748 Canvas -Back and Terrapin. 



make a business of sending them to market complain of their increas- 

 ing rarity, and nothing but the high price has stimulated them to 

 keep up the supply. 



The negroes are credited with having been the first to bring the 

 virtues of the terrapin to notice. They cooked, and still cook it, by 

 placing it alive among the hot coals or in an oven. When it is suffi- 

 ciently cooked, the under shell is easily removed with a knife, and the 

 contents are then eaten from the inverted upper shell, nothing being 

 removed but the gall-sac. There are many, particularly epicures of 



A TERRAPIN HUNTER S HOME. 



long experience with the terrapin, who maintain that this is the true 

 way to cook it. One noted for his knowledge of Maryland dishes 

 invariably cooks his terrapin as follows : He places a " count," alive, 

 on its back in an old-fashioned ten-plate stove, roasts it until the 

 under shell is easily detached, removes the gall, adds a little butter, 

 salt, and a glass of good sherry or madeira, and then eats it, with 

 a sense as of a Mussulman discounting the delights of the seventh 

 heaven. He has never met Mr. Bergh. 



Baltimore consumes most of the terrapins caught. Large numbers 

 are shipped to New York. Delmonico is a good customer of the 

 Baltimore market, and Scoggins's game and terrapin depot is 

 seldom without a box or two addressed to the New York restau- 

 rant. With all due respect for a New York cuisine, neither the ter- 

 rapin nor the canvas-back is ever the same when eaten away from, 

 so to speak, its native heath. There is an indefinable halo of origin- 

 ality about Maryland cookery, wholly independent of the process 

 just delicately alluded to in connection with terrapin, that obtains 

 nowhere else. A Maryland dinner is simplicity itself, but it would 

 tax the capacity of the "best men" of a New York club. 



Washington eats more fish than any other city in the United 

 States in proportion to its population, but Baltimore probably eats 



