ge basin, and proceed
to mix it, so that it shall be as smooth as cream, with 3/4 pint of warm
milk-and-water, or with water only; though even a very little milk will
much improve the bread. Pour the yeast into the hole made in the flour,
and stir into it as much of that which lies round it as will make a
thick batter, in which there must be no lumps. Strew plenty of flour on
the top; throw a thick clean cloth over, and set it where the air is
warm; but do not place it upon the kitchen fender, for it will become
too much heated there. Look at it from time to time: when it has been
laid for nearly an hour, and when the yeast has risen and broken through
the flour, so that bubbles appear in it, you will know that it is ready
to be made up into dough. Then place the pan on a strong chair, or
dresser, or table, of convenient height; pour into the sponge the
remainder of the warm milk-and-water; stir into it as much of the flour
as you can with the spoon; then wipe it out clean with your fingers, and
lay it aside. Next take plenty of the remaining flour, throw it on the
top of the leaven, and begin, with the knuckles of both hands, to knead
it well. When the flour is nearly all kneaded in, begin to draw the
edges of the dough towards the middle, in order to mix the whole
thoroughly; and when it is free from flour and lumps and crumbs, and
does not stick to the hands when touched, it will be done, and may again
be covered with the cloth, and left to rise a second time. In 3/4 hour
look at it, and should it have swollen very much, and begin to crack, it
will be light enough to bake. Turn it then on to a paste-board or very
clean dresser, and with a large sharp knife divide it in two; make it up
quickly into loaves, and dispatch it to the oven: make one or two
incisions across the tops of the loaves, as they will rise more easily
if this be done. If baked in tins or pans, rub them with a tiny piece of
butter laid on a piece of clean paper, to prevent the dough from
sticking to them. All bread should be turned upside down, or on its
side, as soon as it is drawn from the oven: if this be neglected, the
under part of the loaves will become wet and blistered from the steam,
which cannot then escape from them. _To make the dough without setting a
sponge_, merely mix the yeast with the greater part of the warm
milk-and-water, and wet up the whole of the flour at once after a little
salt has been stirred in, proceeding exactly, in every