Suck, chéri

E.S. Turner

  • Sugar-Plums and Sherbet: A Prehistory of Sweets by Laura Mason
    Prospect, 250 pp, £20.00, June 1998, ISBN 0 907325 83 1

One does not get far in this book before one’s eye is stopped by the reproduction of an advertisement placed by B. Henderson, of the China Warehouse, Rye Lane, Peckham. Miss (or Mrs) Henderson ‘respectfully informs the Friends of Africa that she has on Sale an Assortment of Sugar Basins, handsomely labelled in Gold Letters: “East India Sugar not made by Slaves”.’ There follows this assurance: ‘A Family that uses 5lbs of Sugar per Week will, by using East India, instead of West India, for 21 months, prevent the Slavery, or Murder, of one Fellow Creature! Eight such Families, in 19½ years, will prevent the Slavery, or Murder, of 100!!’ The mathematical projection may have been rickety, but what houseproud humanitarian could resist a purchase like that? And what housekeeper could fail to ensure that the bowl was always correctly filled?

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