Emerson, or you, or the
Miller of Concord (if he have any tincture of philosophy) are now
to instruct us! The fact is, potatoes having vanished here, we
are again, with motives large and small, trying to learn the use
of Indian meal; and indeed do eat it daily to meat at dinner,
though hitherto with considerable despair. Question _first,_
therefore: Is there by nature a _bitter_ final taste, which
makes the throat smart, and disheartens much the apprentice in
Indian meal;--or is it accidental, and to be avoided? We surely
anticipate the latter answer; but do not yet see how. At first
we were taught the meal, all ground on your side of the water,
had got fusty, _raw;_ an effect we are well used to in oaten and
other meals but, last year, we had a bushel of it ground _here,_
and the bitter taste was there as before (with the addition of
much dirt and sand, our millstones I suppose being too soft);--
whereupon we incline to surmise that there is, perhaps, as in the
case of oats, some pellicle or hull that ought to be _rejected_
in making the meal? Pray ask some philosophic Miller, if Mrs.
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