Put one and a half pints of medium-sized navy beans into a quart bean pot, fill it with water and let it stand overnight. In the morning pour off the water and cover the beans with fresh water, in which mix one tablespoonful of molasses. Put a quarter pound of pickled pork in the centre, leaving a quarter inch of pork above the beans. Bake them eight hours with a steady fire, and without stirring the beans add a cupful of water every hour but the last two. Earthen pots with narrow mouths are made expressly for baking beans. Cooking them in this manner, without first boiling them, renders each bean perfectly whole, and at the same time thoroughly cooked. When done place the pork in the centre of a dish with the beans around it.