Irish Stew - Cut up, into five or six thin slices, part of a breast of mutton; then wash and peel four pounds of potatoes, and slice thin two onions; put a layer of potatoes cut in thick slices at the bottom of the stewpan, then two pieces of meat, seasoned with pepper and salt, then some sliced onion

again potatoes, meat, and onions, till all is in; add half a pint of water or thin broth, cover close so as to prevent the steam from getting out, and let them stew over a slow fire for two hours. Great care must be taken not to let it burn, and that it does not do too fast. A small teaspoonful of pepper, and one and a half of salt, should be mixed together to season this dish with.

Meat Puddings. — Well work in your hands half a pound of dripping or chopped suet, and one teaspoonful of salt, into two pounds of flour, and then make it into a stiff paste with as little water as you can. Next grease the inside of the pudding basin with dripping or lard, lay a thin crust of the paste inside the basin, and fill up with pieces of the thin flap of a breast of mutton, seasoned with pepper and salt or a bullock's kidney cut lengthwise, and seasoned – or some beef skirt or beef steak cut into pieces slantingwise, seasoned and put in; a fat piece at bottom, and then the lean : when about half full, pour in nearly half a pint of warm water, and fill up with the meat; cover the whole with the remainder of the stiff paste rolled out to shape; well close up the edges, and tie a clean well-floured cloth over. Put into a saucepan of boiling water, and let it boil gently for three hours from its being put in the pot. When done, remove the cloth and serve up.

Savoury Dish without Meat. Wash, peel, and slice six pounds of potatoes into a baking dish, with a pint of water at bottom; upon each layer of potatoes sprinkle a little salt and pepper, and here and there a few slices of dripping or suet; then more potatoes and seasoning, till all are used. Bake them till done enough. For the seasoning, mix two teaspoonfuls of salt, one and a half of pepper, one onion, and one ounce of dripping.

Baked Rice Pudding. - Chop two ounces of suet fine, and sprinkle over the bottom of a baking dish; strew in a pound of rice that has been nicely cleaned and washed, then mix with it three ounces of brown sugar, and a teaspoonful of mixed spice, grated lemon-peel, and a pinch of salt

fill up the baking dish with five pints of water, and bake in a very slack oven till it sets: it should be done gently, and will take from two to three hours.

Boiled Rice Pudding.— Pick and wash well one pound of rice; tie it up loosely in a clean pudding cloth, as rice requires plenty of room to swell. Put it on to boil in cold water, over a slow fire, so as to be an hour before it comes to a boil, and then let it boil gently another hour. Some people eat it with salt, some with sugar, and some with sweet sauce made by boiling a spoonful of treacle or sugar in a little of the water the pudding was boiled in.

Bread Pudding. Soak two pounds of stale bread, or crusts, or toast, all night in plenty of cold water, with a plate placed on the top of them just to keep the bread under water: next morning, pour off and squeeze out all the superfluous water; mash up the pieces of bread, and mix with it half a pound of flour, a quarter of a pound of clean currants, four ounces of suet chopped fine, a quarter of a pound of moist sugar, and two teaspoonfuls of fresh-ground allspice; then grease the inside of a baking dish with a bit of your suet, put your pudding into it, and bake it for two hours: or it may be tied up in a clean floured cloth, put into boiling water, with a plate at the bottom, and boiled for the same time.

Rolley Puddings. Make a crust, by crumbling a quarter of a pound of clean sweet dripping into a pound and a half of flour, with a small teaspoonful of salt; mix it all well together while dry, then add by degrees cold water enough to make it into a stiff paste, roll it out to rather less than a quarter of a yard wide and three quarters of a yard long, but thinnest at the edges; pour and spread upon it a thin layer of treacle, but do not let it touch the sides nor ends within half an inch; then just slightly wet the edges and end of the paste with a little water, roll up the pudding, and close the edges by pinching them together, so that the treacle will not come out. Lay your pudding in a well-floured cloth, and carefully tie it at each end; pin the cloth in the middle to' keep it close. Put it in boiling water with a plate at bottom, and boil for two hours.

Blackberry Jam will make very nice puddings in the winter, and, if you live in the country, will only cost you the price of the sugar, as you may gather the blackberries.

To four pounds of berries add one pound of moist sugar, boil it for full three quarters of an hour, stirring and skimming it well. When cold, put it into earthenware jars, closely covered, with a bladder or paper tied over the top. The skimmings will be much relished by children, spread on bread, or to eat with plain boiled rice pudding.

Firmity.-A pint of wheat soaked in warm water for two hours; pour off the water, and boil the wheat in fresh water ill quite done; it will take several hours. Pour off the water, and put the boiled wheat into an earthenware pan. A large cupfull of this wheat, mixed with an equal quantity of skim milk, made hot, and eaten with treacle or sugar, is a very nice, nourishing meal, and a favourite one with most children.

