ra in as little water as suffices, and add
to the brine, then test again. Put the brine when cold into a clean,
roomy vessel, a keg or barrel, else a big stone crock. It should not
quite half fill it. Provide a heading that will float upon it, also a
light weight to keep the heading on the pickles when put in, and hold
them under the brine. Unless so held the uppermost rot, and spoil the
lot. Mold will gather around the head in spite of the cloves, but less
than without them. Whenever you put in fresh pickles, take out the head,
wash and scald, dry, and return to place.

Anything edible will make pickle--still there are many things better
kept out of the brine. Cabbage and cauliflower for example do not need
it--green tomatoes, onions, and Jerusalem artichokes are likewise taboo.
The artichokes make good pickle, but it must be made all at once. Cut
anything intended for the brine with a bit of stalk, and without
bruising the stalk. Cucumbers should be small, and even in size,
gherkins about half grown, string beans, three parts grown, crook-neck
squash very small and tender, green peppers for mangoes, full grown but
not turning, muskmelons for other mangoes three parts grown. Wash clean
or wipe with a damp cloth. Cut pickles in early morning, so they may be
fresh and crisp. Never put in any wilted bit--thereby you invite decay.

Watermelon rind makes fine pickle, sweet and sour--also citron, queen of
all home made preserves. It must be fairly thick, sound and unbruised.
The Rattle Snake melon has a good rind for such uses. The finer flavored
and thinner-rinded varieties that come to market, are rarely worth
cutting up. The cutting up is a bit tedious. The rind must be cut in
strips rather more than an inch wide and three to five inches long, then
trimmed on each side, free of green outer skin, and all trace of the
soft inside. There will remain less than half an inch thickness of firm
pale green tissue with potentialities of delight--if you know how to
bring them out.

Firm clingstone peaches not fully ripe, can be put in the brine--they
had better, however, be pickled without it. For whatever is put in, and
saved by salt, must be freed of the salt by long soaking before it is
fit to eat. The soaking process is the same for everything--take from
brine, wash clean in tepid water, put to soak in cold water with
something on top to hold the pickles down. Change water twice the first
day, afterward every day, until it has