only come to table in the shape of ratafia,
marmalade, or jelly. In Paris, the quince jelly from
Mâcon and Orleans bears a high name.

People talk of vineyards and the laughing
vine, also about curling tendrils, and purple
clusters, and they quote Byron until they
really seem to forget that the ordinary vineyard
grape, whether in France or Germany,
is scarcely worth eating, and that one fine
bunch of black Hamburghs from an English
greenhouse, is worth a bushel basket of them.
Our highly civilised grapes are higher bred,
thinner, and more exquisitely fine in the skin;
their pulp is less fleshy, and they contain more
juice. Even the famed Chasselas de Fontainebleau
are not to be compared with them for refinement
of flavour. We have tasted grapes in a
Syrian vineyard, when half the grapes were dried
to raisins, and the contrast with the golden grapes
turned to preserves in their own exuded syrup
was delicious, but even they could not hold a
candle to our black Hamburghs. Howbeit people
tell you in Paris, that even the gilded
Fontainebleaus are nothing to the muscatels of
Languedoc, and these they often preserve in
brandy. The raisins of Paris come chiefly
from Provence and Italy, and those of Roquevaire
are preferred even to those of Malaga.

The apple, homely but admirable fruit, painted
red and yellow by the smiling sun, is, whether
golden or red, equally acceptable to peer and
peasant. What sight so glorious as a
Quarenden tree, crimson with its short-lived apples,
or a Codling weighed down with its gigantic
green fruit. Apropos of apples it is a curious
fact that only at Rouen can the gelée de pommes
be made of the true transparent topaz colour.
At Paris, it always clouds and thickens in
course of manufacture. It is the same with
dragées; it is only at Dresden they can be made
white without artificial means. A good apple
should sound quite hard and metallic under the
knuckle; your rich yellow rinded pretty apples
are generally over-ripe. The gelée of Rouen is
obtained from the Reinette alone. The golden
pippin, that delicious little apple, has become
almost obsolete; and the famed Yorkshire
Ribstone pippin, a greenish apple with red streaks,
is now oftener boasted of, than really produced.
The real Ribstone is deliciously crisp and sweet.

The French do more with chesnuts than we
do; they ice them, they make a soup of them,
and when ground to flour they use them in
creams, omelettes, and soufflées. The pâté de
marrons glacés is a great delicacy.

Figs, the French eat raw with salt and at the
time of the bouilli. The Provençal are the best,
but those of Argenteuil, near Paris, are juicy
and full of flavour. Those who think our green
figs worth travelling for (we don't think them
worth opening the mouth for) should seek them
in the fig gardens near Lancing. Our dry figs
come from the Levant. In Paris they regard
most, the Calabrian figs, and those of Provence,
Italy, and especially of Ollioulles. It is more
wholesome to take water than wine with figs.

Melons of late years have reached us in great
numbers from Spain, and have become cheap.
The smooth green melons from Andalusia are
exceedingly good and deliciously sweet. The
French make a sort of hors d'oeuvre, or potage
of melon, and eat it with butter or milk. The
sweet melons of Malta and Honfleur, have a
good name. The green-fleshed water melons of
Provence are also commended as cool, juicy,
and refreshing; but they have not much flavour.
The French eat melon with pepper and salt,
oftener than with sugar; sometimes with sugar
and vinegar, sticking cinnamon and cloves into
the flesh of it to flavour it. It is then eaten with
the bouilli.

The French used formerly to eat also
mulberries with salt and with the bouilli. They dry
them, they make a wine of them, and they moreover
use them to deepen the colour of their
poorer red wines. A very useful jelly syrup for
sore throats can be made with mulberries not
quite ripe.

The oranges of Provence and Italy have little
of the delicious scent of the golden
Portuguese fruit. The French, who are too delicate
to set to work at dessert and flay their oranges
in a hearty way, prefer the fruit sliced into a
compote, seasoned with sugar, orange flower
water, and half a glass of brandy. This mess
should be made several hours before dinner,
to draw out its full flavour. But nothing can
be so good as a high-bred, thin-skinned orange,
the yellow peel removed, its white-kid stripped
off, and the delicious juice left in the quarters,
which a silver knife has decimated.

But let us close with the emperor of all
fruit—the Anana—the West Indian pine, bossy
as bullion, with grey bloom on its thorny
leaves. The French make exquisite bonbons
of it, a liqueur, and a lemonade. They eat
the pine with sugar, wine, or brandy. They
flavour creams and ices with it. For
ourselves, we would as soon smell a pine as eat
one. The fragrance is delicious, the taste
not so pre-eminent. It may be heretical to
say this—it would have been so at least when
pines cost several guineas each; but when
every Whitechapel lad can buy a slice of pine
for a halfpenny, we feel less ashamed of
ourselves.

MINOR MORALITIES.

THE great principles of truth and justice, and
purity of living, and respect for life and
property, are matters of course in morals—the
corner-stones on which the whole fabric of
society rests, and as little to be argued about
as that two and two make four, and not five.
But there are certain smaller virtues, not generally
so much respected, that yet are as important
as the bigger ones in their own way, and
for the work they have to do; for if not the
foundations of society, they are portions of the
superstructure—if not corner stones, then four-
squared ashlars, and well-planked flooring—
perhaps only delicately wrought finials and