Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-08-14
QUEER rAcrs ABOUT FORKS.

By Harriet Prescott Spofford.
The children no use their silver forks
as naturally as they do their silver spoons
us naturally as they do their knives,
their plates, as il they were something
that had always been in existence, Wouiu
possibly be surprised II they knew no"
very recently forks had been used at all
and that they we're part OF the house,
keeping of great dignitaries, so-calIeu,
before they reached the common people,
and that as lately rs their grand
fathers day what forks were used at all
were made of steel with two ''tines,
third tine being later piece of richness.
When forks were first introduced at
English tables they excited great deal
of ridicuIe: it. was thought finical piece
of business and great affectatiou to use
them, and they afforded opportunity for
sarcasm in the plays used just before
Shakespeare. Peoples fingers were
thought good enough for the work done
by these innovators, and folks were
sneered at as If they were made
for the saving of napkins. II was
in the time of Shakespeare 8
grandfather, indeed, that wooden
spoons were changed to silver ones
among others than the higher gentry.
Yet the English had s0me idea of nice
customs at table, for DR.. johnson, sup
ping with lady of rank i'll France, de-
sCribes himself Us being Offended when,
as he saws, ''the sootman took the sugar
in his fingers and threw il into my cof-
fee. / was goiag TO put 1t aside, but
hearing that 1t was made on purpose Tor
me, zen tasted Toms fingers. Yet
for all this, the French had the smaller
elegaucies much before the English dld.
The custom of using forks probably
came in from Italy, being brought home
by travellers, one of whom mentions that
the forks were 'made of irown or steele {,
and some of silver, but these are used
only by gentlemen, because the Italians
cannot by any means indure to have his
dish touched with fingers, seeing all
mems fingers are not alike cleane.
Hereupon l myself thought good to imI-
tate tine Italian fashion oftentimes in
England since came home, being once
uuipped for that frequent using OF my
forke by certain learned gentleman
who, in his merry humor, doubted not
| to call me ut table percifer only for US
| ing forke at feeding.
It was at the end of the Seventeenth
| century that neither knives nor forks
| were used among tho Highlanders OF
| Scotland; 100 years earlier they were
| unknown In Sweden, while the clergy
I opposed their introduction in France a:
an euervating luxury. 1t is doubtful Il
! our Puritan ancestors had any OF thest
now indispensable articles. Only to-
ward the end of the Fifteenth century die
they become frequent in Italy, although
before that they were TO be fount
in the inventory of great mobiles. Large
| flesh forks, for dishing up meats, hat
existed immem orally; and certain i'm
| pIements have been found in extremely
old ruins which, 1t is claimed, are forks
But the fork for table use really belong
TO that period in italian life when beauty
| and refinement had so increased anc
overflowed from the palaces of princes a
to come into the lives of common people
and they are among those things which
mark the rise of ideas concerning tn
worth of humanity in the poor ant
humble as well as in the rich and power
| full.