dding, any delay between removing it from the ice and
getting it on the dish, will destroy that dull, marble-like appearance
it ought to wear when first it makes its entry, although it will gleam
with melting sweetness long before it reaches the partakers. Happily
there are many delightful sweets which are beautiful in appearance and
less depending on atmosphere than any of the family of ices. The
simplest of these are fruit jellies.

I spoke just now of the art of making jelly, and many readers may think
in using such a term for so simple a thing I am exaggerating, and
perhaps "art" is hardly the word, yet there is a daintiness and nicety
in making jelly which almost deserves the term.

However, before talking of how sweet dishes are to be made it is
necessary to provide the means by which they are to be redeemed from the
commonplace of mere richness and sweetness. The flavorings and liqueurs
keep indefinitely if well corked. Orange-flower water, it is true, will
lose strength, but when a bottle is first opened, if it is poured off
into small vials, and each one corked and _sealed_, it will keep its
original strength. The following list of articles kept in store will
enable a cook to give her cakes, creams, etc., just that "foreign"
flavor that home products so often lack: almonds, almond paste, candied
cherries, candied angelica, candied orange, lemon, and citron peels,
pistachio-nuts, orange-flower water, rose-water, prepared cochineal,
maraschino, ratafia, lemons, extract of vanilla, and sherry.

Several of these things are used principally for decoration; for
instance, the candied cherries and angelica and the pistachio-nuts.
Consequently, unless the cherries and angelica are required for dessert
(to which they are a showy and delicious addition), a quarter of a
pound at a time is all that need be bought. Very likely in small cities
or country places these latter articles may not be obtainable. But they
are sold at the large city caterers', also at the stores which deal in
French crystallized fruits--not French _candy_ stores--and can always be
sent by mail.

The vanilla should be of the finest quality, and had better be bought by
the ounce or half-pint from the druggist than from the grocer. There are
good extracts put up, no doubt, but very many of them are largely made
of tonka-bean, the flavor familiar in cheap ice-cream, in place of the
more expensive vanilla.

In the recipes that will be given the direct