Directions for Cookery, in its Various Branches

off. Lay on each slice a shell filled with the crab. The shell of one crab will contain the meat of two. COLD CRABS. Having taken all the meat out of the shells, make a dressing with sweet oil, salt, cayenne pepper, mustard and vinegar, as for lobster. You may add to it some hard-boiled yolk of egg, mashed in the oil. Put the mixture into the back shells of the crabs, and serve it up. Garnish with the small claws laid nicely round. SOFT CRABS. These crabs must be cooked directly, as they will not keep till next day. Remove the spongy substance from each side of the crab, and also the little sand-bag. Put some lard into a pan, and when it is boiling hot, fry the crabs in it. After you take them out, throw in a handful of parsley, and let it crisp; but withdraw it before it loses its colour. Strew it over the crabs when you dish them. Make the gravy by adding cream or rich milk to the lard, with some chopped parsley, pepper and salt. Let them all boil together for a few minutes, and then serve it up in a sauce-boat. TERRAPINS. Have ready a pot of boiling water. When it is boiling very hard put in the terrapins, and let them remain in it till quite dead. Then take them out, pull off the outer skin and the toe-nails, wash the terrapins in warm water and boil them again, allowing a tea-spoonful of salt to each terrapin. When the flesh becomes quite tender so that you can pinch it off, take them out of the shell, remove the sand-bag, and the gall, which you must be careful not to break, as it will make the terrapin so bitter as to be uneatable. Cut up all the other parts of the inside with the meat, and season it to your taste with black and cayenne pepper, and salt. Put all into a stew-pan with the juice or liquor that it has given out in cutting up, but not any water. To