When the soup was on, Marta prepared a fowl as Molly had shown her, and when it was done she directed her how to cut it into neat joints for fricassee, without mangling it. While Marta was doing this Molly put a pound of sugar and a small cup of water into a small iron saucepan that she assured herself was beautifully clean, and set it over the fire. While the syrup came to the boiling-point she turned her attention to the fricassee, and told Marta to lay the pieces in a saucepan with boiling water to just cover them, to cut an onion and half a medium carrot and put it to them, with a level tea-spoonful of salt and the sixth of one of pepper. These were to simmer very slowly until the fowl was tender,—about two hours,—then the fowl to be taken up, the gravy strained and put to boil very fast, till there was less than half a pint, while in another saucepan, half a pint of thick, white sauce was made (a good table-spoonful of butter and a full one of flour to half a pint of milk). This was added to the chicken gravy; they were stirred smooth together, and the chicken returned to it and allowed to simmer in it a few minutes. When Molly had seen the fricassee prepared and slowly stewing, she turned to the sugar, which was now boiling fast. She removed a little bluish scum, very carefully, not to stir the syrup. When it had boiled a quarter of an hour, she began to try it, dipping the fork into it, and when all the drops had run off, watching if a long thread remained. At first the drops ran off quickly, and she waited a minute before trying again, when she dipped in the fork. Drops came now slow and thick, and after the last one a short thick end remained, and she knew the point had nearly come. The next dip left a long, floating hair, and Molly took it from the fire and put it to get cool while she prepared the pudding, for which she used the following recipe: Two apples, finely chopped, two ounces of grated bread, two of sugar, two of currants, two eggs and the rind of a lemon, grated with just enough of the juice to give a perceptible acid, about a third of a pinch of salt, and the third of a small nutmeg, grated. Stir all together and pour into a small, buttered bowl that it will just fill. Molly followed the recipe, tied a cloth over the top (see directions for boiled puddings, Chapter XIV.) and put it into fast-boiling water to boil continually an hour and a half. Lemon sauce was prescribed for this pudding, but as she had used eggs freely lately and it required two, she substituted hard sauce.