William of Malmesbury particularly dwells on the broad line of distinction still existing between the southern English and the folk of the more northerly districts in his day, twelve hundred years after the visit of Caesar. He says that they were then (about A.D. 1150) as different as if they had been different races; and so in fact they were — different in their origin, in their language, and their diet.

In his “Folk-lore¹ Relics² of Early Village Life,” 1883, Mr. Gomme devotes a chapter to “Early Domestic Customs,” and quotes Henry’s “History of Great Britain” for a highly curious clue to the primitive³ mode of dressing⁴ food, and partaking of it, among the Britons. Among the Anglo-Saxons the choice of poultry⁵ and game was fairly wide. Alexander Neckani, in his “Treatise on Utensils⁶ (twelfth century)” gives fowls⁸, cocks, peacocks, the cock of the wood (the woodcock, not the capercailzie), thrushes, pheasants, and several more; and pigeons were only too plentiful⁹. The hare and the rabbit were well enough known, and with the leveret form part of an enumeration¹⁰ of wild animals (animalium ferarum) in a pictorial¹¹ vocabulary of the fifteenth century. But in the very early accounts or lists, although they must have soon been brought into requisition, they are not specifically cited as current dishes. How far this is attributable to the alleged¹²

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