MISCELLANEOUS.
E. M. B.—What you really mean are “cheese straws,” and if you had looked for them by that name, you would have found them, we are sure. They are made as follows:—2 oz. of butter, 2 oz. of flour, 2 oz. of parmesan cheese, 1 oz. of cheddar cheese, 1 egg, salt, red pepper. Put the flour into a bowl, and mix with it the salt and pepper, the grated cheese, and the butter, and, with the yolk of the egg, make into a smooth paste, rather stiff. Then roll it out into a strip of about five inches long, and about an eighth of an inch thick. Cut into strips of equal sizes, and also some rounds for rings. Grease a tin and put them on it, and bake in a hot oven for ten minutes till of a pale brown. To send to table, put the straws through the rings like a bundle of sticks, and hand round in a silver dish.
Flora.—As we are quite old-fashioned people, we should say, “Never marry without your mother’s consent,” and certainly do not worry yourself about matrimony as long as you write so dreadful a hand and distribute your capital letters so recklessly. Of course, marriage is an important subject, but we can dispense with capital letters when we inquire At What Age We May Marry Without our Mother’s Consent. In point of fact, dear foolish Flora, you are of age at twenty-one, and, in a restricted sense, are at liberty to do all sorts of silly things, which we hope you will avoid doing. As a Christian, you are only free in so far as you honour your parents.
Susan.—There is a demand for capable women at Vancouver (Canada) at good wages, and laundresses are specially wanted. “Intermediate class” fare to Halifax amounts to £7, and other emigrants to £5 only. There are lodging-homes at Montreal, Winnipeg, and Vancouver. Mothers’ helps find situations in the North-West. Women starting from London assemble at 53, Horseferry Road, Westminster, the night before embarkation. If starting from Liverpool, they must sleep at Bromborough House, 10, Great George Square, where they will be met and conducted on board ship. Women desiring to emigrate should make application to Miss Bromfield, Friary Cottage, Winchester, or to Miss Lefroy, Imperial Institute, London, S.W., so as to obtain “protected emigration.” The fares for South Africa, Rhodesia, and New Zealand, are more expensive. Lady nurses, members of the Church of England, having had three years’ training, would find engagements at the Kimberley Nurses’ Home, at a salary of £60 per annum, and all found. Those holding “L. O. S.” are preferred.
Rose.—1. You should read our present series of articles on “Etiquette,” by Lady William Lennox.—2. We fear that the present is by no means a good time for selling pictures of any kind. All artists seem to complain of difficulties in that way.
Learner.—“Buddhism” can scarcely be called a “religion,” since it does not acknowledge a Deity, although paying divine honours to their supreme teacher and his effigies. The system was founded about 2,500 years ago by Guatama Buddha, reputed by his followers to have been the son of Sudhodana, King of Kapilawastu, a region at the foot of the mountains of Nepal, Central India. The name Guatama was given to distinguish the great teacher, as his family belonged to the chain of the Guatamas. Sidhartha was his real name, and “the Buddha,” or “the Enlightened,” his self-assumed title. He set out on a proselytising mission to Benares, the sacred city of the Brahmins, and so successful was he, that by the third century B.C. his tenets became the so-called religion of India. Ceylon was the first new country that accepted his teaching, and then followed Siam, Burmah, and China, the latter mission dating about 100 years B.C. Buddhists have a sacred book called the Tripitika (or three baskets), the first, or Sutras, containing the discourses of Buddha, recorded from memory after his death; the second, or Vinaya, having reference to discipline and morality; the third, the Abhidarma, or metaphysics. Their moral code is very pure, but always remember they deny the existence of a God.
Queenie Desmond.—The word mandoline is thought to be derived from the Latin pandora, or the Greek pandoura, from Pan. But we must go further back for the origin of all instruments of the guitar class, which are said to owe their beginnings to the ancient viol, which was a six-stringed guitar. This instrument is called a psaltery in the Bible; and you will find in Smith’s Bible Dictionary an account of them. The words psaltery, or sautry, lute and viol, are all often found in the old English poets, and were all different, though alike. The first originals of the mandoline lie, probably, in the psaltery.
Bazaar (1) would find the quotations she needs for her book in any dictionary of quotations. We could not undertake so long a search.—2. For painting in oils on satin there needs no preparation, but in both cases, for either oils or water colours, the satin must be very tightly and evenly stretched on a drawing-board, or frame for water colours. Take one ounce of Nelson’s gelatine, and cover with cold water for an hour; pour off the cold water, and put a pint of boiling water to the gelatine, stir and dissolve quickly; then strain through muslin, and while still hot apply to the satin with a clean sponge. Go over the whole surface, making it not too wet, but rubbing it in. Rub with a piece of clean silk, and dry, stretched as you have placed it.
Essex and Lover of “G. O. P.”—We can obtain cross-stitch patterns for working in Weldon’s Work Series, an excellent paper of the kind, issued monthly, price twopence, at any newsvendor’s.
A Welsh Girl.—We should advise you to put glass over the panels. That would look the best, and be the most reliable preserver in such a position.