thews says, a lemon stuck in your mouth. We cannot but conceive that such reading in such unprepared minds, would have strange influences; and that the dreams of persons would be dished up to suit the various palates. The school-girl would, like the French goose, "be persuaded to roast itself." The indolent man would "steep a fortnight," and even then not be fit for use. The lover would dream that his heart was overdone. The author would be roasted alive in his own quills, and basted with cold ink. It were an endless task to follow this speculation; and, indeed, we are keeping our readers too long without the meal to which we have taken the liberty of inviting them. The dinner "bell invites" us-we go, and it is done.

The book, the Cook's Oracle, opens with a preface, as other books occasionally do; but "there the likeness ends;" for it continues with a whole bunch of introductions, treating of cooks, and invitations to dinner, and refusals, and friendly advice," and weights and measures, and then we get fairly launched on the sea of boiling, broiling, roasting, stewing, and again return and cast anchor among the vegetables. It is impossible to say where the book begins; it is a heap of initiatory chapters-a parcel of graces before meat-a bunch of heads,—the asparagus of literature. You are not troubled with "more last words of Mr. Baxter," but are delighted, and re-delighted, with more first words of Dr. Kitchener. He makes several starts, like a restless race-horse, before he fairly gets upon the second course; or rather, like Lady Macbeth's dinner party, he stands much upon the order of his going. But now, to avoid sinking into the same trick, we will proceed without further preface to conduct our readers through the maze of pots, gridirons, and fryingpans, which Dr. Kitchener has rendered a very poetical, or we should say, a very palatable amusement.

The first preface tells us, inter alia, that he has worked all the culinary problems which his book contains, in his own kitchen; and that, after this warm experience, he did not venture

to print a sauce, or a stew, until he had read "two hundred cookery books," which, as he says, "he patiently pioneered through, before he set about recording the results of his own experiments!" We scarcely thought there had been so many volumes written on the Dutch oven.

The first introduction begins thus:

The following receipts are not a mere marrowless collection of shreds, and patches, and cuttings, and pastings;-but a bonâ fide register of practical facts,-accumula ted by a perseverance not to be subdued, or evaporated, by the igniferous terrors of a roasting fire in the dog-days,-in defiance of the odoriferous and calefacient repellents, of roasting,-boiling,-frying,—and mitted to a labour no preceding Cookery broiling-moreover, the author has subBook-maker, perhaps, ever attempted to encounter-having eaten each receipt, before he set it down in his book.

We should like to see the Doctor, we confess, after this extraordinary statement. To have superintended the agitations of the pot,-to have hung affectionately over a revolving calf's heart,-to have patiently witnessed the noisy marriage of bubble and squeak,-to have coolly investigated the mystery of a haricot,-appears within the compass of any given old lady or gentleman, whose frame could stand the fire, and whose soul could rule the roast. But to have eaten the substantials of 440 closely printed pages, is "a thing to read of, not to tell." It calls for a man of iron interior, a man "alieni appetens, sui profusus." It demands the rival of time; an edax rerum! The Doctor does not tell us how he travelled from gridiron to frying-pan-from frying-pan to Dutch oven-from Dutch oven to spit-from spit to pot-from pot to fork: he leaves us to guess at his progress. We presume he ate his way, page by page, through fish, flesh, fowl, and vegetable; he would have left us dead among the soups and gravies. Had a whole army of martyrs accompanied him on this Russian retreat of the appetite, we should have found them strewing the way; and him alone, the Napoleon of the task, living and fattening at the end of the journey. The introduction goes on very learnedly, descanting upon Shakspeare, Descartes, Dr. Johnson,

Mrs. Glasse, Professor Bradley, Pythagoras, Miss Seward, and other persons equally illustrious. The Doctor's chief aim is to prove, we believe, that cookery is the most laudable pursuit, and the most pleasurable amusement of life. Much depends on the age of your domestics; for we are told, that "it is a good maxim to select servants not younger than THIRTY." Is it so? Youth "thou art shamed!" This first introduction concludes with a long eulogy upon the Doctor's "laborious stove work;" and upon the spirit, temper, and ability, with which he has dressed his book. The Doctor appends to this introduction, a chapter called "Culinary Curiosities," in which he gives the following recipe for "persuading a goose to roast itself." We must say it out-horrors all the horrors we ever read of.

