The Express.
London, England, 1853-11-24 00:00:00

LITERAT 11118.

A 1-, ent.se on 'lir Propagation of &Onion and Warr VA.
Knwann and TIIJIIAS AbHWOltill. Stockport: E•
11 King. London . Sospitin sod Marshall.
The rixty-eight pages that nuke up this little
book should at once obtain the widest attention, for
they show how one class of really delicious food
may be indefinitely increased. Under an alarm of
rising prices and a deficient supply of food, there are
two things to be done—to provide for the incoming
of the largest obtainable quantity of grain from
abroad, and to economise and improve our resources
at home. Our free-trade policy -largely aids us in
doing the first of these two things. As to the other,
we have almost everything to learn. The case
being so, any premonition of a deficiency of food
should not alarm so much as animate us--stir us up
to see what can be done to make our resources
answer for the satisfaction of every appetite in the
kingdom. At the present time this is no merely
curious 'peculation to amuse a thoughtful hour, but
'matter of seri owl and practical interest and importance.
Experienced farmers assure us that such a deficiency
of wheat has never been known since 1816. We
are likely to require, before next harvest, double the
quantity of wheat we have ever imported; and the
area from which we have hitherto drawn is at the
same time singularly restricted. Oars are a scanty
crop, and now very dear; and so are hay and straw
—our era ill supply being thus affected. Turnips are
in some places nearly twice the usual price ; and in
Ireland the potato crop has turned out worse than
was expr cted, the lees varying on different soils from
a fourth to half the crop. The farmers have taken
the hint afforded by these failures, and they are doing
and will do all they can to give us a good harvest
next year. Every hour of the fine weather of
the last three weeks has been used for

sowing, and the gnantity of seed got into the ground
is perhaps beyond all precedent. It is understood
that *great quantity of grass land has been, and that
more will be, turned up for tillage. If so, there
must be an extension of stall-feeding of cattle. It will
be expensive—so dear as roots, hay, and straw will
be this winter; but there will be a demand for
butcher's meat by-and-bye which will repay the cost.
One consequence, we may hope, will be, that economy
of food will be introduced into the farm-yard, as we
would fain see it into the cottage and the kitchen.
Considerable progress has been made in the know-
ledge and practice of cattle-feeding with steamed
food, but there are still multitudes of farms where
wheat chaff is made manure of by throwing it
upon the dung-heap, instead of the better and
cheaper method of putting it through the
living machine of the animal. A stone of chaff,
boiled with oilcake, makes a capital portion of a meal
for cattle ; and many substances become nutritious
by cooking, which would not otherwise be eaten. The
same is the case, as we have taken occasion to say
before, with human food. If the housewives of
England knew the virtues of steam and of boiling
water, the general body of the working men of
England—of those who, in all ranks, work with bead
or hands—would be stronger and healthier than they
are, from being more generously fed, while the con-
sumption of the materials of food would be remarka-
bly reduced. It is really much to be wished, that,
before the pressure becomes serious, something could
be done to instruct our wives, sisters, servants, and
neighbours, in the principles and art of plain
cookery. The object now is not, as in former times
of scarcity, to discover how people may be kept alive
at the smallest possible cost. It may come to that:
hut we hope sot. The object rather is to make our
resources go as far as possible, so that everybody
may be sufficiently fed. We do not want potato
bread, and unpalatable messes swallowed as a condi-
tion of living; but rather that three persons should
be agreeably and abundantly fed from materials
which, under our English awkwardness in cookery,
feed only two persons much less pleasantly. No
doubt there will be large importations of rice and
Indian meal. There is • method of cooking these
two articles together, and stamaing them, which
provides the cheapest known food, of a really
palatable sort, in England —u the Bradford men
can tell who were supported by it in the famine
time. Under less pressure, the same materials, and
large quantities of bona, broths and vegetables, and
even meat, now wasted, would go a great way
towards repairing the deficiencies of the last harvest.
When the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland sent agricul-
tural missionaries abroad through the island, to in-
struct the people in growing other produce than
potatoes, he d'.d vast good. The benefits of that act
are extending and increasing at this day. We would
fain see another order of missionaries sent out in
England, as well as Ireland—popular lecturers, with
each • portable kitchen, to exhibit the principles and
practice of cookery. The women of England would
crowd to hear them; and from that day forward, the
chances of famine is our country would be remark-
ably reduced.
A very important resource remains to us in our
fish. If this consideration is new to anybody, it is
certainly not so to the royal family. When they
visited the Dublin Exhibition, their attention was
fixed by what they saw in the fisheries department,
and Prince Albert requested that he might be sup-
plied with whatever documents the commissioners
could scud him which could throw light on the art
of propagating and preserving fish. The Ashworths,
whose name is so well known in connexion with
various benevolent social aims, have purchased a
fishery in Galway, and instituted a set of remark-
able experiments in regard to the production and
rearing of fish; and it was the set of models from
their works that interested the Queen and Prince so
deeply. It is now completely proved that, at a
very trifling expense, an unlimited supply
of fish can be secured—as has been known
in France for a long time past. In Ireland, the
experiment has been made, we believe, with salmon
alone. In France, the plan succeeds with carp,
tench, and a variety of other river fish, as well as
with salmon. Now, the end of December is the sea-
son when the spawn and milt of the salmon should
be obtained; and here is time, before that, for the
very simple and cheap preparations for an infant
salmon preserve to be made, without losing another
year. There must be plenty of people living on the
banks of our rivers who have enterprise enough to
make an attempt so cheap, so easy, and so sure of
success, if managed with the ordinary care that we
bestow on our daily business. It would be no small
resource to have in view—that of any number of
millions we please of all the fish that inhabit oar
rivers. If to this we add all that may be
obtained from the sea by applying the commonest
sense and skill in the catching of them, we see that
it will be our own fault if anybody starves for gent
rations to come. If we were wise we should be be-
yond the reach of any fatal injury from unfavourable
seasons, or from fluctuations in the relations of any
foreign powers. If such food as we have always at
command were duly economised, equally distributed,
so that none should cram while others hungered, and
increased as, in the case of fish, it might be by a due
observance of natural laws, the first and greatest of
human liabilities and social calamities might be
avoided, and human existence indefinitely elevated
and ameliorated. It is pest imagining Kist social
life would become if every member of the community
were secure of a sufficient permanent supply of food.
What the evils of insecurity are we mar now con-
ceive by observing the anxiety that is at this moment
hanging over every country in Europe as to how its
people are to be fed next year. So far as the supplies
of salmon and other fish for human food are concerned,
let everybody read this Treatise on Fish Culture by
Edmund and Thomas Ashton. This is the season for
the study of the book, and for putting into practice
the important lesson it suggests.

THE CHOLERA.

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