A good cook has really quite enough to do if she attends perfectly to her own business; and those who wish to have their tables well served, must not require any more of her, and are fortunate mortals if they regularly obtain this. Mistress of her time, she will devote the whole of it to her art; rising with the sun in winter, and by six in summer, her first care will be to set every thing to rights in her kitchen, see that all her utensils are perfectly clean, and arrange them in their proper places. This done, she puts on her soup-kettle, and does not leave it till she has well skimmed it: she will then go early to market, to have the opportunity of selecting from those shops which have the best choice, and charge reasonably. On her return home, she will prepare the dinner according to the bill of fare which she has settled with her master the evening before; prepare her made dishes, ragouts, etc. etc. for the second course; lard and trim the roasts; and, in a word, get every thing ready in time, so that the service may not meet with any obstruction.

When this time comes, she seasons her soup, garnishes all her dishes, and disposes them in the order they are to appear in.

Besides understanding the management of the spit, the stewpans, and the rolling-pin, a complete cook must know how to go to market, write legibly, and keep accounts: she must, moreover, have a full share of cleanliness, good temper, and activity; never give herself airs, but receive as the highest testimonies of her employers' regard, whatever observations they make on her work, as the most unequivocal proofs of their desire to make her thoroughly understand their taste, and retain her in their service. She must entirely enter into all their plans of economy, and endeavour to make the most of every thing, as well for her own honour, as her master's profit.

In those houses where the cook enjoys the confidence of her master so much as to be intrusted with the care of the store-room, which is not very common, she will keep an exact account of every thing as it comes in, for her own satisfaction, as well as that of her employer, and will not trust the key of this room to any one; she will also keep an account of every thing she takes from it, and manage with as much consideration and frugality as if it was her own property she was using, endeavouring to disprove the adage, that "plenty makes waste." The honesty of a cook must be above all suspicion: she should obtain, and (in spite of the numberless temptations that daily offer to bend her from it,) preserve a character of spotless integrity, remembering it is the fair price of independence, which all wish for, but none without it can hope for: only a fool or a madman will be so silly or so crazy as to expect to reap where he has been too idle to sow.

If we now take a review of the qualifications* we have set down as indispensable, to form that highly estimable domestic, "a complete, good cook," we shall find how very few deserve that name. The majority of those who set up for masters and mistresses of this art, are grovelling, dirty creatures; selfish, and pilfering every thing they can: others add indolence to insolence: those who understand their business, (which are by far the smallest number,) are too often either most ridiculously saucy, or insatiably thirsty: in a word, a good subject, in this class, is a rara avis indeed.

" * He must be endowed with a full portion of common sense; quick and strong of sight; his hearing most acute, that he may be sensible when the contents of his vessels bubble, although they be closely covered, and that he may be alarmed before the pot boils over: his auditory nerve ought to discriminate (when several saucepans are in operation at the same time,) the simmering of one, the ebullition of another, and the full toned wabbling of a third.

"It is imperiously requisite that his organ of smell be highly susceptible of the various effluvia, that his nose may distinguish the perfection of aromatic ingredients, and that in ani-mal substances it shall evince a suspicious accuracy between tenderness and putrefaction: above all, his olfactories should be tremblingly alive to mustiness and empyreuma.

"It is from the exquisite sensibility of his palate, that we admire and judge of the cook; and from the alliance between the olfactory and sapid organs it will be seen, that their perfection is indispensable." - A. C.junr.

"Happy the master who finds a servant, who with a proper knowledge of her business unites a zeal and pride to perform it to the best of her abilities, and is, moreover, honest and cleanly: for the rest, he must be indulgent, and such a servant deserves to be treated with some consideration. Give her liberal wages, according to her deserts, and treat her with kindness, but without familiarity: do not pass any dish without observation, qualifying your censure by telling her,

"The reason why 1 point out faults so small, Is, 'cause 'tis better to have none at all."

When you make out the bill of fare for the next day, lake every opportunity of encouraging her. Due praise is the most agreeable reward a woman can receive, and more gratifying than pecuniary compensation; and is the way to make a faithful servant, who will be a treasure."

The foregoing observations are from the ingenious French author we have before quoted.

I have submitted (with no small pains,) to an attentive perusal of every preceding work, connected with the subject, that I could meet with; in number amounting to no fewer than one hundred and seventeen. These books vary but little from each other, except in the prefatory matter: cutting and pasting seem to have been much oftener employed than the pen and ink: any one who has occasion to refer to two or three of them, will find the receipts almost always "verbatim et literatim;" equally unintelligible to those who are ignorant of, and useless to those who are acquainted with, the business of the kitchen.