the best quality of beef is of a bright red color,
intersected with closely laid veins of yellowish fat; the kidney fat, or
suet, is abundant, and there is a thick layer upon the back. The second
quality has rather whitish fat, laid moderately thick upon the back, and
about the kidneys; the flesh is close-grained, having but few streaks of
fat running through it, and is of a pale red color, and covered with a
rough, yellowish skin. Poor beef is dark red, gristly, and tough to the
touch, with a scanty layer of soft, oily fat. Buy meat as cheap as you
can, but be sure it is fresh; slow and long cooking will make tough meat
tender, but tainted meat is only fit to throw away. Never use it. You
would, by doing so, invite disease to enter the home where smiling
health should reign. The best way to detect taint in any kind of meat is
to run a sharp, thin-bladed knife close to the bone, and then smell it
to see if the odor is sweet. Wipe the knife after you use it. A small,
sharp wooden skewer will answer, but it must be scraped every time it is
used, or the meat-juice remaining on it will become tainted, and it will
be unfit for future use. If, when you are doubtful about a piece of
meat, the butcher refuses to let you apply this test carefully enough to
avoid injuring the meat, you will be safe in thinking he is afraid of
the result.

=Mutton.=--Prime mutton is bright red, with plenty of hard, white fat. The
flesh of the second quality is dark red and close grained, with very few
threads of fat running through it; the fat is rather soft, and is laid
thin on the back and kidneys, closely adhering to them. The poorest
healthy quality has very pale flesh, and thin white fat, and the meat
parts easily from the bone. Diseased mutton has decidedly yellow fat,
and very soft flesh, of loose texture. Tainted mutton smells bad; test
it as you would beef.

=Lamb.=--A carcass of lamb should weigh about twenty-five pounds before it
is old enough to be wholesome and nourishing food; before it has reached
that age it is watery and deficient in the elements of strength; at any
age it is more suitable food for women and children than for healthy
men. The finest kind has delicate rosy meat, and white, almost
transparant fat. The flesh of the second quality is soft, and rather red
compared with the pinkish-white meat of choice kinds; the fat is more
scanty, and the general appearance coarser. The poorest lamb has yellow
fat, and lean, flabby r