How to roast and eat a goose alive."Take a goose, or a duck, or some such lively creature, (but a goose is best of all for this purpose,) pull off all her feathers, only the head and neck must be spared: then make a fire round about her, not too close to her, that the smoke do not choke her, and that the fire may not burn her too soon; nor too far off, that she may not escape free; within the circle of the fire let there be set small cups and pots full of water, wherein salt and honey are mingled; and let there be set also chargers full of sodden apples, cut into small pieces in the dish. The goose must be all larded, and basted over with butter, to make her the more fit to be eaten, and may roast the better: put then fire about her, but do not make too much haste, when as you see her begin to roast; for by walking about, and flying here and there, being cooped in by the fire that stops her way out, the unwearied goose is kept in ;* she will fall to drink the water to quench her thirst, and cool her heart, and all her body, and the apple sauce will make her dung, and cleanse and empty her. And when she roasteth, and consumes inwardly, always wet her head and heart with a wet sponge; and when you see her giddy with running, and begin to stumble, her heart wants moisture, and she is roasted enough. Take her up, set her before your guests, and she will cry as you cut off any part from her, and will be almost eaten up before she be dead: it is mighty pleasant to behold!!!" See Wecker's Secrets of Nature, in folio, London, 1660, pp. 148, 309.

The next chapter, or introduction, (for we are not within forty spits' length of the cookery directions yet!) is entitled "Invitations to Dinner;" and commences thus :

In the "affairs of the mouth," the strictest punctuality is indispensable ;-the_gastronomer ought to be as accurate an obserdelay produces fatal and irreparable mis

ver of time, as the astronomer. The least fortunes.

It appearing, therefore, that delay is dangerous, as mammas say to their daughters on certain occasions, the Doctor directs that "the dining-room should be furnished with a good-going clock.". He then speaks of food "well done, when it is done," which leads to certain learned sentences upon indigestion. The sad disregard of dinnerhours generally observed meets with his most serious displeasure and rebuke; but to refuse an invitation to dinner is the capital crime for which there is apparently no capital punish

ment.

Nothing can be more disobliging than a refusal which is not grounded on some very strong and unavoidable cause, except not coming at the appointed hour; according to the laws of conviviality, a certificate from a sheriff's officer, a doctor, or an undertaker, are the only pleas which are admissible. The duties which invitation imposes, do not fall only on the persons invited, but like all other social duties, are reciprocal.

If you should, therefore, fortunately happen to be arrested, or have had the good luck to fracture a limb; or if, better than all, you should have taken a box in that awful theatre at which all must be present once and for ever; you may be pardoned refusing the invitation of some tiresome friend to take a chop; but there is no other excuse, no other available excuse, for absenting yourself; no mental inaptitude will save you.

Carving is the next subject of the Doctor's care; but he resolutely, and somewhat vehemently, protests against your wielding the king of knives at any other table than your own; thus for ever excluding an author from the luxuries of table anatomy.

Dr. Kitchener is rather abstruse and particular in another of his directions: "The best rule for marketing, is to pay ready money for every thing." This is a good rule with the elect: but, is there no luxury in a baker's bill? Are butchers' reckonings nothing? Is there no virtue in a milk-tally? We cannot help thinking that tick was a great invention, and gives many a man a dinner that would otherwise go

unfed.

And now the book begins to boil. The reader is told that meat takes twenty minutes to the pound; and that block-tin saucepans are the best. We can fish out little else, except a long and rather skilful calculation of the manner in which meat jockeys itself, and reduces its weight in the cooking. Buckle and Sam Chiffney are nothing to "a leg of mutton with the shank bone taken out ;" and it perhaps might not be amiss if the Newmarket profession were to consider how far it would be practicable to substitute the cauldron for the blanket, and thus reduce by steam. We should suppose a young gentleman, with half an hour's boiling, would ride somewhere about feather

weight.

Baking is dismissed in a page and a half. We are sorry to find that some joints, when fallen into poverty and decay, are quite unworthy of credit: "When baking a joint of poor meat, before it has been half baked, I have seen it (what?) start from the bone, and shrivel up scarcely to be believed." Roasting is the next object of Dr. Kitchener's anxious care; and if this chapter be generally read, we shall not be surprised to see the people in future roasting their meat before their doors, and in their areas; for the Doctor says

Roasting should be done in the open air, to ventilate the meat from its own fumes, and by the radiant heat, of a clear glowing fire, otherwise it is in fact baked-the machines the economical grate-makers call roasters, are, in plain English, ovens

The Doctor then proceeds, not being content with telling you how to cook your victuals, to advise carefully as to the best method of cooking the fire. "The fire that is but just sufficient to receive the noble sirloin, will

parch up a lighter joint ;" which is plainly a translation into the cook's own particular language of " temper the wind to the shorn lamb." The chapter does not conclude without observing that "every body knows the advantage of slow boiling-slow roasting is equally important." This is an axiom.

