114 Fisumye is Amertcan WArers. 
New England they generally skin the tautog, as an easier 
process than scaling, and consider it a culinary delicacy when 
properly cooked, of which there are three methods, ¢. ¢., broil- 
ing, frying, and stewing. Before frying the fish, score him 
across each sitle an inch apart, as you would any breakfast 
pan-fish. Fry some salt pork to a crisp; take out the pork, 
and, while the fat is so hot as to be next to blazing, roll your 
fish in a mixture of rye and corn meal, and place it in the 
sparkling hot fat, and let it brown. Turn it twice, and dredge 
it each time with flour, so that its crust will become an eighth 
of an inch thick. After broiling, and while piping hot, baist 
it with butter, salt it, and give it a simple dash of red pep- 
per, which stimulates without inflaming the stomach, and the 
slightest dash of black as a bouquet, though it does inflame 
the stomach without stimulating or assisting digestion. 
The following receipt by an editor of quelque chose de gout 
is worth remembering : 
“ Now, fair ruler of the destinies of dinner (for if thou beest 
aman I have no sympathies toward thee), smoke-compelling 
Betty, or Mary, or whatever else may be the happy appella- 
tive in which not only thou, but all of us rejoice, thou hast 
before thee one of the most delicately absorbent substances 
in nature, imbibing flavor from every thing which surrounds 
it, whether of adverse or of propitious tendency ; subject, as 
Warren Hastings said of the tenure of the British possessions 
in India, alike ‘to the touch of chance or the breath of opin- 
ion.’ 
“Thou hast it, my choice Mary! The small, deep stew- 
pan—with its thin cullender or strainer, on which the fish is 
to be lowered to the bottom, that it may, when stewed into 
soft delight, be gently raised again without injuring its integ- 
rity of form—glows with brightness in front of thee! Thy 
vigorous arm of mottled red, thy round wrist, and small, com- 
pact fingers, grasp the sharp-pointed knife with which to sat- 
isfy thyself that not one scale remains around the head, the 
fins, the tail. 
