



Produced by Charles Aldarondo.  HTML version by Al Haines.









TRIALS AND CONFESSIONS OF A HOUSEKEEPER.


BY

T. S. Arthur



PHILADELPHIA:

1859.





INTRODUCTION.


UNDER the title of Confessions of a Housekeeper, a portion of the
matter in this volume has already appeared. The book is now
considerably increased, and the range of subjects made to embrace
the grave and instructive, as well as the agreeable and amusing. The
author is sure, that no lady reader, familiar with the trials,
perplexities, and incidents of housekeeping, can fail to recognize
many of her own experiences, for nearly every picture that is here
presented, has been drawn from life.




CONTENTS.


CHAPTER

      I. MY SPECULATION IN CHINA WARE.
     II. SOMETHING ABOUT COOKS.
    III. LIGHT ON THE SUBJECT.
     IV. CHEAP FURNITURE.
      V. IS IT ECONOMY?
     VI. LIVING AT A CONVENIENT DISTANCE.
    VII. THE PICKED-UP DINNER.
   VIII. WHO IS KRISS KRINGLE?
     IX. NOT AT HOME.
      X. SHIRT BUTTONS.
     XI. PAVEMENT WASHING IN WINTER.
    XII. REGARD FOR THE POOR.
   XIII. SOMETHING MORE ABOUT COOKS.
    XIV. NOT A RAG ON THEIR BACKS.
     XV. CURIOSITY.
    XVI. HOUSE CLEANING.
   XVII. BROILING A LOBSTER.
  XVIII. THE STRAWBERRY-WOMAN.
    XIX. LOTS OF THINGS.
     XX. A CURE FOR LOW SPIRITS.
    XXI. A BARGAIN.
   XXII. A PEEVISH DAY AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.
  XXIII. WORDS.
   XXIV. MAY BE SO.
    XXV. "THE POOR CHILD DIED"
   XXVI. THE RIVAL BONNETS.
  XXVII. MY WASHERMAN.
 XXVIII. MY BORROWING NEIGHBOR.
   XXIX. EXPERIENCE IN TAKING BOARDERS.
    XXX. TWO WAYS WITH DOMESTICS.
   XXXI. A MOTHER'S DUTY.




CONFESSIONS OF A HOUSEKEEPER.




CHAPTER I.

MY SPECULATION IN CHINA WARE.


THIS happened a very few years after, my marriage, and is one of
those feeling incidents in life that we never forget. My husband's
income was moderate, and we found it necessary to deny ourselves
many little articles of ornament and luxury, to the end that there
might be no serious abatement in the comforts of life. In furnishing
our house, we had been obliged to content ourselves mainly with
things useful. Our parlor could boast of nine cane-seat chairs; one
high-backed cane-seat rocking chair; a pair of card tables; a pair
of ottomans, the covers for which I had worked in worsted; and a few
illustrated books upon the card tables. There were no pictures on
the walls, nor ornaments on the mantle pieces.

For a time after my marriage with Mr. Smith, I did not think much
about the plainness of our style of living; but after a while,
contracts between my own parlors and those of one or two friends,
would take place in my mind; and I often found myself wishing that
we could afford a set of candelabras, a pair of china vases, or some
choice pieces of Bohemian glass. In fact, I set my heart on
something of the kind, though I concealed the weakness from my
husband.

Time stole on, and one increase after another to our family, kept up
the necessity for careful expenditure, and at no time was there
money enough in the purse to justify any outlay beyond what the
wants of the household required. So my mantel pieces remained bare
as at first, notwithstanding the desire for something to put on them
still remained active.

One afternoon, as I sat at work renovating an old garment, with the
hope of making it look almost "as good as new," my cook entered and
said--

"There's a man down stairs, Mrs. Smith, with a basket full of the
most beautiful glass dishes and china ornaments that you ever did
see; and he says that he will sell them for old clothes."

"For old clothes?" I responded, but half comprehending what the girl
meant.

"Yes ma'am. If you have got an old coat, or a pair of pantaloons
that ain't good for nothing, he will buy them, and pay you in glass
or china."

I paused for a moment to think, and then said--

"Tell him to come up into the dining room, Mary."

The girl went down stairs, and soon came back in company with a dull
looking old man, who carried on his arm a large basket, in which
were temptingly displayed rich china vases, motto and presentation
cups and saucers, glass dishes, and sundry other articles of a like
character.

"Any old coats, pantaloons or vests?" said the man, as he placed,
carefully, his basket on the floor. "Don't want any money. See here!
Beautiful!"

And as he spoke, he took up a pair of vases and held them before my
eyes. They were just the thing for my mantle pieces, and I covetted
them on the instant.

"What's the price?" I enquired.

"Got an old coat?" was my only answer. "Don't want money."

My husband was the possessor of a coat that had seen pretty good
service, and which he had not worn for some time. In fact, it had
been voted superannuated, and consigned to a dark corner of the
clothes-press. The thought of this garment came very naturally into
my mind, and with the thought a pleasant exhilaration of feeling,
for I already saw the vases on my mantles.

"Any old clothes?" repeated the vender of china ware.

Without a word I left the dining room, and hurried up to where our
large clothes-press stood, in the passage above. From this I soon
abstracted the coat, and then descended with quick steps.

The dull face of the old man brightened, the moment his eyes fell
upon the garment. He seized it with a nervous movement, and seemed
to take in its condition at a single glance. Apparently, the
examination was not very satisfactory, for he let the coat fall, in
a careless manner, across a chair, giving his shoulders a shrug,
while a slight expression of contempt flitted over his countenance.

"Not much good!" fell from his lips after a pause.

By this time I had turned to his basket, and was examining, more
carefully, its contents. Most prominent stood the china vases, upon
which my heart was already set; and instinctively I took them in my
hands.

"What will you give for the coat?" said I.

The old man gave his head a significant shake, as he replied--

"No very good."

"It's worth something," I returned. "Many a poor person would be
glad to buy it for a small sum of money. It's only a little defaced.
I'm sure its richly worth four or five dollars."

"Pho! Pho! Five dollar! Pho!" The old man seemed angry at my most
unreasonable assumption.

"Well, well," said I, beginning to feel a little impatient, "just
tell me what you will give for it."

"What you want?" he enquired, his manner visibly changing.

"I want these vases, at any rate," I answered, holding up the
articles I had mentioned.

"Worth four, five dollar!" ejaculated the dealer, in well feigned
surprise.

I shook my head. He shrugged his shoulders, and commenced searching
his basket, from which, after a while, he took a china cup and
saucer, on which I read, in gilt letters, "For my Husband."

"Give you this," said he.

It was now my time to show surprise; I answered--

"Indeed you won't, then. But I'll tell you what I will do; I'll let
you have the coat for the vases and this cup and saucer."

To this proposition the man gave an instant and decided negative,
and seemed half offended by my offer. He threw the coat, which was
in his hands again, upon a chair, and stooping down took his basket
on his arm. I was deceived by his manner, and began to think that I
had proposed rather a hard bargain; so I said--

"You can have the coat for the vases, if you care to make the
exchange; if not, why no harm is done."

For the space of nearly half a minute, the old man stood in apparent
irresolution, then he replied, as he set down his basket and took
out the pair of vases--

"I don't care; you shall have them."

I took the vases and he took the coat. A moment or two more, and I
heard the street door close behind the dealer in china ware, with a
very decided jar.

"Ain't they beautiful, aunty?" said I to my old aunt Rachel, who had
been a silent witness of the scene I have just described; and I held
the pair of vases before her eyes.

"Why yes, they are rather pretty, Jane," replied aunt Rachel, a
little coldly, as I thought.

"Rather pretty! They are beautiful," said I warmly. "See there!" And
I placed them on the dining room mantle. "How much they will improve
our parlors."

"Not half so much as that old coat you as good as gave away would
have improved the feelings as well as the looks of poor Mr. Bryan,
who lives across the street," was the unexpected and rebuking answer
of aunt Rachel.

The words smote on my feelings. Mr. Bryan was a poor, but honest and
industrious young man, upon whose daily labor a wife and five
children were dependent. He went meanly clad, because he could not
earn enough, in addition to what his family required, to buy
comfortable clothing for himself. I saw, in an instant, what the
true disposition of the coat should have been. The china vases would
a little improve the appearance of my parlors; but how many pleasant
feelings and hours and days of comfort, would the old coat have
given to Mr. Bryan. I said no more. Aunt Rachel went on with her
knitting, and I took the vases down into the parlors and placed them
on the mantles--one in each room. But they looked small, and seemed
quite solitary. So I put one on each end of a single mantle. This
did better; still, I was disappointed in the appearance they made,
and a good deal displeased with myself. I felt that I had made a bad
bargain--that is, one from which I should obtain no real pleasure.

For a while I sat opposite the mantle-piece, looking at the
vases--but, not admiringly; then I left the parlor, and went about
my household duties, but, with a pressure on my feelings. I was far,
very far from being satisfied with myself.

About an hour afterwards my husband came home. I did not take him
into the parlor to show him my little purchase, for, I had no heart
to do so. As we sat at the tea table, he said, addressing me--

"You know that old coat of mine that is up in the clothes-press?"

I nodded my head in assent, but did not venture to speak.

"I've been thinking to-day," added my husband, "that it would be
just the thing for Mr. Bryan, who lives opposite. It's rather too
much worn for me, but will look quite decent on him, compared with
the clothes he now wears. Don't you think it is a good thought? We
will, of course, make him a present of the garment."

My eyes drooped to the table, and I felt the blood crimsoning my
face. For a moment or two I remained silent, and then answered--

"I'm sorry you didn't think of this before; but it's too late now."

"Too late! Why?" enquired my husband.

"I sold the coat this afternoon," was my reply.

"Sold it!"

"Yes. A man came along with some handsome china ornaments, and I
sold the coat for a pair of vases to set on our mantle-pieces."

There was an instant change in my husband's face. He disapproved of
what I had done; and, though he uttered no condemning words, his
countenance gave too clear an index to his feelings.

"The coat would have done poor Mr. Bryan a great deal more
good than the vases will ever do Jane," spoke up aunt Rachel, with
less regard for my feelings than was manifested by my husband. "I
don't think," she continued, "that any body ought to sell old
clothes for either money or nicknackeries to put on the
mantle-pieces. Let them be given to the poor, and they'll do some
good. There isn't a housekeeper in moderate circumstances that
couldn't almost clothe some poor family, by giving away the cast off
garments that every year accumulate on her hands."

How sharply did I feel the rebuking spirit in these words of aunt
Rachel.

"What's done can't be helped now," said my husband kindly,
interrupting, as he spoke, some further remarks that aunt Rachel
evidently intended to make. "We must do better next time."

"I must do better," was my quick remark, made in penitent tones. "I
was very thoughtless."

To relieve my mind, my husband changed the subject of conversation;
but, nothing could relieve the pressure upon my feelings, caused by
a too acute consciousness of having done what in the eyes of my
husband, looked like a want of true humanity. I could not bear that
he should think me void of sympathy for others.

The day following was Sunday. Church time came, and Mr. Smith went
to the clothes press for his best coat, which had been worn only for
a few months.

"Jane!" he called to me suddenly, in a voice that made me start.
"Jane! Where is my best coat?"

"In the clothes press," I replied, coming out from our chamber into
the passage, as I spoke.

"No; it's not here," was his reply. "And, I shouldn't wonder if you
had sold my good coat for those china vases."

"No such thing!" I quickly answered, though my heart gave a great
bound at his words; and then sunk in my bosom with a low tremor of
alarm.

"Here's my old coat," said Mr. Smith, holding up that defaced
garment--"Where is the new one?"

"The old clothes man has it, as sure as I live!" burst from my lips.

"Well, that is a nice piece of work, I must confess!"

This was all my husband said; but it was enough to smite me almost
to the floor. Covering my face with my hands, I dropped into a
chair, and sat and sobbed for a while bitterly.

"It can't be helped now, Jane," said Mr. Smith, at length, in a
soothing voice. "The coat is gone, and there is no help for it. You
will know better next time."

That was all he said to me then, and I was grateful for his kind
consideration. He saw that I was punished quite severely enough, and
did not add to my pain by rebuke or complaint.

An attempt was made during the week to recover the coat, valued at
some twenty dollars; but the china ornament-man was not to be
found--he had made too good a bargain to run the risk of having it
broken.

About an hour after the discovery of the loss of my husband's coat,
I went quietly down into the parlor, and taking from the
mantle-piece the china vases, worth, probably, a dollar for the
pair, concealed them under my apron, lest any one should see what I
had; and, returning up stairs, hid them away in a dark closet, where
they have ever since remained.

The reader may be sure that I never forgot this, my first and last
speculation in china ware.




CHAPTER II.

SOMETHING ABOUT COOKS.


WAS there ever a good cook who hadn't some prominent fault that
completely overshadowed her professional good qualities? If my
experience is to answer the question, the reply will be--_no_.

I had been married several years before I was fortunate enough to
obtain a cook that could be trusted to boil a potato, or broil a
steak. I felt as if completely made up when Margaret served her
first dinner. The roast was just right, and all the vegetables were
cooked and flavored as well as if I had done it myself--in fact, a
little better. My husband eat with a relish not often exhibited, and
praised almost every thing on the table.

For a week, one good meal followed another in daily succession. We
had hot cakes, light and fine-flavored, every morning for breakfast,
with coffee not to be beaten--and chops or steaks steaming from the
gridiron, that would have gladdened the heart of an epicure. Dinner
was served, during the time, with a punctuality that was rarely a
minute at fault, while every article of food brought upon the table,
fairly tempted the appetite. Light rolls, rice cakes, or "Sally
Luns," made without suggestion on my part usually met us at tea
time. In fact, the very delight of Margaret's life appeared to be in
cooking. She was born for a cook.

Moreover, strange to say, Margaret was good-tempered, a most
remarkable thing in a good cook; and more remarkable still, was tidy
in her person, and cleanly in her work.

"She is a treasure," said I to my husband, one day, as we passed
from the dining-room, after having partaken of one of her excellent
dinners.

"She's too good," replied Mr. Smith--"too good to last. There must
be some bad fault about her--good cooks always have bad faults--and
I am looking for its appearance every day."

"Don't talk so, Mr. Smith. There is no reason in the world why a
good cook should not be as faultless as any one else."

Even while I said this, certain misgivings intruded themselves. My
husband went to his store soon after.

About three o'clock Margaret presented herself, all dressed to go
out, and said that she was going to see her sister, but would be
back in time to get tea.

She came back, as she promised, but, alas for my good cook! The
fault appeared. She was so much intoxicated that, in attempting to
lift the kettle from the fire, she let it fall, and came near
scalding herself dreadfully. Oh, dear! I shall never forget the sad
disappointment of that hour. How the pleasant images of good dinners
and comfortable breakfasts and suppers faded from my vision. The old
trouble was to come back again, for the faultless cook had
manifested a fault that vitiated, for us, all her good qualities.

On the next day, I told Margaret that we must part; but she begged
so hard to be kept in her place, and promised good behaviour in
future so earnestly, that I was prevailed on to try her again. It
was of no use, however--in less than a week she was drunk again, and
I had to let her go.

After that, for some months, we had burnt steaks, waxy potatoes, and
dried roast beef to our hearts' content; while such luxuries as
muffins, hot cakes, and the like were not to be seen on our
uninviting table.

My next good cook had such a violent temper, that I was actually
afraid to show my face in the kitchen. I bore with her until
patience was no longer a virtue, and then she went.

Biddy, who took charge of my "kitchen cabinet," a year or so
afterwards, proved herself a culinary artist of no ordinary merit.
But, alas! Biddy "kept a room;" and so many strange disappearances
of bars of soap, bowls of sugar, prints of butter, etc., took place,
that I was forced to the unwilling conclusion that her room was
simply a store room for the surplussage of mine. Some pretty strong
evidence on this point coming to my mind, I dismissed Biddy, who was
particularly forward in declaring her honesty, although I had never
accused her of being wanting in that inestimable virtue.

Some of my experiences in cooks have been musing enough. Or, I
should rather say, are musing enough to _think_ about: they were
rather annoying at the time of their occurrence. One of these
experiences I will relate. I had obtained a "treasure" in a new
cook, who was not only good tempered and cleanly, but understood her
business reasonably well. Kitty was a little different from former
incumbents of her office in this, that she took an interest in
reading, and generally dipped into the morning paper before it found
its way up stairs. To this, of course, I had no objection, but was
rather pleased to see it. Time, however, which proves all things,
showed my cook to be rather too literary in her inclinations. I
often found her reading, when it was but reasonable for me to expect
that she would be working; and overdone or burnt dishes occasionally
marked the degree in which her mind was absorbed in her literary
pleasures, which I discovered in time, were not of the highest
order-such books as the "Mysteries of Paris" furnishing the aliment
that fed her imagination.

"Jane," said my husband to me one morning, as he was about leaving
the house, "I believe I must invite my old friend Green to dine with
me to-day. He will leave the city to-morrow, and I may not have the
pleasure of a social hour with him again for years. Besides, I want
to introduce him to you. We were intimate as young men, and much
attached to each other. I would like you to know him."

"Invite him, by all means," was my reply.

"I will send home a turkey from market," said Mr. Smith, as he stood
holding on to the open door. "Tell Kitty to cook it just right. Mrs.
Green, I am told, is a first-rate housekeeper, and I feel like
showing you off to the best advantage."

"Don't look for too much," I replied, smiling, "lest you be
disappointed."

Mr. Smith went away, and I walked back to the kitchen door to say a
word to Kitty. As I looked in, the sound of my feet on the floor
caused her to start. She was standing near a window, and at my
appearance she hurriedly concealed something under her apron.

"Kitty," said I, "we are to have company to dine with us to-day. Mr.
Smith will send home a turkey, which you must dress and cook in the
best manner. I will be down during the morning to make some lemon
puddings. Be sure to have a good fire in the range, and see that all
the drafts are clear."

Kitty promised that every thing should be right, and I went up
stairs. In due time the marketing came home. About eleven o'clock I
repaired to the kitchen, and, much to my surprise, found all in
disorder.

"What in the world have you been doing all the morning?" said I,
feeling a little fretted.

Kitty excused herself good naturedly, and commenced bustling about
to put things to rights, while I got flour and other articles
necessary for my purpose, and went to work at my lemon puddings,
which were, in due time, ready for the oven. Giving all necessary
directions as to their baking, and charging Kitty to be sure to have
every thing on the table precisely at our usual hour for dining, I
went up into the nursery to look after the children, and to see
about other matters requiring my attention.

Time passed on until, to my surprise, I heard the clock strike one.
I had yet to dress for dinner.

"I wonder how Kitty is coming on?" said I to myself. "I hope she
will not let the puddings get all dried up."

But, I felt too much in a hurry to go down and satisfy myself as to
the state of affairs in the kitchen; and took it for granted that
all was right.

A little while afterwards, I perceived an odor as of something
burning.

"What is that?" came instinctively from my lips. "If Kitty has let
the puddings burn!"

Quick as thought I turned from my room, and went gliding down
stairs. As I neared the kitchen, the smell of burned flour, or
pastry, grew stronger. All was silent below; and I approached in
silence. On entering Kitty's domain, I perceived that lady seated in
front of the range, with a brown covered pamphlet novel held close
to her face, in the pages of which she was completely lost. I never
saw any one more entirely absorbed in a book. No sign of dinner was
any where to be seen. Upon the range was a kettle of water boiling
over into the fire, and from one of the ovens poured forth a dark
smoke, that told too plainly the ruin of my lemon puddings. And, to
cap all, the turkey, yet guiltless of fire or dripping pan, was upon
the floor, in possession of a strange cat, which had come in through
the open window. Bending over the still entranced cook, I read the
title of her book. It was "THE WANDERING JEW."

"Kitty!" I don't much wonder, now, at the start she gave, for I
presume there was not the zephyr's softness in my voice.

"Oh, ma'am!" She caught her breath as her eyes rested upon the cat
and the turkey. "Indeed, ma'am!" And then she made a spring towards
puss, who, nimbly eluding her, passed out by the way through which
she had come in.

By this time I had jerked open the oven door, when there came
rushing out a cloud of smoke, which instantly filled the room. My
puddings were burned to a crisp!

As for the turkey, the cat had eaten off one side of the breast, and
it was no longer fit for the table.

"Well! this is fine work!" said I, in an angry, yet despairing
voice. "Fine work, upon my word!"

"Oh, ma'am!" Kitty interrupted me by saying, "I'll run right off and
buy another turkey, and have it cooked in time. Indeed I will,
ma'am! And I'll pay for it. It's all my fault! oh dear! dear me! Now
don't be angry, Mrs. Smith! I'll have dinner all ready in time, and
no one will be any the wiser for this."

"In time!" and I raised my finger towards the kitchen clock, the
hands of which marked the period of half past one. Two o'clock was
our regular dinner hour.

"Mercy!" ejaculated the frightened cook, as she sank back upon a
chair; "I thought it was only a little past eleven. I am sure it was
only eleven when I sat down just to read a page or two while the
puddings were in the oven!"

The truth was, the "Wandering Jew," in the most exciting portion of
which she happened to be, proved too much for her imagination. Her
mind had taken no note of time, and two hours passed with the
rapidity of a few minutes.

