ful with the pupils. It was easy and pleasant, yet careful and thorough, and secured a rapid and gratifying proficiency.
"In saying that the South Kensington Cooking-School has been successful, I speak from direct knowledge of it. I was a pupil there for several weeks, and carefully observed its operations. The classes showed the most extraordinary mental and social diversity. There were cultivated ladies, the daughters of country gentlemen, old housekeepers, servants, cooks, and colored girls from South Africa, together with a large proportion of intelligent young women who were preparing to become teachers. They worked together with a harmony and good feeling that, I confess, somewhat surprised me, but they were all closely occupied and thoroughly interested in a common object. There were teachers to provide materials, to plan the daily work, to direct operations, and to be consulted when necessary; but the admirable method adopted left each learner to go through her task with but a small amount of assistance. Indeed, the completeness of the directions in hand seemed to assure the success of every pupil from the start. There was, of course, a difference in dexterity, and in facility of work previously acquired; but raw beginners went on so well that they were astonished at what they found themselves able to do.
"American ladies, when looking over these lessons, are apt to smile at their extreme simplicity and triviality, but it must be remembered that the difference between good and bad cookery is very much a matter of attention to trifles. Slight mistakes, small omissions, little things done at the wrong time, spoil dishes. The excellence of these lessons consists in their faithfulness in regard to minutæ, and the habits they enforce of attention to trifling particulars. They make no claim to literary merit. The receipts are homely, direct, and meant only to be easily and distinctly understood. They are full of repetitions, because processes are constantly repeated, and it was necessary that the directions in each receipt should be full and complete. They are not enticing reading, because they were made to work by. The book, in fact, belongs in the kitchen where cookery is done; and it is now republished because its success there has been demonstrated. Many hundred persons totally ignorant of the subject have become efficient and capable cooks by pursuing the mode of practice here adopted—by going through these lessons—and the same results can be obtained by pursuing the same method anywhere. American housekeepers who have any real interest in home improvement, and are willing to take a little pains to instruct their daughters or their servants in the art of cooking well, will find the volume an adequate and invaluable help toward the attainment of this object. It will prove a useful text-book in the cooking-schools that are springing up in this country, and classes could be advantageously formed in it for kitchen practice in every female seminary in the land."
Appended to the volume is an admirable essay on "The Principles of Diet in Health and Disease," by Dr. Thomas K. Chambers, one of the highest living authorities upon that subject. This is a most valuable addition to the work. As food is prepared in order to be eaten, as the subject of cookery is therefore in close relations with that of diet, and commonly receives too little attention on the part of housekeepers, it was an excellent idea to furnish an authoritative summary of the facts and rules of the most recent dietetical science. Good cookery and rational diet are equal conditions of healthful enjoyment.
Annual Record of Science and Industry, for 1877. By S. F. Baird. New York: Harper & Brothers. Pp. 494. Price, $2.
The "Record" for 1877 is considerably less voluminous than its predecessors, and the reduction in size has been effected by summarily omitting one of the two main divisions of the work, namely, that containing abstracts of notable scientific papers. In truth, it would be simply impossible to compress within the limits of an ordinary volume an intelligible synopsis of the important scientific papers annually contributed to the proceedings of learned societies and the periodical press. Hence, we cannot but approve the action of Prof. Baird in omitting that feature of the "An-
