COOKERY. 201 
them. For instance, the following is the method of cooking 
practised by the Kanakas, of the Friendly Islands: “ A hole is 
scooped in the earth, and a fire is made therein with wood, and 
kept burning until a fair-sized heap of glowing charcoal remains. 
Pebbles are then thrown in until the charcoal is covered. What- 
ever is to be cooked is enveloped in leaves, then placed upon the 
pebbles, and more leaves heaped upon it. The earth is next 
thrown back into the cavity, and stamped well down. A long 
time is, of course, needed for the viands to become cooked 
through, but so subtle is the mode that to overdo anything is 
almost an impossibility. A couple of days may pass from the 
time of ‘ putting down’ the joint, yet when it is dug up it will 
be smoking hot, retaining all its juices, tender as jelly, yet withal 
as full of flavour as it is possible for cooked meat to be. No 
matter how large the joint is, or how tough the meat, this gentle 
suasion will render it succulent, and tasty; and no form of 
civilized cookery can in the least compare with it. No better 
illustration of the advantages of slow cooking could well be 
found ” (Hutchison, Cruise of the Cachalot). 
“We must bear in mind,” as Sir Wm. Roberts has taught, 
“that among civilized races the preparation of food for the 
table is carried to a high degree of practical effect. The cereal 
grains, for example, which are employed for making bread, are 
first finely ground, and sifted from the bran by the miller; the 
flour is subjected, with the aid of moisture, and artificial heat, 
to a cooking process; the meats and fish we eat are boiled, 
or roasted ; the vegetables we use are carefully deprived of their 
coarser parts, and are then boiled. All this preliminary prepara- 
tion and cooking, serve to make the food more capable of being 
thoroughly exhausted of its nutritive qualities. Even as it is, 
some waste occurs, and the feces always retain considerable 
elements of undigested food. But it is obvious that if food be 
rendered too easy of digestion, there arises a risk that the nutri- 
ment will pass unduly quick, and wastefully, into the blood, and on 
through the tissues into the excretory organs; so likewise out of 
the body before this food has been made fully and economically 
available for the completion of the slow nutritive processes. 
Moreover, a sudden irruption into the blood of large quantities 
of newly-digested aliment would tend to disturb the chemical 
balanee of that fluid, and thus interfere with the tranquil per- 
formance of its functions. A too rapid digestion and absorption 
