With Dumas to promise was to fulfil, and in due time his book--the last volume from his pen--appeared, a tall folio of over a thousand pages, with the spirited etching of the author by Rajon. While this is more especially devoted to the French kitchen, it contains a large number of recipes from foreign countries where the author had travelled. It thus becomes a compendium of many different schools, offering a wide range for selection. Written, moreover, by an amateur, it is also an easier guide than many of the professional manuals of the _haute cuisine_. In the "Dictionary" everything is passed under review--from snails _à la provençale_ to the feet of elephants, from filets of kangaroo to lambs' tails _glacées à la chicorée_, the list of fishes including an account of the origin of the term "Poisson d'Avril" (April fool). [Illustration: "L'ART DU CUISINIER" (BEAUVILLIERS) Facsimile of title-page. 1824, Vol. II.] Even the babiroussa, or wild Asian hog, is not forgotten, the author pronouncing its flesh very delicate, and presenting this additional information concerning its character: "'Ah! mon Dieu,' asked a lady of her husband, as they were looking at a babiroussa at the Jardin des Plantes, 'what kind of an animal is that, my dear, who instead of two horns has four?' "'Madame,' said some one who was passing by, 'that is a widower who has remarried.'" There are recipes from Beauvilliers, Carême, the Marquis de Cussy, and the cook of King Stanislas; from the manuals of the times of Louis XIV and XV; from the cafés Anglais, Verdier, Brébant, Magny, Grignon, Véfour, and Véry; from Elzéar-Blaze, La Reynière, the Provincial Brothers, and Vuillemot, proprietor of the Tête Noire at St. Cloud. One's mouth waters as he reads the vast alphabet of dishes. There are, for example, thirty-one modes presented for preparing the carp, and fifty-six for dressing the egg, apart from the omelet, with sixteen recipes for artichokes and a dozen for asparagus. There is the Java formula for cooking halcyons' nests, and that of the cook of Richelieu for _godiveau_, a dissertation on the hocco, and a prescription for bustards _à la daube_. No wonder that Dumas has defined the dinner as a daily and capital action that can be worthily accomplished only by _gens d'esprit_. This is well illustrated by an anecdote in the dedicatory epistle to Jules Janin, which shows the characteristic hand of Dumas to advantage: "The Viscount de Vieil-Castel, brother of Count Horace de Vieil-Castel, one of the finest epicures of France, made this proposition at a gathering of friends: "'A single person can eat a dinner costing five hundred francs.' "'Impossible!' was the simultaneous exclamation. "'It is well understood,' resumed the Viscount, 'that by the term eating is included drinking as well.' "'Parbleu!' replied his friends.