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 XX phefage. thoroughly conversant with the subject. With this object in view, therefore, I submitted to Mrs. H. Wicken what I required. I knew Mrs. Wicken to be well qualified for the task from the following facts, namely, that she had previously been successful in her culinary writings ; that she was a Diplomee of the National Training School for Cookery, South Kensington ; and that she occupied the responsible post of lecturer to the Technical College, Sydney. My propositions were that the recipes were to be written purely for Australian use, and that they were to be of the strictly economical order. Mrs. Wicken accepted the task, and it can only be hoped that her efforts will meet with the approbation they deserve. In their original form the three chapters on Aus- tralian Food Habits, Australian Fish and Oysters, and on Salads, appeared in The Daily Telegraph, Sydney. I take this opportunity, therefore, of ex- pressing my sense of obligation to the Proprietors thereof for their courtesy in permitting me to make complete use of these three contributions. As they now appear in chapters they have been revised, con- siderably altered, and materially added to, for the purposes of reproduction in book form. 143, Elizabeth Street, Hyde Park, Sydney. September 1893.