In boiling, put the meat, if fresh, into cold water, or, if salt, into luke-warm. Simmer it very gently until done. It is a general rule to allow a quarter of an hour to every pound of meat; but in this, as in everything else, judgment must be used according to the bone and shape of the joint, and according to the taste of the eaters. All kinds of meat, fish, flesh and fowl, should be boiled very slowly, and the scum taken off just as boiling commences. If meats are allowed to boil too fast they toughen, all their juices are extracted, and only the fleshy fiber, without sweetness, is left; if they boil too long they are reduced to a jelly, and their nourishing properties are transferred to the water in which they are boiled. Nothing is more difficult than to boil meat exactly as it should be; close attention and good judgment are indispensable.