Page:A History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments in England During the Middle Ages.djvu/444

 424 Hiftory of Domejiic Manners this period, the EngHfli merchants and burghers in general feem to have kept very good tables, and that the lovi^er orders, and even the peafantry, appear to have been by no means ill fed. The confufion in ferving at table defcribed by Alexander Barclay was no doubt caufed in a great meafure by the numerous troops of riotous and unruly ferving men and followers, who were kept by the noblemen and greater land-holders, and who formed everywhere one of the curfes of fociety. Within the houfehold, they had become fo unmanageable that their maflers made vain attempts to regulate them ; while abroad they were continually engaged in quarrels, often fanguinary ones, with coun- trymen or townfmen, or with the retainers of other noblemen or gentle- men, in which their mafters confidered that it concerned their credit to fupport and protect them, lb that the quarrels of the fervants became fometimes feuds between their lords. The old writers, of all defcriptions, bear witnefs to the bad conduft of lerving men and fervants in general, and to their riotoufnels, and efpecially of the garqons, or, as they were called in Englifli, " lads." Cain's garcio, in the " Towneley Myfteries," was intended as a pifture of this clafs, in all their coarfenefs and vulgarity 5 and the chara6ter of Jak Garcio, in the play of "The Shepherds," in the fame colle6tion, is another type of them. We have feen that the breakfall: in the houfehold of the Percys was a very fubftantial meal, but it feems not to have been generally confidered a regular meal, either as to what was eaten at it, or as to the hour at ^^ hich it was taken. Perhaps this was left to the convenience, or caprice, ot individuals.* AVe have a curious defcription of the divifion of the occu- pations of the day in a princely houfehold, in an account which has been left To of the houfehold regulations of the duchefs of York, mother of king Ldward IV., which, however, were ftrongly influenced by the pious charafter of that princefs, who fpent much time in religious duties and (printed in 1541), recommends that breakfast should be taken about four hours before diniu-r, considering it therefore as a light meal, and he advises, in a sanitary view, that not less than six hours should be allowed to elapse between dinner and supper. obfervances.
 * At a rather later period, sir Thomas Elyot, in his " Castell of Helth "