In frying use a slice to lift the articles in and out of the pan, and drain them. To make batter for frying: melt two ounces of butter in a little warm water, and pour it upon half-a-pound of flour; stir it and add water enough to form a batter, thick enough to adhere to whatever is put into it; but it should run freely add some salt and the beaten whites of two eggs. A small shallow frying-pan, or sauté pan, as it is called, is very useful to fry articles to be stewed this method differs from common frying, as it only requires butter enough to keep the article from sticking to the pan and burning. The fire for frying should be free from smoky coals, sharp, and even. Charcoal makes the best frying fire. The fat should be carefully drained from all fried articles; indeed, they should be so dry as scarcely to soil a cloth. Fish is best drained by wrapping it in soft whited-brown paper, by which it will so dry as not to soil the napkin upon which it is served. Stewing.-All articles to be stewed should first be boiled gently, then skimmed and set aside in an even heat: on this account, charcoal makes the best fire for stewing. All stews, or meat dressed a second time, should be only simmered, as the meat should only be made hot through. A stewpan is the most advantageous vessel in which stews, hashes, soups, or gravies, can be made; indeed, for all purposes of boiling, a stewpan is preferable to a deep saucepan, as, in the former, the articles are exposed to more even heat than when they are placed one upon another in the saucepan, and are likely to be broken in stirring. The best stewpans are made of copper or iron; they should be kept covered as much as possible, unless you wish to reduce the gravy. Be careful not to fry in a stewpan; or, if so, with great care, and sufficient butter to save the tinning from melting. Most of the directions for making soups and gravies apply also to this branch of cookery. Baking.-Baking is the least advantageous mode of cookery: for by it meat loses about onethird of its weight. Iron ovens are ill-adapted for baking meat or meat-pies; fruit-pies, pastry, and puddings, may, however, be baked in them. Larding.-Have ready larding-pins of different sizes, according to the article to be done; cut slices of bacon into bits of a proper length, quite smooth, and put on a larding-needle to suit it, with which pierce the skin and a very little of the meat, leaving the bacon in, and the two ends of equal length outwards. Lard in rows the size you think fit. The same effect with regard to flavour, may be produced by raising the skin and laying a slice of fat bacon beneath it. Doubing consists in passing bacon through meat, while larding is on the surface only. Braising.-Put the meat you would braise into a stewpan, and cover it with thick slices of fat bacon: then lay round it six or eight onions, a faggot of sweet herbs, some celery, and, if tó be brown, some thick slices of carrots, and trimmings of any fresh meat-bones you have, with a pint and a half of water, or the same quantity of stock, according to what the meat is, and add seasoning. Cover the pan close, and set it over a slow stove; it will require two or three hours, as its size and quality may direct. Then strain the gravy; keep the meat quite hot; take the fat off by plunging the basin inte cold water, which will cause the fat to coagulate; and boil it as quickly as you can till it thickens. If, however, you wish the gravy to adhere to the meat, it must be still further thickened; then with a brush kept for the purpose do over the meat, and if that has been larded, put it into the oven for a few minutes. This is called "glazing," and is much in use for made-dishes. Glazing is done by brushing melted glaze or jelly over the article, and letting it cool; in some cases it is requisite to cover the articles with two or three coats of glaze, allowing each to cool as it is laid on. The glaze should be of a clear yellow brown, and as thick as good treacle. If you have not the glaze ready, sift a little sugar over the article to be glazed, and finish in the oven, with a salamander, or red hot shovel. Boning. In disengaging the flesh from the bones, work the knife always close to the bone, and take care not to pierce the outer skin. Minute directions are given in other parts of the work for boning fowls, &c. Blanching makes the article plump and white, and consists in putting it into cold water over the fire, allowing it to boil up, and then plunging it into cold water, where the article should remain until cold. danger from the use of copper saucepans, or Danger from Copper Saucepans.