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THE population of
Old-world Scotland being thin and sparse, the means of sustenance were
on the whole plentiful. That was an exceptional household which, in the
Middle Ages, and later, could not boast
To haue guse, cok and hen,
Bread, drink and bedding to treat horse and men."
Starvation, or even the
mordant misery of hunger, was probably almost unknown, or the result of
years unwontedly calamitous. Even when seasons were exceptionally
unfavourable dearth was not so universal and all-pervading as to be
intolerable; and though a course of Southron rapine might cause a vast
amount of temporary suffering, it could hardly ruin the food resources
of an entire district. A partial failure of the harvest might occasion
some scarcity of bread, but probably what was affected was quality
rather than quantity. In any case the staple vegetable, kale, retained
its normal and luxurious greenness through all the atrocities of winter
weather. Also when whole tracts were beggared of sheep and kine
restitution was not impossible by means of a foray across the border;
and in any case there were the moorlands and the woods, which abounded
in game of many kinds, while the rivers and estuaries teemed unfailingly
with fish. By the beginning of the sixteenth century the whole nation
was not more than half a million strong ; and although the science of
agriculture was still in its infancy, it sufficed to meet such demands
as were made on it. One dearth, serious in some Parts of Scotland, did
occur in the fifteenth century, but it was not till the closing half of
the sixteenth century that famine years recurred with any frequency.
Even then much of the scarcity was due to the luxurious living of the
nobles, or a result of the broils and civil wars at the time of the
Reformation or in the reign of James VI The farmer in early times turned
his attention chiefly to the raising of oats, his sheep and cattle being
left almost wholly to their old ways and their own devices; but dairy
produce— milk, butter, cheese—was in general use from times the most
remote. Barley and wheaten bread were not uncommon at the tables of the
lords and barons, but from time immemorial oats was the grain affected
by the multitude; and even yet in Scotland a common synonym for it is
the generic term "corn."
At first, when the pinch
of poverty was not so sharp and flesh was cheaper and more abundant, the
grain was of less importance in itself, and the forms in which it
appeared were not so various; but oatcake was always the staple bread of
Scotland, in the Lowlands and Highlands both. "Of otes," according to
Bishop Lesley's "History of Scotland," "by the opinion of many is made
very gude bread, nocht tasteless, but with great labour, quilke all the
north part of England, and the greater part of Scotland use, and are
sustained upon commonly." In the north of England the oaten cake was
known as haver-bread, and the same name was also current in some parts
of Scotland. "O whaur did ye get that haver-meal baunock?" asked the
"silly auld body" of the ballad; and the answer was, "Between St.
Johnstone's (Perth)" and "Bonnie Dundee." Writing towards the close of
the sixteenth century, Fynes Moryson, as one illustration of the
rudeness of Scottish cookery, states that the Scots "vulgarly"
(commonly) ''eat hearth-cakes of oats." In Roman times the same
hearth-cakes of oats were the bread of the savage natives, who baked
them on stones round the fire. These stones the native Celts termed "greadeal."
They formed a ring round the fire, and hence the peculiar significance
of the word "girdle" in the Scots vocabulary. Froissart has a curious
reference to this ancient and indispensable utensil of the Scottish
housewife, and gives a picturesque illustration of its use by the
Scottish soldiers. Amid all their wanderings and adventures they
remained ever faithful to their native bread, and retained a tenderness
almost pathetic not for aqua vitae, but for oatmeal. It was the one
indispensable article of diet, and as they had no guarantee that they
would be able to beg, borrow, or steal it, they had to carry with them a
supply. According to Froissart, a man's acoutrements included a flat
plate at his saddle and a wallet of meal at his back, ''the purpose
whereof is this: Whereas a Scottish soldier hath eaten of flesh so long
that he begins to loathe the same, he casteth this plate into the fire,
he moisteneth a little of his meal in water, and when the plate is
heated he layeth his paste thereon and maketh a little cake the which he
eateth to comfort his stommach. Hence, our author infers with a notion
somewhat loose and inexact of the principles of ethnological or
physiological science, "it is no marvel that the Scots should be able to
make longer marches than other men." All the same, if we are to believe
the anonymous author of "Andrew and his Cutty Gun," oat-cakes might tend
to bring about a physical condition not altogether conducive to the
accomplishment of long marches. Says he of his heroine, ale-wife, or
what-not :-
The canine brought her
kebbuck ben
Wi' girdle-cakes well tosted broon.
