The guest of honor arrived to the accompaniment of bagpipes and the kind of poetic tribute typically reserved for conquering heroes. There were men in formal kilts standing at attention, a celebratory toast of 21-year-old Scotch and a collective gasp of awe. 


All this for a sheep's stomach stuffed with heart, lung, liver, kidneys, tongue and fat? 


Not just any sheep's stomach, of course, but haggis, the much-maligned Scottish delicacy that poet Robert Burns called the "great chieftain o' the puddin-race" and the less-eloquent sometimes call "disgusting." 


After two laps around the room on a silver platter, the haggis was presented to Jim Cryle, a master distiller for the Glenlivet whisky company, who raised
his knife, recited Burns' famous ode, "Address to a Haggis," and sliced the great beast from pyloric sphincter to cardiac valve. 


The Gnome was recently invited to participate in this time-honored Scottish ritual, an invitation I happily accepted because it represented a chance to drink large quantities of fine Glenlivet whisky (some of it older than my older brother), eat haggis as well as the "neeps" and "chappit tatties" that typically accompany the beguiling, livery meatloaf, and, more important, wear a kilt in public (for the record, nothing comes between me and my tartan, if you know what I mean.)


The Glenlivet's whisky-fueled haggis debauch last week at the Morgan Library had a more noble purpose than merely getting a bunch of journalists drunk (we hardly need such ceremony). The company wanted a lively way to announce that it has donated 100 bottles of rare 1959 single-malt Scotch to various charities, which will raise money by auctioning off the bottles.

(Full disclosure: The Glenlivet distillery would have donated a couple of bottles more, but the rigorous standards of journalism demanded that reporters test the 43-year-old whisky to insure that it is suitable for auction. Rest assured, my extensive tests proved that it is.) 


The charities, which will auction the bottles over the next six months, include Dennis Leary's firefighter fund, City Harvest, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and the American Heart Association. 


Who buys Scotch that's expected to go for $1,000? Not the kind of people a master distiller hangs around with.

"It's usually collectors who never even take the top off the bottle and enjoy it," said Cryle, in the manner of a disappointed parent. " 'Tis a pity because whether it was distilled in 1959 or 1999, the whisky was made to be drunk." 

What a coincidence. So are reporters.

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gersh.kuntzman@verizon.net