“No; I did everything just as you showed me.” Molly said nothing. Marta must be untruthful; this was a more unpleasant thing to discover than the failure of the bread. “Well, we must have bread; it is four o’clock, and Saturday. I will make a rye loaf, because it needs to rise only once after it is mixed, and by seven o’clock it will be ready to bake.” Molly measured the flour and set it to warm (she meant to make this bread herself, because she was much quicker than Marta). As she poured the hot water into the cold, to make the right temperature for the yeast, a thought struck her;—she always dissolved the yeast in the tin pint measure, and Marta did the same. “Marta, after you put the yeast in the water, did you set it on the stove?” “Yes, ma’am, the water was a little cool, and I set it there to dissolve; but I did not let it get a bit hot, and it was quite back of the stove.” “That is the mystery then!” Molly had remembered hearing a lady speak of having done the same thing herself; and though it was back of the stove, and the water could not get hotter, the yeast, being at the bottom in contact with the hot iron, had baked or scalded. Of one thing she was very glad; Marta had immediately owned the fact, and the failure had not come from her neglect of any of the rules Molly had laid down,—only from not understanding cause and effect. CHAPTER XXI. TO MAKE A FOWL TENDER AS SPRING-CHICKEN. AS I have said, the fowl was a yearling, and Molly meant to try with it an experiment she had seen practiced in France, by which fowls, not quite young, were made very tender, without being converted into fricassee or pot-pie. On Sunday morning, before going to church, she had taken a large sheet of soft paper, and, after twisting the wings over on the back, and forcing the legs up against the body snugly, securing them there with skewer and twine, and fastening the skin of the neck neatly on the back with a toothpick, she seasoned it and wrapped it entirely in the paper, which was large enough to cover it twice. She then tied it up with twine. “Marta, put this chicken in the oven at half past eleven; that is, half an hour earlier than if it were a young chicken. Let the oven be hot, and, at a quarter past twelve, remove the paper. Take care to let all the grease that may be in it run into the pan; flour the fowl a little, and set it back in the oven and roast it. Take care to turn it often, and let it get well browned; when you take it up, remove skewer and string, pour the gravy from the giblets, with the liver and gizzard chopped very fine, into the dripping-pan; set it over the stove, season, and, if it should not look a nice rich brown, put about two drops of caramel in it. Send the gravy to table in a sauce-boat.” Marta promised to follow directions carefully, and Molly left the kitchen; and then, remembering a mistake Marta might make, hastened back.