With regard to the manner in which chocolate is prepared in England
nothing need be said, as it is too well known to require description.
That which has appeared to me the best is "_Fry's Chocolate_," which
requires only to be rubbed up with a little boiling water, and scalded
milk added to it with sugar, according to the taste of the drinker;
there is a flavour, however, in this chocolate sometimes of _suet_,
which is probably added to give it a richness which the cacao employed
may not possess of itself. In the West Indies they rarely add anything
to cacoa but arnatto (sometimes a little fresh butter), though it is
often scented and sweetened, and sold in little rolls at five-pence
and ten-pence each, currency. It is always boiled with milk, which,
though very indigestible when boiled and taken alone, seems to lose
this quality when taken with chocolate. Chocolate thus made is much
drank, when cold, in the middle of the day, and is considered, both by
the negroes and the old settlers, as a most nutritive and salutary
beverage.

The signs by which _good chocolate_ or cacao is known are these:--It
should dissolve entirely in water, and be without sediment; it should
be oily, and yet melt in the mouth; and if genuine, and carefully
prepared, should deposit no grits or grounds. That made in the West
Indies, and in some parts of Cuba, is dark; but that manufactured in
Jamaica is of a bright brick colour, owing to the greater quantity of
arnatto which is used in the preparation, and which, I think, gives it
a richer and more agreeable flavor.

In an economical point of view, chocolate is a very important article
of diet, as it may be literally termed meat and drink; and were our
half-starved artisans, over-wrought factory children, and ricketty