Buttered Wheat is made with the same boiled wheat, seasoned with a cup of thin soup, pepper and salt, and warmed: it is a very savoury supper for a poor man, after his day's work is over.

Mrs. H. More, and others.

FRIENDLY HINTS TO THE COTTAGE COOK.

THE difference between eating bread new or stale is one loaf in five.

If you turn your meat into broth, it will go much farther than if you roast or bake it.

If you have a garden, make the most of it: a bit of leek, or an onion, makes all dishes savoury at small expense; a border of parsley and a few herbs take up but little space in the garden, and will make your soups, &c. pleasant all the year round, if you are careful to gather, dry, and put them into paper bags in the summer time.

Take care to render the fat skimmings of your broth into dripping.

Four ounces of dripping rubbed into a quart of flour, and made up into a loaf, will save butter upon the bread; and if a few carraway-seeds are added, will answer for a seed-cake.

Always boil cabbages or potatoes by themselves, and throw away the water they are boiled in, as it is injurious to the health, though the vegetables are wholesome.

Always have oatmeal in the house; a cup of porridge is an excellent breakfast or supper for man, woman, and child, and may be made at far less cost than the miserable trash called tea which poor people buy. If the money spent in butter were spent in meat, poor families would be much better fed than they are.

Mrs. H. More and others.

THE WORK-ROOM AT WESTON SCHOOL.

I HAVE told you already, that Mrs. Jones encouraged habits of personal neatness in the school, and among the cottagers, by allowing mothers or elder sisters to come on Friday afternoon, for the purpose of repairing all their newly-washed garments for the next week's wear, and sometimes cutting out a tidy frock or petticoat from materials given by the gentry. Now Mrs. Jones had never been used to visit schools, till good Mr. Simpson had roused her to a life of usefulness; and Mrs. Betty, the housekeeper, understood cookery and economy, could knit very well, and even spin the finest thread, as some of her master's table-linen could prove, yet she was not very clever at her needle; so it was a fortunate circumstance for the school, that about this time (which, by the by, was many years since) Sir John Temple's eldest son brought his wife to live at Weston, that he might be near to his father at Weston Hall. Young Mrs. Temple was a very amiable person, and readily entered into all the village charities; and, as she was a clergyman's daughter, she was able to tell Mrs. Jones of many improvements that were taking place in schools at that period. The village schoolmistress was a plain, pious woman, anxious to do her full duty to the children, who all loved her; but she was often puzzled how to keep all the little ones, of which there were a great many, employed while she was instructing the elder ones. Mrs. Temple, on visiting the school one afternoon, finding several little creatures waiting with weary looks till the mistress had placed and stroked the gathers of a shirt sleeve for an elder girl, pointed out kindly the great advantage of classing the girls, and placing monitors over them for their work, in the same way as for their morning lessons. She also had half a dozen nice strong stools made,

with a deep drawer in each, for the monitors. These drawers held the cottons, needles, and thimbles for each class, a pair of scissors for the monitor also, &c.

I assure you the young teachers were not a little pleased to take possession of these seats; and, placing them in front of their class, distributed the work, thimbles, &c. among the children they had charge of, instructing them as far as their own knowledge could.

The lowest class, perhaps you will be surprised to hear, were only taught to fold hems on strips of paper, which the monitor cut from old copy-books; and also to thread their own needles; so that, when advanced to another class, they gave no trouble, but could prepare their work for themselves. As soon as they could fold even hems, both in paper and linen, and turn the corners neatly, they advanced to a second bench, where the monitor fitted them with a thimble, and taught them to place their work over the forefinger of the left hand, and to slant the needle properly, and take small stitches in their hems, also to finish off the corners nicely. In this class the children always made a pocket-handkerchief for themselves as soon as they could hem it neatly. Then they went into the fourth class, where they learned seam-stitch, which you know is quite different from hemming, the work being held along the side of the fore-finger, and not over it, and the needle put in perfectly straight instead of aslant: in this class, also, they made sheets, pinafores, and the plain parts of shifts and shirts; they were also allowed to use scissors, and to become monitors to the two lower classes.

In the third class, back-stitching, running, felling, and mantuamaker's hem, were taught. In the second class the children soon learned to put together entirely many plain articles, to set in gathers, run tucks, herring-bone flannel, sew on frills, and to mark and to mend stockings thoroughly, — work which, I am sorry to say, is rarely well done by servants even now. By this arrangement of working classes the schoolmistress was able to give her undivided attention to the head girls, who, in a short time, were able to put together and neatly finish off all sorts of plain work; besides assisting on Friday to examine, mend, and alter the little children's frocks and other garments. Sir John Temple was very fond of his young daughter-in-law, and, observing her interest in the village school children, he desired the schoolmistress to bring specimens of the girls' needlework up to