Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1866-06-01
Letter from Boston.

BosToN, MASS, May 30th, 1866.
Like yourself, friend PHGNIx, enterprise
is catching) another Connecticut river jour
nal has an occasional correspondent from
this city; who, from internal evidence it is
easily guessed, is lady, and, by the same
token, is a lady of culture, with fine taste
in art, a gift for thoughtful and discrminat-
ing criticism, enlivened by vein of pleas
antry now and then, that has in it spice of
playful malice. She dares, l have noticed,
speak disrespectfuly of the HUB" at least
call in question its claims to perfection in
everything, whilst condescendingly conced-
ing its indubitable merits. OF course she
cannot be to the."manor born;" for no ma
tive would dream of taking liberties with
this Athens-like metropolis Her last shot,
noticed, was about the ''furor" about Prof.
Blot. This was not so good a hit as some
others she has made. 1t was more funny
than philosophical and showed an ignorance
of the vital relation between cookery and
enlightened civilization Surely it is the
highest proof of Bostonian intelligence-es-
daughters of its citizens, to be enthusiastic
over the advent of the hero of the cuisine.
There is an understanding of the affinities,
an insight into the homogeniety of aesthetics,
when those who crowd the lecture-room of
an Emerson. gather about the gas-stove of
Blot; when those who comprehend the
transcendentalsm of historic Concord, are
eager to taste the ETHEREAL dishes of epicu-
rean Paris. OF what worth in this world
are poetry and metaphysics, subtitle thought
and brilliant imaginings, if waited upon by
| indigestion? "A community afflicted with
chronic dyspepsia, suffering from bad din
ners and worse coffee. certainly cannot be
expected to appreciate the learning of the
scholars, the wisdom of the thinkers, or the
lyrics of the singers. Erasmus and Cotton
Mather would discourse to it in vain; and
Solomon and Martin Tupper waste upon it
their proverbs: and Tennyson and Hosea
| Biglow fail to interest il any more than the
war-whoops of savages. The foundation of
any social system, which is to have an har-
monious and graceful superstructure shin
ing in the light and aspiring to the heavens,
must be the kitchen,-the regeneratcd, re-
constructed, perfectly adjusted, scientifically
conducted, and artistically engineered kitch-
en-. Bostonians are alive to this great truth;
and hence by the papers and the public the
temporary desertion of politics and polkas,
of commerce and caucuses, of all the ordi-
nary pursuits of scheming and doing life,
welcome, report, talk and joke about the ac-
complshed teacher of soup-making, cake
baking, ,meat-roasting and vegetable-boilng;
the expert of the saucepan and the spider;
the man of marmalades and jellies; who has
appeared so TO mdoctrinate the parlor, that
the present and future mistresses thereof
shall no longer be at the mercy of indcpen-
dent Bridgets, or find their households re-
belious, from the inmates of the nursery up
to the head of the family, by meals uneata-
BILE and meals indigestible.
This great and glorious reform will not
be confined to this metropolis; thanks to
stenography, photography, new powers of
the press, and the omnipresence of private
b female correspondence! The reports of the
o lecturers and the receipts of the lecturer are
already abroad, almost as thoroughly as the
schoOlmaster: and one of the magazines the
- Galaxy of New York, has with consummate
shrewdness engaged Prof. Blot as a "star"
contributor,-who,a at the range, will doubt
less rival Mrs. Stowe in the "Chimney Cor
ner." You need not despair, therefore, even
among the Green Mountains. The reyolu-
ton will reach you and the day will dawn
upon you when your bills of fare will be all
French, and you will feed ON delicacies with
unpronouncable and unintellgible names
u and find them tasting no better than the
dishes your grandmothers concocted for the
hungry boys, after hard days work in the
fields.
But let not my badinage do injustice to O
. mertorious enterprise. Prof. Blot is really
- doing good. His instructions have an eye
to economy and health, as well as to luxur
n ous or palatable living. There is nothing o
's the charlatan about him. The tendency o
T. his mission is to remove some of the gross
'e ness of American dinners, and to show Am
u ercan housekeepers, even those who are no
G. rich, how they can greatly improve in th'
= preparation and serving of fish, flesh anC
ie fowl, vegetables, pastry and preserves. S'
'e let the Professor continue to discourse anC
illustrate, and let il be set down to the credi
of Boston maids and matrons, that they
show jealous ardor to listen to him, a
those who believe that one of woman's right
is the right to learn how best to discharg
all her domestic duties "Let her be ship
master if she WILL" said Margaret Fuller
so say If she "will' and wants to. Blu
shipmaster or no shipmaster, should she no
understand how TO bake shad, iricassee
chicken and broil steak? Would any ma
a even be the worse for that kind of knowl
-. edge?
. But though the Professor of the culinar,
lr art has been engrossing much, he has no
monopolized all the attention of the city.
:. have already alluded 10 the interest taken il
Emerson's lectures. That thinker keeps hi
"a hold on large circle of admirers, not to sa,
disciples, who never weary of hearing hi