Vintage Lemon Cake from 1912

This cake recipe is from "The Goulburn Cookery Book" twelfth edition published in 1912.   The original recipe is made with orange but today I decided to try it with lemon instead.  

Orange Cake
Three eggs, their weight in sugar, butter and flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, 1 orange, a pinch of salt.

Beat the sugar and butter to a cream; add 2 eggs one at a time, and beat well; then add half the flour, beating well all the time; add the grated rind of the orange and half the juice; then put in remainder of flour and a small teaspoon of baking powder; add the third egg.  Bake 1 hour or longer in a moderate oven.  Ice with the following icing: - Six ounces of icing sugar, enough orange juice to make a thick cream (about 1 ½ tablespoons); warm, but do not let get hot, and pour over the cake.

It's so delicious and moist that I increased the quantity and used 4 eggs, their weight in sugar, butter and flour; added a heaped teaspoon of baking powder and replaced the orange with one whole lemon.  The cake is moist, flavoursome, has a gorgeous texture and rises really well.  I baked the cake at 150 degrees celsius (fan forced) for one hour.

I also made a Rose Cake from the 1930s from a different vintage cookbook but sadly it was a flop.  Although, the recipe sounds gorgeous I was skeptical when I started making it as the mixture was extremely runny.  When cooked, the cake was moist and the flavour was allright but it had this weird rubbery texture.  It also didn't rise that well.  The recipe also omits instructions for the cooking temperature and time which is problematic in itself.  I cooked the cake in a moderate oven (150 degrees celsius) for 45 minutes.

Rose Cake
Take 1 cup flour, 1 cup sugar, 3 eggs, 1 teaspoon cream of tartar, 1/2 teaspoon bicarb. soda, 1 tablespoon milk, with enough boiling water to make 1/2 cup, a few drops of essence of rose, 1 teaspoon cochineal and 1 tablespoon butter.  Cream sugar and butter, add eggs well-beaten, the flour sifted with cream of tartar and soda, then milk and water, and lastly the essences.  Bake in sandwich-tins.  When cold ice the rose-flavoured icing and fill with whipped cream.  

I chose not to add the cochineal