the romance was originally written in French, that it was translated from the French into Portuguese, and thence into Castilian, in which language we have the oldest version that remains to us. He has not proved his point, and Southey ridicules his theory. It is quite certain that the Comte de Tressan attempted to prove too much; but, on the other hand, permit us to quote from what we have written elsewhere. "Southey has not allowed weight enough to the fact that the Amadis of Gaul is the first work of romance which appeared in the Portuguese and Castilian languages; that it was preceded for more than a century by other romances of Anglo-Norman origin; and that in its idea, in the character of its incidents, and in much of its geography, it belongs to the world of Anglo- Norman romance. What though we cannot lay our hands. on the French original from which Lobeira translated, any more than we can lay our hands on Lobeira's own work from which the Castilian version has been made? We still know that all the ideas and materials, all the design, all the machinery of Amadis of Gaul, belong to the Anglo- Norman cycle of romance which was in vogue before Lobeira was born." To this it is now to be added, that here is the name Darioleta of the Castilian or Portuguese Dauphiness romance, borrowed directly from the Anglo-Norman dialect to be the proper name for the Princess Elisene's maid of honour.
The old receipt for the Dariole is as follows. It bears the date of 1381. All the words are given here in modern spelling. "Take cream of almonds or of cowmilk, and beat them well together; and make small coffins [that is, cases of pastry], and do it [put it] therein; and do [put] thereto sugar and good powders. Or take good fat cheese and eggs and make them of divers colours, green, red or yellow, and bake them or serve them forth." Modern receipt.-Put into a spouted basin two tablespoonfuls of flour, two of sifted sugar, one-and-a-half of melted butter, one whole egg, three yolks of eggs, a pinch of salt, and whatever flavouring, of almonds or lemons, orange, vanilla or coffee, may be liked best. Mix these well together and then add to them a tumblerful of cream. When the batter is ready pour it into pattypans which have been lined with light puff paste, and top them with candied orange-flowers; place the pattypans upon a baking-sheet and set them in a quiet oven. When the darioles are ready they are lightly strewed with sugar and served hot.
There is an immense consumption of these in Paris. In 1856 there were 128 darioleurs and darioleuses-that is, makers of darioles, who hawked them about, using up annually 3,000,000 lbs. of flour.
DAUPHINESS-Beignets à la Dauphine. This is a French name given to a German invention, -the Dauphiness being Marie Antoinette. Throughout Germany they are known as Berliner Pfannkuchen; throughout Austria as Wiener Krapfen. In plain English they are Brioche Fritters, and will be found among the Fritters, No. 6.
DEVONSHIRE-famous for its butter, its cream, its cider, and its pie. The butter is the best English butter that comes Devils into London; but it is not so good as that of Brittany, Normandy, and Ostend. The clubs are chiefly supplied with Ostend butter. The cream, called clotted cream, is the richest cream there is, short of butter. New milk is strained into shallow metal pans, which after standing for twelve hours are passed on to a hot plate with a fire below, to heat the milk to scalding without boiling or even simmering it. The pans are then carried back to the dairy, allowed to stand for another twelve hours, and the cream is drained off. This is Devonshire or clotted cream. Devonshire cider is simply the finest in the world. Devonshire pie, called also Squab pie, is made of Devonshire apples and of Devonshire (that is Dartmoor) mutton, or else of pork. See Irish Stew.