-The precise stewpans, imperfectly tinned, is far from rightly understood. It appears that the acid contained in stews and other made dishes, as lemon-juice, though it does not dissolve copper by being merely boiled in it a few minutes, nevertheless, if allowed to cool and stand in it for some time, will acquire poisonous matter, as verdigris, in the form of a green band, or crust, inside the vessel. It has likewise been proved that weak solutions of common salt, such as are daily made by adding a little salt to boiling vegetables, fish, or meat, act powerfully on copper vessels, although strong solutions, or brine would not affect them. attend to the nice distinctions by which copper It is, however, in vain to hope that cooks will stewpans may be rendered safe; the general advice given by prudent physicians is, therefore, against their use at all. The kettles in which the soups are made should be well tinned, and kept particularly clean, by being washed in hot water and rubbed dry before they are put away. If they are not kept well tinned, the taste as well as the colour of the soup will be liable to be affected by the iron; and if the soup-kettle be made of copper, and the tinning not quite perfect, everything cooked in it will be more or less poisonous, as everything which is sweet, salt, or sour, extracts verdigris from copper. PRACTICAL PUZZLE.-No. 3. Get a bottle full of water, with the cork driven tightly in, and the top of it level with the neck of the bottle. You must remove the cork from the bottle without touching the cork with anything, and without injuring the bottle. ARITHMETICAL PROBLEM. An old man married a young woman; their united ages amounted to C. The man's age multiplied by 4 and divided by 9, gives the woman's age. What were their respective ages? RIDDLES. 1. If your gown was too small, what letter would give you stuff enough to enlarge it? 2. If in me my first's my second, I shall ne'er my whole be reckon'd. 3. I When I have wings most people wish me to fly away-when I have none, many take me in their hands. I don't go far to a ball, but have to do with one. I am sometimes near a trap, but never was known to be caught in one. am a striking person all will allow, yet I am very apt to keep out of sight. I was known to Titania's elves, and have sometimes been taken for a ghost. I do not drink, but I love a good bowl. I am not a grasshopper, but the cricket cannot get on without me. 4. Let poets who may, My beauties display, I'm subject to change 't is well known: Their fancy may dwell On those that excel, But never describe me alone. Included in lays That celebrate praise, When lovers do sonnets compose; Like rays of the morn The skies to adorn, I'm said to resemble the rose. To mix me with white The lily, that beautiful flower, With me they compare, In jessamine twined round the bower. By all I'm possess'd, And sometimes caress'd, Admired in the sprightly fair maid, It can't be denied, I'm quite on one side, Yet to beauty must still lend 4. my aid. TRANSPOSITION. I'm a sharp little blade, You quickly would see How soon they'd expose every charm. And then, prythee, say, How, with me, you would like, sir, to deal ; If I came on your arm, You would think me too warm, For I'm sure I could cause you to feel. ANSWERS TO FAMILY PASTIME. PRACTICAL PUZZLE.-When the first line of figures is set down, subtract 2 from the last right-hand figure, and place it before the first figure of the line, and that is the quotient for five lines. For example, suppose the figures given are 86,214, the quotient will be 286, 212. You may allow any person to put down the two first and the fourth lines, but you must always set down the third and fifth lines, and in doing so always make up 9 with the line above, as in the following example: ARITHMETICAL PROBLEMS.-1. London. 2. Solomon. 3. Olive-oil. 4. Violin. ENIGMA. The two men had been widowers, and married each others daughters. CONUNDRUMS.-1. Noise. 2. When the hedges are shooting, and when the bull rushes out (bullrush is out). 3. When it becomes a lady. 4. When she is a little pale (pail). 5. When it is a little bare (bear). 6. When it is a little cross. 7. When it is a little reddish (radish). PUZZLING INSCRIPTION. By the use of the Four merry fiddlers play'd all night, THE MOTHER'S MISTAKE. of a celebrated engineer, and the conver CHAPTER IX. LEAVING for awhile the re-united party of the Cliftons to pursue their different amusements, we turn again to the oldest brother, and look in upon that new home where he still remains, with considerable comfort and satisfaction, even after a trial of some two or three weeks. The piano has not troubled him as might have been anticipated. Only once or twice in the early morning has he heard a distant sound of music, which might be a piano, or it might be some wandering organist, only that the hour was too early for street - minstrelsy. At all events, it had not deprived him of a moment's slumber, nor had he bestowed more than a passing thought upon the matter. He was, in fact, by far too deeply occupied to think of any kind of music, unless it had disturbed him by sounding close upon his ear. Robert Clifton had at the present moment a great project in hand. Chance had lately thrown him into the company VOL. IX.