1892 Drinks of the world

DRINKS.

183

such as those composed .of Claret, Madeira, etc., but the ingredients of the real mint julep are as follows. I learned how to make them, and succeeded pretty- well." Then follows the receipt : " Put into a tumbler about a dozen sprigs of the tender shoots of mint, upon them put a spoonful of white sugar, and equal proportions of peach and common brandy so as to fill it up one-third, or perhaps a little less. Then take rasped or pounded ice and fill up the tumbler. Epicures rub the lips of the tumbler with a piece of fresh pine apple, and the tumbler itself is very often incrusted outside with stalactites of ice. As the ice melts, you drink." *' I once," says the marine author of this receipt, of which the reader has ipsissima verba, ** I once over- heard two ladies talking in the next room to me, and one of them said, * Well, if I have a weakness for any one thing, it is for a mint julep ./ * '* This weakness of the American lady was, in the opinion of the Metropolitan Hotel barman in New York, very amiable, and proved, not only her good taste, but her good sense. In mulls, which may be made of any kind of wine, the essential feature is the boiling. Sugar and spice, of which the nursery song tells us little girls are' manu- factured, are also invariably used in mulls. We give a rhymed receipt for mulled wine, not for the sake of the poetry, which is indifferent, but for that of the cookery, which is not bad.

my dear madam, you must t-ake

" First,

• Nine- eggs, which carefully you'll break,