As soon as the soup is served up, the ingredients for the next meal are put into the pot (which is never suffered to cool, and does not require scouring;) and this pot, which is of cast iron, or of earthenware, being well closed with its thick wooden cover, is placed by the side of the fire, where its contents are kept simmering for many hours, but are seldom made to boil, and never but in the gentlest manner possible.

Were the pot put in a close fire-place (which might easily be constructed, even with the rudest materials, with a few bricks or stone, or even with sods, like a camp-kitchen,) no arrangement for cooking could well be imagined more economical or more convenient.

Soups prepared in this way are uncommonly savoury, and there is little doubt that the true reason why nourishing soups and broths are not more in use among the common people in most countries, is because they do not know how good they really are, nor how to prepare them; in short because they are not acquainted with them. There is another important reason which the Editor must add - the common people for the most part cannot spare time from their labour to stay at home and attend to them.

To form a just idea of the enormous waste of fuel that arises from making water boil and evaporate unnecessarily in culinary processes, we have only to consider how much heat is expended in the forma tion of steam. Now it has been proved by the most decisive and un exceptionable experiments that have ever been made by experimental philosophers, that if it were possible that the heat which actually combines with water, in forming steam (and which gives it wings to fly up into the atmosphere,) could exist in the water, without changing it from a dense liquid to a rare elastic vapour, this water would be heated by it to the temperature of red-hot iron.

Many kinds of food are known to be most delicate and savoury when cooked in a degree of heat considerably below that of boiling water; and it is more than probable that there are others which would be improved by being exposed to a heat greater than that of boiling water.

In many of the seaport towns of our New England States, it has been a custom, time immemorial, among people of fashion, to dine one day in the week (Saturday) on salt fish, and a long habit of preparing the same dish has, as might have been expected, led to very considerable improvements in the art of cooking it. We have often heard foreigners who have partaken of these dinners, declare that they never tasted salt fish dressed in such perfection. The secret of this cooking is to keep the fish a great many hours in water, which is just scalding hot, but which is never made actually to boil.

The Count being desirous of finding out whether it was possible to roast meat with a much gentler heat than that usually employed, put a shoulder of mutton in a machine contrived for drying potatoes: the result, which we give in the Count's own words, was as follows:

"After trying the experiment for three hours, and finding it showed no signs of being done, it was concluded that the heat was not sufficiently intense, and, despairing of success, it was abandoned to the cookmaids.

"It being late in the evening, and the cookmaids thinking, perhaps, that the meat would be as safe in the drying machine as anywhere else, left it there all night; when they came in the morning to take it away, intending to cook it for their dinner, they were much surprised to find it already cooked, and not merely eatable, but perfectly done, and most singularly well tasted. This appeared to them the more miraculous, as the fire under the machine was quite gone out before they left the kitchen in the evening to go to bed, and as they had locked up the kitchen when they left it and taken the key.

This wonderful shoulder of mutton was immediately brought in triumph, and though we were at no great loss to account for what had happened, yet it certainly was unexpected: and when the meat was tasted we were much surprised indeed to find it very different, both in taste and flavour, from any we had ever tasted. It was perfectly tender, but though it was so much done it did not appear to be in the least sodden or insipid; on the contrary, it was uncommonly savoury and high-flavoured. It was neither boiled, nor roasted, nor baked. Its taste seemed to indicate the manner in which it had been prepared: that the gentle heat to which it had for so long a time been exposed, had by degrees loosened the cohesion of its fibres, and concocted its juices, without driving off their fine and more volatile part9, and without washing away or burning and rendering rancid its oils."

Having given an abstract of Romford's opinions and experiments on boiling water as a medium for the preparation of meat for the food of man, we shall now take an opportunity of remarking, that the same rule will not apply to the cooking of the greater part of vegetables, which must be put into the water boiling hot, and which cannot be boiled too quickly. This does not apply, however, to potatoes, which cannot be boiled too slowly. These things, however, will be treated of more particularly in the receipts, which we shall give for the cooking of different kinds of vegetables.

Seasoning is a very important element in the art of cookery. Experience is absolutely necessary to acquire this art, which to be properly done, requires great judgment and delicacy of taste. All the recommendations of Dr. Kitchiner and others to season by weight and measure, as apothecaries serve out drugs, are in the nature of the thing impracticable. "What's one man's meat is another man's poison," is a homely proverb, but a true one. So in seasoning, what one person likes, another may dislike. The writers we have alluded to ridicule the idea of directing the cook to use a pinch of that, and a dust of the other. M. Ude justly observes, " that where the quantities are indefinite, it is impossible to adjust the exact proportions of spice, or other condiments, which it will be necessary to add in order to give the proper flavour." If these remarks are correct, and who can doubt it, the general terms "handful, pinch, and dust," are the best that can be applied as directions upon such a subject.

In the use of salt in cooking, considerable judgment is required. The best rule is to employ as little as possible. It is easy to make a dish too fresh, salt; but if made too salt, it cannot be made fresh again. Sugar may be applied with advantage in various dishes, where it is not generally used in this country, and which will be enumerated hereafter, but great care must be taken, that in such preparations it should be employed to enrich, not to sweeten. The taste of sugar should not predominate, or even be recognised. We allude more particularly to soups and gravies, and in some cases in vegetables, such as green peas for instance. Meat intended to be broiled, or fried, shouid be well peppered, but never salted; salt renders it hard. The author of "Domestic Cookery" says, that "salt should not be put into the water in which vegetables are boiled." We dis-agree with this lady; indeed, she disagrees with herself; for in another part of her book she directs salt to be put into the water in which potatoes are to be boiled; and we are quite sure it is very necessary in boiling cabbage, savoys, and most other descriptions of greens.

It ought to be well understood, that pepper and all descriptions of spice require to be subjected to the action of heat to bring out their genuine flavour. Thus it will be seen, that though it is very practicable to sweeten or salt things after they are dressed, it is not so as respects flavouring them with spice. In the use of spices it is, however, very important to take care that the aroma (commonly called smell), which they give forth, should not. be allowed to evaporate or escape. Druggists and medical men always keep their essential oils, tinctures, volatile spirits and volatile gums, in ground stopper bottles, which are perfectly air-tight. This puts us in mind of a foolish custom, which cannot be too much deprecated, of exposing in the open air aromatic herbs, such as marjoram, thyme, mint, and several others, which are known by the general term of sweet herbs, and which are extensively used in seasoning. These herbs ought always to be kept as much as possible excluded from the air. This may be partially effected by tying the dried herbs in paper bags, but it is much better to reduce the leaves to a coarse powder, and confine it in well-corked bottles.