"Useful Hints To Grocers" is a chapter within a book called "Everybody's Guide: Of Things Worth Knowing" by R. Moore, originally printed in 1884 in New York.
In that chapter is a recipe for Gherkins:
"Take small cucumbers (not young) steep for a week in very strong brine; it is then poured off, heated to the boiling point and again pour on the fruit. The next day the gherkins are strained on a sieve, wiped dry, put into bottles or jars, with some spice, ginger, pepper, or cayenne, and at once covered with strong pickling vinegar."
In that book... "We are also told how to make butter and place it in a tub or firkin. It occurred to me that if one stores his pickles in a butter tub, he would have a firkin of gherkins!"
Quote from "The Two-Story Outhouse" by Norm Weis