"I don't exactly comprehend this," said my husband, as he sat down
with his old friend, to dine off of broiled steak and potatoes, at
half-past two o'clock.

"It's all the fault of the 'Wandering Jew!'" I replied, making an
effort to drive away, with a smile, the red signs of mortification
that were in my face.

"The Wandering Jew!" returned my husband, looking mystified.

"Yes, the fault lies with that imaginary personage," said I,
"strange as it may seem." And then I related the mishaps of the
morning. For desert, we had some preserved fruit and cream, and a
hearty laugh over the burnt puddings and disfigured turkey.

Poor Kitty couldn't survive the mortification. She never smiled
again in my house; and, at the close of the week, removed to another
home.




CHAPTER III.

LIGHT ON THE SUBJECT.


"THE oil's out, mum," said Hannah, the domestic who succeeded Kitty,
pushing her head into the room where I sat sewing.

"It can't be," I replied.

"Indade, mum, and it is. There isn't the full of a lamp left," was
the positive answer.

"Then, what have you done with it?" said I, in a firm voice. "It
isn't four days since a gallon was sent home from the store."

"Four days! It's more nor a week, mum!"

"Don't tell me that, Hannah," I replied, firmly; "for I know better.
I was out on last Monday, and told Brown to send us home a gallon."

"Sure, and it's burned, mum, thin! What else could go with it?"

"It never was burned in our lamps," said I, in answer to this.
"You've either wasted it, or given it away."

At this Hannah, as in honor bound, became highly indignant, and
indulged in certain impertinences which I did not feel inclined to
notice.

But, as the oil was all gone, and no mistake; and, as the prospect
of sitting in darkness was not, by any means, an agreeable one--the
only remedy was to order another gallon.

Something was wrong; that was clear. The oil had never been burned.

That evening, myself and husband talked over the matter, and both of
us came to the conclusion, that it would never do. The evil must be
remedied. A gallon of oil must not again disappear in four days.

"Why," said my husband, "it ought to last us at least a week and a
half."

"Not quite so long," I replied. "We burn a gallon a week."

"Not fairly, I'm inclined to think. But four days is out of all
conscience."

I readily assented to this, adding some trite remark about the
unconscionable wastefulness of domestics.

On the next morning, as my husband arose from bed, he shivered in
the chilly air, saying, as he did so:

"That girl's let the fire go out again in the heater! Isn't it too
bad? This thing happens now every little while. I'm sure I've said
enough to her about it. There's nothing wanted but a little
attention."

"It is too bad, indeed," I added.

"There's that fishy smell again!" exclaimed Mr. Smith. "What can it
be?"

"Fishy smell! So there is."

"Did you get any mackerel from the store yesterday?"

"None."

"Perhaps Hannah ordered some?"

"No. I had a ham sent home, and told her to have a slice of that
broiled for breakfast."

"I don't know what to make of it. Every now and then that same smell
comes up through the register--particularly in the morning. I'll bet
a sixpence there's some old fish tub in the cellar of which she's
made kindling."

"That may be it," said I.

And, for want of a better reason, we agreed, for the time being,
upon that hypothesis.

At the end of another four days, word came up that our best sperm
oil, for which we paid a dollar and forty cents a gallon, was out
again.

"Impossible!" I ejaculated.

"But it is mum," said Hannah. "There's not a scrimption left--not so
much as the full of a thimble."

"You must be mistaken. A gallon of oil has never been burned in this
house in four days."

"We burned the other gallon in four days," said Hannah, with
provoking coolness. "The evenings are very long, and we have a great
many lights. There's the parlor light, and the passage light, and
the--"

"It's no use for you to talk, Hannah," I replied, interrupting her.
"No use in the world. A gallon of oil in four days has never gone by
fair means in this house. So don't try to make me believe it--for I
won't. I'm too old a housekeeper for that."

Finding that I was not to be convinced, Hannah became angry, and
said something about her not being a "thafe." I was unmoved by this,
however; and told her, with as much sternness of manner as I could
assume, that I should hold her responsible for any future waste of
the article; and that if she did not feel inclined to remain on such
terms, she had better go.

"Dade, thin, and I'll go to onst," was the girl's spirited answer.

"Very well, Hannah. You are your own mistress in this respect," said
I, coolly. "I'm not in the least troubled about filling your place;
nor fearful of getting one who will waste a gallon of oil in four
days."

Hannah retired from my presence in high indignation, and I fully
expected that she would desert my house forthwith. But, no; unlike
some others of her class, she knew when she had a good place, and
had sense enough to keep it as long as she could stay.

In due time she cooled off, and I heard no more about her getting
another place.

"There's that fishy smell again!" exclaimed my husband, as he arose
up in bed one morning, a day or two afterwards, and snuffed the air.
"And, as I live, the fire in the heater is all out again! I'll have
some light on this subject, see if I don't."

And he sprung upon the floor, at the same time hurriedly putting on
his dressing gown and a pair of slippers.

"Where are you going?" said I, seeing him moving towards the door.

"To find out where this fishy smell comes from," he replied,
disappearing as he spoke.

In about five minutes, Mr. Smith returned.

"Well, if that don't beat all!" he exclaimed, as he re-entered the
chamber.

"What?" I very naturally enquired.

"I've found out all about that fishy smell," said he.

"What about it? Where does it come from?"

"You wouldn't guess in a month of Sundays! Well, this is a great
world! Live and learn!"

"Explain yourself, Mr. Smith. I'm all impatience."

"I will; and in a few words. The fire was out in the heater."

"Yes."

"And I very naturally took my way down to where I expected to find
our lady at work in the re-kindling process."

"Well?"

"Sure enough, there she was, kindling the fire with a vengeance."

"With what?" I asked. "With a vengeance?"

"Yes, with a vengeance to my pocket. She had the oil can in her
hands, and was pouring its contents freely into the furnace, in
order to quicken combustion. I now understand all about this fishy
smell."

"And I all about the remarkable disappearance of a gallon of oil in
four days. Kindling the fire with dollar and forty cent oil!"

"Even so!"

"What did you say to her, Mr. Smith?"

"Nothing. But I rather think she'll not want me to look at her
again, the huzzy!"

"Kindling fire with my best sperm oil! Well, I can't get over that!"

Something in this wise I continued to ejaculate, now and then, until
my astonishment fairly wore itself out.

I didn't consider it worth while to say any thing to Hannah when I
went down stairs, thinking it best to let the look my husband spoke
of, do its work. By the way, I don't much wonder that she was
frightened at his look--for he can--But I forgot--I am speaking of
my husband, and he might happen to read this.

Of course, Hannah's days in my house were numbered. No faith was to
be placed in a creature who could so shamefully destroy a useful
article placed in her hands. If she would burn up the oil, it was
but fair to infer that she would as remorselessly make way with
other things. So I parted with her. She begged me to let her stay,
and made all sorts of promises. But I was immovable.

Whether I bettered myself in the change, is somewhat doubtful.




CHAPTER IV.

CHEAP FURNITURE.


ONE of the cardinal virtues, at least for housekeepers who are not
overburdened in the matter of income, is economy. In the early part
of our married life, Mr. Smith and myself were forced to the
practice of this virtue, or incur debt, of which both of us had a
natural horror. For a few years we lived in the plain style with
which we had begun the world. But, when our circumstances improved,
we very naturally desired to improve the appearance of things in our
household. Our cane seat chairs and ingrain carpet looked less and
less attractive every day. And, when we went out to spend an
evening, socially, with our friends, the contrast between home and
abroad was strikingly apparent to our minds.

"I think," said Mr. Smith to me, one day, "that it is time we
re-furnished our parlors."

"If you can afford the outlay," I remarked.

"It won't cost a great deal," he returned.

"Not over three hundred dollars," said I.

Mr. Smith shook his head as he answered: "Half that sum ought to be
sufficient. What will we want?"

"A dozen mahogany chairs to begin with," I replied. "There will be
sixty dollars."

"You don't expect to pay five dollars a-piece for chairs?" said my
husband, in a tone of surprise.

"I don't think you can get good ones for less."

"Indeed we can. I was looking at a very handsome set yesterday; and
the man only asked four dollars for them. I don't in the least doubt
that I could get them for three and a half."

"And a dear bargain you would make of that, I do not in the least
doubt. It is poor economy, Mr. Smith, to buy cheap furniture. It
costs a great deal more in the end, than good furniture, and never
gives you any satisfaction."

"But these were good chairs, Jane. As good as I would wish to look
at. The man said they were from one of the best shops in the city,
and of superior workmanship and finish."

As I make it a point never to prolong an argument with my husband,
when I see his mind bent in one direction, I did not urge my view of
the case any farther. It was settled, however, that we could afford
to re-furnish our parlors in a better style, and that in the course
of the coming week, we should go out together and select a Brussels
carpet, a sofa, a dozen mahogany chairs, a centre table, &c.

As I had foreseen from the beginning, my husband's ideas of economy
were destined to mar everything. At one of the cabinet ware-rooms
was a very neat, well-made set of chairs, for which five dollars and
a half were asked, but which the dealer, seeing that he was beyond
our mark, offered for five dollars. They were cheap at that price.
But Mr. Smith could not see that they were a whit better than the
set of chairs just mentioned as offered for four dollars; and which
he was satisfied could be bought for three and a half. So I went
with him to look at them. They proved to be showy enough, if that
were any recommendation, but had a common look in my eyes. They were
not to be compared with the set we had just been examining.

"Now, are they not very beautiful, Jane?" said my husband. "To me
they are quite as handsome as those we were asked sixty dollars
for."

From this I could not but dissent, seeing which, the cunning dealer
came quickly to my husband's side of the question with various
convincing arguments, among the strongest of which was an abatement
in the price of the chairs--he seeing it to be for his interest to
offer them for three dollars and three-quarters a-piece.

"I'll give you three and a-half," said Mr. Smith, promptly.

"Too little, that, sir," returned the dealer. "I don't make a cent
on them at three and three-quarters. They are fully equal, in every
respect, to the chairs you were offered at five dollars. I know the
manufacturer, and have had his articles often."

"Say three and a-half, and it's a bargain," was the only reply made
to this by my economical husband.

I was greatly in hopes that the man would decline this offer; but,
was disappointed. He hesitated for some time, and, at last, said:

"Well, I don't care, take them along; though it is throwing them
away. Such a bargain you will never get again, if you live to be as
old as Mathuselah. But, now, don't you want something else? I can
sell you cheaper and better articles in the furniture line than you
can get in the city. Small profits and quick sales--I go in for the
nimble sixpence."

My husband was in the sphere of attraction, and I saw that it would
take a stronger effort on my part to draw him out than I wished to
make. So, I yielded with as good a grace as possible, and aided in
the selection of a cheap sofa, a cheap, overgrown centre table, and
two or three other article that were almost "thrown away."

Well, our parlor was furnished with its new dress in good time, and
made quite a respectable appearance. Mr. Smith was delighted with
everything; the more particularly as the cost had been so moderate.
I had my own thoughts on the subject; and looked very confidently
for some evidences of imperfection in our great bargains. I was not
very long kept in suspense. One morning, about two weeks after all
had been fitted out so elegantly, while engaged in dusting the
chairs, a part of the mahogany ornament in the back of one of them
fell off. On the next day, another showed the same evidence of
imperfect workmanship. A few evenings afterwards, as we sat at the
centre table, one of our children leaned on it rather heavily, when
there was a sudden crack, and the side upon which he was bearing his
weight, swayed down the distance of half an inch or more. The next
untoward event was the dropping of one of its feet by the sofa, and
the warping up of a large piece of veneering on the back. While
lamenting over this, we discovered a broken spring ready to make its
way through the hair cloth covering.

"So much for cheap furniture," said I, in a tone of involuntary
triumph.

My husband looked at me half reproachfully, and so I said no more.

It was now needful to send for a cabinet maker, and submit our sofa
and chairs to his handy workmanship. He quickly discovered other
imperfections, and gave us the consoling information that our fine
furniture was little above fourth-rate in quality, and dear at any
price. A ten dollar bill was required to pay the damage they had
already sustained, even under our careful hands.

A more striking evidence of our folly in buying cheap furniture was,
however, yet to come. An intimate friend came in one evening to sit
a few hours with us. After conversing for a time, both he and my
husband took up books, and commenced reading, while I availed myself
of the opportunity to write a brief letter. Our visitor, who was a
pretty stout man, had the bad fault of leaning back in his chair,
and balancing himself on its hind legs; an experiment most trying to
the best mahogany chairs that were ever made.

We were all sitting around the centre table, upon which burned a
tall astral lamp, and I was getting absorbed in my letter, when
suddenly there was a loud crash, followed by the breaking of the
table from its centre, and the pitching over of the astral lamp,
which, in falling, just grazed my side, and went down, oil and all,
upon our new carpet! An instant more, and we were in total darkness.
But, ere the light went out, a glance had revealed a scene that I
shall never forget. Our visitor, whose weight, as he tried his usual
balancing experiment, had caused the slender legs of his chair to
snap off short, had fallen backwards. In trying to save himself, he
had caught at the table, and wrenched that from its centre
fastening. Startled by this sudden catastrophe, my husband had
sprung to his feet, grasping his chair with the intent of drawing it
away, when the top of the back came off in his hand. I saw all this
at a single glance--and then we were shrouded in darkness.

Of the scene that followed, I will not speak. My lady readers can,
without any effort of the mind, imagine something of its
unpleasant reality. As for our visitor, when lights were brought in,
he was no where to be seen. I have a faint recollection of having
heard the street door shut amid the confusion that succeeded the
incident just described.

About a week afterwards, the whole of our cheap furniture was sent
to auction, where it brought less than half its first cost. It was
then replaced with good articles, by good workmen, at a fair price;
not one of which has cost us, to this day, a single cent for
repairs.

A housekeeping friend of mine, committed, not, long since, a similar
error. Her husband could spare her a couple of hundred dollars for
re-furnishing purposes; but, as his business absorbed nearly all of
his time and thoughts, he left with her the selection of the new
articles that were to beautify their parlors and chambers, merely
saying to her:

"Let what you get be good. It is cheapest in the end."

Well, my friend had set her heart on a dozen chairs, a new sofa,
centre table, and "what-not," for her parlors; and on a
dressing-bureau, mahogany bedstead, and wash-stand, for her chamber,
besides a new chamber carpet. Her first visit was to the ware-rooms
of one of our best cabinet makers; but, his prices completely
frightened her--for, at his rate, the articles she wanted would
amount to more than all the money she had to spend, and leave
nothing for the new chamber carpet.

"I must buy cheaper," said she.

"The cheapest is generally dearest in the end," returned the cabinet
maker.

"I don't know about that," remarked the lady, whose thoughts did not
take in the meaning of the man's words. "All I know is, that I can
get as good articles as I desire at lower prices than you ask."

It did not once occur to my friend, that it would be wisest to
lessen the number of articles, and get the remainder of the first
quality. No; her heart covered the whole inventory at first made
out, and nothing less would answer. So she went to an auction store,
and bought inferior articles at lower prices. I visited her soon
after. She showed me her bargains, and, with an air of exultation,
spoke of the cost.

"What do you think I paid for this?" said she, referring to a showy
dressing-bureau; and, as she spoke, she took hold of the suspended
looking-glass, and moved the upper portion of it forward. "Only
seventeen dollars!"

The words had scarcely passed her lips, ere the looking-glass broke
away from one of the screws that held it in the standards, and fell,
crashing, at our feet!

It cost just seven dollars to replace the glass. But, that was not
all--over thirty dollars were paid during the first year for
repairs. And this is only the beginning of troubles.

Cheap furniture is, in most cases, the dearest that housekeepers can
buy. It is always breaking, and usually costs more, in a year or
two, than the difference between its price and that of first-rate
articles; to say nothing of the vexation and want of satisfaction
that always attends its possession. Better be content with fewer
articles, if the purse be low, and have them good.

While on this subject, I will incorporate in these "Confessions" an
"Experience" of my sister and her husband, Mr. and Mrs. John Jones.
Mr. Jones is, in some respects, very much like Mr. Smith, and, as
will be seen in the story about to be given, my sister's ideas of
things and my own, run quite parallel to each other. The story has
found its way, elsewhere, into print, for Mr. Jones, like myself,
has a natural fondness for types. But its repetition here will do no
harm, and bring it before many who would not otherwise see it.




CHAPTER V.

IS IT ECONOMY?


THE "Experience" of my relative, Mr. John Jones, referred to in the
preceding chapter, is given in what follows. After reading it, we
think that few young housekeepers will commit the folly of indulging
to any very great extent in cheap furniture.

We had been married five years, and during the time had boarded for
economy's sake. But the addition of one after another to our family,
admonished us that it was getting time to enlarge our borders; and
so we were determined to go to housekeeping. In matters of domestic
economy both my wife and myself were a little "green," but I think
that I was the greenest of the two.

To get a house was our first concern, and to select furniture was
our next. The house was found after two months' diligent search, and
at the expense of a good deal of precious shoe leather. Save me from
another siege at house-hunting! I would about as soon undertake to
build a suitable dwelling with my own hands, as to find one "exactly
the thing" already up, and waiting with open doors for a tenant. All
the really desirable houses that we found ticketed "to let," were at
least two prices above our limit, and most of those within our means
we would hardly have lived in rent free.

At last, however, we found a cosey little nest of a house, just
built, and clean and neat as a new pin, from top to bottom. It
suited us to a T. And now came the next most important
business--selecting furniture. My wife's ideas had always been a
little in advance of mine. That is, she liked to have every thing of
the best quality; and had the weakness, so to speak, of desiring to
make an appearance. As my income, at the time, was but moderate, and
the prospect of an increase thereof not very flattering, I felt like
being exceedingly prudent in all outlays for furniture.

"We must be content with things few and plain," said I, as we sat
down one morning to figure up what we must get.

"But let them be good," said my wife.

"Strong and substantial," was my reply. "But we can't afford to pay
for much extra polish and filigree work."

"I don't want any thing very extra, Mr. Jones," returned my wife, a
little uneasily. "Though what I do have, I would like good. It's no
economy, in the end, to buy cheap things."

The emphasis on the word cheap, rather grated on my ear; for I was
in favor of getting every thing as cheap as possible.

"What kind of chairs did you think of getting?" asked Mrs. Jones.

"A handsome set of cane-seat," I replied, thinking that in this, at
least, I would be even with her ideas on the subject of parlor
chairs. But her face did not brighten.

"What would you like?" said I.

"I believe it would be more economical in the end to get good
stuffed seat, mahogany chairs," replied Mrs. Jones.

"At five dollars a-piece, Ellen?"

"Yes. Even at five dollars a-piece. They would last us our
life-time; while cane-seat chairs, if we get them, will have to be
renewed two or three times, and cost a great deal more in the end,
without being half so comfortable, or looking half-so well."

"Sixty dollars for a dozen chairs, when very good ones can be had
for twenty-four dollars! Indeed, Ellen, we mustn't think of such a
thing. We can't afford it. Remember, there are a great many other
things to buy."

"I know, dear; but I am sure it will be much more economical in the
end for us to diminish the number of articles, and add to the
quality of what we do have. I am very much like the poor woman who
preferred a cup of clear, strong, fragrant coffee, three times a
week, to a decoction of burnt rye every day. What I have, I do like
good."

"And so do I, Ellen. But, as I said before, there will be, diminish
as we may, a great many things to buy, and we must make the cost of
each as small as possible. We must not think of such extravagance as
mahogany chairs now. At some other time we may get them."

My wife here gave up the point, and, what I thought a little
remarkable, made no more points on the subject of furniture. I had
every thing my own way; I bought cheap to my heart's content. It was
only necessary for me to express my approval of an article, for her
to assent to its purchase.

As to patronizing your fashionable cabinet makers and high-priced
upholsterers, we were not guilty of the folly, but bought at
reasonable rates from auction stores and at public sales. Our parlor
carpets cost but ninety cents a yard, and were handsomer than those
for which a lady of our acquaintance paid a dollar and
thirty-eight. Our chairs were of a neat, fancy pattern, and had cost
thirty dollars a dozen. We had hesitated for some time between a set
at twenty-four dollars a dozen and these; but the style being so
much more attractive, we let our taste govern in the selection. The
price of our sofa was eighteen dollars, and I thought it a really
genteel affair, though my wife was not in raptures about it. A pair
of card tables for fifteen dollars, and a marble-top centre table
for fourteen, gave our parlors quite a handsome appearance.

"I wouldn't ask any thing more comfortable or genteel than this,"
said, I, when the parlors were all "fixed" right.

Mrs. Jones looked pleased with the appearance of things, but did not
express herself extravagantly.

In selecting our chamber furniture, a handsome dressing-bureau and
French bedstead that my wife went to look at in the ware-room of a
high-priced cabinet maker, tempted her strongly, and it was with
some difficulty that I could get her ideas back to a regular maple
four-poster, a plain, ten dollar bureau, and a two dollar
dressing-glass. Twenty and thirty dollar mattresses, too, were in
her mind, but when articles of the kind, just as good to wear, could
be had at eight and ten dollars, where was the use of wasting money
in going higher?