Frying is a very graceful and lively species of cooking, though yielding perhaps, in its vivacity and music, to broiling-but of this more anon. We are sorry to find the Doctor endeavouring to take away from the originality of frying, classing it unkindly with the inferior sorts of boiling-calling it, in fact, the mere corpulence of boiling.

A frying-pan should be about four inches deep, with a perfectly flat and thick bottom, twelve inches long, and nine broad-with with fat: good frying is in fact-boiling in perpendicular sides, and must be half filled fat. To make sure that the pan is quite clean, rub a little fat over it-and then make it warm and wipe it out with a clean

cloth.

Broiling follows. We really begin to be enacting this sort of cookery our selves, from the vigour and spirit with which we have rushed along in the company of Dr. Kitchener. Broiling is the poetry of cooking. The lyrelike shape of the instrument on which it is performed, and the brisk and pleasant sounds that arise momentarily, are rather musical than culinary. We are transported at the thought to that golden gridiron in the beef-steak club, which seems to confine the white cook in his burning cage, which generates wit, whim, and song, for hours together, and pleasantly blends the fanciful and the substantial in one laughing and robust harmony.

The Doctor is profound on the subject of vegetables. And when we consider the importance of it, we are not suprised to hear him earnestly exclaim, "I should as soon think of roasting an animal alive, as of boiling a vegetable after it is dead." No one will question that the one is quite as pardonable as the other. Our readers cannot be too particular in looking to their brocoli and potatoes.

If vegetables are a minute or two too long flavour. over the fire,—they lose all their beauty and

If not thoroughly boiled tender, they are tremendously indigestible, and much more troublesome during their residence in the stomach, than under-done meats.

We pass over the rudiments of dressing fish, and of compounding broths and soups, except with remarking, that a turbot is said to be better for not being fresh, and "lean juicy beef, mutton, or veal, form the basis of · broth."

Gravies and sauces are not neglect ed. The Doctor writes

However "les pompeuses Bagatelles de la Cuisine Masquée," may tickle the fancy of demi-connoisseurs, who leaving the substance, to pursue the shadow,-prefer won

derful and whimsical metamorphoses, and things extravagantly expensive to those which are intrinsically excellent,-in whose mouth-mutton can hardly hope for a welcome, unless accompanied by Venison sauce—or a rabbit any chance for a race down the red-lane, without assuming the form of a frog or a spider; or pork, without being either "goosified," or "lambified," and game and poultry in the shape of crawfish or hedgehogs;

These travesties rather show the patience than the science of the cook,—and the bad taste of those who prefer such baby tricks to old English nourishing and substantial plain cookery.

We could have made this the biggest book with half the trouble it has taken me to make it the best; concentration and perspicuity have been my aim.

We do not know what the Doctor understands as 66 a big book;" but to our notions (and we are experienced in the weights and measures of printed works,) the Cook's Oracle is a tolerably huge and Gog-like production. We should have been glad to have had a calculation of what the MS. lost in the printing. In truth, a comparative scale of the wasting of meat and prose during the cooking, would be no uninteresting performance. For our parts, we can only remark, from experience, that these our articles in the London Magazine boil up like spinage. We fancy, when written, that we have a heap of leaves fit to feed thirty columns; and they absolutely and alarmingly shrink up to a page or two when dressed by the compositor.

The romantic fancy of cooks is thus

restrained:

The imagination of most cooks, is so incessantly on the hunt for a relish,-that 21 ATHENEUM VOL. 10.

they seem to think, they cannot make sauce sufficiently savoury, without putting into it, every thing that ever was eaten ;—and supposing every addition must be an improvement, they frequently overpower the natural flavour of their plain sauces, by overloading them with salt and spices, &c :but, remember, these will be deteriorated by any addition, save only just salt enough to awaken the palate-the lover of "pirecourse to "the Magazine of Taste." quance," and compound flavours, may have

And now will the reader believe it? the work commences afresh! After all our labour, after all our travelling through boiling, broiling, roasting, &c. we find that we have the whole to go over again. To our utter dismay, page 142 begins anew with-boiling! It is little comfort to us that the joints and cuttings come in for their distinct treatment: we seem to have made no way; and sit down with as much despair as a young school-girl, who, after three quarters of a year's dancing, is put back Beef has been to the Scotch step. spoken of before; but we have not at all made up our minds on the following subject:

Obs. In Mrs. Mason's Ladies' Assistant this joint is called haunch-bone; in Henderson's Cookery, edge-bone; in Domestic Management, aitch-bone; in Reynolds' Cookery, ische-bone; in Mrs. Lydia Fisher's Prudent Housewife, ach-bone; in Mrs. also seen it spelt each-bone, and ridge-bone, We have M'Iver's Cookery, hook-bone. and we have also heard it called natchbone.

