The Sun.
London, England, 1849-05-03 00:00:00

FRAS.ER.

Michael South is the prince of military novelists,
and his " Peace Campaigns of Ensign Faunce" bids
fair to become the most amusing, as it already is the
most veracious of military daguerreotypes. Those who
desire to know what life in barracks really is should
accompany Ensign John Faunce to his quarters. Our
friend the:Schemer concludes; his " Loose Leaves from
his Note-Book" this month with schemes for destroying
those two monster evils, mendicancy and pauperisT,•
We commend his lucubrations to the attentive cons:
deration of our statesmen and legislators, who .1
find many valuable hints in these "loose leaves 0.1
" The Schemer." The present number is rich I°,
reviews. We have a laudatory notice 0
Aytoun's " Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers," gl
slashing critique on much " Recent Poetry,
and Recent Verse," and an admirable analysis 11
16Froude's Nemesis of Faith," in which, full
justice the fart
errors of the author are fearlessly exposed) .
justice is done to his transcendant genius
and his unswerving honesty. The most
practically useful, perhaps, of the papers in this
month's Fraser is the one on " Indian Meal." It act'
pears that Indian meal acquired a bad character on
its first introduction, because the first specimens im-
ported were fusty. In fact, Indian meal will not
keep sweet any length of time, and there'
fore the corn and not the meal should
be imported. The corn, however, requires peculiar,.
care in the process of grinding, as the generality 01
English millstones are too soft for grinding such a
hard grain without grinding themselves at the same,
time, which makes the meal gritty; and the corn itself
should be fresh, or the meal will be bitter. In con'
sequence of these mishaps Indian meal has become
unpopular in England ; but if common care were
used to procure Indian corn of the same quality
as that used by the free population of the United
States, there cannot be a doubt but that it would
become a favourite food among us. The writer thus
describes Indian corn and meal as it ought to be :--
" Well; three days ago I received, direct from the
barn of an American friend, as it was stowed there last
autumn, a small barrel of Indian corn in the natural
state; large ears or cobs of the Indian corn, merely
stript of its loose leaves. On each ear, which is of
obelisk shape, about the size of a large thick truncated
carrot, there are perhaps about five hundred grains,
arranged in close order in their eight columns; th 3
colour gold yellow, or in some cases with a flicker of
blood-red. These grains need to be rubbed off, and
ground by some rational miller, whose millstones are
hard enough for the work: that is all the secret of pre-
paring them. And here comes the important point.
This grain, I now for the first time find, is sweet, among
the sweetest; pith an excellent rich taste something like
that of nuts; indeed it seems to me, perhaps from novelty
in part, decidedly sweeter than wheat, or any other grail
I have ever tasted. So that, it would appear, all our ex'
periments hitherto on Indian meal have been vitiated to
the heart by a deadly original sin, or fundamental falsity
to start with :—as if in experimenting on Westphalleo„
ham, all the ham presented to us hitherto for trial bed
been—in a rancid state. The difference between halo
and rancid ham, M. Boyer well knows, is considerable!
This is the difference, however, this highly considerable
one, we have had to encounter hitherto in all our e)Fpe-
riences of Indian meal. Ground by a reasonable male!,
who grinds only it and not his millstones along with it,
this grain, I can already promise, will make excellent,
cleanly, wholesome, and palatable eating; and be fit for
the cook's art under all manner of conditions; ready to
combine with whatever judicious condiment, and reward
well whatever wise treatment he applies to it; and indeed
on the whole, I should say, a more promising article
could not well be submitted to him, if his art is really a
useful one."

The Indian meal has hitherto been sold at an exorbi-
tant rate. In the London shops it has not been wld
at a lower rate than threepence per pound, the price
of wheaten flour, whereas its actual value, when 501 d
by retail, with a free demand, is about a penny per
pound, and even with a poor demand its price should
never exceed three-halfpence. 'We hope some enter-
prising corn merchant will undertake to supply the
public with good Indian meal, at a fair price. It
appears to us that this would be a most profitable spe-
culation. The present number of Fraser contains
some very respectable verse contributions.