The ratio of cost set down against the foregoing articles, was
maintained from garret to kitchen; and I was agreeably disappointed
to find, after the last bill for purchases was paid, that I was
within the limit of expenditures I had proposed to make by over a
hundred dollars.

The change from a boarding-house to a comfortable home was, indeed,
pleasant. We could never get done talking about it. Every thing was
so quiet, so new, so clean, and so orderly.

"This is living," would drop from our lips a dozen times a week.

One day, about three months after we had commenced housekeeping, I
came home, and, on entering the parlor, the first thing that met my
eyes was a large spot of white on the new sofa. A piece of the
veneering had been knocked off, completely disfiguring it.

"What did that?" I asked of my wife.

"In setting back a chair that I had dusted," she replied, "one of
the feet touched the sofa lightly, when off dropped that veneer like
a loose flake. I've been examining the sofa since, and find that it
is a very bad piece of work. Just look here."

And she drew me over to the place where my eighteen dollar sofa
stood, and pointed out sundry large seams that had gaped open, loose
spots in the veneering, and rickety joints. I saw now, what I had
not before seen, that the whole article was of exceedingly common
material and common workmanship.

"A miserable piece of furniture!" said I.

"It is, indeed," returned Mrs. Jones. "To buy an article like this,
is little better than throwing money into the street."

For a month the disfigured sofa remained in the parlor, a perfect
eye-sore, when another piece of the veneering sloughed off, and one
of the feet became loose. It was then sent to a cabinet maker for
repair; and cost for removing and mending just five dollars.

Not long after this, the bureau had to take a like journey, for it
had, strangely enough, fallen into sudden dilapidation. All the
locks were out of order, half the knobs were off, there was not a
drawer that didn't require the most accurate balancing of forces in
order to get it shut after it was once open, and it showed
premonitory symptoms of shedding its skin like a snake. A five
dollar bill was expended in putting this into something like
_usable_ order and respectable aspect. By this time a new set of
castors was needed for the maple four-poster, which was obtained at
the expense of two dollars. Moreover, the head-board to said
four-poster, which, from its exceeding ugliness, had, from the
first, been a terrible eye-sore to Mrs. Jones, as well as to myself,
was, about this period, removed, and one of more sightly appearance
substituted, at the additional charge of six dollars. No tester
frame had accompanied the cheap bedstead at its original purchase,
and now my wife wished to have one, and also a light curtain above
and valance below. All these, with trimmings, etc., to match, cost
the round sum of ten dollars.

"It looks very neat," said Mrs. Jones, after her curtains were up.

"It does, indeed," said I.

"Still," returned Mrs. Jones, "I would much rather have had a
handsome mahogany French bedstead."

"So would I," was my answer. "But you know they cost some thirty
dollars, and we paid but sixteen for this."

"Sixteen!" said my wife, turning quickly toward me. "It cost more
than that."

"Oh, no. I have the bill in my desk," was my confident answer.

"Sixteen was originally paid, I know," said Mrs. Jones. "But then,
remember, what it has cost since. Two dollars for castors, six for a
new head-board, and ten for tester and curtains. Thirty-four dollars
in all; when a very handsome French bedstead, of good workmanship,
can be bought for thirty dollars."

I must own that I was taken somewhat aback by this array of figures
"that don't lie."

"And for twenty dollars we could have bought a neat, well made
dressing-bureau, at Moore and Campion's, that would have lasted for
twice as many years, and always looked in credit."

"But ours, you know, only cost ten," said I.

"The bureau, such as it is, cost ten, and the glass two. Add five
that we have already paid for repairs, and the four that our maple
bedstead has cost above the price of a handsome French, one, and we
will have the sum of twenty-one dollars,--enough to purchase as
handsome a dressing-bureau as I would ask. So you see. Mr. Jones,
that our cheap furniture is not going to turn out so cheap after
all. And as for looks, why no one can say there is much to brag of."

This was a new view of the case, and certainly one not very
flattering to my economical vanity. I gave in, of course, and,
admitted that Mrs. Jones was right.

But the dilapidations and expenses for repairs, to which I have just
referred, were but as the "beginning of sorrows." It took, about
three years to show the full fruits of my error. By the end of that
time, half my parlor chairs had been rendered useless in consequence
of the back-breaking and seat-rending ordeals through which they had
been called to pass. The sofa was unanimously condemned to the
dining room, and the ninety cent carpet had gone on fading and
defacing, until my wife said she was ashamed to put it even on her
chambers. For repairs, our furniture had cost, up to this period, to
say nothing of the perpetual annoyance of having it put out of
order, and running for the cabinet maker and upholsterer, not less
than a couple of hundred dollars.

Finally, I grew desperate.

"I'll have decent, well made furniture, let it cost what it will,"
said I, to Mrs. Jones.

"You will find it cheapest in the end," was her quiet reply.

On the next day we went to a cabinet maker, whose reputation for
good work stood among the highest in the city; and ordered new
parlor and chamber furniture--mahogany chairs, French bedstead,
dressing-bureau and all, and as soon as they came home, cleared the
house of all the old cheap (dear!) trash with which we had been
worried since the day we commenced housekeeping.

A good many years have passed since, and we have not paid the first
five dollar bill for repairs. All the drawers run as smoothly as
railroad cars; knobs are tight; locks in prime order, and veneers
cling as tightly to their places as if they had grown there. All is
right and tight, and wears an orderly, genteel appearance; and what
is best of all the cost of every thing we have, good as it is, is
far below the _real_ cost of what is inferior.

"It is better--much better," said I to Mrs. Jones, the other day.

"Better!" was her reply. "Yes, indeed, a thousand times better to
have good things at once. Cheap furniture is dearest in the end.
Every housekeeper ought to know this in the beginning. If we had
known it, see what we would have saved."

"If _I_ had known it, you mean," said I.

My wife looked kindly, not triumphantly, into my face, and smiled.
When she again spoke, it was on another subject.




CHAPTER VI.

LIVING AT A CONVENIENT DISTANCE.


THERE are few of us who do not feel, at some time in life, the
desire for change. Indeed, change of place corresponding, as it
does, in outward nature, to change of state in the mind, it is not
at all surprising that we should, now and then, feel a strong desire
to remove from the old, and get into new locations, and amid
different external associations. Thus, we find, in many families, an
ever recurring tendency to removal. Indeed, I have some housekeeping
friends who are rarely to be found in the same house, or in the same
part of the city, in any two consecutive years. Three moves,
Franklin used to say, were equal to a fire. There are some to whom I
could point, who have been, if this holds true, as good as burned
out, three or four times in the last ten years.

But, I must not write too long a preface to my present story. Mr.
Smith and myself cannot boast of larger organs of Inhabitativeness--I
believe, that is the word used by phrenologists--than many of
our neighbors. Occasionally we have felt dissatisfied with the
state of things around us, and become possessed of the demon of
change. We have moved quite frequently, sometimes attaining superior
comfort, and some times, getting rather the worst of, it for
"the change."

A few years ago, in the early spring-time, Mr. Smith said to me, one
day:

"I noticed, in riding out yesterday, a very pleasant country house
on the Frankford Road, to let, and it struck me that it would be a
fine thing for us, both as to health and comfort, to rent it for the
summer season. What do you think of it?"

"I always, loved the country, you know," was my response.

My heart had leaped at the proposition.

"It is such a convenient distance from the city," said Mr. Smith.

"How far?"

"About four miles."

"Do the stages pass frequently?"

"Every half hour; and the fare is only twelve and a half cents."

"So low! That is certainly an inducement."

"Yes, it is. Suppose we go out and look at the house?"

"Very well," said I. And then we talked over the pleasures and
advantage that would result from a residence in the country, at such
a convenient distance from the city.

On the next day we went to look at the place, and found much, both
in the house and grounds, to attract us. There was a fine shaded
lawn, and garden with a stock of small and large fruit.

"What a delightful place for the children," I exclaimed.

"And at such a convenient distance from the city," said my husband.
"I can go in and out to business, and scarcely miss the time. But do
you think you would like the country?"

"O, yes. I've always loved the country."

"We can move back into the city when the summer closes," said Mr.
Smith.

"Why not remain here permanently? It will be too expensive to keep
both a city and country house," I returned.

"It will be too dreary through the winter."

"I don't think so. I always feel cheerful in the country. And, then,
you know, the house is at such a convenient distance, and the stages
pass the door at every half hour. You can get to business as easily
as if we resided in the city."

I was in the mood for a change, and so it happened was Mr. Smith.
The more we thought and talked about the matters, the more inclined
were we to break up in the city, and go permanently to the country.
And, finally, we resolved to try the experiment.

So the pleasant country house was taken, and the town house given
up, and, in due time, we took our flight to where nature had just
carpeted the earth in freshest green, and caused the buds to expand,
and the trees of the forest to clothe themselves in verdure.

How pleasant was every thing. A gardener had been employed to put
the garden and lawn in order, and soon we were delighted to see the
first shoots from seeds that had been planted, making their way
through the ground. To me, all was delightful. I felt almost as
light-hearted as a child, and never tired of expressing my pleasure
at the change.

"Come and see us," said I, to one city friend and another, on
meeting them. "We're in a most delightful place, and at such a
convenient distance from the city. Just get into the Frankford
omnibus, which starts from Hall's, in Second street above Market,
every half hour, and you will come to our very door. And I shall be
so delighted to have a visit from you."

In moving from the city, I took with me two good domestics, who had
lived in my family for over a year. Each had expressed herself as
delighted at the prospect of getting into the country, and I was
delighted to think they were so well satisfied, for I had feared
lest they would be disinclined to accompany us.

About a month after our removal, one of them, who had looked
dissatisfied about something, came to me and said:

"I want to go back to the city, Mrs. Smith; I don't like living in
the country."

"Very well," I replied. "You must do as you please. But I thought
you preferred this to the city?"

"I thought I would like it, but I don't. It's too lonesome."

I did not persuade her to stay. That error I had once or twice, ere
this, fallen into, and learned to avoid it in future. So she went
back to the city, and I was left with but a single girl. Three days
only elapsed before this one announced her intended departure.

"But you will stay," said I, "until I can get some one in your
place."

"My week will be up on Saturday," was replied. "Can you get a girl
by that time?"

"That leaves me only two days, Mary; I'm afraid not."

Mary looked unamiable enough at this answer. We said no more to each
other. In the afternoon I went to the city to find a new domestic,
if possible, but returned unsuccessful.

Saturday came, and to my surprise and trouble, Mary persisted in
going away. So I was left, with my family of six persons, without
any domestic at all.

Sunday proved to me any thing but a day of rest. After washing and
dressing the children, preparing breakfast, clearing away the table,
making the beds, and putting the house to order, I set about getting
dinner. This meal furnished and eaten, and the dishes washed and put
away, I found myself not only completely tired out, but suffering
from a most dreadful headache. I was lying down, about four o'clock,
in a half-waking and sleeping state, with my head a little easier,
when my husband, who was sitting by the window, exclaimed:

"If there isn't Mr. and Mrs. Peters and their three children,
getting out of the stage!"

"Not coming here!" said I, starting up in bed, while, at the same
moment, my headache returned with a throbbing intensity that almost
blinded me.

"Yes, coming here," replied Mr. Smith.

"How unfortunate!" came from my lips, as I clasped my hands to my
temples.

Now, Mr. and Mrs. Peters were people for whom we had no particular
friendship. We visited each other scarcely once a year, and had
never reciprocated an evening to tea. True, I had, on the occasion
of meeting Mrs. Peters, about a week before, while stopping in the
city, said to her, while praising my new country home:

"You must come and see me sometime during the summer."

The invitation was intended as a compliment more than anything else.
I didn't particularly care about a visit from her; and certainly had
no idea that she would take me at my word. So much for insincerity.

"Go down and ask them into the parlor," said I to Mr. Smith. "I will
dress myself and join you in a little while."

In about half an hour I left my room, feeling really quite unwell. I
found my visitors walking in the garden, and their children ranging
about like wild colts, to the particular detriment of choice
shrubbery and garden beds.

"Oh, what a delightful place!" exclaimed Mrs. Peters, on my meeting
her. "I really envy you! You see that I have accepted your very kind
invitation. I said to my husband to-day, says I, wouldn't it be nice
to make the Smiths a visit this afternoon. They live at such a
convenient distance; and it will be such a treat to the children.
Well, just as you like, said Mr. Peters. And so, as soon as dinner
was over, we got ready and came out. Oh, I'm delighted! What a sweet
spot you have chosen. I shall come and see you often."

And thus she ran on, while I smiled, and responded with all
due politeness, and to a certain extent, hypocritical pretence of
pleasure at the visit.

They had come to spend the afternoon, and take tea with us, of
course, and, as the last stage went by at seven o'clock, I was soon
under the necessity of leaving my guests, in order to engage in
certain preliminary acts that looked towards an early supper. Oh,
how my head did throb; and with what an effort did I drag my weary
feet about!

But, the longest trial--the most painful ordeal has an end; and the
end of this came at length. Our visitors, after spending a few
hours, and being served with tea, took their departure, assuring us,
as they did so, that they had spent a delightful afternoon, and
would be certain to come again soon.

In ten minutes after they had left the house, I was in bed.

Two whole weeks elapsed before I succeeded in getting a girl; and
six times during that period, we had friends out from the city to
take tea with us; and one young lady spent three whole days!

When the season of fruits came, as we had a few apple and pear
trees, besides a strawberry bed, and a fine row of raspberry bushes,
our city friends, especially those who had children, were even more
particular in their attentions. Our own children, we could make
understand the propriety of leaving the small fruit to be picked for
table use, so that all could share in its enjoyment. But, visitors'
children comprehended nothing of this, and rifled our beds and
bushes so constantly, that, although they would have given our table
a fair supply of berries, in the season, we never once could get
enough to be worth using, and so were forced to purchase our fruit
in the city.

After a destructive visitation of this nature, during strawberry
time, I said to Mr. Smith, as he was leaving for the city one
morning--

"I wish you would take a small basket with you, and bring out two or
three quarts of strawberries for tea. I've only tasted them once or
twice, and it's hopeless to think of getting any from our garden."

Well, when Mr. Smith came home with his two or three quarts of
strawberries, we had six women and children, visitors from the city,
to partake of them. Of course, our own children, who had been
promised strawberries at tea time, and who had been looking for
them, did'nt get a taste.

And thus it happened over and over again.

As the weather grew warmer and warmer, particular friends whom we
were glad to see, and friends, so called, into whose houses we had
rarely, if ever ventured, came out to get a "mouthful of fresh air,"
and to "see something green." We lived at "such a convenient
distance," that it was no trouble at all to run out and look at us.

Twice again during the summer, I was left without a single domestic.
Girls didn't like to leave the city, where they had been used to
meeting their acquaintances every few days; and, therefore, it was
hard to retain them. So it went on.

I had poor help, and was overrun with company, at such a rate, that
I was completely worn out. I rarely heard the rumble of the
approaching stage that I did not get nervous.

Early in August, Mr. Smith said to me, one evening after returning
from the city--on that very morning, a family of four had left me,
after staying three days--

"I met Mr. Gray this afternoon, and he told me that they were coming
out to see you to-morrow. That he was going away for a while, and
his wife thought that it would be such a pleasant time to redeem her
promise of making you a visit."

"Oh dear! What next!" I exclaimed in a distressed voice. "Is there
to be no end to this?"

"Not before frost, I presume," returned Mr. Smith, meaningly.

"I wish frost would come along quickly, then," was my response. "But
how long is Mr. Gray going to be absent from home?"

"He didn't say."

"And we're to have his whole family, I suppose, during his absence."

"Doubtless."

"Well, I call that taxing hospitality and good feeling a little too
far. I don't want them here! I've no room for them without
inconvenience to ourselves. Besides, my help is poor."

But, all my feelings of repugnance were of no avail. As I was
sitting, on the next day, by a window, that overlooked the road, I
saw the stage draw up, and issue therefrom Mr. Jones, Mrs. Jones,
servant and five children--two of the latter twin-babies. They had
boxes, carpet bags, bundles, &c., indicating a prolonged sojourn,
and one little boy dragged after him a pet dog, that came also to
honor us with a visit.

Down to meet them at the door, with as good a grace as possible, I
hurried. Words of welcome and pleasure were on my tongue, though I
am not sure that my face did not belie my utterance. But, they were
all too pleased to get into our snug country quarters, to perceive
any drawback in their reception.

I will not describe my experience during the next three weeks--for,
Mr. Gray took the tour of the Lakes before returning, and was gone
full three weeks, leaving his family to our care for the whole time.

"Heaven be praised, that is over!" was my exclamation, when I saw
the stage move off that bore them from our door.

Frost at length came, and with it expired the visiting season. We
were still at a convenient distance from the city; but, our friends,
all at once, seemed to have forgotten us.

"You are not going to move back, now," said a friend in surprise, to
whom I mentioned in the following March our intention to return to
the city.

"Yes," I replied.

"Just as spring is about opening? Why, surely, after passing the
dreary winter in the country, you will not come to the hot and dusty
town to spend the summer? You are at such a convenient distance too;
and your friends can visit you so easily."

Yes, the distance was convenient; and we had learned to appreciate
that advantage. But back to the city we removed; and, when next we
venture to the country, will take good care to get beyond a
convenient distance.




CHAPTER VII.

THE PICKED-UP DINNER.


IT was "washing day;" that day of all days in the week most dreaded
by housekeepers. We had a poor breakfast, of course. Cook had to
help with the washing, and, as washing was the important thing for
the day, every thing else was doomed to suffer. The wash kettle was
to her of greater moment than the tea kettle or coffee pot; and the
boiling of wash water first in consideration, compared with broiling
the steak.

The breakfast bell rung nearly half an hour later than usual. As I
entered the dining room, I saw that nearly every thing was in
disorder, and that the table was little over half set. Scarcely had
I taken my seat, ere the bell was in my hand.

"There's no sugar on the table, Kitty."

These were my words, as the girl entered, in obedience to my
summons.

"Oh, I forgot!" she ejaculated, and hurriedly supplied the
deficiency.

Ting-a-ling-a-ling, went my bell, ere she had reached the kitchen.

"There's no knife and fork for the steak," said I, as Kitty
re-appeared.

The knife and fork were furnished, but not with a very amiable
grace.

"What's the matter with this coffee?" asked Mr. Smith, after sipping
a spoonful or two. "It's got a queer taste."

"I'm sure I don't know."

It was plain that I was going to have another trying day; and I
began to feel a little worried. My reply was not, therefore, made in
a very composed voice.

Mr. Smith continued to sip his coffee with a spoon, and to taste the
liquid doubtingly. At length he pushed his cup from him, saying:

"It's no use; I can't drink that! I wish you would just taste it. I
do believe Kitty has dropped a piece of soap into the coffee pot."

By this time I had turned out a cup of the fluid for myself, and
proceeded to try its quality. It certainly had a queer taste; but,
as to the substance to which it was indebted for its peculiar
flavor, I was in total ignorance. My husband insisted that it was
soap. I thought differently; but we made no argument on the subject.

The steak was found, on trial, to be burned so badly that it was not
fit to be eaten. And my husband had to make his meal of bread and
butter and cold water. As for myself, this spoiling of our breakfast
for no good reason, completely destroyed both my appetite and my
temper.

"You'd better get your dinner at an eating house, Mr. Smith," said
I, as he arose from the table. "It's washing day, and we shall have
nothing comfortable."

"Things will be no more comfortable for you than for me," was kindly
replied by my husband.

"We shall only have a picked-up dinner," said I.

"I like a good picked-up dinner," answered Mr. Smith. "There is
something so out of the ordinary routine of ribs, loins, and
sirloins--something so comfortable and independent about it. No, you
cannot eat your picked-up dinner alone."

"Drop the word _good_ from your description, and the picked-up
dinner will be altogether another affair," said I. "No, don't come
home to-day, if you please; for every thing promises to be most
uncomfortable. Get yourself a good dinner at an eating house, and
leave me to go through the day as well as I can."

"And you are really in earnest?" said my husband, seriously.

"I certainly am," was my reply. "Entirely in earnest. So, just
oblige me by not coming home to dinner."

Mr. Smith promised; and there was so much off of my mind. I could
not let him come home without seeing that he had a good dinner. But,
almost any thing would do for me and the children.

In some things, I am compelled to say that my husband is a little
uncertain. His memory is not always to be depended on. Deeply
absorbed in business, as he was at that time, he frequently let
things of minor importance pass from his thoughts altogether.

So it happened on the present occasion. He forgot that it was
washing day, and that he had promised to dine down town. Punctually
at half-past one he left his place of business, as usual, and took
his way homeward. As he walked along, he met an old friend who lived
in a neighboring town, and who was on a visit to our city.

"Why, Mr. Jones! How glad I am to see you! When did you arrive?"

And my husband grasped the hand of his friend eagerly.

"Came in last evening," replied Mr. Jones. "How well you look,
Smith! How is your family?"

"Well--very well. When do you leave?"

"By this afternoon's line."

"So soon? You make no stay at all?"

"I came on business, and must go back again with as little delay as
possible."

"Then you must go and dine with me, Jones. I won't take no for an
answer. Want to have a long talk with you about old times."

"Thank you, Mr. Smith," replied Jones. "But, as I don't happen to
know your good lady, I hardly feel free to accept your invitation."

