The old fashion, however, of mixing with an egg, and boiling a
few minutes, makes a coffee hardly inferior in flavor. In fact, the
methods are many, but results, under given conditions, much the same; and
we may choose urn, or old-fashioned tin pot, or a French biggin, with the
certainty that good coffee, well roasted, boiling water, and good judgment
as to time, will give always a delicious drink. Make a note of the fact
that long boiling sets free tannic acid, powerful enough to literally tan
the coats of the stomach, and bring on incurable dyspepsia. Often coffee
without milk can be taken, where, with milk, it proves harmful; but, in
all cases, moderation must rule. Taken too strong, palpitation of the
heart, vertigo, and fainting are the usual consequences.
_Cocoa_, or, literally, cacao, from the cacao-tree, comes in the form of a
thick seed, twenty or thirty of which make up the contents of a gourd-like
fruit, the spaces between being filled with a somewhat acid pulp. The
seeds, when freed from this pulp by various processes, are first dried in
the sun, and then roasted; and from these roasted seeds come various forms
of cocoa.
_Cocoa-shells_ are the outer husk, and by long boiling yield a pleasant
and rather nutritious drink.
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