Fill a wide mouthed bottle three parts full of strawberries gathered quite dry, strewing amongst them 4 table-spoonsful of finely pounded sugar; fill up with fine old sherry, and cork it close.
They must be just ripe, but no more. Clip off the top of each berry, make a little slit in the side, with a needle, that the sugar may penetrate, and take an equal weight of fruit and of sugar: boil them together, very gently, scum well, and when the skins begin to look transparent, take out the fruit, with a skimmer, and put it into jars or glasses; boil the syrup till it jellies, then strain, and pour it over the fruit.
Cut off the stalks, and prick the fruit with a needle, boil a fourth more than its weight of sugar, about five minutes, with ¼ pint of red or white currant jelly; then put in the cherries, and simmer gently till they look bright. Some take out the stones.
Cut off half the stalk of large ripe cherries; roll them, one by one, in beaten white of egg, and then lightly in sifted sugar. Spread a sheet of thin white paper on a sieve reversed, and place that on a stove, spread the fruit on the paper, and send them from the stove to table. Bunches of currants, or strawberries, in the same way.
Take out the stones, put the fruit into a preserving-pan, with 2 lbs. lump sugar to 6 lbs. fruit, let it come slowly to a boil, set it by till next day, boil up again, repeat this the third day, when they will begin to look bright and plump; then pot them in the syrup.
