If you wish your jack to go well, keep it as clean as possible, oil it, and then wipe it: if the oil is not wiped off again it will gather dust; to prevent this, as soon as you have done roasting, cover it up. Never leave the winders on while the jack is going round, unless you do it, as Swift says, "that it may fly off, and knock those troublesome servants on the head who will be crowding round your kitchen fire."
Be very careful to place the dripping-pan at such a distance from the fire as just to catch the drippings: if it is too near, the ashes will fall into it, and spoil the drippings[76-*] (which we shall hereafter show will occasionally be found an excellent substitute for butter or lard). To clarify drippings, see (No. 83,) and pease and dripping soup (No. 229), savoury and salubrious, for only a penny per quart. If it is too far from the fire to catch them, you will not only lose your drippings, but the meat will be blackened and spoiled by the foetid smoke, which will arise when the fat falls on the live cinders.
A large dripping-pan is convenient for several purposes. It should not be less than 28 inches long and 20 inches wide, and have a covered well on the side from the fire, to collect the drippings; this will preserve them in the most delicate state: in a pan of the above size you may set fried fish, and various dishes, to keep hot.
This is one of Painter's and Hawke's contrivances, near Norfolk-street, Strand.
The time meat will take roasting will vary according to the time it has been kept, and the temperature of the weather; the same weight[77-*] will be twenty minutes or half an hour longer in cold weather,[77-+] than it will be in warm; and if fresh killed, than if it has been kept till it is tender.
A good meat-screen is a great saver of fuel. It should be on wheels, have a flat top, and not be less than about three feet and a half wide, and with shelves in it, about one foot deep; it will then answer all the purposes of a large Dutch oven, plate-warmer, hot hearth, &c. Some are made with a door behind: this is convenient, but the great heat they are exposed to soon shrinks the materials, and the currents of air through the cracks cannot be prevented, so they are better without the door. We have seen one, which had on the top of it a very convenient _hot closet_, which is a great acquisition in kitchens, where the dinner waits after it is dressed.