-NO. CVII. sation happening to turn upon the subject of lands reclaimed from the sea, Robert had subsequently pondered in secret upon a particular line of the English coast, until he saw, or fancied that he saw, a method, barely practicable at best, by which the sea could be driven out; and not only a vast tract of land reclaimed, and brought into cultivation, but a safe harbour made for shipping, and a flourishing sea-port town planted in a spot where nothing was now to be seen but the long waves of a rolling sea. Perhaps Robert was a little in advance with his town, not having yet rescued the land; but however that might be, he was already planning streets, docks, and public buildings, very much to his own satisfaction, and greatly to the astonishment of the servant Jane, who not unfrequently looked wonderingly towards the great table where the gentleman's papers lay, though she was ever faithful to his strict injunctions not to touch anything which he left there. An indistinct impression remained obstinately on the mind of the girl that some S scheme was concocting in the gentleman's rooms for some kind of blowing-up, either distant or near; and though he seemed, as she said, a kind and a pleasant-spoken gentleman, she never saw such things about in all her life; and she usually concluded by expressing her wonder when it was all to come out,-for that a crisis was approaching, Jane was determined to believe. Mrs. Maitland, the lady of the house, being constitutionally liable to catch the infection of alarm, felt often a little disturbed about the lodger, only that she was perpetually re-assured by her daughter, who, having once and once only looked him fully in the face, and heard him speak, as she did when they met at the door, spoke confidently of the honest, grave countenance that he had, the upright, manly bearing, and the general appearance there was about him, the young lady said, of one of whom a kindness might be asked, or a service required. This was all very well and very comforting, while the young lady was present; but no sooner had the door closed upon her departing steps, than her mother began to consult again with her servant, and to listen to the reports which came down from the upper rooms of the house, of instruments, Jane said,-and she had by some lucky chance got hold of the right word, though in her vocabulary its meaning would have been found to refer to some kind of conjuring. But all was very quiet, and very regular in the department of the house appropriated to the lodger's use, notwithstanding these strange apprehensions. Nobody could say that the gentleman stayed out late at night, or had much company at home. Now and then a person like a clerk had been seen rather late at night, and on one occasion early in the morning; but there had been no suppers called for yet, and nothing, in fact, to which the most scrupulous matron could object. Little, indeed, did Robert Clifton imagine that his quiet life, his innocent amusements, and his monotonous occupations, could be the occasion of even a passing comment either to mistress, or servant. In fact, he thought little of the people around him, only once or twice he recurred to the pale face of the hurried girl whom he had met at the door, and who he thought he should like very well to meet again; but, except for the sense of a quickly-gliding figure being somewhere about on the stairs, or in a room above his own, he had no further evidence that such a being was an occupant of the same house with himself. More than once, too, Robert wondered why that thin hand shook so that the key of the door could not be got into its proper place; but he was busy with the building of a town, and he had, consequently, few thoughts to spare for trifles, such as pale faces, and trembling hands. One evening Robert had so far deviated from his accustomed habits as to throw himself down on a sofa, exclaiming as he did so, "I wonder what they are all doing at home? Let me see," he added, "this must be about the time when Philip was to return to town. I wonder he has never called on me. What a thoughtless fellow he is!" Scarcely had these thoughts formed themselves into words, when a thundering knock was heard at the street-door; and in another moment Philip Clifton himself was ushered into the room. Warm, frank, and cordial, was the first meeting of the two brothers, and much they found to say about home and mutual friends. Philip, however, unlike his former self, fell not unfrequently into fits of musing, which his brother observed, and even rallied him upon, without in the slightest degree suspecting there was any but the most agreeable cause for this change of manner. Indeed, Robert was at first favourably