The thorough good cook

It is true, ot course, that children eat large quantities of cheese-cakes, which are made, as a rule, without any cheese at all: although in one kind of home-made cheesecakes we begin by putting four well-beaten eggs into a saucepan containing a pint of boiling milk, and let it remain on the fire until it curdles ; then we pour off the whey, put the curd on an inverted sieve to drain, and, when quite dry, add the other and sweet ingredients. There is a savoury cheesecake, too, made of well - drained curds, butter, eggs, with the addition of some grated Parmesan and a little salt and pepper. But cheesecakes, after all, are frivolous things, scarcely calling for the notice of the serious student of cookery. We do make very excellent toasted cheese ; but the delicacy is evidently not of Saxon but of ancient British extraction, as Theodore Hook well showed in telling the story of the Welsh school-boy who declared that one of his ancestors gave a banquet at which five hundred cooks were employed ; upon which a malicious Sassenach suggested that the boy's ancestor only presided at a feast of five hundred guests, and that every man brought and toasted his own cheese. With regard to the Welsh rabbit, or rare-bit, it is amusing to remember that M. Jules Goufife, the distinguished author of " Le Livre de Cuisine " — perhaps one of the best French cookery-books of modern times — paid us the compliment, in his "Livre dcs Soupes," to admit " that we at least possess one national ravage " — cheese soup, to wit — and he proceeded to specify with the utmost * See pp. 3:)7-10U gravity the ingredients and the mode of preparing a Welsh rabbit. There is indeed an English cheese soup which can be made without toast. You may grate very finely as much dry Gruyere or any other light-coloured cheese as you require ; strew a layer of it at the bottom of the soup-tureen ; over this place some very thin slices of the stale untoasted crumb of bread. Repeat this process until the cheese is used, when one-fourth of the depth of the tureen should be occupied. Then you put a piece of fresh butter into a saucepan ; let it melt, and stir into it a tablespoonful of flour, and keep it on the fire, stirring constantly till it browns. Then throw in two tablespoonfuls of finely minced onions ; when they are browned, stir in gradually a quart of water ; let it boil, season with pepper and salt. Allow the soup to stand a couple of minutes before the fire to soak the bread and cheese, and when that is done, serve. Cool Driuks. What should we drink in broiling summer weather ? The most philosophic reply to the question is that Ave should drink as little as ever Ave possibly can, either of an alcoholic or a non-alcoholic nature, for there is danger, when the thermometer is at 85°, in gulping down draughts of cold Avater, especially if it is iced ; and in any case, touching aqueous potations, Falstaff A'ery cogently observes that " water SAvells a man." Old and experienced travellers Avill, I think, agree Avitli me that in exceedingly sultry Aveather, and in stress of Avater, thirst may be staved off by sucking gum Arabic ; and in far-distant days, Avhen I Avas campaigning Avith Garibaldi in the Tyrol, Ave did very Avell, Avhen the coffee ran out, by sucking chocolate drops, Avhich gave us a strange sustaining