"Don't hesitate for that. She'll be delighted to see you. Always
glad to meet any of my old friends. So come along. I've a dozen
things to say to you."

"I'm really afraid of intruding on your wife," said Mr. Jones, still
holding back from the invitation.

"Nonsense!" answered my husband. "My friends are hers. She will be
delighted to see you. I've talked of you to her a hundred times."

At this Mr. Jones yielded.

"I can't promise you any thing extra," said Mr. Smith, as they
walked along. "Nothing more than a good, plain family dinner, and a
warm welcome."

"All I could ask or desire," returned Mr. Jones.

It was a few minutes to two o'clock. The bell had rung for dinner;
and I was just rising to go to the dining room, when I heard the
street door open, and the sound of my husband's voice in the
passage. There was a man in company with him, for I distinctly heard
the tread of a pair of feet. What could this mean? I remained
seated, listening with attention.

My husband entered the parlor with his companion, talking in a
cheerful, animated strain; and I heard him pull up the blinds and
throw open the shutters. Presently he came tripping lightly up the
stairs to my sitting room.

"I've brought a friend home to dinner, Jane," said he, as coolly and
as confidently as if it were not washing day; and as if he had not
told me on going out, that he would dine at an eating house.

This was a little too much for my patience and forbearance.

"Are you beside yourself, Mr. Smith?" I replied, my face instantly
becoming flushed, and my eyes glancing out upon him the sudden
indignation I felt at such treatment.

"Why, Jane! Jane! This is not kind in you," said my husband, with
regret and displeasure in his voice. "It is rather hard if a man
can't ask an old friend home to dine with him once in five years,
without asking the special permission of his wife."

"Mr. Smith! Are you not aware that this is washing day?"

There was an instant change in my husband's countenance. He seemed
bewildered for a few moments.

"And, moreover," I continued, "are you not aware that I was to have
a picked-up dinner at home, and that you were to dine at an eating
house?"

"I declare!" Mr. Smith struck his hands together, and turned around
once upon his heel.--"I entirely forgot about that."

"What's to be done?" said I, almost crying with vexation. "I've
nothing for dinner but fried ham and eggs."

"The best we can do is the best," returned Mr. Smith. "You can give
Mr. Jones a hearty welcome, and that will compensate for any defects
in the dinner. I forewarned him that we should not entertain him
very sumptuously."

"You'd better tell him the whole truth at once," said I, in answer
to this; "and then take him to an eating house."

But my good husband would hear to nothing of this. He had invited
his old friend to dine with him; and dine he must, if it was only on
a piece of dry bread.

"Pick up something. Do the best you can," he returned. "We can wait
for half an hour."

"I've nothing in the house, I tell you," was my answer made in no
very pleasant tones; for I felt very much irritated and outraged by
my husband's thoughtless conduct.

"There, there, Jane. Don't get excited about the matter," said he
soothingly. But his words were not like oil to the troubled waters
of my spirit.

"I am excited," was my response. "How can I help being so? It is too
much! You should have had more consideration."

But, talking was of no use. Mr. Jones was in the parlor, and had
come to take a family dinner with us. So, nothing was left but to
put a good face on the matter; or, at least, to try and do so.

"Dinner's on the table now," said I. "All is there that we can have
to-day. So just invite your friend to the dining room, where you
will find me."

So saying, I took a little fellow by the hand, who always eat with
us, and led him away, feeling, as my lady readers will very
naturally suppose, in not the most amiable humor in the world. I had
just got the child, who was pretty hungry, seated in his high chair,
when my husband and his guest made their appearance; and I was
introduced.

Sorry am I to chronicle the fact--but truth compels me to make a
faithful record--that my reception of the stranger was by no means
gracious. I tried to smile; but a smile was such a mockery of my
real feelings, that every facial muscle refused to play the
hypocrite. The man was not welcome, and it was impossible for me to
conceal this.

"A plain family dinner, you see," said Mr. Smith, as we took our
places at the meagre board. "We are plain people. Shall I help you
to some of the ham and eggs?"

He tried to smile pleasantly, and to seem very much at his ease.
But, the attempt was far from successful.

"I want some! Don't give him all!" screamed out the hungry child at
my side, stretching out his hands towards the poorly supplied dish,
from which my husband was about supplying our guest.

My face, which was red enough before, now became like scarlet. A
moment longer I remained at the table, and then rising up quickly
took the impatient child in my arms, and carried him screaming from
the room. I did not return to grace the dinner table with my
unattractive presence. Of what passed, particularly, between my
husband and his friend Mr. Jones, who had left his luxurious dinner
at the hotel to enjoy "a plain family dinner" with his old
acquaintance, I never ventured to make enquiry. They did not remain
very long at the table; nor very long in the house after finishing
their frugal meal.

I have heard since that Mr. Jones has expressed commiseration for my
husband, as the married partner of a real termigant. I don't much
wonder at his indifferent opinion; for, I rather think I must have
shown in my face something of the indignant fire that was in me.

Mr. Smith, who was too much in the habit of inviting people home to
take a "family dinner" with him on the spur of the moment, has never
committed that error since. His mortification was too severe to be
easily forgotten.




CHAPTER VIII.

WHO IS KRISS KRINGLE?


IT was the day before Christmas--always a day of restless, hopeful
excitement among the children; and my thoughts were busy, as is
usual at this season, with little plans for increasing the gladness
of my happy household. The name of the good genius who presides over
toys and sugar plums was often on my lips, but oftener on the lips
of the children.

"Who is Kriss Kringle, mamma?" asked a pair of rosy lips, close to
my ear, as I stood at the kitchen table, rolling out and cutting
cakes.

I turned at the question, and met the earnest gaze of a couple of
bright eyes, the roguish owner of which had climbed into a chair for
the purpose of taking note of my doings.

I kissed the sweet lips, but did not answer.

"Say, mamma? Who is Kriss Kringle?" persevered the little one.

"Why, don't you know?" said I, smiling.

"No, mamma. Who is he?"

"Why, he is--he is--Kriss Kringle."

"Oh, mamma! Say, won't you tell me?"

"Ask papa when he comes home," I returned, evasively.

I never like deceiving children in any thing. And yet, Christmas
after Christmas, I have imposed on them the pleasant fiction of
Kriss Kringle, without suffering very severe pangs of conscience.
Dear little creatures! how fully they believed, at first, the story;
how soberly and confidingly they hung their stockings in the chimney
corner; with what faith and joy did they receive their many gifts on
the never-to-be-forgotten Christmas morning!

Yes, it is a pleasant fiction; and if there be in it a leaven of
wrong, it is indeed a small portion.

"But why won't you tell me, mamma?" persisted my little
interrogator. "Don't you know Kriss Kringle?"

"I never saw him, dear," said I.

"Has papa seen him?"

"Ask him when he comes home."

"I wish Krissy would bring me, Oh, such an elegant carriage and four
horses, with a driver that could get down and go up again."

"If I see him, I'll tell him to bring you just such a nice
carriage."

"And will he do it, mamma?" The dear child clapped his hands
together with delight.

"I guess so."

"I wish I could see him," he said, more soberly and thoughtfully.
And then, as if some new impression had crossed his mind, he
hastened down from the chair, and went gliding from the room.

Half an hour afterwards, as I came into the nursery, I saw my three
"olive branches," clustered together in a corner, holding grave
counsel on some subject of importance; at least to themselves. They
became silent at my presence; but soon began to talk aloud. I
listened to a few words, but perceived nothing of particular
concern; then turned my thoughts away.

"Who is Kriss Kringle, papa?" I heard my cherry-lipped boy asking of
Mr. Smith, soon after he came home in the evening.

The answer I did not hear. Enough that the enquirer did not appear
satisfied therewith.

At tea-time, the children were not in very good appetite, though in
fine spirits.

As soon as the evening meal was over, Mr. Smith went out to buy
presents for our little ones, while I took upon myself the task of
getting them off early to bed.

A Christmas tree had been obtained during the day, and it stood in
one of the parlors, on a table. Into this parlor the good genius was
to descend during the night, and hang on the branches of the tree,
or leave upon the table, his gifts for the children. This was our
arrangement. The little ones expressed some doubts as to whether
Kriss Kringle would come to this particular room; and little "cherry
lips" couldn't just see how the genius was going to get down the
chimney, when the fire-place was closed up.

"Never mind, love; Kriss will find his way here," was my answer to
all objections.

"But how do you know, mother? Have you sent him word?"

"Oh, I know."

Thus I put aside their enquiries, and hurried them off to bed.

"Now go to sleep right quickly," said I, after they were snugly
under their warm blankets and comforts; "and to-morrow morning be up
bright and early."

And so I left them to their peaceful slumbers.

An hour it was, or more, ere Mr. Smith returned, with his pockets
well laden. I was in the parlor, where we had placed the Christmas
tree, engaged in decorating it with rosettes, sugar toys, and the
like. At this work I had been some fifteen or twenty minutes, and
had, I will own, become a little nervous. My domestic had gone out,
and I was alone in the house. Once or twice, as I sat in the silent
room, I imagined that I heard a movement in the one adjoining. And
several times I was sure that my ear detected something like the
smothered breathing of a man.

"All imagination," said I to myself. But again and again the same
sounds stirred upon the silent air.

"Could there be a robber concealed in the next room?"

The thought made me shudder. I was afraid to move from where I sat.
What a relief when I heard my husband's key in the door, followed by
the sound of his well known tread in the passage! My fears vanished
in a moment.

As Mr. Smith stood near me, in the act of unloading his pockets, he
bent close to my ear and whispered:

"Will is under the table. I caught a glance of his bright eyes,
just now."

"What!"

"It's true. And the other little rogues are in the next room,
peeping through the door, at this very moment."

I was silent with surprise.

"They're determined to know who Kriss Kringle is," added my husband;
then speaking aloud, he said:

"Come, dear, I want to show you something up in the dining-room."

I understood Mr. Smith, and arose up instantly, not so much as
glancing towards the partly opened folding door.

We were hardly in the dining room before we heard the light
pattering of feet, and low, smothered tittering on the stairway.
Then all was still, and we descended to the parlors again, quite as
much pleased with what had occurred as the little rogues were
themselves.

"I declare! Really, I thought them all sound asleep an hour ago,"
said I, on resuming my work of decorating the Christmas tree, "Who
could have believed them cunning enough for this? It's all Will's
doings. He'll get through the world."

"Aye will he," returned Mr. Smith. "Oh if you could have seen his
face as I saw it, just peering from under the table cloth, his eyes
as bright as stars, and full of merriment and delight."

"Bless his heart! He's a dear little fellow!"

How could I help saying this?

"And the others! You lost half the pleasure of the whole affair by
not seeing them."

"We shall have a frolic with the rogues to-morrow morning. I can see
the triumph on Will's face. I understand now what all their
whisperings meant this afternoon. They were concocting this plan. I
couldn't have believed it of them?"

"Children are curious bodies," said Mr. Smith.

"I thought I heard some one in the next room," I remarked, "while
you were out, and became really nervous for a while. I heard the
breathing of some one near me, also; but tried to argue myself into
the belief that it was only imagination."

Thus we conned over the little incident, while we arranged the
children's toys.

"I know who Kriss Kringle is! I know!" was the triumphant
affirmation of one and another of the children, as we gathered at
the breakfast table next morning.

"Do you, indeed?" said I, trying to look grave.

"Yes; it is papa."

"Papa, Kriss Kringle! How can that be?"

"Oh, we know! We found out!"

"Indeed!"

And we, made, of course, a great wonder of this assertion. The merry
elves! What a happy Christmas it was for them. Ever since, they have
dated from the time when they found out who Kriss Kringle was. It is
all to no purpose that we pleasantly suggest the possibility of
their having dreamed of what they allege to have occurred under
their actual vision; they have recorded it in their memories, and
refer to it as a veritable fact.

Dear children! How little they really ask of us, to make them happy.
Did we give them but a twentieth part of the time we devote to
business, care, and pleasure, how greatly would we promote their
good, and increase the measure of their enjoyment. Not alone at
Christmas time, but all the year should we remember and care for
their pleasures; for, the state of innocent pleasure, in children,
is one in which good affections are implanted, and these take root
and grow, and produce fruit in after life.




CHAPTER IX.

NOT AT HOME.


NEVER but once did I venture upon the utterance of that little white
lie, "Not at home," and then I was well punished for my weakness and
folly. It occurred at a time when there were in my family two new
inmates: a niece from New York, and a raw Irish girl that I had
taken a few days before, on trial.

My niece, Agnes, was a young lady in her nineteenth year, the
daughter of my brother. I had not seen her before since her
school-girl days; and knew little of her character. Her mother I had
always esteemed as a right-thinking, true-hearted woman. I was much
pleased to have a visit from Agnes, and felt drawn toward her more
and more every day. There was something pure and good about her.

"Now, Aggy, dear," said I to her, one morning after breakfast, as we
took our work and retired from the dining-room to one of the
parlors, where I was occasionally in the habit of sitting,--"we must
sew for dear life until dinner time, so as to finish these two
frocks for the children to wear this evening. It isn't right, I
know, to impose on you in this way. But you sew so quick and neatly;
and then it will help me through, and leave me free to visit Girard
College with you this afternoon."

"Don't speak of it, aunt," returned Agnes.--"I'm never happier than
when employed. And, besides, it's only fair that I should sew for
you in the morning, if you are to go pleasuring with me in the
afternoon."

Lightly the hours flew by, passed in cheerful conversation. I found
that the mind of my niece had been highly cultivated; that her
tastes were refined, and her moral sense acute. To say that I was
pleased with her, would but half express what I felt.

There was to be a juvenile party at the house of one of our
acquaintances that evening, to which the children were invited; and
we were at work in preparing dresses and other matters suitable for
them to appear in.

Twelve o'clock came very quickly--too quickly for me, in fact; for I
had not accomplished near so much as I had hoped to do. It would
require the most diligent application, through every moment of time
that intervened until the dinner hour, for us to get through with
what we were doing, so as to have the afternoon to ourselves for the
intended excursion.

As the clock rung out the hour of noon, I exclaimed:

"Is it possible! I had no idea that it was so late. How slowly I do
seem to get along!"

Just at this moment the bell rung.

"Bless me! I hope we are not to have visitors this morning," said I,
as I let my hands fall in my lap. I thought hurriedly for a moment,
and then remarked, in a decided way:

"Of course we cannot see any one. We are engaged."

By this time I heard the footsteps of Mary on her way from the
kitchen, and I very naturally passed quickly to the parlor door to
intercept and give her my instructions.

"Say that I'm engaged," was on my tongue. But, somehow or other, I
had not the courage to give these words utterance. The visitor might
be a person to whom such an excuse for not appearing would seem
unkind, or be an offence. In this uncertain state, my mind fell into
confusion. Mary was before me, and awaiting the direction she saw
that I was about giving.

"Say that I'm not at home, if any one asks to see me," came in a
sudden impulse from my lips.

And then my cheeks flushed to think that I had instructed my servant
to give utterance to a falsehood.

"Yes, mim," answered the girl, glancing into my face with a knowing
leer, that produced an instant sense of humiliation; and away she
went to do my bidding.

I did not glance towards Agnes, as I returned to my seat and took up
my work. I had not the courage to do this. That I had lowered myself
in her estimation, I felt certain. I heard the street door open, and
bent, involuntarily, in a listening attitude. The voice of a lady
uttered my name.

"She's not at home, mim," came distinctly on my ears, causing the
flush on my cheeks to become still deeper.

A murmur of voices followed. Then I heard the closing of the
vestibule door, and Mary returning to the back parlor where we were
sitting.

"Who was it, Mary?" I enquired, as the girl entered.

"Mrs.--Mrs.--Now what was it? Sure, and I've forgotten their names
intirely."

But, lack of memory did not long keep me in ignorance as to who were
my visitors, for, as ill luck would have it, they had bethought
themselves of some message they wished to leave, and, re-opening the
vestibule door, left a-jar by Mary, followed her along the passage
to the room they saw her enter. As they pushed open the door of the
parlor, Mary heard them, and, turning quickly, exclaimed, in
consternation--

"Och, murther!"

A moment she stood, confronting, in no very graceful attitude, a
couple of ladies, and then escaped to the kitchen.

Here was a scene of embarrassment. Not among all my acquaintances
were there, perhaps, two persons, whom I would have least desired to
witness in me such a fault as the one of which I had been guilty.
For a little while, I knew not what to say. I sat, overcome with
mortification. At length, I arose, and said with an effort,

"Walk in, ladies! How are you this morning? I'm pleased to see you.
Take chairs. My niece, Mrs. Williams, and Mrs. Glenn. I hope you
will excuse us. We were--"

"Oh, no apologies, Mrs. Smith," returned one of the ladies, with a
quiet smile, and an air of self-possession. "Pardon this intrusion.
We understood the servant that you were not at home."

"Engaged, she meant," said I, a deeper crimson suffusing my face.
"The fact is, we are working for dear life, to get the children
ready for a party to-night, and wished to be excused from seeing any
one."

"Certainly--all right," returned Mrs. Williams, "I merely came in to
say to your domestic (I had forgotten it at the door) that my sister
expected to leave for her home in New York in a day or two, and
would call here with me, to-morrow afternoon."

"I shall be very happy to see her," said I,--"very happy. Do come in
and sit down for a little while. If I had only known it was you."

Now that last sentence, spoken in embarrassment and mental
confusion, was only making matters worse. It placed me in a false
and despicable light before my visitors; for in it was the savor of
hypocrisy, which is foreign to my nature.

"No, thank you," replied my visitors. "Good morning!"

And they retired, leaving me so overcome with shame, mortification,
confusion, and distress, that I burst into tears.

"To think that I should have done such a thing!" was my first
remark, so soon as I had a little recovered my self-possession; and
I looked up, half timidly, into the face of my niece. I shall not
soon forget the expression of surprise and pain that was in her fair
young countenance. I had uttered a falsehood in her presence, and
thus done violence to the good opinion she had formed of me. The
beautiful ideal of her aunt, which had filled her mind, was blurred
over; and her heart was sad in consequence.

"Dear Aggy!" said I, throwing my work upon the floor, and bending
earnestly towards her.--"Don't think too meanly of me for this
little circumstance. I never was guilty of that thing before--never!
And well have I been punished for my thoughtless folly I spoke from
impulse, and not reflection, when I told Mary to say that I was not
at home, and repented of what I had done almost as soon as the words
passed my lips."

Agnes looked at me for some moments, until her eyes filled with
tears. Then she said in a low, sweet, earnest voice:

"Mother always says, if she cannot see any one who calls, that she
is engaged."

"And so do I, dear," I returned. "This is my first offence against
truth, and you may be sure that it will be the last."

And it was my last.

When next I met Mrs. Williams and Mrs. Glenn, there was, in both of
them, a reserve not seen before. I felt this change keenly. I had
wronged myself in their good opinion; and could not venture upon an
explanation of my conduct; for that, I felt, might only make matters
worse.

How often, since, has my cheek burned, as a vivid recollection came
up before my mind of what occurred on that morning! I can never
forget it.




CHAPTER X.

SHIRT BUTTONS.


IN a previous chapter, I gave the reader one of the Experiences of
my sister's husband, Mr. John Jones. I now give another.

There was a time in my married life, (thus Mr. Jones writes, in one
of _his_ "Confessions,") when I was less annoyed if my bosom or
wristband happened to be minus a button, than I am at present. But
continual dropping will wear away a stone, and the ever recurring
buttonless collar or wristband will wear out a man's patience, be he
naturally as enduring as the Man Of Uz.

I don't mean by this, that Mrs. Jones is a neglectful woman. Oh, no!
don't let that be imagined for a moment. Mrs. Jones is a woman who
has an eye for shirt buttons, and when that is said, a volume is
told in a few words.

But I don't care how careful a wife is, nor how good an eye she may
have for shirt buttons, there will come a time, when, from some
cause or other, she will momentarily abate her vigilance, and that
will be the very time when Betty's washing-board, or Nancy's
sad-iron, has been at work upon the buttons.

For a year or two after our marriage, I used to express impatience,
whenever, in putting on a clean shirt, I found a button gone. Mrs.
Jones, bore this for a while without exhibiting much feeling. But it
fretted her more than she permitted any one to see. At length, the
constant recurrence of the evil--I didn't know as much then as I do
now--annoyed me so that I passed from ejaculatory expressions of
impatience into more decided and emphatic disapprobation, and to
"Psha!" and "there it is again!" and the like were added:

"I declare, Mrs. Jones, this is too bad!" or

"I've given up hoping for a shirt with a full complement of
buttons--" or

"If you can't sew the buttons on my shirt, Mrs. Jones, I will hire
some one to do it."