Weel does the canny kimmer ken,
They gar the scuds gae glither doon."
And annotating these
stanzas—probably for the information of benighted Southrons - Burns
remarks that ''these oatmeal cakes are kneaded out with the knuckles and
toasted over the red embers of wood on a gridiron. They are remarkably
fine," he adds—presumably on the authority of frequent experience—"and a
delicate relish when eaten warm with ale. On winter nights the landlady
heats them and drops them into the quaigh to warm the ale." But if the
muse of Allan Ramsay does not lie, the principle was absolute, for a
pease scone might be substituted for the oaten cake
"Sae brawly did a
pease-scon toast
Biz i' the queff and flie the frost,
There we got fou wi' little cost
And muckle speed."
It is possible that
bannocks or scones— be they of wheat, or bere, or barley, or pease, or
"mixed" meals—may point to the existence of a less primitive kitchen but
they must nevertheless he reckoned as essentially Scottish. The
differences in the methods of baking and firing are mere adaptations of
old modes to the peculiarities of new materials. Pease bread was very
anciently in use, but probably was only partaken of by the poorest, or
from dire necessity. Thus in the "Lamentations of Lady Scotland,"
written in 1572 during the siege of the Castle of Edinburgh, the
extremity of destitution is indicated in the line-
"And glaid to get Peis
breid and watter caill."
Shortbread—"Scotch cake,"
as it is called in South Britain —is probably the triumph of Scottish
baking on the old national lines. It may have been the invention of some
professional Scotch cook or baker, but he must at least have been
thoroughly imbued with the old Scots house-hold notions in regard to the
"staff of life." It is probably entitled to the place of honour among
the breads of Britain, if regard be had to the cheapness and simplicity
of its materials, its pleasant sweetness, and its wholesomeness and
digestibility in comparison to other sugared cates.
Among Scottish household
breads neither the wheaten loaf nor any form of wheaten bread was ever
included. These were (and still are) known as ''baker's bread," and were
only to be had in the principal towns. It was enacted that sixteen
ounces of fine bread (doubtless the wheaten loaf) should be supplied to
Queen Mary's attendants for four pennies Scots during her visit to
.Jedburgh in 1566; but even in cities, according to Fynes Moryson,
wheaten bread was bought, at the close of the sixteenth century, chiefly
by ''gentlemen, courtiers, and the best kind of citizens." The records
of the burgh of Aberdeen contain a curious enactment made on the 8th of
October, 1656, forbidding, probably in the interests of the professional
baker, oat-cakes to be baked or sold within the burgh, but probably, in
this instance at least, Aberdeen was in advance of other towns in
Scotland. As regards the country districts, the wheaten loaf so late as
1750 was rarely seen on the tables even of the richer classes.
"Though wheaten bread,"
says Dr. Somerville, "was partly used, yet cakes or bannocks of barley
and pease meal formed the principal household bread in gentlemen's
families; and in those of the middle class on ordinary occasions no
other kind of bread was ever thought of." And thus, when railways were
unknown and means of communication difficult in Scotland through, there
prevailed a curious difference between town and country in respect of
the bread in general use. Not more than fifty years back ''loaf-bread"
was still a luxury in certain districts, and the staple was as yet cakes
or bannocks of oats or pease for the poorer classes, bannocks of
barley-meal being used at the wealthier tables, and for special
occasions at the tables of the poor. Thus a correspondent of Fergusson
the poet promises to treat him, among other dainties "wi' bannocks o'
gude barley-meal."
In the beginning the
professional baker in the towns may possibly have borrowed his methods
from the French. At any rate, being patronised chiefly by the nobles and
the wealthier burghers, he was accustomed to use the very best
materials, and he rejoiced in every encouragement to devote himself to
the perfection of his methods. Edinburgh was doubtless the cradle of the
craft; and if you want to beat the Edinburgh baker you must go—not to
London, but—to Paris or Vienna. It is true that, with the accession of
James VI. to the English throne, London was invaded by a host of bakers,
among other tradesmen, from the north; but possibly the native
shrewdness soon perceived that to catch the obtuse, uneducated English
palate, it was as unnecessary to deal with the "finest of the wheat" as
to seek to excel in the art of baking. At any rate their incursion has
failed to raise the average standard of excellence of the London loaf,
which is probably the worst of any capital in Europe. |
