“And thou took'st them in so kindly, little was there then to blame, To thy parched and panting palate sweet as mother's milk they came. Did the hams of old Virginny find no favour in thine eyes? Came no soft compunction o'er thee at the thought of pumpkin pies? Could not all our chicken fixings into silence fix thy scorn? Did not all our cakes rebuke thee, Johnny, waffle, dander, corn?”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
Cut up and parboil a tender young chicken—a year old is best. Line a deep dish with a good pie-crust. Cut some thin slices of cold boiled ham, and spread a layer next the crust; then arrange pieces of the fowl upon the ham. Cover this, in turn, with slices of hard-boiled eggs, buttered and peppered. Proceed in this order until your materials are used up. Then pour in enough veal or chicken gravy to prevent dryness. Unless you have put in too much water for the size of the fowl, the liquor in which the chicken was boiled is best for this purpose. Bake one hour and a quarter for a large pie.
Sources: The passage is from Theodore Martin, The Book of Ballads: Eleventh Edition, 1870, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Harland, Common Sense in the Household of 1871, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — oxblood cloth, boar stamp.