could scarcely be seen on its sides tunnel | puddings and confectionery the same, and through it at their leisure. But then we want the fixed idea that England, which cannot be the mountain, is to be the man.

EGG.

From The Spectator.

more than the same, purpose which common yeast serves for bread. The artistic Parisian eye catches rapidly these advantages, and hence the devotion of Paris to the culinary treatment of egg.

In the first place, what object so elegant, so natural a unit of appetite, if the expres sion may be allowed, and yet so capable of artificial enhancement, as an egg still in its shell-a pure white ellipsoid-which in a

LADY GLENCORA PALLISER is said by shining silver or china cup reminds the eye Mr. Trollope to have displayed a profounding in its own cup, though suggesting at the of the natural beauty of the acorn snugly lyunconcern as to the number of eggs consumed in Paris every morning, irreverently declaring to her husband, Mr. Palliser, the Duke of St. Bungay's Chancellor of the Exchequer, that the information was worth nothing unless he could tell her how many of them were good and how many bad. Perhaps, however, the special proclivity of Paris to the consumption of eggs, the modes of dressing which in that brilliant capital are said by a recent writer on the subject of eggs to be no less than 685 in number, is a fact not altogether without interest apart from the inquiry as to the number of successful and unsuccessful

eggs

which are

kind and quality which the consumer of same moment the great advantages both in the one has over the prodigal who was reduced to attempt the assimilation of the other. The mere symmetry of the egg (to any one, that is, who adopts the obviously natural principle of the Narrow-endians, and puts the acute end of the ellipsoid upwards, allowing it to rest upon the Big-end), is in artist. It is the only article of real nutriitself a fascination to the mind of a true tion which resembles fruit in being appro priated naturally and without division to a single consumer. Meat must be carved, daily made proof of. To an enlarged mind broken or cut, and cheese scooped or quarthe limbs of fowls must be dislocated, bread it is rather the numberless capabilities which ried out ; only in the egg, amongst things that the swift Parisian intellect detects in egg, will support life and health, do we obtain a than the mere incident of gratification or fair natural whole the symmetry of which disappointment, that furnishes the subject of need not be broken by division. No doubt interest. Nay, the very fact that there is, it requires art both to furnish and eat an as it were, a suspense and a development as to the interior of the casket, a possible tra- egg so as not to jar upon this sense of natugedy in the dénouement, gives a fresh human ral harmony. There should be no painful interest to eggs as an article of consumption suspense in the last stage of preparation for which does not hang round fully manifested eating, no danger of any painful éclaircissefood. But what causes the Parisian reputa- even of discovering the "notes" of a "pudment on the breaking of the egg, no risk tion of egg is no doubt its immense adapti- ding" or "shop" egg of that half doubtful bility to different circumstances of the cu- sort which recalls the antiquarian scent of linary art. Easily manageable either in the liquid or the solid form, it serves alike for ously, indeed in direct opposition to the a dusty library, and suggests, very erronesecondary and for primary purposes. You may recognize its substantial and indepen- ter for a more thorough ventilation. On the truth, that the egg would have been betdent existence as an individual article of food, in which form it is indeed a more com- of white resembling rather the solid froth of contrary, the egg should display first a layer plete and graceful whole than any other ob- Devonshire cream than the smooth, semiject consumed by man; or secondly, you translucent white of ordinary albumen, and may make many eggs contribute and blend their substance into a homogeneous whole, circumference and becoming fluid only tonext a cocoon of yolk properly 'set' at the that loses none of the properties of the indi-wards the centre. This is not only nicer, but vidual, any more than the lakes lose the properties of the rivers which supply it; or finally, you may use it for merely secondary and subsidiary ends, to penetrate and enrich and flavour neutral solids, serving for

* How to Cook and Serve Eggs. By Georgiana

Till Routledge and Sons.

much easier to eat, without those indecorious overflows of yolk on to the plate, that suggest to a spectator of the ruins of a breakfast that a number of artists have been making a prodigal use of " King's yeltable. The beauty of an egg cooked in its low," and left their pallettes littering the

shell consists in its individual unity; and even in the process of consumption every care should be taken not to let it sprawl and oveflow like sauce or gravy. All the sandegg glasses give at least a minute too little for proper boiling, and it is the use of these delusive instruments, or the fatal impression which they tend to spread that three minutes is full time for the boiling of a new laid egg, (possibly it may for a shop egg of ambiguous character, if such a thing is to be boiled at all), which so often implants a kind of despair in the minds of very respectable cooks as to the art of boiling eggs. We have known an otherwise very estimable cook maintain that nature and education had conspired to render her incompetent to the task of boiling eggs, and this with an abject fatalism more suitable to a Mahometan than a Christian. The simple truth is, that she had never learned that the time requisite for boiling an egg varies inversely as its own age and directly as its size, a really new-laid hen's egg of average size requiring at least four minutes in boiling water, more if it be very big, and less if it be very small. We doubt, too, whether the English cooks are aware of, what is well known, we believe, to Parisian cooks, that a fresh egg well roasted is a far richer thing than the same egg well boiled. An egg turned round on the hearth till it is thoroughly done is perhaps, served in the best form of which it is susceptible, to those at least who like rich food. Of the other solid forms of eggs, perhaps the best is the

