Currants


The original Currants in times past were small grapes, grown in

Greece at Zante, near Corinth, and termed Corinthians; then they

became Corantes, and eventually Currants. But, as an old Roman

proverb pertinently said: Non cuivis homini contingit adire

Corinthum, It was not for everyone to visit fashionable

Corinth. And therefore the name of Currants became transferred

in the Epirus to certain small fruit of the Goosebe
ry order which

closely resembled the grapes of Zante, but were identical rather

with the Currants of our modern kitchen gardens, such as we now

use for making puddings, pies, jams, and jellies. The bushes which

produce this fruit grow wild in the Northern part, of Great Britain,

and belong to the Saxifrage order of plants. The wild Red Currant

bears small berries which are intensely acid. In modern Italy

basketsful are gathered in the woods of the Apennines, and the

Alps.



Currants are not mentioned in former Greek or Roman literature,

nor do they seem to have been cultivated by the Anglo-Saxons, or

the Normans. Our several sorts [138] of Currants afford a striking

illustration of the mode which their parent bushes have learnt to

adopt so as to attract by their highly coloured fruits the birds

which shall disperse their seeds. These colours are not developed

until the seed is ripe for germination; because if birds devoured

them prematurely the seed would fall inert. But simultaneously

come the ripeness and the soft sweet pulp, and the rich colouring,

so that the birds may be attracted to eat the fruit, and spread the

seed in their droppings. Zeuxis, a famous Sicilian painter four

hundred years before Christ, depicted currants and grapes with

such fidelity that birds came and tried to peck them out from his

canvas.



White Currants are the most simple in kind; and the Red are a step

in advance. If equal parts of either fruit and of sugar are put over

the fire, the liquid which separates spontaneously will make a very

agreeable jelly because of the pectin with which it is chemically

furnished. Nitric acid will convert this pectin into oxalic acid, or

salts of sorrel. The juice of Red Currants also contains malic and

citric acids, which are cooling and wholesome. In the Northern

counties this red Currant is called Wineberry, or Garnetberry, from

its rich ruddy colour, and transparency. Its sweetened juice is a

favourable drink in Paris, being preferred there to the syrup of

orgeat (almonds). When made into a jelly with sugar the juice of

red Currants is excellent in fevers, and acts as an anti-putrescent;

as likewise if taken at table with venison, or hare, or other high

meats. This fruit especially suits persons of sanguine temperament.

Both red and white Currants are without doubt trustworthy

remedies in most forms of obstinate visceral obstruction, and they

correct impurities of the blood, being certainly antiseptic.



[139] The black Currant is found growing wild in England, for the

most part by the edges of brooks, and in moist grounds, from

mid-Scotland southwards. Throughout Sussex and Kent the shrub is

called Gazles as corrupted from the French Groseilles

(Gooseberries). The fruit is cooling, laxative, and anodyne. Its

thickened juice concocted over the fire, with, or without sugar,

formed a rob of Old English times. The black Currant is often

named by our peasantry Squinancy, or Quinsyberry, because a

jelly prepared therefrom has been long employed for sore throat

and quinsy. The leaf glands of its young leaves secrete from their

under surface a fragrant odorous fluid. Therefore if newly

gathered, and infused for a moment in very hot water and then

dried, the leaves make an excellent substitute for tea; also these

fresh leaves when applied to a gouty part will assuage pain, and

inflammation. They are used to impart the flavour of brandy to

common spirit. Bergius called the leaf, mundans, pellens, et

diuretica. Botanically the black Currant, Ribes nigrum, belongs

to the Saxifrage tribe, this generic term Ribes being applied to all

fresh currants, as of Arabian origin, and signifying acidity.

Grocers' currants come from the Morea, being small grapes dried

in the sun, and put in heaps to cake together. Then they are dug out

with a crow-bar, and trodden into casks for exportation. Our

national plum pudding can no more be made without these currants

than little Tom Tucker who for his supper, could cut his

bread without any knife or could find himself married without any

wife. Former cooks made an odd use of grocers' currants,

according to King, a poet of the middle ages, who says:--



They buttered currants on fat veal bestowed,

And rumps of beef with virgin honey strewed.



[140] On the kitchen Currant a riddling rhyme was long ago to be

found in the Children's Book of Conundrums:--



Higgledy-piggledy, here I lie

Picked and plucked, and put in a pie;

My first is snapping, snarling, growling;

My second noisy, ramping, prowling.



Eccles cakes are delicious Currant sandwiches which are very

popular in Manchester.



Black Currant jelly should not be made with too much sugar, else

its medicinal-virtues will be impaired. A teaspoonful of this jelly

may be given three or four times in the day to a child with thrush.

In Russia the leaves of the black Currant are employed to fabricate

brandy made with a coarse spirit. These leaves and the fruit are

often combined by our herbalists with the seeds of the wild carrot

for stimulating the kidneys in passive dropsy. A medicinal wine is

also brewed from the fruit together with honey. In this country we

use a decoction of the leaf, or of the bark as a gargle. In Siberia

black Currants grow as large as hazel nuts. Both the black and the

red Currants afford a pleasant home-made wine. Ex eo optimum

vinum fieri potest non deterius vinis vetioribus viteis, wrote

Haller in 1750. White Currants, however, yield the best wine, and

this may be improved by keeping, even for twenty years. Dr.

Thornton says: I have used old wine of white Currants for

calculous affections, and it has surpassed all expectation.



A delicate jelly is made from the red Currant at Bas-le-duc; and a

well-known nursery rhyme tells of the tempting qualities of

cherry pie, and currant wine. A rob of black Currant jam is taken

in Scotland with whiskey toddy. Shakespeare in the Winter's

Tale makes Antolycus, the shrewd picker-up of unconsidered

[141] trifles talk of buying for the sheep-shearing feast three

pounds of sugar, five pounds of currants, and rice. In France a

cordial called Liqueur de cassis is made from black Currants;

and a refreshing drink, Eau de groseilles, from the red.



Some forty years ago, at the time of the Crimean war a patriotic

song in praise of the French flag was most popular in our streets,

and had for its refrain, Hurrah for the Red, White, and Blue! So

valuable for food and physics are our tricoloured Currants that the

same argot may be justly paraphrased in their favour, with a

well-merited eulogium of Hurrah for the White, Red, Black!



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