IT is usually presumed that the highest forms of human achievement

spring from music and the arts. In the rich tapestry of our cultural

heritage, however, there are woven many pathways to fulfilment. Some

find it in madrigals and plainsong; others paint and sketch, or moon

about in art galleries and museums. For all of us there is some route to

that mental elevation which rewards the study and true appreciation of

man's creativity. The diversity of human achievement was illustrated at

the weekend by the revelation that there exists a Pork Pie Appreciation

Society. This body meets in the Bridge Inn at Ripponden, Yorkshire,

where each week it masticates and then pontificates on the pieman's art.

At the annual contest in March there were more than 60 entries, the

winners being Raymond and Janice Lodge, an enterprising couple who have

made a best-seller of a local speciality. This is the Fidget Pie, a pork

pie with added apple and stuffing. Such a delicacy, crisp outside and

moist within, its meat-filled interior held firm with jelly, is far

removed from the dried-out products of the supermarket shelf.

Scotland, alas, does have its own version of the pork pie. Our cuisine

leans heavily on the influence of France, where the nearest product of

the charcuterie seems to be Porc en croute. The English have a varied

range of regional pies -- the fishy Stargazey, the Lancashire Foot, the

Checky Pig of Leicestershire, the Crowthy, the pink-tinged Melton

Mowbray, flavoured with anchovy sauce. Against the Cornish Pasty the

Forfar bridie certainly holds its own. The steak pies of Aberdeen, made

with home-bred beef, are incomparable. All of Scotland's reputation,

unfortunately, is lost with the greasy grey cylinders of the football

terraces. Even with brown sauce, it is unlikely that there will ever be

a Mutton Pie Appreciation Society.