f an acre, or, in other words, _forty rods_, of
land; and, in my next, I will make good my promise.

No. IV

MAKING BREAD--(CONTINUED.)

101. In the last number, at Paragraph 86, I observed that I hoped it was
unnecessary for me to give any directions as to the mere _act_ of making
bread. But several correspondents inform me that, without these
directions, a conviction of the utility of baking bread at home is of _no
use to them_. Therefore, I shall here give those directions, receiving my
instructions here from one, who, I thank God, does know how to perform
this act.

102. Suppose the quantity be a bushel of flour. Put this flour into a
_trough_ that people have for the purpose, or it may be in a clean smooth
tub of any shape, if not too deep, and if sufficiently large. Make a
pretty deep hole in the middle of this heap of flour. Take (for a bushel)
a pint of good fresh yeast, mix it and stir it well up in a pint of _soft_
water milk-warm. Pour this into the hole in the heap of flour. Then take a
spoon and work it round the outside of this body of moisture so as to
bring into that body, by degrees, flour enough to make it form a _thin
batter_, which you must stir about well for a minute or two. Then take a
handful of flour and scatter it thinly over the head of this batter, so as
to _hide_ it. Then cover the whole over with a cloth to keep it _warm_;
and this covering, as well as the situation of the trough, as to distance
from the fire, must depend on the nature of the place and state of the
weather as to heat and cold. When you perceive that the batter has risen
enough to make _cracks_ in the flour that you covered it over with, you
begin to form the whole mass into _dough_, thus: you begin round the hole
containing the batter, working the flour into the batter, and pouring in,
as it is wanted to make the flour mix with the batter, soft water
milk-warm, or milk, as hereafter to be mentioned. Before you begin this,
you scatter the _salt_ over the heap at the rate of _half a pound_ to a
bushel of flour. When you have got the whole _sufficiently moist_, you
_knead it well_. This is a grand part of the business; for, unless the
dough be _well worked_, there will be _little round lumps of flour in the
loaves_; and, besides, the original batter, which is to give fermentation
to the whole, will not be duly mixed. The dough must, therefore, be well
worked. The _fists_ must go heartily into it. It must be rolled o