"I must admit that you seem to understand it thoroughly, judging from the specimens I have seen and eaten. But are you not a little chary in your information?" and he glanced from one to another.
"Miss Morgan shall be first spokeswoman," declared Sylvie gayly.
"If it is a boiled potato," began Jane sententiously, as if she were a child speaking a piece, "I put mine in the saucepan, and pour hot water over them, as they come to a boil sooner, taking care that they shall be as nearly of a size as possible. In about twenty minutes I try an average potato. If I can stick a fork through it nicely, it is done. Then I pour off the water, letting it drain until every drop is gone, when I shake up the lot two or three times rather hard and quick, stand them on the back of the stove with the cover partly off, so that the steam may escape; and you have a dry, light, flaky potato, unless it was irremediably bad to begin with. I have sometimes boiled new and rather small potatoes in twelve minutes over a good fire. But cooking, like liberty, has the same high price, eternal vigilance."
Maverick laughed. "I shall remember this," he exclaimed. "You will yet hear of me teaching some of my poor patients to cook potatoes. Heaven knows there is enough need of it. Wasn't there some talk of a school for useful arts?"
"Yes," answered Sylvie, "only there was no money to start with, and we have all been so busy."
"What would be needed?"
"Imprimis: a room, a cooking-stove, a fire, a cook, and some materials," replied Sylvie with merry audacity.
How pretty and bright she was! He liked to watch her in these changeful moods. One great charm of this place was finding her here so frequently.
"And Mr. Darcy has been so much engrossed with weightier matters," she continued in a half apology.
"I really think I ought to be more interested in this question than Mr. Darcy. It supplements my work. While cheap living is an imperative necessity in times of depression and low wages, I cannot see why we do not make it more of a study. While we are so ready to copy the vices of our French neighbors, perhaps their virtues would do us no harm. A doctor often finds himself quite nonplussed by something in the preparation of the patient's diet. The old doctrine preached years ago, on St. Paul's text of 'keeping the body under,' has worked as much damage as the asceticism of the middle ages. A good healthy body is the first requisite everywhere; and to keep it so, every one's first duty. When men began to consider the body a poor, vile thing, to be treated with contumely, and fed with what would just sustain life, they offered an outrage to the highest work of God. When people think it is no matter what they eat, and that no pains need be taken in the preparation, they have made a big lapse toward heathenism. Confusion of the physical senses leads to confusion of the moral sense; and weak, miserable bodies with hysterical nerves, though they may dream dreams, and see visions, cannot do good healthy work in this world. And your poor people need a good deal of training on this subject. It must be made an honorable, not a despised, business. If I were to build houses, I should make the kitchens large, light, and pretty; and, if any room had to be small and uninviting, it should be that for the storage of the best furniture," laughing humorously.