This last expression of displeasure I never ventured upon but once.
I have always felt ashamed of it since, whenever a recollection of
my unreasonableness and impatience in the early times of the shirt
button trouble has crossed my mind. My wife took it so much to
heart, and so earnestly avowed her constant solicitude in regard to
the shirt buttons, that I resolved from that time, to bear the evil
like a man, and instead of grumbling or complaining, make known the
fact of a deficiency whenever it occurred, as a good joke. And so
for a year or so it used to be when the buttons were missing:

"Buttons again, Mrs. Jones;" or

"D'ye see that?" or

"Here's the old story"--

Always said laughingly, and varied as to the mood or fertility of
fancy. But on so grave a subject as shirt buttons, Mrs. Jones had no
heart for a joke. The fact that her vigilance had proved all in
vain, and that, spite of constant care, a shirt had found its way
into my drawer, lacking its full complement of buttons, was
something too serious for a smile or a jest, and my words, no matter
how lightly spoken, would be felt as a reproof. Any allusion,
therefore, to shirt buttons, was sure to produce a cloud upon the
otherwise calm brow of Mrs. Jones. It was a sore subject, and could
not be touched even by the light end of a feather without producing
pain.

What was I to do? Put off with the lack of a shirt button
uncomplainingly? Pin my collar, if the little circular piece of bone
or ivory were gone, and not hint at the omission? Yes; I resolved
not to say a word more about shirt buttons, but to bear the evil,
whenever it occurred, with the patience of a martyr. Many days had
not passed after this resolution was taken, before, on changing my
linen one morning, I found that there was a button less than the
usual number on the bosom of my shirt. Mrs. Jones had been up on the
evening before, half an hour after I was in bed, looking over my
shirts, to see if every thing was in order. But even her sharp eyes
had failed to discover the place left vacant by a deserting member
of the shirt button fraternity. I knew she had done her best, and I
pitied, rather than blamed her, for I was sensible that a knowledge
of the fact which had just come to light would trouble her a
thousand times more than it did me.

The breakfast hour passed without a discovery by Mrs. Jones of the
fact that there was a button off of the bosom of my shirt. But, when
I came in at dinner time, her first words, looking at me, were:
"Why, Mr. Jones, there's a button off your bosom."

"I know," said I, indifferently. "It was off when I put the shirt on
this morning. But it makes no difference--you can sew it on when the
shirt next comes from the wash."

I was really sincere in what I said, and took some merit to myself
for being as composed as I was on so agitating subject. Judge of my
surprise, then, to hear Mrs. Jones exclaim, with a flushed face,
"Indeed, Mr. Jones, this is too much! no difference, indeed? A nice
opinion people must have had of your wife, to see you going about
with your bosom all gaping open in that style?"

"Nobody noticed it," said I in reply. "Don't you see that the edges
lie perfectly smooth together, as much so as if held by a button?"

But it was no use to say anything; Mrs. Jones was hurt at my not
speaking of the button.

"I'm sure," she said, "that I am always ready to do anything for
you. I never complain about sewing on your buttons."

"Nonsense, Mrs. Jones! don't take it so much to heart," I replied;
"here, get your needle and thread, and you can have it all right in
a minute. It's but a trifle--I'm sure I havn't thought about it
since I put on the shirt this morning."

But all would not do--Mrs. Jones' grief was too real; and when I,
losing to some extent, my patience, said fretfully, "I wish somebody
would invent a shirt without buttons," she sighed deeply, and in a
little while I saw her handkerchief go quietly to her eyes. Again
and again I tried the say-nothing plane; but it worked worse, if any
thing, than the other; for Mrs. Jones was sure to find out the
truth, and then she would be dreadfully hurt about my omission to
speak.

And so the years have passed. Sometimes I fret a little when I find
a shirt button off; sometimes I ask mildly to have the omission
supplied when I discover its existence; sometimes I jest about it,
and sometimes I bear the evil in silence. But the effects produced
upon Mrs. Jones are about the same. Her equanimity of mind is
disturbed, and she will look unhappy for hours. Never but once have
I complained without a cause. But that one instance gave Mrs. Jones
a triumph which has done much to sustain her in all her subsequent
trials.

We had some friends staying with us, and among the various matters
of discussion that came up during the social evenings we spent
together, shirt buttons were, on one occasion, conspicuous. To
record all that was said about them would fill pages, and I will
not, therefore, attempt even a brief record of all the allegations
brought against the useful little shirt button. The final decision
was, that it must be the Apple of Discord in disguise.

"A button off, as usual!" I muttered to myself the next morning, as
I put on a clean shirt. Mrs. Jones had risen half an hour before me,
and was down stairs giving some directions about breakfast, so that
I could not ask to have it sewed on.

And after leaving my room, I thought it as well not to say any thing
about it. In due time we gathered with our friends around the
breakfast table. A sight of them reminded me of the conversation the
previous evening, and I felt an irresistible desire to allude to the
missing shirt button as quite an apropos and amusing incident. So,
speaking from the impulse of the moment, I said, glancing first at
Mrs. Jones, then around the table, and then pointing down at my
bosom, "The old story of shirt buttons again!"

Instantly the color mounted to the cheeks and brow of Mrs. Jones;
then the color as quickly melted away, and a look of triumph passed
over her face. She pushed back her chair quickly, and rising up,
came round to where I sat, took hold of the button I had failed to
see, and holding it between her fingers, said, "Oh, yes, this _is_
the old story, Mr. Jones!"

I drew down my chin so as to get a low angle of vision, and sure
enough, the button was there. A burst of laughter went around the
table, in which Mrs. Jones most heartily joined; and I laughed, too,
as glad as she was, that the joke was all on her side. I have never,
you may be sure, heard the last of this; but it was a lucky
incident, for it has given Mrs. Jones something to fall back upon,
and have her jest occasionally, whenever I happen to discover that a
button is among the missing, and that she can, even at times, find
it in her heart to jest on such a subject, is, I can assure you, a
great gain. So much for shirt buttons. I could say a great deal
more, for the subject is inexhaustible. But I will forbear.




CHAPTER XI.

PAVEMENT WASHING IN WINTER.


TWO weeks of spring-like weather in mid-winter, and then the
thermometer went hurrying down towards zero with alarming rapidity.
Evening closed in with a temperature so mild that fires were
permitted to expire in the ashes; and morning broke with a cold
nor-wester, whistling through every crack and cranny, in a tone that
made you shrink and shiver.

"Winter at last," said I, creeping forth from my warm bed, with a
very natural feeling of reluctance.

"Time," was the half asleep and half awake response of Mr. Smith, as
he drew the clothes about his shoulders, and turned himself over for
the enjoyment of his usual half hour morning nap.

It was Saturday--that busiest day in the seven; at least for
housekeepers--and as late as half past seven o'clock, yet the house
felt as cold as a barn. I stepped to the register to ascertain if
the fire had been made in the heater. Against my hand came a
pressure of air--cold air.

"Too bad!" I murmured fretfully, "that girl has never touched the
fire."

So I gave the bell a pretty vigorous jerk. In a few minutes up came
Nancy, the cook, in answer to my summons.

"Why hasn't Biddy made the fire in the heater?" I asked.

"She has made it, mum."

"There isn't a particle of heat coming up."

"I heard her at work down there. I guess she's made it up, but it
hasn't began to burn good yet."

"Tell her that I want her."

"She's washing the pavement, mum."

"Washing the pavement!"

"Yes, mum."

"What possessed her to wash the pavement on a day like this?"

"It's the right day, mum. It's Saturday."

"Saturday! Don't she know that the water will freeze almost as soon
as it touches the ground? Go and tell her to come in this minute,
and not throw another drop on the pavement."

Nancy withdrew, and I kept on speaking to myself--

"I never saw such creatures. No consideration in them! Washing the
pavement on a morning like this! Little do they care who falls on
the ice; or who has a broken arm, or a broken leg."

Just as I had said this, I heard a crash, and an exclamation
without, and hurrying to the window looked forth. Biddy's work was
done, and well done, for the pavement was one sheet of ice, as hard
and smooth as glass, and as slippery as oil. Prostrate thereon was a
grocer's boy, and just beyond the curb stone, in the gutter, lay the
fragments of a jug of molasses.

Stepping back quickly to where the bell rope hung against the wall,
I gave it a most determined jerk. Scarcely had I done this, ere the
door of the adjoining room, which was used as a nursery, opened, and
Biddy appeared therein.

"Why, Biddy!" I exclaimed, "what possessed you to throw water on the
pavement this morning?"

"Faix! And how was I to get it clane, mim, widout wather?" coolly
returned Biddy.

"Clean!"

"Yes, mim, clane."

"There was no crying necessity to have it clean to-day. Didn't you
see--"

"It's Sathurday, mim," interrupted Biddy, in a voice that showed the
argument in her mind to be unanswerable. "We always wash the
pavement on Sathurday."

"But it doesn't do to wash the pavement," I returned, now trying to
put a little reason into her head, "when it is so cold that water
will freeze as soon as it touches the ground. The bricks become as
slippery as glass, and people can't walk on them without falling."

"Och! And what hev we till do wid the paple. Lot 'em look 'till
their steps."

"But, Biddy, that won't do. People don't expect to find pavements
like glass; and they slip, often, while unaware of danger. Just at
this moment a poor lad fell, and broke his jug all to pieces."

"Did he! And less the pity for him. Why did'nt he walk along like an
orderly, dacent body? Why didn't he look 'till his steps?"

"Biddy," said I, seeing that it was useless to hold an argument with
her,--"Do you go this minute and throw ashes all over the pavement."

"Ashes on the clane pavement! Mrs. Smith!"

"Yes, Biddy; and do it at once. There! Somebody else has fallen."

I sprung to the window in time to see a woman on the pavement, and
the contents of her basket of marketing scattered all around her.

"Go this minute and throw ashes over the pavement!" I called to
Biddy in a voice of command.

The girl left the room with evident reluctance. The idea of
scattering ashes over her clean pavement, was, to her, no very
pleasant one.

It seemed to me, as I sat looking down from my windows upon the
slippery flags, and noted the difficulty which pedestrians had to
cross them safely, that Biddy would never appear with her pan of
ashes.

"Why don't the girl do as I directed?" had just passed, in an
impatient tone, from my lips, when two well dressed men came in
view, one at each extremity of the sheet of ice. They were
approaching, and stepped with evident unconsciousness of danger,
upon the treacherous surface. I had a kind of presentiment that one
or both would fall, and my instinct was not at fault. Suddenly the
heels of one flew up, and he struck the pavement with a concussion
that sprung his hat from his head, and sent it some feet in the air.
In his efforts to recover himself, his legs became entangled in
those of the other, and over he went, backwards, his head striking
the ground with a terrible shock.

I started from the window, feeling, for an instant, faint and sick.
In a few moments I returned, and looked out again. Both the fallen
ones had regained their feet, and passed out of sight, and Biddy,
who had witnessed the last scene in this half comic, half tragic
performance, was giving the pavement a plentiful coating of ashes
and cinders.

I may be permitted to remark, that I trust other housekeepers, whose
pavements are washed on cold mornings--and their name, I had almost
said, is legion--are as innocent as I was in the above case, and
that the wrong to pedestrians lies at the door of thoughtless
servants. But is it not our duty to see the wrong has no further
repetition?

It has been remarked that the residence of a truly humane man may be
known by the ashes before his door on a slippery morning. If this be
so, what are we to think of those who coolly supply a sheet of ice
to the side walk?




CHAPTER XII.

REGARD FOR THE POOR.


WE sometimes get, by chance, as it were, glimpses of life altogether
new, yet full of instruction. I once had such a glimpse, and, at the
time, put it upon record as a lesson for myself as well as others.
Its introduction into this series of "Confessions" will be quite in
place.

"How many children have you?" I asked of a poor woman, one day, who,
with her tray of fish on her head, stopped at my door with the hope
of finding a customer.

"Four," she replied.

"All young?"

"Yes ma'am. The oldest is but seven years of age."

"Have you a husband?" I enquired.

The woman replied in a changed voice:

"Yes, ma'am. But he isn't much help to me. Like a great many other
men, he drinks too much. If it wasn't for that, you wouldn't find me
crying fish about the streets in the spring, and berries through the
summer, to get bread for my children. He could support us all
comfortably, if he was only sober; for he has a good trade, and is a
good workman. He used to earn ten and sometimes twelve dollars a
week."

"How much do you make towards supporting your family?" I asked.

"Nearly all they get to live on, and that isn't much," she said
bitterly. "My husband sometimes pays the rent, and sometimes he
doesn't even do that. I have made as high as four dollars in a week,
but oftener two or three is the most I get."

"How in the world can you support yourself, husband, and four
children on three dollars a week?"

"I have to do it," was her simple reply. "There are women who would
be glad to get three dollars a week, and think themselves well off."

"But how do you live on so small a sum?"

"We have to deny ourselves almost every little comfort, and confine
ourselves down to the mere necessaries of life. After those who can
afford to pay good prices for their marketing have been supplied, we
come in for a part of what remains. I often get meat enough for a
few cents to last me for several days. And its the same way with
vegetables. After the markets are over, the butchers and country
people, whom we know, let us have lots of things for almost nothing,
sooner than take them home. In this way we make our slender means go
a great deal farther than they would if we had to pay the highest
market price for every thing. But, it often happens that what we
gain here is lost in the eagerness we feel to sell whatever we have,
especially when, from having walked and cried for a long time, we
become much fatigued. Almost every one complains that we ask too
much for our things, if we happen to be one or two cents above what
somebody has paid in market, where there are almost as many
different prices as there are persons who sell. And in consequence,
almost every one tries to beat us down.

"It often happens that, after I have walked for hours and sold but
very little, I have parted with my whole stock at cost to some two
or three ladies, who would not have bought from me at all if they
hadn't known that they were making good bargains out of me; and this
because I could not bear up any longer. I think it very hard,
sometimes, when ladies, who have every thing in plenty, take off
nearly all my profits, after I have toiled through the hot sun for
hours, or shivered in the cold of winter. It is no doubt right
enough for every one to be prudent, and buy things as low as
possible; but it has never seemed to me as quite just for a rich
lady to beat down a poor fish-woman, or strawberry-woman, a cent or
two on a bunch or basket, when that very cent made, perhaps,
one-third, or one-half of her profits.

"It was only yesterday that I stopped at a house to sell a bunch of
fish. The lady took a fancy to a nice bunch of small rock, for which
I asked her twenty cents. They had cost me just sixteen cents.
'Won't you take three fips?' she asked. 'That leaves me too small a
profit, madam,' I replied. 'You want too much profit,' she returned;
'I saw just such a bunch of fish in market yesterday for three
fips.' 'Yes, but remember,' I replied, 'that here are the fish at
your door. You neither have to send for them nor to bring them home
yourself.' 'Oh, as to that,' she answered, 'I have a waiter whose
business it is to carry the marketing. It is all the same to me. So,
if you expect to sell me your things, you must do it at the market
prices. I will give you three fips for that bunch of fish, and no
more.' I had walked a great deal, and sold but little. I was tired,
and half sick with a dreadful headache. It was time for me to think
about getting home. So I said, 'Well, ma'am, I suppose you must take
them, but it leaves me only a mere trifle for my profit.' A servant
standing by took the fish, and the lady handed me a quarter, and
held out her hand for the change. I first put into it a five cent
piece. She continued holding it out, until I searched about in ny
pocket for a penny. This I next placed in her hand. 'So you've
cheated me out of a cent at last,' she said, half laughing and half
in earnest; 'you are a sad rogue.' A little boy was standing by.
'Here, Charley,' she said to him, 'is a penny I have just saved. You
can buy a candy with it.'

"As I turned away from the door of the large, beautiful house in
which that lady lived, I felt something rising in my throat and
choking me; I had bitter thoughts of all my kind.

"Happily, where I next stopped, I met with one more considerate. She
bought two bunches of my fish at my own price--spoke very kindly, to
me, and even went so far, seeing that I looked jaded out, to tell me
to go down into her kitchen and rest myself for a little while.

"Leaving my tub of fish in her yard, I accepted the kind offer. It
so happened that the cook was making tea for some one in the house
who was sick. The lady asked me if I would not like to have a cup. I
said yes; for my head was aching badly, and I felt faint; and
besides, I had not tasted a cup of tea for several days. She poured
it out with her own hands, and with her own hands brought it to me.
I think I never tasted such a cup of tea in my life. It was like
cordial. God bless her!--When I again went out upon the street my
headache was gone, and I felt as fresh as ever I did in my life.
Before I stopped at this kind lady's house, I was so worn down and
out of heart, that I determined to go home, even though not more
than half my fish were sold. But now I went on cheerful and with
confidence. In an hour my tray was empty, and my fish sold at fair
prices.

"You do not know, madam," continued the woman, "how much good a few
kindly spoken words, that cost nothing, or a little generous regard
for us, does our often discouraged hearts. But these we too rarely
meet. Much oftener we are talked to harshly about our exorbitant
prices--called a cheating set--or some such name that does not sound
very pleasant to our ears. That there are many among us who have no
honesty, nor, indeed, any care about what is right, is too true. But
all are not so. To judge us all, then, by the worst of our class, is
not right. It would not be well for the world if all were thus
judged."




CHAPTER XIII.

SOMETHING MORE ABOUT COOKS.


FOR sometime I had a treasure of a cook; a fine Bucks county girl,
whose strongest recommendation in my eyes, when I engaged her, was
that she had never been out of sight of land. But she left my house
for a "better place," as she said. I might have bribed her to
remain, by an offer of higher wages; but, experience had
demonstrated to my satisfaction, that this kind of bribery never
turns out well. Your servant, in most instances, soon becomes your
mistress--or, at least, makes bold efforts to assume that position.

So, I let my Bucks county girl go to her "better place." As to how
or why it was to be a better place, I did not make enquiry. That was
her business. She was a free agent, and I did not attempt to
influence her. In fact, being of rather an independent turn of mind
myself, I sympathize with others in their independence, and rarely
seek to interfere with a declared course of action.

My new cook, unfortunately, had been out of sight of land, and that
for weeks together. She was fresh from the Emerald Island. When she
presented herself I saw in her but small promise. Having learned on
enquiry that her name was Alice Mahoney, I said:

"How long have you been in this country, Alice?"

There was a moment or two of hesitation. Then she answered:

"Sax months, mum."

I learned afterwards that she had arrived only three days before.

"Can you cook?" I enquired.

"Och, yis! Ony thing, from a rib of bafe down till a parate."

"You're sure of that, Alice?"

"Och! sure, mum."

"Can you give me a reference?"

"I've got a char_ac_ter from Mrs. Jordan, where I lived in New York.
I've only been here a few days. Biddy Jones knows me."

And she produced a written testification of ability, signed "Mary
Jones, No.--William street, New York." There was a suspicious look
about this "char_ac_ter;" but of course I had no means of deciding
whether it were a true or false document.

After some debate with myself, I finally decided to give Alice a
trial.

It so happened that on the very day she came, an old lady friend of
my mother's, accompanied by her two daughters, both married and
housekeepers, called to spend the afternoon and take tea. As they
lived at some distance, I had tea quite early, not waiting for Mr.
Smith, whose business kept him away pretty late.

During the afternoon, my "butter man" came. Occasionally he brings
some very nice country sausages, and I always make it a point to
secure a few pounds when he does so. He had some on this occasion.

"Alice," said I, as I entered the kitchen about four o'clock, "I
want you to hurry and get tea ready as quickly as you can."

"Yes, mum," was the ready reply.

"And Alice," I added, "we'll have some of these sausages with the
tea. They are very fine ones--better than we usually get. Be sure to
cook them very nice."

"Yes, mum," promptly answered the girl, looking quite intelligent.

A few more directions as to what we were to have were given, and
then I went up to sit with my company.

It was not my intention to leave all to the doubtful skill of my new
cook, but, either the time passed very rapidly, or she was more
prompt and active than is usual among cooks, for the tea bell rung
before I was in expectation of hearing it.

"Ah," said I, "there is our tea bell," and I arose, adding, "will
you walk into the dining-room, ladies?"

The words were no sooner uttered than a doubt as to all being as I
could wish crossed my mind; and I regretted that I had not first
repaired to the dining-room alone. But, as it was too late now, or,
rather, I did not happen to have sufficient presence of mind to
recall my invitation to the ladies to walk in to tea, until I had
preceded them a few minutes.

Well, we were presently seated at the tea table. My practised eye
instantly saw that the cloth was laid crookedly, and that the dishes
were placed in a slovenly manner.

I couldn't help a passing apology, on the ground of a new domestic,
and then proceeded to the business of pouring out the tea. The cups
were handed around, and I soon noticed that my guests were sipping
from their spoons in a very unsatisfactory manner. I was in the act
of filling my own cup from the tea urn, when I missed the plate of
sausages, about which I had boasted to my lady friends as something
a little better than were usually to be obtained. So I rung the
table bell. Alice presently made her appearance.

"Alice," said I, "where are the sausages I told you to cook? You
surely hav'nt forgotten them?"

"Och, no indade, mum. They're there."

"Where? I don't see them."

And my eyes ran around the table.

"They're wid the ta mum, sure!"

"With the tea?"

"Sure, mum, they're wid the ta. Ye towld me yees wanted the sausages
wid the ta; and sure they're there. I biled 'em well."

A light now flashed over my mind. Throwing up the lid of the tea
urn, I thrust in a fork, which immediately came in contact with a
hard substance. I drew it forth, and exhibited a single link of a
well "biled" sausage.

Let me draw a veil over what followed.




CHAPTER XIV.

NOT A RAG ON THEIR BACKS.


