Cream of Cucumbers a la Sheppard

Peel or remove the green skin from the cucumbers, mince up two pounds of them, blanch them in boiling, salted water for ten minutes, then drain. Heat four ounces of butter in a saucepan; when very hot, add the cucumbers, and fry them colorless, moistening with two quarts of white broth; boil all slowly until the cucumbers are thoroughly done, and then drain and mash them in a mortar; thin out this puree with its own broth, and if still to thick, add some more white broth, and strain the whole through a tammy. Add one quart of veloute (No. 415), season with salt, sugar and nutmeg, and heat it up without boiling; remove all the white particles arising to the surface, and thicken the soup with egg-yolks, cream and fine butter (No. 175). Pour the soup very hot into a tureen with a good white of chicken garnishing allowing one ounce for each quart, and cut up into three-sixteenths of an inch squares.