water
as possible; make use of the syrup they were scalded in, as you did for
your apples, &c. Cherries, currants, raspberries, and all ripe fruits
need not be scalded; and if you make your tarts in china, or glass
patties, lay the sugar at bottom, then the fruit, with a little more
sugar on the top; put no paste at the bottom, only lid them over, and
bake them in a slack oven. You have receipts how to make crust for
tarts; mince pies must be baked in tin patties, that you may slip them
out into a dish, and a puff paste is the best for them. When you make
sweetmeat tarts, or a crocant tart, lay in the sweetmeats, or preserved
fruit either in glass or china patties that are small, for that purpose;
lay a very thin crust on the top, and let them be baked no more than
till your crust is nicely coloured, and that in a slow oven. If you
would have a crocant tart for the middle of the table, or a side-dish,
have a glass, or china dish, of what size you please, and lay in the
preserved fruit of different sorts, (you must have a round cover just
the size of the inside of your dish) roll out a sugar crust, the
thickness of an half crown, and lay over the cover; mark it with marking
irons made on purpose for that use, of what shapes you please; then put
the crust, with the cover, into a very slack oven, not to discolour it,
only to have it crisp. When you take it out of the oven, loosen it from
the cover very gently, and when quite cold, take it carefully off, and
lay over your sweetmeats, and it being hollow, you will see the fruit
through it. If the tart is not eaten, only take off the lid, and your
sweetmeats may be put into the pots again.

TEA. The habit of drinking tea frequently, and in large quantities,
cannot fail to be injurious, as it greatly weakens and relaxes the tone
of the stomach. This produces indigestion, nervous trembling and
weakness, attended with a pale, wan complexion. When tea is taken only
at intervals, and after solid food, it is salutary and refreshing; but
when used as a substitute for plain nourishing diet, as is too commonly
the case amongst the lower classes, it is highly pernicious, especially
as large quantities of a spurious description are too frequently imposed
upon the public. The policy which compels a very numerous class to
purchase this foreign article, for procuring which immense sums are sent
out of the country, while the produce of our own soil is comparatively
withheld by an exorbit