THERE are, among the many things which Mr. Smith, like other men,
will _not_ understand, frequent difficulties about the children's
clothing. He seems to think that frocks and trowsers grow
spontaneously; or that the dry goods, once bought and brought into
the house, will resolve into the shapes desired, and fit themselves
to the children's backs, like Cindarella's suit in the nursery tale.
Now, I never did claim to be a sprite; and I am not sure that the
experience of all housekeepers will bear me out in the opinion that
the longer a woman is married, the less she becomes like a fairy.

Stitch! stitch! stitch! Hood's Song of the Shirt, which every body
has heard and admired, is certainly most eloquent and pathetic upon
the sufferings and difficulties of sewing girls. "Much yet remains
unsung," particularly in regard to the ceaseless labors of women who
are as rich as Cornelia in muslin-rending, habit-cloth-destroying,
children's-plaid-rubbing--jewels! I am sure that the Roman matron
never went shopping. I am sure that she did not undertake to keep
her own children's clothing in repair; for if she had, she could not
have been ready, at a moment's warning, to put forward her
troublesome charge as specimen jewels. Do all I can, my little
comforts never _are_ "fit to be seen!"

Many is the weary evening that I have been occupied, past the noon
of night, in repairing the wear and tear of habiliments--abridging
the volume of the elder children's clothes into narrow dimensions
for the next, or compiling a suit for one, out of the fringed
raiment of two or three. Honest was the pride with which I have
surveyed these industrious efforts, and sincere the thought that I
had really accomplished something. Depositing the various articles
where the wearers elect would find them, I have retired to rest;
almost angry with Mr. Smith, who was asleep hours before me--asleep
as unconcernedly as if an indestructible substance fabric had been
invented for children's clothing.

Well, after such a night's work, imagine me waking, with a
complacent and happy sensation that, my work having been _done_ on
the day before, the morning is open for new employment. Down stairs
I come, full of the thoughts of the confusion I shall heap on Mr.
Smith's head. He, observe, told me, as he left me to retire, that I
had much better go to bed, for all my work would amount to nothing
but loss of necessary rest. I am ready to show him triumphant
evidence to the contrary, in the clothes, as good as new, in which
his children are habited. Before I can speak, I discern a lurking
smile in his face. My boy Will stands in a sheepish posture, with
his back as close to the jam, as if he were a polypus growing there,
and his life depended upon the adhesion.

My eldest girl--another of the laboriously fitted out of the night
before, has a marvellous affection for the little stool, and the
skirt of her frock seems drawn about her feet in a most unbecoming
manner.

But the third, an inveterate little romp, unconscious of shame, is
curveting about in the most abandoned manner, utterly indifferent to
the fact she has--not, indeed, "a rag to her back"--for she is _all_
rags! One hour's play before my descent has utterly abolished all
traces of my industry, so far as she is concerned.

I expostulate--at first more in sorrow than in anger--but as Mr.
Smith's face expands into a broad laugh, it becomes more anger than
sorrow. The child on the stool looks as if she would laugh, if she
_dared_. Lifting her up suddenly, I discover that the whole front
breadth of her frock is burned--past redemption.

I say nothing--what _can_ I say? I have not words equal to the
emergency. And the boy--boys _are_ such copies of their fathers! He
actually forgets all embarrassment, and breaks out into a hearty
laugh. I jerk him forward.

Horror on horrors! The unveiling of the Bavarian statue, of which I
read an account in the newspapers the other day, is nothing to it.
The jamb, it appears, has supported something besides the mantle
shelf; for when I draw the young Smith forward, deprived of the
friendly aid of the wall, his teguments drop to the floor, and _he_
stands unveiled! One fell swoop at rude play has destroyed all my
little innumerable stitches; and I am just where I was before I
threaded a needle the night before!

Now I appeal to any body--any woman with the least experience, if
this is not all _too bad_! And yet my husband insists that I have no
need to be continually worrying myself with the needle. It _is_ true
that each of the children has four or five changes of clothes, which
they might wear--but what is the use of their having things to "put
right on--and tear right out!" I like to be prudent and saving. It
was only the other day that Mr. Smith came in early, and found me
busy; and commenced a regular oration. He said that every child in
the house has a better wardrobe than he; and so he went on, and
counted all off to me. He says--and men think they know _so
much_--that if children have clothes they should wear them; and when
they are worn out, provide more, and not try to keep as many
half-worn suits in repair, as there are new suits in a queen's
wardrobe. But he likes, as well as any man, to see his children look
neat, whatever he may say. And yet he pretends that children should
have clothes so made that they can convert themselves into horses,
and treat each other to rides without rending to pieces! And he
protests that it is all nonsense to undertake to keep children
dressed in the fashion! Truly I am tempted to say to the men as Job
did to his friends: "No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom
shall die with you!"

Such plagues as they are sometimes! But I could not help laughing
after all, when, as I said before, he was lecturing me. The table
was covered with work, done and in progress. He went on till out of
breath. I answered:

"Now you know the children have not a rag to their backs!"

"I should think not," he said, drily, as he looked about him. "The
other morning finished up the rags on hand--but you are doing your
best, with flimsy finery, to get up a new assortment."

"Now, that is unkind in you, Mr. Smith," said I, feeling hurt, and
looking and speaking as I felt. "Really unkind in you. I'm sure it's
no pleasure for me to work, work, work, from morning till night,
until I'm worn down and good for nothing. I wish my children to look
decent at least; and to do this at as small cost to you as possible.
You can't change me with wasting your property, at least."

"There, there, dear! That will do. Say no more about it," returned
Mr. Smith, in a soothing voice. "I didn't mean to be unkind. Still,
I do think that you are a little over-particular about the
children's clothes, as I have said before--over-particular in the
matter of having things _just so_. Better, a great deal, I think,
spare a few hours from _extra work_ given to the clothing designed
for their bodies, to that which is to array and beautify their
minds."

"Now, Mr. Smith!" I exclaimed, and then bending my face into my
hands, gave way to involuntary tears.

That he should have said this!




CHAPTER XV.

CURIOSITY.


THE curiosity of our sex is proverbial. Proverbs are generally based
upon experience, and this one, I am ready to admit, is not without a
good foundation to rest upon.

Our sex are curious; at least I am, and we are very apt to judge
others by ourselves. I believe that I have never broken the seal nor
peeped into a letter bearing the name of some other lady; but, then,
I will own to having, on more occasions than one, felt an
exceedingly strong desire to know the contents of certain epistles
in the hands of certain of my friends.

The same feeling I have over and over again observed in my
domestics, and, for this reason, have always been careful how I let
my letters lie temptingly about. One chamber maid in my service,
seemed to have a passion for reading other people's letters. More
than once had I caught her rummaging in my drawers, or with
some of my old letters in her hands; and I could not help remarking
that most of the letters left at the door by the penny post, had, if
they passed to me through her, a crumpled appearance. I suspected
the cause of this, but did not detect my lady, until she had been
some months in my family.

One morning, after breakfast was over, and the children off to
school, I drew on a cap, and went down to sweep out and dust the
parlors. I had not been at work long, when I heard the bell ring.
Presently Mary came tripping down stairs. As she opened the street
door, I heard her say:

"Ah! another letter? Who is it for? Me?"

"No, it is for Mrs. Smith," was answered, in the rougher voice of
the Despatch Post-man.

"Oh." There was a perceptible disappointment in Mary's tone. "What's
the postage?" she asked.

"Paid," said the man.

The door closed, and I heard the feet of Mary slowly moving along
the passage. Then the murmur of her voice reached my ears. Presently
I heard her say:

"I wonder who it is from? Mrs. Smith gets a great many letters. No
envelope, thank goodness! but a plain, good old fashioned letter. I
must see who it is from."

By this time Mary had stepped within the back parlor. I stood, hid
from her view, by one of the folding doors, which was closed, but
within a few feet of her.

"From Mrs. Jackson! Hum--m. I wonder what she's got to say?
Something about me, I'll bet a dollar."

There was a very apparent change in the thermometer of Mary's
feelings at this last thought, as was evident from the tone of her
voice.

"Lace collars--stockings--pocket han--. I can't make out that word,
but it is handkerchiefs, of course," thus Mary read and talked to
herself. "Breastpin--this is too mean! It's not true, neither. I'm a
great mind to burn the letter. Mrs. Smith would never be the wiser.
I won't give it to her now, at any rate. I'll put it in my pocket,
and just think about it."

The next sound that came to my ears was the pattering of Mary's feet
as she went hurrying up the stairs.

In a few minutes I followed. In one of my chambers I found Mary, and
said to her:

"Didn't the carrier leave me a letter just now?"

The girl hesitated a moment, and then answered:

"Oh, yes, ma'am. I have it here in my pocket."

And she drew forth the letter, crumbled, as was usually the case
with all that passed through her hands.

I took it, with some gravity of manner; for I felt, naturally
enough, indignant. Mary flushed a little under the steady eye that I
fixed upon her.

The letter, or note, was from my friend, Mrs. Jackman, and read as
follows:

"MY DEAR MRS. SMITH.--Do call in and see me some time to-day. I have
bought some of the cheapest laces, stockings, and cambric pocket
handkerchiefs that ever were seen. There are more left; and at a
great bargain. You must have some. And, by the way, bring with you
that sweet breastpin I saw you wear at Mrs. May's last Thursday
evening. I want to examine it closely. I must have one just like it.
Do come round to-day; I've lots of things to say to you.

Yours, &c."

"Nothing so dreadful in all that," I said to myself, as I re-folded
the letter. "My curious lady's conscience must be a little active!
Let's see what is to come of this."

It is hardly in the nature of woman to look very lovingly upon the
servant whom she has discovered peeping into her letters. At least,
it was not in my nature. I, therefore, treated Mary with becoming
gravity, whenever we happened to meet. She, under the circumstances,
was ill at ease; and rather shunned contact with me. The morning
passed away, and the afternoon waned until towards five o'clock,
when the accumulating pressure on Mary's feelings became so great
that she was compelled to seek relief.

I was alone, sewing, when my chamber maid entered my room. The
corners of her lips inclined considerably downward.

"Can I speak a word with you, Mrs. Smith?" said she.

"Certainly, Mary," I replied. "What do you wish to say?"

Mary cleared her throat once or twice--looked very much
embarrassed, and at length stammered out.

"You received a letter from Mrs. Jackson this morning?"

"No." I shook my head as I uttered this little monosyllable.

A flush of surprise went over the girl's face.

"Wasn't the letter I gave you from Mrs. Jackson?" she asked.

"No; it was from Mrs. Jackman."

Mary caught her breath, and stammered out, in her confusion:

"Oh, my! I thought it was from Mrs. Jackson. I was sure of it."

"What right had you to think any thing about it?" I asked, with
marked severity.

Mary's face was, by this time crimsoned.

I looked at her for some moments, and then, taking from my drawer
Mrs. Jackman's note, handed it to her, and said:

"There's the letter you were so curious about this morning. Read
it."

Mary's eyes soon took in the contents. The moment she was satisfied,
she uttered a short "Oh!" strongly expressive of mental relief, and
handed me back the letter.

"I thought it was from Mrs. Jackson," said the still embarrassed
girl, looking confused and distressed.

"You can now retire," said I, "and when another letter is left at my
door, be kind enough to consider it my property, not yours. I shall
make it my business to see Mrs. Jackson, and ascertain from her why
you are so much afraid that she will communicate with me. There's
some thing wrong."

Poor Mary still lingered.

"Indeed, Mrs. Smith," she sobbed--"I didn't do nothing wrong at Mrs.
Jackson's, but wear her clothes sometimes. Once I just borrowed a
breastpin of hers out of her drawer, to wear to a party; and she saw
me with it on, and said I had stolen it. But, I'd put my hand in the
fire before I'd steal, Mrs. Smith! Indeed, indeed I would. I was
only going to wear it to the party; and I didn't think there was any
great harm in that."

"Of course there was harm in using other people's things without
their consent," I replied, severely. "And I don't wonder that Mrs.
Jackson accused you of stealing. But what cause had you for thinking
this letter was from Mrs. Jackson?"

"The two names are so near alike, and then Mrs. Jackson speaks
about--."

Here Mary caught herself, and crimsoned still deeper.

"That is," said I, "you took the liberty of peeping into my letter
before you gave it to me; and this is not your first offence of the
kind."

Mary was too much confounded to speak, or make any effort to excuse
herself; and so thought it best to retire.

I called to see Mrs. Jackson that day. She gave Mary a good
character, as far as honesty was concerned; but stated plainly her
faults, especially her bad habit of wearing her clothes and
trinkets, for which offence, in a moment of indignation, she had
dismissed her from her service.

I saw no reason to send Mary away. But I gave her a "good talking."
I think she is pretty well cured of her propensity of reading other
people's letters.




CHAPTER XVI.

HOUSE-CLEANING.


I LIKE a clean house. So does Mr. Smith, and so do all men, if they
would acknowledge it. At any rate, when their dwellings seem a
little dingy or dusty--a very thin coat of dinginess or dust over
the whole, producing a decidedly bad effect--I say when their
dwellings appear to them out of order--though ever so little--_we_
are sure to find it out. The dull look of the house appears to be
communicated to the countenance of the master thereof. I confess
that I have often been half inclined to wax and cork my husband's
visage, or at least to whisk over it with the duster, and see if
that experiment would not restore its sunny look.

But though men like clean houses, they do not like house-cleaning.
They have certain absurd notions which they would wish to carry out;
such, for instance, as that constant-quiet, preventive care, or
frequent topical applications, carefully applied, would gradually
renovate the whole interior. But who wishes to be cleaning all the
time? Who wishes to be always dusting? Indeed, at the best, we are
constantly with broom, brush, or besom in hand; but the men will not
perceive it, and we receive no credit for our tidiness. What is to
be done, then? Evidently there is nothing better than a
"demonstration," as the politicians say--a demonstration that may be
felt; a mass-meeting of brooms, buckets, brushes, paint-pots,
white-wash pails, chairs overturned, tubs, coal-skuttles, dust-pans,
char-women, and all other possible disagreeables, all at once
summoned, and each as much as possible in others' way. In this there
is some satisfaction. It looks like _business_. It seems as if you
were doing something. It raises the value of the operation, and
demonstrates its usefulness and necessity; for if there is little
difference apparent between the house before cleaning and after,
there is a world of odds between a house-_cleaning_ and a house
_cleaned_. There is a perfect delight in seeing what order _can_ be
brought out of chaos, even though you are obliged to make the chaos
first, to produce the effect.

I had inflicted several of these impressive lessons upon Mr. Smith.
He had become so much horrified at their confusion, that I do
believe he had fully reconciled himself to dust and dirt, as the
better alternative. They were, to be sure, at some little cost of
comfort to myself, and reflectively produced discomfort for him; for
he traced, with a correctness which I could easier frown at
than deny, many a week's indisposition to my house-cleaning phrenzy.
And when a man's wife is sick, if, he is a man of feeling, he is
unhappy. And if he is a man of selfishness, he is wretched, too; for
what becomes of husband's little comforts, when wife is not able to
procure or direct them? So Mr. Smith,--for the better reason, I
believe--pure compassion--declared, long ago, against wholesale
house-cleaning. And he has so often interfered in my proceedings
with his provoking prophecy, "Now, you know, my dear, it will make
you sick," that I have striven many a time to hide pain under a
forced smile, when it seemed as if "my head was like to rend."

Now, a woman _can_ carry her point in the house by stubborn daring,
but "the better part of valor is discretion," and I have learned
quietly to take my way, and steal a march upon him;--open the
flood-gate--set the chimneys smoking--up with the carpets--throw the
beds out of the windows--pack the best china in the middle of the
floor distributing pokers and fire-shovels among it--unhang the
pictures--set all the doors ajar--roll the children in dust--cover
my head with a soiled night-cap--put on slip-shod shoes--and streak
my ancles with dust and dirty water. Then, if he pops in
opportunely, I can say, with Shakspeare--amended:

  I am in _slops_,
  Stept in so far, that, should I wade no more,
  Returning were as tedious as go o'er.

And, then, husband has no choice but to retreat to a chop-house, and
leave me to finish.

But the chance for a grand saturnalia is best when Mr. Smith goes
from home for a day or two. Then I can deny myself to visitors--take
full license--set the hydrant running, and puzzle the water
commissioners with an extra consumption of Schuylkill. My last
exploit in this way was rather disastrous; and I am patiently
waiting for its memory to pass away, before I venture even to think
of repeating it. Mr. Smith had business in New York--imperative
business, he said,--but I do believe it might have waited, had not
Jenny Lind's first appearance taken place just then. This by the
way. He went, and I was rejoiced to improve the opportunity, for it
occurred precisely as I was devising some method to get myself so
fairly committed to soap and brushes, that objection or interdict
would be too late.

Never did I pack his carpet-bag with more secret satisfaction than
on that morning. He was entirely unsuspicious of my
intention--though he might have divined it but for having a secret
of his own, for Kitty's water-heating operations spoiled the
breakfast. There was more than a taste of "overdone" to the steak,
and the whole affair, even to me, was intolerable--me, who had the
pleasures of house-cleaning in perspective to console me. The door
was scarce shut behind him, when I entered into the business _con
amore_. It was resolved to begin at the very attic and sweep, scrub,
and wash down. Old boxes and trunks were dragged out of their
places, and piles of forgotten dust swept out. The passengers in the
street had a narrow chance for their beavers and fall bonnets, for
every front window had an extra plashing. Mr. Smith had several
times urged me to permit him to introduce some Yankee fashion which
he highly recommends for having "professional window-cleaners," with
their whiting and brushes, who could go through the house with half
the trouble, and none of the litter. There's nothing like water.

The first day's work sufficed to put the house into thorough
confusion, and I retired to bed--but not to rest, for my fatigue was
too great to sleep in comfort. My neglected child rested as ill as
myself,--and when I rose the next morning, it was with the
oppressive weight of a weary day before me. I had the consciousness
that the work _must_ be completed before my husband's return; and he
had engaged to be with me at dinner. I felt it an imperative duty to
welcome him with a cheerful house, and a pleasant repast after his
journey; but as the time of his arrival drew near, I was more and
more convinced of the impossibility. Like a drove of wild beasts
forced into a corner by a hunting party, we forced our unmanageable
matters to a crisis. The area for old brooms and brushes, tubs,
litter, and slops, was at last narrowed down to the kitchen, and all
that remained of our house-cleaning was to put that place into
something like the semblance of an apartment devoted to culinary
purposes. Dinner, as yet, was unthought of--but the house was clean!

Wearied rather than refreshed by my night of unrest, my arms sore,
and my limbs heavy, I labored with double zeal to get up an
excitement, which should carry me through the remainder of the day.
My head began to feel sensations of giddiness--for I had hardly
eaten since my husband left. Of the pleasures of house-cleaning, I
had at length a surfeit; when a ring, which I knew among all others,
surprised me. I looked at the clock. It was past four, and the
kitchen still in confusion, and the hearth cold.

I sank in a chair-in a swoon from sheer exhaustion. When I awoke to
consciousness, an overturned pale of water was being absorbed by my
clothing, my nose was rejecting with violent aversion the pungency
of a bottle of prime Durham mustard, to which Kitty had applied as
the best substitute for salts which the kitchen afforded; and my
husband, carpet-bag and cane in hand, was pushing his way toward me
with more haste than good speed, as the obstacles witnessed, which
he encountered and overturned.

I was confined to my room a week--which I could not conceal from Mr.
Smith. But he does not even yet know the whole amount of the
breakage, and, thank fortune, he is too much of a man to ask. I am
only afraid that he will succeed in forcing me to admit, that what
he calls his classical proposition is true; that to clean a house
does not require the feat of a Hercules, to wit: turning a river
through it.

This is my story of house-cleaning, and it is in no very high degree
flattering to my housekeeping vanity. Perhaps the thing might be
managed differently. But I don't know. Out of chaos, order comes.
While on this subject, it will be all in place to introduce another
house-cleaning story, which I find floating about in the newspapers.
It presents the matter from another point of view, and was written,
it will be seen, by a man:

Talk of a washing day! What is that to a whole week of washing-days?
No, even this gives no true idea of that worst of domestic
afflictions a poor man can suffer--house-cleaning. The washing is
confined to the kitchen or wash-house, and the effect visible in the
dining-room is in cold or badly cooked meals; with a few other
matters not necessary to mention here. But in the
house-cleaning--oh, dear! Like the dove from the ark, a man finds no
place where he can rest the sole of his foot. Twice a year,
regularly, have I to pass through this trying ordeal, _willy-nilly,_
as it is said, in some strange language. To rebel is useless. To
grumble of no avail. Up come the carpets, topsyturvy goes the
furniture, and _swash!_ goes the water from garret to cellar. I
don't know how other men act on these occasions, but I find
discretion the better part of valor, and submission the wisest
expedient.

Usually it happens that my good wife works herself half to
death--loses the even balance of her mind--and, in consequence,
makes herself and all around her unhappy. To indulge in an unamiable
temper is by no means a common thing for Mrs. Sunderland, and this
makes its occurrence on these occasions so much the harder to bear.
Our last house-cleaning took place in the fall. I have been going to
write a faithful history of what was said, done, and suffered on the
occasion ever since, and now put my design into execution, even at
the risk of having my head combed with a three-legged stool by my
excellent wife, who, when she sees this in print, will be taken, in
nautical phrase, all aback. But, when a history of our own
shortcomings, mishaps, mistakes, and misadventures will do others
good, I am for giving the history and pocketing the odium, if there
be such a thing as odium attached to revelations of human weakness
and error.

