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Mary, and the Three Kings, which were given to the poor; and if the bean should be in either of these portions, the king was chosen by pulling straws. Baby-cake, in the mask of '■ Christmas,' was attended by an usher, bearing a great cake, with a bean and pea. The king elect chose his queen, or occasionally a pea was inserted in the cake for the purpose, and they chose their officers; and in France, when either of them drank, the company were to cry out, on pain of forfeit, " Le Roi (ou la Heine) boit."
Louis the Fourteenth, on one occasion, in his youth, was king of the bean, but would not undertake the office, handing it over to his governor, De Souvre.
Herrick, in the seventeenth century, refers to the practice of choosing by the bean and pea :—
" Now, now the mirth comes,
With the cake full of plums, Where beane's the king of the sport here ;
Beside we must know,
The pea also Must revell as queene in the court here.
Begin then to chuse,
This night as ye use, Who shall for the present delight here;
Be a king by the lot,
And who shall not Be Twelfth-Day queene for the night heere."
The French twelfth-cake is still plain in appearance, containing a bean: it was composed, about 250 years since, of flour, honey, ginger and pepper; what it is made of now, Monsieur Verey can no doubt tell, if he will; they are how- |
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