Practical home cookery

boiling water, and pour it on the pulp of, say, three lemons, with a small piece of peel, but not too much, as it will render the lemonade bitter. Add white sugar to taste ; of course, children hke it sweeter than others. Let it get cold, and then strain it. Care should be taken that all the pips are removed from the pulp before the boiling water is added. A great improvement to this kind of lemonade is the addition of a little dilute sulphuric acid, about thirty drops to a quart. Thirty drops of dilute sulphuric acid, when freely diluted, can be taken at one dose without any fear, though of course such a dose must not be taken without a doctor’s order ; but the addition of it to a whole quart of lemonade has the effect of rendering it much more palatable ; and were a person to drink the whole quart, which is improbable, it would not do them the slightest possible harm. Dilute sulphuric acid is a simple but valuable medicine, particularly useful in summer. Those who prefer sparkling lemonade had better try the following method, and then let them judge for themselves whether it is not infinitely superior to the ordinary bottled lemonade : — Squeeze a lemon through a little piece of muslin into a tumbler, and have the patience to wait while a couple of lumps of sugar dissolve in it. Then add some iced soda-water and stir it up, taking care it is not half lost by frothing over the tumbler. Soda-water can be bought now very good at one shilling and ninepence a dozen. Mixed with a little fruit-essence or French syrup, or raspberry vinegar, it makes most delicious drinks, especially if iced. Let me, therefore, entreat ladies who, during this hot weather, when they feel at times exhausted, have been in the habit of taking either weak brandy-and-water or sherry-and-water, to try one of these kinds of syrup instead. The effect of a stimulant is but short, and too often is followed by a reaction far worse than the original feeling of lassitude. There is one subject in connection with cooling drinks that I wish to mention, though a trifle out of place in an article that purports teaching cookery ; yet its importance is so great that I trust I may be pardoned for introducing it. When you use water for drinking, or for mixing cooling drinks, take care that it is pure. No house ought to be without a filter. Were the custom of first boiling and then filtering water universal, tens of thousands of lives would be annually saved throughout the country. Children are peculiarly susceptible to the influence of impure water, and during hot weather especially drink a great deal. The cost of a filter is small, and the trouble of boiling the water also small. Let me strongly advise mothers in small households, where no trustworthy housekeeper is kept, to superintend the management of the filter themselves. If my advice be the means of saving the life of even one little one, it will not have been given in vain. Should any one say or think that this is all rubbish, let that one ask any respectable medical man for his opinion, and then act on it. CHAPTER XIV.