"We must clean house this week," said my good wife one morning as we
sat at the breakfast-table--"every thing is in a dreadful condition.
I can't look at nor touch any thing without feeling my flesh creep."

I turned my eyes, involuntarily, around the room. I was not, before,
aware of the filthy state in which we were living. But not having so
good "an eye for dirt" as Mrs. Sunderland, I was not able, even
after having my attention called to the fact, to see "the dreadful
condition" of things. I said nothing, however, for I never like to
interfere in my wife's department. I assume it as a fact that she
knows her own business better than I do.

Our domestic establishment consisted at this time of a cook, chamber
maid, and waiter. This was an ample force, my wife considered, for
all purposes of house-cleaning, and had so announced to the
individuals concerned some days before she mentioned the matter
incidentally to me. We had experienced, in common with others, our
own troubles with servants, but were now excellently well off in
this respect. Things had gone on for months with scarcely a jar.
This was a pleasant feature in affairs, and one upon which we often
congratulated ourselves.

When I came home at dinner-time, on the day the anticipated
house-cleaning had been mentioned to me, I found my wife with a long
face.

"Are you not well?" I asked.

"I'm well enough," Mrs. Sunderland answered, "but I'm out of all
patience with Ann and Hannah."

"What is the matter with them?" I asked, in surprise.

"They are both going at the end of this week."

"Indeed! How comes that? I thought they were very well satisfied."

"So they were, all along, until the time for house-cleaning
approached. It is too bad!"

"That's it--is it?"

"Yes. And I feel out of all patience about it. It shows such a want
of principle."

"Is John going too?" I asked.

"Dear knows! I expect so. He's been as sulky as he could be all the
morning--in fact, ever since I told him that he must begin taking up
the carpets to-morrow and shake them."

"Do you think Ann and Hannah will really go?" I asked.

"Of course they will. I have received formal notice to supply their
places by the end of this week, which I must do, somehow or other."

The next day was Thursday, and, notwithstanding both cook and
chamber maid had given notice that they were going on Saturday, my
wife had the whole house knocked into _pi_, as the printers say,
determined to get all she could out of them.

When I made my appearance at dinner-time, I found all in precious
confusion, and my wife heated and worried excessively. Nothing was
going on right. She had undertaken to get the dinner, in order that
Ann and Hannah might proceed uninterruptedly in the work of
house-cleaning; but as Ann and Hannah had given notice to quit in
order to escape this very house-cleaning, they were in no humor to
put things ahead. In consequence, they had "poked about and done
nothing," to use Mrs. Sunderland's own language; at which she was no
little incensed.

When evening came, I found things worse. My wife had set her whole
force to work upon our chamber, early in the day, in order to have
it finished as quickly as possible, that it might be in a sleeping
condition by night--dry and well aired. But, instead of this, Ann
and Hannah had "dilly-dallied" the whole day over cleaning the
paint, and now the floor was not even washed up. My poor wife was
a sad way about it; and I am sure that I felt uncomfortable enough.
Afraid to sleep in a damp chamber, we put two sofas together in the
parlor, and passed the night there.

The morning rose cloudily enough. I understood matters clearly. If
Mrs. Sunderland had hired a couple of women for two or three days to
do the cleaning, and got a man to shake the carpets, nothing would
have been heard about the sulkiness of John, or the notice to quit
of cook and chamber maid. Putting upon them the task of
house-cleaning was considered an imposition, and they were not
disposed to stand it.

"I shall not be home to dinner to-day," I said, as I rose from the
breakfast table. "As you are all in so much confusion, and you have
to do the cooking, I prefer getting something to eat down town."

"Very well," said Mrs. Sunderland--"so much the better."

I left the house a few minutes afterwards, glad to get away. Every
thing was confusion, and every face under a cloud.

"How are you getting along?" I asked, on coming home at night.

"Humph! Not getting along at all!" replied Mrs. Sunderland, in a
fretful tone. "In two days, the girls might have thoroughly cleaned
the house from top to bottom, and what do you think they have done?
Nothing at all!"

"Nothing at all! They must have done something."

"Well, next to nothing, then. They havn't finished the front and
back chambers. And what is worse, Ann has gone away sick, and Hannah
is in bed with a real or pretended sick-headache."

"Oh, dear!" I ejaculated, involuntarily.

"Now, a'nt things in a pretty way?"

"I think they are," I replied, and then asked, "what are you going
to do?"

"I have sent John for old Jane, who helped us to clean house last
spring. But, as likely as not, she's at work somewhere."

Such was in fact the case, for John came in a moment after with that
consoling report.

"Go and see Nancy, then," my wife said, sharply, to John, as if he
were to blame for Jane's being at work.

John turned away slowly and went on his errand, evidently in not the
most amiable mood in the world. It was soon ascertained that Nancy
couldn't come.

"Why can't she come?" enquired my wife.

"She says she's doing some sewing for herself, and can't go out this
week," replied John.

"Go and tell her that she must come. That my house is upside down,
and both the girls are sick."

But Nancy was in no mood to comply. John brought back another
negative.

"Go and say to her, John, that I will not take no for an answer:
that she must come. I will give her a dollar a day."

This liberal offer of a dollar a day was effective. Nancy came and
went, to work on the next morning. Of course, Ann did not come back;
and as it was Hannah's last day, she felt privileged to have more
headache than was consistent with cleaning paint or scrubbing
floors. The work went on, therefore, very slowly.

Saturday night found us without cook or chamber-maid, and with only
two rooms in order in the whole house, viz. our chambers on the
second story. By great persuasion, Nancy was induced to stay during
Sunday and cook for us.

An advertisement in the newspaper on Monday morning, brought us a
couple of raw Irish girls, who were taken as better than nobody at
all. With these new recruits, Mrs. Sunderland set about getting
"things to right." Nancy plodded on, so well pleased with her wages,
that she continued to get the work of one day lengthened out into
two, and so managed to get a week's job.

For the whole of another precious week we were in confusion.

"How do your new girls get along?" I asked of my wife, upon whose
face I had not seen a smile for ten days.

"Don't name them, Mr. Sunderland! They're not worth the powder it
would take to shoot them. Lazy, ignorant, dirty, good-for-nothing
creatures. I wouldn't give them house-room."

"I'm sorry to learn that. What will you do?" I said.

"Dear knows! I was so well suited in Ann and Hannah, and, to think
that they should have served me so! I wouldn't have believed it of
them. But they are all as destitute of feeling and principle as they
can be. And John continues as sulky as a bear. He pretended to shake
the carpets but you might get a wheelbarrow-load of dirt out of
them. I told him so, and the impudent follow replied that he didn't
know any thing about shaking carpets; and that it wasn't the
waiter's place, any how."

"He did?"

"Yes, he did. I was on the eve of ordering him to leave the house."

"I'll save you that trouble," I said, a little warmly.

"Don't say any thing to him, if you please, Mr. Sunderland,"
returned my wife. "There couldn't be a better man about the house
than he is, for all ordinary purposes. If we should lose him, we
shall never get another half so good. I wish I'd hired a man to
shake the carpets at once; they would have been much better done,
and I should have had John's cheerful assistance about the house,
which would have been a great deal."

That evening I overheard, accidentally, a conversation between John
and the new girls, which threw some light upon the whole matter.

"John," said one of them, "what made Mrs. Sunderland's cook and
chamber maid go aff and lave her right in the middle of
house-clainin'?"

"Because Mrs. Sunderland, instead of hiring a woman, as every lady
does, tried to put it all off upon them."

"Indade! and was that it?"

"Yes, it was. They never thought of leaving until they found they
were to be imposed upon; and, to save fifty cents or a dollar, she
made me shake the carpets. I never did such a thing in my life
before. I think I managed to leave about as much dirt in as I shook
out. But I'll leave the house before I do it again."

"So would I, John. It was downright mane imposition, so it was. Set
a waiter to shaking carpets!"

"I don't think much has been saved," remarked the waiter, "for Nancy
has had a dollar a day ever since she has been here."

"Indade!"

"Yes; and besides that, Mrs. Sunderland has had to work like a dog
herself. All this might have been saved, if she had hired a couple
of women at sixty-two and a half cents a day for two or three days,
and paid for having the carpets shaken; that's the way other
people do. The house would have been set to rights in three or four
days, and every thing going on like clockwork."

"I heard no more. I wanted to hear no more; it was all as clear as
day to me. When I related to Mrs. Sunderland what John had said, she
was, at first, quite indignant. But the reasonableness of the thing
soon became so apparent that she could not but acknowledge that she
had acted very unwisely.

"This is another specimen of your saving at the spigot," I said,
playfully.

"There, Mr. Sunderland! not a word more, if you please, of that,"
she returned, her cheek more flushed than usual. "It is my duty, as
your wife, to dispense with prudence in your household; and if, in
seeking to do so, I have run a little into extremes, I think it ill
becomes you to ridicule or censure me. Dear knows! I have not sought
my own ease or comfort in the matter."

"My dear, good wife," I quickly said, in a soothing voice, "I have
neither meant to ridicule nor censure you--nothing was farther from
my thoughts."

"You shall certainly have no cause to complain of me on this score
again," she said, still a little warmly. "When next we clean house,
I will take care that it shall be done by extra help altogether."

"Do, so by all means, Mrs. Sunderland. Let there be, if possible,
two paint-cleaners and scrubbers in every room, that the work may
all be done in a day instead of a week. Take my word for it, the
cost will be less; or, if double, I will cheerfully pay it for the
sake of seeing 'order from chaos rise' more quickly than is wont
under the ordinary system of doing things."

My wife did not just like this speech, I could see, but she bit her
lips and kept silent.

In a week we were without a cook again; and months passed before we
were in any thing like domestic comfort. At last my wife was
fortunate enough to get Ann and Hannah back again, and then the old
pleasant order of things was restored. I rather think that we shall
have a different state of things at next house-cleaning time. I
certainly hope so.




CHAPTER XVII.

BROILING A LOBSTER.


MR. SMITH'S appetite sometimes takes an epicurean turn, and then we
indulge in a lobster, calf's-head soup, terrapins, or something of
that sort.

Once upon a time, he sent home a lobster. I did not feel very well
that day, and concluded to leave the cooking of the animal to a new
girl that I had taken a week or two before, on a strong
recommendation. She claimed to be a finished cook, and her
testimonials were distinct on that head.

"Kitty," said I, "Mr. Smith has sent home a lobster, I believe?"

I had summoned the girl to my room.

"Yes, ma'am," she replied. "Is it for dinner?"

"Of course it is; and you must see that it is well cooked."

Kitty lingered a few moments, as if not entirely satisfied about
something, and then retired to the kitchen.

"I wonder if she knows how to boil a lobster?" said I to myself.

But then, the remembrance that she had come to me as a finished
cook, crossed my mind, and I answered, mentally, my own question, by
saying:

"Of course she does."

Not long afterwards, I went to the dining-room, which was over the
kitchen. I had been there only a little while, when I heard an
unusual noise below, followed by an exclamation from Kitty--

"Oh! murderation! I can't cook the straddling thing. I wonder what
Mr. Smith brought it home alive for!"

I was, of course, all attention now, and going to the top of the
stairs, stood listening to what was going on below.

"There now. Lie still!" I heard Kitty say. This was followed by a
rattling of tongs, or some other iron implements, and a rapid
shuffling of feet.

Curious to know what was going on, I stepped lightly down the
stairs, and through the open door had a full view of both Kitty and
the lobster.

Live coals had been raked out upon the hearth. Over these was placed
a gridiron, and on this not very comfortable bed Kitty was
endeavoring to force Mr. Lobster to lie still and be cooked. But
this he was by no means inclined to do; and no sooner did she place
him on the heated bars, than he made his way off in the quickest
possible time. Then she caught hold of him with the tongs, restored
him to his proper position on the gridiron, and with poker and tongs
strove to hold him there.

As the lobster, a second and a third time, struggled free of Kitty's
tongs and poker, I could no longer restrain myself, but burst forth
into a loud fit of laughter. By the time this subsided, his
lobstership was in the middle of the kitchen floor. Picking him up,
I threw him into a pot of boiling water, and then retreated from the
kitchen, so convulsed with laughter that I could not utter a word.

Kitty did not soon hear the last of her attempt to broil a lobster.




CHAPTER XVIII.

THE STRAWBERRY-WOMAN.


THE observance of economy in matters of family expenditure, is the
duty of every housekeeper. But, there is an economy that involves
wrong to others, which, as being unjust and really dishonest, should
be carefully avoided. In a previous chapter, I introduced the story
of a poor fish-woman, as affording a lesson for the humane. Let me
here give another, which forcibly illustrates the subject of
oppressive and unjust economy. It is the story of a
"Strawberry-Woman," and appeared in one of the magazines some years
ago.

"Strawb'_rees!_ Strawb'_rees!_ cried a poorly clad, tired-looking
woman, about eleven o clock one sultry June morning. She was passing
a handsome house in Walnut street, into the windows of which she
looked earnestly, in the hope of seeing the face of a customer. She
did not look in vain, for the shrill sound of her voice brought
forward a lady, dressed in a silk morning-wrapper, who beckoned her
to stop. The woman lifted the heavy, tray from her bead, and placing
it upon the door-step, sat wearily down.

"What's the price of your strawberries?" asked the lady, as she came
to the door.

"Ten cents a box, madam. They are right fresh."

"Ten cents!" replied the lady, in a tone of surprise, drawing
herself up, and looking grave. Then shaking her head and compressing
her lips firmly, she added:

"I can't give ten cents for strawberries. It's too much."

"You can't get such strawberries as these for less, madam," said the
woman. "I got a levy a box for them yesterday."

"Then you got too much, that's all I have to say. I never pay such
prices. I bought strawberries in the market yesterday, just as good
as yours, for eight cents a box."

"Don't know how they do to sell them at that price," returned the
woman. "Mine cost nearly eight cents, and ought to bring me at least
twelve. But I am willing to take ten, so that I can, sell out
quickly. It's a very hot day." And the woman wiped, with her apron,
the perspiration from her glowing face.

"No, I won't pay ten cents," said the lady (?) coldly. "I'll give
you forty cents for five boxes, and nothing more."

"But, madam, they cost me within a trifle of eight cents a box."

"I can't help that. You paid too much for them, and this must be
your loss, not mine, if I buy your strawberries. I never pay for
other people's mistakes. I understand the use of money much better
than that."

The poor woman did not feel very well. The day was unusually hot and
sultry, and her tray felt heavier, and tired her more than usual.
Five boxes would lighten it, and if she sold her berries at eight
cents, she would clear two cents and a half, and that would be
better than nothing.

"I'll tell you what I will do," she said, after thinking a few
moments; "I don't feel as well as usual to-day, and my tray is
heavy. Five boxes sold will be something. You shall have them at
nine cents. They cost me seven and a half, and I'm sure it's worth a
cent and a half a box to cry them about the streets such hot weather
as this."

"I have told you, my good woman, exactly what I will do," said the
customer, with dignity. "If you are willing to take what I offer
you, say so; if not, we needn't stand here any longer."

"Well, I suppose you will have to take them," replied the
strawberry-woman, seeing that there was no hope of doing better.
"But it's too little."

"It's enough," said the lady, as she turned to call a servant. Five
boxes of fine large strawberries were received, and forty cents paid
for them. The lady re-entered the parlor, pleased at her good
bargain, while the poor woman turned from the door sad and
disheartened. She walked nearly the distance of a square before she
could trust her voice to utter her monotonous cry of

"Strawb'_rees!_ Strawb'_rees!_"

An hour afterward, a friend called upon Mrs. Mier, the lady who had
bought the strawberries. After talking about various matters and
things interesting to lady housekeepers, Mrs. Mier said:

"How much did you pay for strawberries this morning?"

"Ten cents."

"You paid too much. I bought them for eight."

"For eight! Were they good ones?"

"Step into the dining-room, and I will show them to you."

The ladies stepped into the dining-room, when Mrs. Mier displayed
her large, red berries, which were really much finer than she had at
first supposed them to be.

"You didn't get them for eight cents," remarked the visitor,
incredulously.

"Yes I did. I paid forty cents for five boxes."

"While I paid fifty for some not near so good."

"I suppose you paid just what you were asked?"

"Yes, I always do that. I buy from one woman during the season, who
agrees to furnish me at the regular market price."

"Which you will always find to be two or three cents above what you
can get them for in the market."

"You always buy in market."

"I bought these from a woman at the door."

"Did she only ask eight cents for them?"

"Oh, no! She asked ten cents, and pretended that she got twelve and
a half for the same quality of berries yesterday. But I never give
these people what they ask."

"While I never can find it in my heart to ask a poor, tired-looking
woman at my door, to take a cent less for her fruit than she asks
me. A cent or two, while it is of little account to me, must be of
great importance to her."

"You are a very poor economist, I see," said Mrs. Mier. "If that is
the way you deal with every one, your husband no doubt finds his
expense account a very serious item."

"I don't know about that. He never complains. He allows me a certain
sum every week to keep the house, and find my own and the children's
clothes; and so far from ever calling on him for more, I always have
fifty or a hundred dollars lying by me."

"You must have a precious large allowance, then, considering your
want of economy in paying everybody just what they ask for their
things."

"Oh, no! I don't do that, exactly, Mrs. Mier. If I consider the
price of a thing too high, I don't buy it."

"You paid too high for your strawberries today."

"Perhaps I did; although I am by no means certain."

"You can judge for yourself. Mine cost but eight cents, and you own
that they are superior to yours at ten cents."

"Still, yours may have been too cheap, instead of mine too dear."

"Too cheap! That is funny! I never saw any thing too cheap in my
life. The great trouble is, that every thing is too dear. What do
you mean by too cheap?"

"The person who sold them to you may not have made profit enough
upon them to pay for her time and labor. If this were the case, she
sold them to you too cheap."

"Suppose she paid too high for them? Is the purchaser to pay for her
error?"

"Whether she did so, it would be hard to tell; and even if she had
made such a mistake, I think it would be more just and humane to pay
her a price that would give her a fair profit, instead of taking
from her the means of buying bread for her children. At least, this
is my way of reasoning."

"And a precious lot of money it must take to support such a system
of reasoning. But how much, pray, do you have a week to keep the
family? I am curious to know."

"Thirty-five dollars."

"Thirty-five dollars! You are jesting."

"Oh, no! That is exactly what I receive, and as I have said, I find
the sum ample."

"While I receive fifty dollars a week," said Mrs. Mier, "and am
forever calling on my husband to settle some bill or other for me.
And yet I never pay the exorbitant prices asked by everybody for
every thing. I am strictly economical in my family. While other
people pay their domestics a dollar and a half and two dollars a
week, I give but a dollar and a quarter each to my cook and
chambermaid, and require the chamber maid to help the washer-woman
on Mondays. Nothing is wasted in my kitchen, for I take care in
marketing, not to allow room for waste. I don't know how it is that
you save money on thirty-five dollars with your system, while I find
fifty dollars inadequate with my system."

The exact difference in the two systems will be clearly understood
by the reader, when he is informed that although Mrs. Mier never
paid any body as much as was at first asked for an article, and was
always talking about economy, and trying to practice it, by
withholding from others what was justly their due, as in the case of
the strawberry-woman, yet she was a very extravagant person, and
spared no money in gratifying her own pride. Mrs. Gilman, her
visitor, was, on the contrary, really economical, because she was
moderate in all her desires, and was usually as well satisfied with
an article of dress or furniture that cost ten or twenty dollars, as
Mrs. Mier was with one that cost forty or fifty dollars. In little
things, the former was not so particular as to infringe the rights
of others, while in larger matters, she was careful not to run into
extravagance in order to gratify her own or children's pride and
vanity, while the latter pursued a course directly opposite.

Mrs. Gilman was not as much dissatisfied, on reflection, about the
price she had paid for her strawberries, as she had felt at first.

"I would rather pay these poor creatures two cents a box too much
than too little," she said to herself--"dear knows, they earn their
money hard enough, and get but a scanty portion after all."

Although the tray of the poor strawberry-woman, when she passed from
the presence of Mrs. Mier, was lighter by five boxes, her heart was
heavier, and that made her steps more weary than before. The next
place at which she stopped, she found the same disposition to beat
her down in her price.

"I'll give you nine cents, and take four boxes," said the lady.

"Indeed, madam, that is too little," replied the woman; "ten cents
is the lowest at which I can sell them and make even a reasonable
profit."

"Well, say thirty-seven and a half for four boxes, and I will take
them. It is only two cents and a half less than you ask for them."

"Give me a fip, ma!--there comes the candy-man!" exclaimed a little
fellow, pressing up to the side of the lady. "Quick, ma! Here,
candy-man!" calling after an old man with a tin cylinder under his
arm, that looked something like an ice cream freezer. The lady drew
out her purse, and searched among its contents for the small coin
her child wanted.

"I havn't any thing less than a levy," she at length said.

"Oh, well, he can change it. Candy-man, you can change a levy?"

