19 JUNE 1897, Page 24

title. "Majestic" is an adjective which can never be applied

to cookery. You cannot have a majestic leg of mutton except in "Alice Thro' the Looking-Glass." The book itself very sensibly makes no claim to literature, but merely gives a collection of excellent-looking receipts, and its purchase may be recommended to housekeepers at the exact moment when they begin to long for "somebody to invent a new animal." But good as are M. Gallier's receipts, his bills-of-fare cannot be read without awe and astonishment. "You must borrow me Gargantua's mouth to eat all that." He maps out four meals a day, every one of

which has on an average eight to twelve items in the menu. But let us hope that his attractive suppers are an alternative, not an

addition, to his ten-course dinners. There are excellent new dishes to be found both in the chapters devoted to different kinds of meats and in those on hot puddings and vegetables. But it is a pity that some one has not taught M. Gallier to make tea. His tea would keep the average nervous person awake for weeks,—is, indeed, so strong that "rum and brandy" are added to the condiments, to be banded with it, as a pick-me-up, it is to be concluded, to shattered nerves.