"Boil some eggs until they are hard. Remove the shell; cut each egg into half, and scoop out the yolks; put these into a mortar, with some pepper, salt, savoury herbs, and cream. Beat all to a paste; place some of it in each halved white of egg, and lay the remainder in a buttered dish; arrange the stuffed eggs on the top with the force meat uppermost. Place the dish in a moderately heated oven, and serve when the eggs are nicely browned."

What would an intelligent hen say to that? You might just as well put strawberry ice in the interior of a penny roll, or fill a cup with gold pieces, or excavate a history and stuff its framework with sensation novel.

In dealing with the secondary form of egg, in which many individual eggs are made tributary to abstract egg, the omelette form, there is more to be said for artificial treatment. The individuality of the thing has already escaped, and the mixture with other alien subtances is at this stage only a question of more or less. The danger of omelette is richness, and the tendency to mix freely with butter is excessive in omelette makers, and as objectionable as excessive. Egg is too nutritions to be greased. You might just as well butter your meat. The most that is permissable in this way is the very slight use of butter which is made in those little toasted" dice" used for soup. There the butter is not apparent, it has imparted a flavour, but left no physical trail. And the following receipt for omelette will be found at once one of the simplest and best in the little book before us:

-

"OMELETTE AUX CROUTONS.

hard-boiled that is eaten with salad. There is a peculiarly happy contrast between salad and egg, both in colour and edible qualities, which recommends this combination to the true artist. Salad is refreshing exactly because it is so innutritious, but then for that reason it suggests browsing and purely pastoral ideas without the balance of the most "Beat the yolks of six and the whites of four nutritious of all substances that are not pos- eggs; season with salt and spice according to itively meat. Egg mediates between the taste. Cut some nice little pieces of bread no salad and the cold meat with which it is larger than dice; fry them in butter till they eaten, breaks the abruptness of the change are well browned, then throw them quickly into to the luncher's imagination, and pleasantly boiling gravy or milk, or sauce of any particustars the table with a contrast of colours lar flavour; mix them with the beaten egg, and which otherwise is never obtained except fry as an ordinary omelette." from fruit. As for the artificial modes of

treating solid eggs, those, we mean, which substitute some artificial compound for the yolk, leaving the white envelope in its natural form, they appeal only to the morbid desire for surprises which marks the decadence of true art. Take this, for instance, called, we suppose from the Morning, because the jaded appetite of an epicure is

The vast use of egg in merely enriching other substances, in cakes, puddings, soups, &c., is, we think, overdone, both in this country and abroad. There is not a viler decoction known to human art than that which is called egg-soup in Germany, where masses of greasy yellow substance, floating like very putrid duckweed in a watery fluid, are offered

to you at the beginning of dinner to destroy | title frightens the general public, and its blue your chance of eating anything afterwards. cover is but seldom seen on the tables of the If yolk of egg is used separately from the egg salles de lecture. Yet there is no French peat all, it should be diffused and made a sort riodical so well suited to the tastes of the of yeast, as it is in cakes and puddings. better class of readers in England. Its conCrumbs of yolk are chaotic and rather re-tributors are all members of the Institut de volting spectacles. But we doubt whether France, and, if we may measure the value of its secondary enriching use is not greatly a periodical by the honour which it reflects overdone in modern cookery. Custard is on those who form its staff, no journal in by far its best form, because it is its most France can vie with the Journal des Savants. honest form. Very eggy puddings, and very At the present moment we find on its roll eggy cakes, are overpowering; like drawing- such names as Cousin, Flourens, Villemain, rooms with too heavy a scent in them, they Mignet, Barthélemy, Saint-Hilaire, Naudet, call the atttention too much to a secondary Prosper Mérimé, Littré, Vitet -names influence which is properly meant to blend which, if now and then seen on the covers absolutely with the primary. Eggs used of the Revue des Deux Mondes, the Revue freely as yeast is used in other food remind Contemporaine, or the Revue Moderne, confer one of a very picturesque style used not in an exceptional lustre on these fortnightly or describing facts, but in illustrating opinions. monthly issues. The articles which are adThe style overpowers the substance as the mitted into this select periodical may be deegg so often overpowers the pudding. Thus ficient now and then in those outward charms Macaulay wrote what we may call a very of diction by which French readers like to be eggy style when he illustrated political prin- dazzled; but what in France is called trop ciples. His style was made for description, savant, trop lourd, is frequently far more paland when he applied it to discuss abstract po- atable than the highly-spiced articles which litics his discussions tasted like a pudding too are no doubt delightful to read, but which, rich with egg. like an excellent French dinner, make you forget whether you have dined or not. If English journalists are bent on taking for their models the fortnightly or monthly contemporaries of France, the Journal des Savants might offer a much better chance of success than the more popular revues. We should be sorry indeed to see any periodical published under the superintendence of Ministre de l'Instruction Publique, or of any other member of the Cabinet; but, apart from that, a literary tribunal like that formed by the members of the Bureau du Journal des Savants would be a great benefit to literary criticism. The general tone that runs through their articles is impartial and dignified. Each writer seems to feel the responsibility which attaches to the bench from which he addresses the public, and we can of late years recall hardly any case where the dictum of "noblesse oblige" has been disregarded in this the most ancient among the purely literary Journals of Europe.

