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 . 21, 1863.] other fabrics. Now there are upwards of seventy schools of design flourishing in the Three Kingdoms; and the French Commissioners, sent over here by their Government to report upon the progress made by us since the Exhibition of 1851, declared that we had so advanced in our artistic training that France no longer could claim a monopoly of art-designing in connection with textile fabrics, but that we had made such strides that their own countrymen must look to their laurels. Surely, if we can conquer a difficulty which was deemed to be beyond our genius, there is no reason on earth why so material a study as cookery, and one which appeals so strongly to our animal appetites, should not be acquired also!

The School of Cookery, after perfecting the student in the art, gives a certificate of capability, which will stand in the same stead to the servant as the diploma does to the doctor. A cook armed with one of these tokens of proficiency, would find that she was not only able to get a better place, but a higher rate of wages; she would be a skilled artisan, in short, and therefore entitled to a higher place in the social hierarchy than she can command at present. We hear that already applications have been made at the institution for these trained cooks, and we have no doubt that they will be sought after as much as are the trained nurses that are now procurable from the institution in South Audley Street. Only those who know the troubles of housekeeping will be able to appreciate the value of a race of young cooks free from the vices of the ancient dames who have held us at their mercy for so long a time. We may hope from the young adepts in the art, an immunity from that gin-drinking which seemed inseparable from the old school of spoiled domestics we have put up with so long.

May not persons of moderate incomes also be expected to benefit by this infusion of new blood into our kitchens? What can a young couple about to marry say to the warning they receive from knowing matrons, that they cannot put down the expense of a really good cook at less than sixty or seventy pounds a-year—what with the extravagant wages they demand and the expensive methods they are accustomed to, to say nothing of their insisting, as they almost invariably do if they are skilled hands, on your keeping a scullerymaid? Let us hope that all this will be changed, and that with cheap instruction we may get cheap cooks, whereby our pockets and our stomachs may be benefited. If prevention is better than cure, surely it is putting the cart before the horse to institute training-schools for nurses before instituting schools for the preparation of wholesome, palatable, digestible food, the want of which is in itself a grievous source of ill-health, and the cause of a demand for nurses! Moreover, we believe that instruction in cooking is a movement demanded in the interest of the working-classes themselves. Those who are acquainted with the habits of our artisans know that a fearful waste is experienced by them in consequence of the ignorance on the part of their wives of the commonest principles of the culinary art. Half the goodness of the meat they boil is thrown away instead of being utilised in soup-making. They know nothing of the art of stewing; very few can boil a potato or a little rice perfectly, and the whole art of making palatable the very inferior meat their means will afford, is lost by their ignorance of the qualifying power of a few vegetables. There can be no doubt whatever, that at least twenty per cent. of the nourishment which a French man or woman would extract from the provisions consumed by the working-classes of Great Britain, is wholly lost to them by their ignorance of cookery. Let us, therefore, welcome most heartily the experiment of establishing a school for instruction in the art; and let us add that, if properly conducted, no speculation is more certain of success, for the reason that it is an attempt to supply the great want of our households at the present moment.

A. W.

Supernatural Investigation Society—that was what we styled ourselves—was limited to six members: namely, Messieurs Toombs, Graves, Knight, Gashleigh, Scully, and Bone. For a twelvemonth or more we had been addling our brains by culling ghost-stories out of books, or collecting them from our friends. But this was, at best, second-hand evidence.

“What we want,” said Jack Toombs, our president, bringing his fist upon the table with a crash, and startling us all (for twelve months of continuous spectral literature tends to unstring the nerves)—“what we want is to see a ghost!”

“That,” observed Mr. Gashleigh, “is easier said than done. Gentlemen,” he continued, solemnly, “although there is not a rood of ground in this mighty city upon which some deed of blood and darkness has not been perpetrated, I don’t believe there’s a ghost to be heard of in all London. Either the noise of the night-cabs, or the carbonised atmosphere, or the policemen’s bulls-eyes, or the cats on the roofs—whatever it is, something keeps ’em away. For aught we know, a frightful and mysterious murder may have been committed under this very roof—nay, on that exact spot where you, Scully, are now sitting.”

(Mr. Scully looked uncomfortable, and shifted the position of his chair.)

“Why don’t we hear of that murder?” pursued Mr. Gashleigh. “Because, sir,” said the honourable member, fixing his eye on the president, “in this bustling, excitable metropolis, it was probably only a nine-days’ wonder. In a secluded country place it would have afforded gossip for a century. Now this is the gist of my argument. Ghosts don’t care to walk except where there’s a public who know all about their affairs. Here in London, if you met a ghost on the stairs you would take him for a housebreaker, and insist on giving him in charge; whereas in the country, your blood would curdle with horror at a similar visitation, because you would recognise the spectre of old Job Tatterly, the miser, who was found in the horsepond one November morning, but whose hoarded wealth was never discovered.”

“Why not advertise,” said Bone, “for a Haunted House?”