impressed with regard to his brother. He thought he had never seen him so grave, and so reasonable before; and though his fine, bold forehead was occasionally crossed by an anxious frown, this was easily accounted for, by the circumstance of his having so recently torn himself away from society so delightful as that which Robert had often had described to him, and expatiated upon, in his sister Catherine's letters, to cheer his generous heart, as the writer said, with the idea of their happiness, even while shut out from it himself. Thus Robert Clifton had become tolerably well acquainted with Grace Linden and her brother, even while personally a stranger. He knew of Philip's admiration of that lady, too, and rejoiced to know it. But of late he had heard little. Catherine's correspondence had almost ceased. Her last letter had been written, as he fancied, in a peevish temper, for it spoke of everybody having gone silly; for which remark her brother gave her a reprimand; she had then written no more, and the reason why Robert had been thinking of his family more than usual was, that he had lately heard so little. Thus the pleasure to him of welcoming one of the party, and freely and fully talking all family and domestic matters over, was unusually great to one shut out as Robert was from such pleasant, social intercourse; and he asked of his brother a thousand trifling but familiar questions, which, under other circumstances, would scarcely have been permitted to interfere with the progress of the great plan. Philip Clifton was not quite so communicative as his brother had expected. We have said he had fits of abstraction quite unusual with him, and along with these, or rather bursting in upon them, he fell into sudden fits of laughter louder than the occasion called for, and somewhat inappropriately timed. There are few things which spoil conversation more than causeless laughter. Robert wished his brother would be grave, and quiet, for what he said was more serious and better worth listening to than usual. He wanted to hear about the Lindens too, and the progress of this new attachment when he touched upon that the laughter certainly did cease, and a very becoming degree of reverence overspread the features of the young man as he said "That subject we will leave, if you please, for the present." So Robert began to suspect, what was really the truth, that his brother had some painful or unpleasant intelligence to communicate the difficulty of bringing it forward causing a strange embarrassment which took the form of laughter, and that not until he had freely spoken on this subject could he begin with any other. At length there was a moment's pause. Robert broke the silence by saying, "And what are you after yourself, Philip? You seem to be a good deal in London. Don't you find it expensive?" Philip started from his chair, walked towards the fire-place, and stood leaning with his back against the mantelpiece. Robert thought he had never seen a finer face and figure; but he did not think they belonged properly to the church; and he silently wondered what kind of clergyman his brother would make. "I want to talk to you," said Philip very gravely;" and he belied his words by laughing again. "What is it?" said Robert. "We can never have a better opportunity. Go on." Philip ran his fingers up through his beautiful hair, set it all standing on end, turned round and looked at himself in the glass, burst into another laugh, and said, what a pretty fellow he was to preach. "You don't seem to be in a very preaching humour just now, certainly," said Robert. "I wish you would speak out, and say all that you want to say." Philip took a long breath, and said— "Well, then."-But at that moment he knocked off the mantelpiece the small figure of an Indian god. It was broken by the fall, and he laughed prodigiously at that. "This is perfect folly," said Robert, rather vexed about the broken figure. "If you have anything to say-speak!" "Well, then," said Philip again, “I am in a kind of-of fix." "Fix? Of what kind?": "A money fix, or rather a want of it." "You have had your usual remittance?" "Yes, and spent it before it came." "I don't know what you mean, nor what you want. I have nothing to advance." "That's what the old lady tells me." "Don't, Philip, use that expression. You might surely say mother. I think it is the worst taste possible to give one's parents those stupid, vulgar names." "Well, my mother, then. I am sure she deserves the name.' "Indeed she does; and now, more than ever, we ought to build up her dignity, and show her double honour." "I think so, too. She bears up nobly." "Well then, since we are agreed on that point, let me hear more about your own business." "The long and the short of it is, Robert, my remittances are not enough. I am in debt, and can't pay." "I suppose I ought not to be surprised |