Of 'half a calf's-head,' Dr. Kitchener says, slily enough, 'If you like it full-dressed, score it superficially; beat up the yolk of an egg, and rub it over the head with a feather; powder it,' &c. Such a calf's-head as this, so full-dressed, might be company for the best nobleman's ditto in the land.

It is quite impossible for us to accompany Dr. Kitchener regularly through "roasting, frying, vegetables, &c. as we are by no means sure that our readers would sanction the encore.

We shall pick a bit here and a bit there, from the Doctor's dainty larder; and take care to choose, as the English do with a French bill of fare, from those niceties which are novelties.

"A pig," observes the Doctor, as though he were speaking of any other dull obstinate personage, "is a very

troublesome subject to roast. Most persons have them baked; send a quarter of a pound of butter, and beg the baker to baste it well." The following occurs to us to be as difficult a direction to fulfil as any of Sir Thomas Parkins's wrestling instructions: "Lay your pig back to back in the dish, with one half of the head on each side, and the ears one at each end, which you must take care to make nice and crisp, or you will get scolded, as the good man was who bought his wife a pig with one ear." The point at the end is like the point of a spit. Again: "A sucking pig, like a young child, must not be left for an instant !" Never was such affection manifested before for this little interesting and persecuted tribe.

If Isaac Walton be the greatest of writers on the catching of fish, Dr. Kitchener is, beyond doubt, triumphant over all who have written upon the dressing of them. The Doctor dwells upon the fine pale red rose colour" of pickled salmon, till you doubt whether he is not admiring a carnation. "Cod's skull" becomes flowery and attractive; and fine "silver eels," when "stewed Wiggy's way," swim in beauty as well as butter. The Doctor points out the best method of killing this perversely living fish, observing, very justly, "that the humane executioner does certain criminals the favour to hang them, before he breaks them on the wheel."

Of salmon, the Doctor rather quaintly and pozingly observes," the thinnest part of the fish is the fattest." If you have any left, put it into a pye-dish, and cover it," &c. Remember to choose your lobsters "heavy and lively." "Motion," says the Doctor, "is the index of their freshness.”

66

Upon oysters, Dr. Kitchener is eloquent indeed. He is, as it were, native here, and to the manner born."

The true lover of an oyster, will have some regard for the feelings of his little favourite, and will never abandon it to the merey of a bungling operator, but will open it himself, and contrive to detach the fish from the shell so dexterously, that the oyster is hardly conscious he has been eject ed from his lodging, till he feels the teeth of the piscivorous gourmand tickling him to death.

Who would not be an oyster, to be

thus surprised, to be thus pleasingly ejected from its tenement of mother of pearl,-to be thus tickled to death? When we are placed in our shell, we should have no objection to be astonished with a similar delicate and titillating opening!

Giblet soup requires to be eaten with the fingers. We were not aware that these handy instruments could be used successfully in the devouring of gravies and soups.

N. B. This is rather a family dish than a company one, the bones cannot be well

picked, without the help of a live pincers. Since Tom Coryat introduced forks, A. D. 1642, it has not been the fashion to put "pickers and stealers" into soup.

After giving a most elaborate recipe for mock turtle soup, he proceeds

SOV

This soup was eaten by the committee of taste with unanimous applause, and they pronounced it a very satisfactory substitute for "the far fetcht and dear bought" turtle; which itself is indebted for its title of “ ereign of savouriness," to the rich soup with which it is surrounded; without its paraphernalia of double relishes, a “starv ed turtle," has not more intrinsic sapidity FATTED CALF."

than a

And a little further on he observes—

Obs. This is a delicious soup, within the reach of those who "eat to live;" but if it had been composed expressly for those who only "live to eat," I do not know how it could have been made more agreeable: as it is, the lover of good eating will "wish his throat a mile long, and every inch of it palate."

"Mr. Michael Kelly's sauce for boiled tripe, calf-head, or cow-heel." Garlick vinegar, a tablespoonful,-of

mustard, brown sugar, and black pepper, a teaspoonful each; stirred into half a pint

of oiled melted butter.

Gad 'a mercy, what a gullet must be in the possession of Mr.Michael Kelly!

We think the following almost a superfluous direction to cooks:-"Take your chops out of the frying-pan;" but then he tells you, in another place, "to put your tongue into plenty of cold water;" which makes all even again.

After giving ample directions for the making of essence of anchovy, the Doctor rather damps our ardour for entering upon it by the following observation: "Mem. You cannot make essence of anchovy half so cheap as you can buy it."

The Doctor proceeds to luxuriate