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A German Speisekarte (Beim vollen Humpen zechen wir)

"Beim vollen Humpen zechen wir, wir kräftigen Germanen, Und trinken von dem edlen Bier wie weiland unsere Ahnen; Denn in dem edlen Gerstensaft, da sprudelt noch die alte Kraft." 1 Y the French the Germans are charged with having no cuisine that is worthy of the name, and having produced no poet of gastronomy or no work on the subject that merits serious attention. Dining at midday, and fond of Pumpernickel, what can they be but "barbarians," and how may they be expected to comprehend the finesse of an art which has been created for the elect among mankind? "Surely," argues 1 (In depths of Seidels tall we Germans find our power, As did in years agone our ancestors of yore; For in the noble barley-wine there lingers still a might divine.) De Quincey, "of the rabid animal who is caught dining at noonday, the homo ferus who affronts the meridian sun by his inhuman meals, we are entitled to say that he has a maw, but nothing resembling a stomach. A nation must be barbarous which dined in the morning." As with day's decline the sun illumes with fairest hues the western sky, and Nature gradually prepares for sleep by the restful hour of twilight, so it would seem that man, in like manner, after the cark and care of the day should refresh himself by the solace that waits upon the evening dinner and pleasant companionship ere he too retires for the slumbers that are to fit him for the exigencies of the morrow.