On the whole we regard eggs as best in the beautiful individuality of the egg-shell, and degenerating in proportion as they are made subservient to other food. They have too much individuality for the work of yeast. The egg is the only unit of animal food, and has a pronounced taste in proportion to its unique character and shape. Like meat, it is scarcely well adapted for flavouring other things than itself. It has too dominating a nature of its own. Egg in the abstract should be very sparingly used in cookery, or it will suggest itself obtrusively. Egg is admirable in a substantive form, but in an adjective form not so. Eggy compounds

soon revolt.

From The Saturday Review. THE JOURNAL DES SAVANTS AND THE JOURNAL DE TREVOUX.*

FOR a hundred persons who, in this country, read the Revue des Deux Mondes, how many are there who read the Journal des Savants? In France the authority of that journal is indeed supreme; but yet its very

*Table Methodique des Mémoires de Trévoux (1701-1775), précede d'une Notice Historique. Par le Père P. C. Sommervogel de la Compagnie de Jesus.

3 vols. Paris: 1864-5.

The first number of the Journal des Savants was published more than two hundred years ago, on the 5th of January, 1655. It was the first small beginning in a branch of literature which has since assumed such immense proportions. Voltaire speaks of it as "le père de tous les ouvrages de ce genre, dont l'Europe est aujourd'hui remplie." It was published at first once a week, every Monday; and the responsible editor was M. de Sallo, who, in order to avoid the retaliations of sensitive authors, adopted the name

What has been said of other journals was said of the Journal de Trévoux:

interests of science, like the Jesuits, and if bus, modo secum sentiant, aut sibi faveant, our own missionaries may on many points ubique blandiri, doctissimos sibi non plane take warning from the history of the Jesuits, pleneque deditos plus quam canino dente`mordere. on that one point at least they might do well to imitate their example. Scientific interests, however, were by no means the chief motive of the Jesuits in founding their journal, and the controversial character began soon to preponderate in their articles. Protestant writers received but little mercy in the pages of the Journal de Trévoux, and the battle was soon raging in every country of Europe between the flying batteries of the Jesuits and the strongholds of Jansenism, of Protestanism, or at least of liberal thought. Le Clerc was attacked for his Harmonia Evangelica, Boileau even was censured for his Epitre sur l'Amour de Dieu. But the old lion was too much for the reverend satirists. The following is a specimen of his reply:

Les auteurs de ce journal, qui a son mérite, sont constants à louer tous les ovrages de ceux qu'ils affectionnent, et pour éviter une froide monotonie, ils, exercent quelquelois la critique sur les écrivains à qui rien ne les oblige de faire grâce.

It took some time before authors became at all reconciled to these new tribunals of literary justice. Even a writer like Voltaire, who braved public opinion more than anybody, looked upon journals, and the influence which they soon gained in France and abroad, as a great evil. "Rien n'a plus nui à la littérature," he writes, "plus repandu le mauvais goût, et plus confondu le vrai avec le faux." Before the establishment of literary journals, a learned writer had indeed little to fear. For a few years, at all events, he was allowed to enjoy the reputation of having published a book, and this by itself was considered a great distincbook was never noticed at all, or, if it was, tion by the world at large. Perhaps his it was only criticized in one of those elaborate letters which the learned men of the sixteenth and seventeeth centuries used to write to each other, which might be forwarded indeed to one or two other professors, but which never influenced public opinion. Only in extreme cases a book would be answered by another book, but this would necessarily require a long time; nor would it at all follow that those who had read and admired the original work would have an opportunity of consulting the volume that contained its refutation. This happy state of things came to an end after the year 1655. Since the invention of printing, no more important event had happened in the republic of letters than the introduction of a periodical literature. It was a complete revolution, differing from other revolutions only by the quickness with which the new power was recognised even by its fiercest opponents. The power of journalism soon found its proper level, and the history of its rise and progress, which has still to be written, teaches the same lesson as the history of political pow

ers.
Journals which defended private in-
terests, or the interests of parties, whether
religious, political, or literary, never gained
that influence which was freely conceded