PREFACE
A long time ago, an estimable lady fell at the feet of an habitual publisher, and prayed unto him:—

“Give, oh! give me the subject of a book for which the world has a need, and I will write it for you.”

“Are you an author, madam?” asked the publisher, motioning his visitor to a seat.

“No, sir,” was the proud reply, “I am a poet.”

“Ah!” said the great man. “I am afraid there is no immediate worldly need of a poet. If you could only write a good cookery book, now!”

The story goes on to relate how the poetess, not rebuffed in the least, started on the requisite culinary work, directly she got home; pawned her jewels to purchase postage stamps, and wrote far and wide for recipes, which in course of time she obtained, by the hundredweight. Other recipes she “conveyed” from ancient works of gastronomy, and in a year or two the magnum opus was given to the world; the lady’s share in the[Pg x] profits giving her “adequate provision for the remainder of her life.” We are not told, but it is presumable, that the publisher received a little adequate provision too.

History occasionally repeats itself; and the history of the present work begins in very much the same way. Whether it will finish in an equally satisfactory manner is problematical. I do not possess much of the divine afflatus myself; but there has ever lurked within me some sort of ambition to write a book—something held together by “tree calf,” “half morocco,” or “boards”; something that might find its way into the hearts and homes of an enlightened public; something which will give some of my young friends ample opportunity for criticism. In the exercise of my profession I have written leagues of descriptive “copy”—mostly lies and racing selections,—but up to now there has been no urgent demand for a book of any sort from this pen. For years my ambition has remained ungratified. Publishers—as a rule, the most faint-hearted and least speculative of mankind—have held aloof. And whatever suggestions I might make were rejected, with determination, if not with contumely.

At length came the hour, and the man; the introduction to a publisher with an eye for budding and hitherto misdirected talent.

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