and only at the moment
when it is wanted, or the aromatic flavour will in some measure be
lost. To extract all its good qualities, the powder requires two
separate and somewhat opposite modes of treatment, but which do not
offer any difficulty when explained. On the one hand, the fine
flavour would be lost by boiling, while, on the other, it is
necessary to subject the coffee to that degree of heat in order to
extract its medicinal quality. The mode of proceeding, which, after
many experiments, Mr. Donovan found to be the most simple and
efficacious for attaining both these ends, was the following:--

The whole water to be used must be divided into two equal parts.
One half must be put first to the coffee "cold", and this must be
placed over the fire until it "just comes to a boil", when it must
be immediately removed. Allowing it then to subside for a few
moments the liquid must be poured off as clear as it will run. The
remaining half of the water, which during this time should have
been on the fire, must then be added "at a boiling heat" to the
grounds, and placed on the fire, where it must be kept "boiling"
for about three minutes. This will extract the medicinal virtue,
and if then the liquid be allowed again to subside, and the clear
fluid be added to the first portion, the preparation will be found
to combine all the good properties of the berry in as great
perfection as they can be obtained. If any fining ingredient is
used it should be mixed with the powder at the beginning of the
process.

Several kinds of apparatus, some of them very ingenious in their
construction, have been proposed for preparing coffee, but they are
all made upon the principle of extracting only the aromatic
flavour, while Professor Donovan's suggestions not only enable us
to accomplish that desirable object, but superadd the less obvious
but equally essential matter of extracting and making our own all
the medicinal virtues.

When Webster and Parkes published their _Encyclopedia of Domestic
Economy_, London, 1844, they gave the following as "the most usual
method of making coffee in England":

Put fresh ground coffee into a coffee-pot, with a sufficient
quantity of water, and set this on the fire till it boils for a
minute or two; then remove it from the fire, pour o