By this time the "candy-man" stood smiling beside the
strawberry-woman. As he was counting out the fip's worth of candy,
the child spoke up in an earnest voice, and said:

"Get a levy's worth, mother, do, wont you? Cousin Lu's coming to see
us to-morrow."

"Let him have a levy's worth, candy-man. He's such a rogue I can't
resist him," responded the mother. The candy was counted out, and
the levy paid, when the man retired in his usual good humor.

"Shall I take these strawberries for thirty-seven and a half cents?"
said the lady, the smile fading from her face. "It is all I am
willing to give."

"If you wont pay any more, I musn't stand for two cents and a half,"
replied the woman, "although they would nearly buy a loaf of bread
for the children," she mentally added.

The four boxes were sold for the sum offered, and the woman lifted
the tray upon her head, and moved on again. The sun shone out still
hotter and hotter as the day advanced. Large beads of perspiration
rolled from the throbbing temples of the strawberry-woman, as she
passed wearily up one street and down another, crying her fruit at
the top of her voice. At length all were sold but five boxes, and
now it was past one o'clock. Long before this she ought to have been
at home. Faint from over-exertion, she lifted her tray from her
head, and placing it upon a door-step, sat down to rest. As she sat
thus, a lady came up, and paused at the door of the house, as if
about to enter.

"You look tired, my good woman," she said kindly. "This is a very
hot day for such hard work as yours. How do you sell your
strawberries?"

"I ought to have ten cents for them, but nobody seems willing to
give ten cents to-day, although they are very fine, and cost me as
much as some I have got twelve and a half for."

"How many boxes have you?"

"Five, ma'am."

"They are very fine, sure enough," said the lady, stooping down and
examining them; "and well worth ten cents. I'll take them."

"Thanky, ma'am. I was afraid I should have to take them home," said
the woman, her heart bounding up lightly.

The lady rung the bell, for it was at her door that the tired
strawberry-woman had stopped to rest herself. While she was waiting
for the door to be opened, the lady took from her purse the money
for the strawberries, and handing it to the woman, said:

"Here is your money. Shall I tell the servant to bring you out a
glass of cool water? You are hot and tired."

"If you please, ma'am," said the woman, with a grateful look.

The water was sent out by the servant who was to receive the
strawberries, and the tired woman drank it eagerly. Its refreshing
coolness flowed through every vein, and when she took up her tray to
return home, both heart and step were lighter.

The lady whose benevolent feelings had prompted her to the
performance of this little act of kindness, could not help
remembering the woman's grateful look. She had not done much--not
more than it was every one's duty to do; but the recollection of
even that was pleasant, far more pleasant than could possibly have
been Mrs. Mier's self-gratulations at having saved ten cents on her
purchase of five boxes of strawberries, notwithstanding the
assurance of the poor woman who vended them, that, at the reduced
rate, her profit on the whole would only be two cents and a half.

After dinner Mrs. Mier went out and spent thirty dollars in
purchasing jewelry for her eldest daughter, a young lady not yet
eighteen years of age. That evening, at the tea-table, the
strawberries were highly commended as being the largest and most
delicious in flavor of any they had yet had; in reply to which, Mrs.
Mier stated, with an air of peculiar satisfaction, that she had got
them for eight cents a box, when they were worth at least ten cents.

"The woman asked me ten cents," she said, "but I offered her eight,
and she took them."

While the family of Mrs. Mier were enjoying their pleasant repast,
the strawberry-woman sat at a small table, around which were
gathered three young children, the oldest but six years of age. She
had started out in the morning with thirty boxes of strawberries,
for which she was to pay seven and a half cents a box. If all had
brought the ten cents a box, she would have made seventy-five cents;
but such was not the case. Rich ladies had beaten her down in her
price--had chaffered with her for the few pennies of profits to
which her hard labor entitled her--and actually robbed her of the
meager pittance she strove to earn for her children. Instead of
realizing the small sum of seventy-five cents, she had cleared only
forty-five cents. With this she bought a little Indian meal and
molasses for her own and her children's supper and breakfast.

As she sat with her children, eating the only food she was able to
provide for them, and thought of what had occurred during the day, a
feeling of bitterness toward her kind came over her; but the
remembrance of the kind words, and the glass of cool water, so
timely and thoughtfully tendered to her, was like leaves in the
waters of Marah. Her heart softened, and with the tears stealing to
her eyes, she glanced upward, and asked a blessing on her who had
remembered that, though poor, she was still human.

Economy is a good thing, and should be practiced by all, but it
should show itself in denying ourselves, not in oppressing others.
We see persons spending dollar after dollar foolishly one hour, and
in the next trying to save a five penny piece off of a wood-sawyer,
coal-heaver, or market-woman. Such things are disgraceful, if not
dishonest.




CHAPTER XIX.

LOTS OF THINGS.


"O DEAR!" said I to Mr. Smith one morning, as we arose from the
breakfast-table, at which we had been partaking of rather a
badly-cooked meal,--"more trouble in prospect."

"What's the matter now?" asked Mr. Smith, with a certain emphasis on
the word "now" that didn't sound just agreeable to my ears.

"Oh, nothing! nothing!" I answered, with as much indifference of
manner as I could assume.

"You spoke of trouble," said he, kindly, "and trouble, in my
experience, is rather more tangible than 'nothing.'"

"I've another raw Irish girl in the kitchen, who, according to her
own confession, hasn't been above ten days in the country. Isn't
that enough?"

"I should think so. But, why, in the name of goodness did you take
another of these green islanders into your house?"

"It's easy enough to ask questions, Mr. Smith," said I, a little
fretfully; "but--" I checked myself. We looked at each other,
smiled, and--said no more on the subject.

"Your name is Anna, I believe?" said I, as I stepped to the
kitchen-door, a couple of hours afterwards.

"Thot's me name," replied the new domestic.

"I will send home a loin of veal and some green peas," said I. "They
are for dinner, which must be ready at two o'clock. You know how to
roast a piece of veal, I presume?"

"Lave me for thot same, honey!"

"And the green peas?"

"All right, mum. I've lived in quality houses since I was so high. I
can cook ony thing."

"Very well, Anna. We will see. I have to go out this morning; and
you must do the best you can. Don't fail to have dinner ready by two
o'clock. Mr. Smith is a punctual man."

Anna was profuse in her promises.

"If," said I, recollecting myself, as I was about opening the street
door, and returning along the passage,--"If any thing is sent home
for me, be sure to take it up stairs and lay it carefully on my
bed."

"Yes, mum."

"Now don't forget this, Anna."

"Och! niver fear a hate, mum," was the girl's answer. "I'll not
forget a word iv y'r insthructions."

I turned away and left the house. My principal errand was a visit to
the milliner's, where I wished to see a bonnet I had ordered, before
it was sent home. It was this bonnet I referred to when I desired
Anna to place carefully on the bed in my chamber, any thing that
might come home.

On my way to the milliner's, I stopped at the grocer's where we were
in the habit of dealing, and made selections of various things that
were needed.

The bonnet proved just to my taste. It was a delicate white spring
bonnet, with a neat trimming, and pleased my fancy wonderfully.

"The very thing," said I, the moment my eyes rested upon it.

"Do you want a box?" asked the milliner, after I had decided to take
the bonnet.

"I have one," was my answer.

"O, very well. I will send the bonnet home in a box, and you can
take it out."

"That will do."

"Shall I send it home this morning?"

"If you please."

"Very well. I'll see that it is done."

After this I made a number of calls, which occupied me until after
one o'clock, when I turned my face homeward. On arriving, I was
admitted by my new girl, and, as the thought of my beautiful bonnet
now returned to my mind, my first words were:

"Has any thing been sent home for me, Anna?"

"Och! yis indade, mum," was her answer,--"lots o' things."

"Lots of things!" said I, with manifest surprise; for I only
remembered at the moment my direction to the milliner to send home
my bonnet.

"Yis, indade!" responded the girl. "Lots. And the mon brought 'em on
the funniest whale barry ye iver seed."

"On a wheel barrow!"

"Yis. And such a whale barry! It had a whale on each side, as I'm a
livin' sinner, mum and a cunnin' little whale in front, cocked 'way
up intil the air, thot didn't touch nothin' at all--at all! There's
no sich whale barrys as thot same in Ireland, me leddy!"

"And what did you do with the lots of things brought on this wheel
barrow?" said I, now beginning to comprehend the girl.

"Put them on y'r bed, sure."

"On my bed!" I exclaimed, in consternation.

"Sure, and didn't I remember the last words ye spake till me?
'Anna,' says ye,--'Anna, if ony thing is sent home for me, be sure
till take it carefully up stairs and lay it on me bed.' And I did
thot same. Sure, I couldn't have found a nicer place, if I gone the
house over."

Turning from the girl, I hurried up stairs.

It was as I had too good reason to fear. Such a sight as met my
eyes! In the centre of my bed, with its snowy-white Marseilles
covering, were piled "lots of things," and no mistake. Sugar, tea,
cheese, coffee, soap, and various other articles, not excepting a
bottle of olive oil, from the started cork of which was gently
oozing a slender stream, lay in a jumbled heap; while, on a satin
damask-covered chair, reposed a greasy ham. For a moment I stood
confounded. Then, giving the bell a violent jerk, I awaited, in
angry impatience, the appearance of Anna, who, in due time, after
going to the street door, found her way to my chamber.

"Anna!" I exclaimed, "what, in the name of goodness, possessed you
to do this?"

And I pointed to the bed.

"Sure, and ye towld me till put them on ye's bed."

"I told you no such thing, you stupid creature! I said if a bonnet
came, to put it on the bed."

"Och! sorry a word did ye iver say about a bonnet, mum. It's the
first time I iver heard ony thing about a bonnet from yer blessed
lips. And thot's thrue."

"Where is my bonnet, then? Did one come home?"

"Plase, mum, and there did. And a purty one it is, too, as iver my
two eyes looked upon."

"What did you do with it?" I enquired, with a good deal of concern.

"It's safe in thot great mahogany closet, mum," she replied,
pointing to my wardrobe.

I stepped quickly to the "mahogany closet," and threw open the door.
Alas! for my poor bonnet! It was crushed in between two of Mr.
Smith's coats, and tied to a peg, by the strings, which were, of
course, crumpled to a degree that made them useless.

"Too bad! Too bad!" I murmured, as I disengaged the bonnet from its
unhappy companionship with broadcloth. As it came to the light, my
eyes fell upon two dark spots on the front, the unmistakable prints
of Anna's greasy fingers. This was too much! I tossed it, in a
moment of passion, upon the bed, where, in contact with the "lots of
things," it received its final touch of ruin from a portion of the
oozing contents of the sweet oil bottle.

Of the scene that followed, and of the late, badly-cooked dinner to
which my husband was introduced an hour afterwards, I will not trust
myself to write. I was not, of course, in a very agreeable humor;
and the record of what I said and did, and of how I looked, would be
in no way flattering to my own good opinion of myself, nor prove
particularly edifying to the reader.

I shall never forget Anna's new variety of "whale-barry," nor the
"lots o' things" she deposited on my bed. She lived with me just
seven days, and then made way for another a little more tolerable
than herself.




CHAPTER XX.

A CURE FOR LOW SPIRITS.


FROM some cause, real or imaginary, I felt low spirited. There was a
cloud upon my feelings, and I could not smile as usual, nor speak in
a tone of cheerfulness. As a natural result, the light of my
countenance being gone, all things around me were in a shadow. My
husband was sober, and had but little to say; the children would
look strangely at me when I answered their questions or spoke to
them for any purpose, and the domestics moved about in a quiet
manner, and when they addressed me, did so in a tone more subdued
than usual.

This reaction upon my state, only made darker the clouds that veiled
my spirits. I was conscious of this, and was conscious that the
original cause of depression was entirely inadequate, in itself, to
produce the result which had followed. Under this feeling, I made an
effort to rally myself, but in vain--and sank lower from the
struggle to rise above the gloom that overshadowed me.

When my husband came home at dinner time, I tried to meet him with a
smile; but I felt that the light upon my countenance was feeble, and
of brief duration. He looked at me earnestly, and in his kind and
gentle way, enquired if I felt no better, affecting to believe that
my ailment was one of the body instead of the mind. But I scarcely
answered him, and I could see that he felt hurt. How, much more
wretched did I become at this? Could I have then retired to my
chamber, and alone given my heart full vent in a passion of tears, I
might have obtained relief to my feelings. But I could not do this.

While I sat at the table forcing a little food into my mouth for
appearance sake, my husband said:

"You remember the fine lad who has been with me for some time?"

I nodded my head, but the question did not awaken in my mind the
least interest.

"He has not made his appearance for several days; and I learned this
morning, on sending to the house of his mother, that he is very
ill."

"Ah!" was my indifferent response. Had I spoken, what was in my
mind, I would have said, "I'm sorry, but I can't help it." I did not
at the moment feel the smallest interest in the lad.

"Yes," added my husband, "and the person who called to let me know
about it, expressed his fears that Edward would not get up again."

"What ails him?" I enquired.

"I did not clearly understand. But he has a fever of some kind. You
remember his mother very well?"

"Oh, yes. You know she worked for me. Edward is her only child, I
believe."

"Yes; and his loss to her will be almost everything."

"Is he dangerous?" I enquired, a feeling of interest beginning to
stir in my heart.

"He is not expected to live."

"Poor woman! How distressed she must be! I wonder what her
circumstances are just at this time. She seemed very poor when she
worked for me."

"And she is very poor still, I doubt not. She has herself been sick,
and during the time it is more than probable that Edward's wages
were all her income. I am afraid she has not now the means of
procuring for her sick boy things necessary for his comfort. Could
you not go around there this afternoon, and see how they are?"

I shook my head instantly at this proposition, for sympathy for
others was not strong enough to expel my selfish despondency of
mind.

"Then I must step around," replied my husband, "before I go back to
business, although I have a great deal to do to-day. It would not be
right to neglect this lad and his mother under present circumstances."

I felt rebuked at these words, and, with an effort, said:

"I will go."

"It will be much better for you to see them than for me," returned
my husband, "for you can understand their wants better, and minister
to them more effectually. If they need any comforts, I would like to
have you see them supplied."

It still cost me an effort to get ready, but as I had promised to do
as my husband wished, the effort had to be made. By the time I was
prepared to go out, I felt something better. The exertion I was
required to make, tended to disperse, slightly, the clouds that hung
over me, and as they began gradually to remove, my thoughts turned,
with an awakened interest, towards the object of my husband's
solicitude.

All was silent within the humble abode to which my errand led me. I
knocked lightly, and in a few moments the mother of Edward opened
the door. She looked pale and anxious.

"How is your son, Mrs. Ellis?" I enquired, as I stepped in.

"He is very low, ma'am," she replied.

"Not dangerous, I hope?"

"The fever has left him, but he is as weak as an infant. All his
strength is gone."

"But proper nourishment will restore him, now that the disease is
broken."

"So the doctor says. But I'm afraid it's too late. He seems to be
sinking every hour. Will you walk up and see him?"

I followed Mrs. Ellis up stairs, and into a chamber, where the sick
boy lay. I was not surprised at the fear she expressed, when I saw
Edward's pale, sunken face, and hollow, almost expressionless eyes.
He scarcely noticed my entrance.

"Poor boy!" sighed his mother. "He has had a very sick spell."

My liveliest interest was at once awakened.

"He has been sick, indeed!" I replied, as I laid my hand upon his
white forehead.

I found his skin cold and damp. The fever had nearly burned out the
vital energy of his system.

"Do you give him much nourishment?"

"He takes a little barley-water."

"Has not the doctor ordered wine?"

"Yes, ma'am," replied Mrs. Ellis, but she spoke with an air of
hesitation. "He says a spoonful of good wine, three or four times a
day, would be very good for him."

"And you have not given him any?"

"No, ma'am."

"We have some very pure wine, that we always keep for sickness. If
you will step over to our house, and tell Alice to give you a bottle
of it, I will stay with Edward until you return."

How brightly glowed that poor woman's face as my words fell upon her
ears!

"O, ma'am, you are very kind!" said she. "But it will be asking too
much of you to stay here!"

"You didn't ask it, Mrs. Ellis," I simply replied. "I have offered
to stay; so do you go for the wine as quickly as you can, for Edward
needs it very much."

I was not required to say more. In a few minutes I was alone with
the sick boy, who lay almost as still as if death were resting upon
his half-closed eye-lids. To some extent during the half hour I
remained thus in that hushed chamber, did I realize the condition
and feelings of the poor mother, whose only son lay gasping at the
very door of death, and all my sympathies were, in consequence,
awakened.

As soon as Mrs. Ellis returned with the wine, about a teaspoonful
was diluted, and the glass containing it placed to the sick lad's
lips. The moment its flavor touched his palate, a thrill seemed to
pass through his frame, and he swallowed eagerly.

"It does him good!" said I, speaking warmly, and from an impulse
that made my heart glow.

We sat and looked with silent interest upon the boy's face, and we
did not look in vain, for something like warmth came upon his wan
cheeks, and when I placed my hand upon his forehead, the coldness
and dampness were gone. The wine had quickened his languid pulse. I
stayed an hour longer, and then another spoonful of the generous
wine was given. Its effect was as marked as the first. I then
withdrew from the humble home of the widow and her only child,
promising to see them again in the morning.

When I regained the street, and my thoughts for a moment reverted to
myself, how did I find all changed? The clouds had been
dispersed--the heavy load had been raised from my bosom. I walked
with a free step.

Sympathy for others, and active efforts to do others good, had
expelled the evil spirit from my heart; and now serene peace had
there again her quiet habitation. There was light in every part of
my dwelling when I re-entered it, and I sung cheerfully, as I
prepared with my own hands, a basket of provisions for the poor
widow.

When my husband returned again in the evening, he found me at work,
cheerfully, in my family, and all bright and smiling again. The
efforts to do good to others had driven away the darkness from my
spirit, and the sunshine was again on my countenance, and reflected
from every member of my household.




CHAPTER XXI.

A BARGAIN.


I AM not much of a bargain-buyer, having had, like most
housekeepers, sufficient experience on that subject to effect a
pretty thorough cure of the disease, mild as it was in the
beginning. As all diseases, whether bodily or mental, leave behind
them a predisposition to return, I have, from time to time, been
subjected to slight paroxisms of the old complaint. From the effects
of my last rather mild attack, I am now recovering.

I was passing along Walnut street, on my way to drop a letter in the
Post Office, one morning, about ten o'clock, when the ringing of an
auctioneer's bell came suddenly on my ears. Lifting my eyes, I saw
the flag of Thomas & Son displayed before me, and read the words,
"Auction this morning."

Here was an "exciting cause," as the doctors say, and, instantly I
felt a movement of the old affection. Two or three ladies happened
to be entering the store at the time, and the sudden inclination to
follow them was so strong that I did not attempt its resistance. It
was not my intention, to buy any thing, of course; for I was
conscious of no particular want. I only just wished, if any wish
were really full formed, to see what was to be sold.

Scarcely had I entered the door, when a sofa, so nearly new that it
hardly bore a mark of having been used, presented itself, and
captivated my fancy. The one that graced our parlor had grown
somewhat out of fashion. It was in good keeping, but rather plain in
style: and, as we had recently treated ourselves to handsome new
carpets, did not appear to quite so good advantage as before. This
one, to be sold at auction, was made after a newer pattern, and, as
my eyes continued to rest upon it, the desires to have it in my
parlor was fully formed.

I have said, that on entering the auction store, I was unconscious
of any particular want. This was true, notwithstanding Mr. Smith and
I had, a few days before, called at a cabinet maker's wareroom, to
look at a sofa. In consequence of former experience in cheap
furniture, we had no thought of getting a low-priced article from a
second or third rate establishment; but designed, when we did
purchase, to act wisely and get the best. We had been looking at a
sofa for which sixty-five dollars was asked; and were hesitating
between that and another upon which fifty dollars was set as the
price.

It was but natural, under these circumstances, that I should, look
upon this sofa with more than ordinary interest. A glance told me
that it was an article of superior make, and a close examination
fully confirmed this impression.

A few minutes after my entrance, the sale begun, and it so happened
that the sofa came first on the list.

"We shall begin this morning," said the auctioneer, "with a superior,
fashionable sofa, made by--. It has only been in use a short time,
and is, in every respect, equal to new."

All my predilections in favor of the sofa were confirmed the moment
the manufacturer's name was announced. Of course, it was of the best
material and workmanship.

"What is bid for this superior sofa, made by--," went on the
salesman,--"Seventy dollars--sixty-five--sixty-fifty--five-fifty--
forty-five--forty--thirty-five--thirty."

"Twenty-five dollars," said a timid voice.

"Twenty-five! Twenty-five!" cried the auctioneer.

"Twenty-six," said I.

The first bidder advanced a dollar on this; then I bid twenty-eight;
he went up to twenty-nine, and I made it thirty, at which offer the
sofa was knocked down to me.

"That's a bargain, and no mistake," said the salesman. "It is worth
fifty dollars, if it's worth a cent."

"I'll give you five dollars advance," proposed a lady by my side,
who had desired to bid, but could not bring up her courage to the
point.

"No, thank you," was my prompt answer. I was too well pleased with
my bargain.

When Mr. Smith came home to dinner on that day, I met him in the
parlor.

"What do you think of this?" said I, pointing to the new sofa. I
spoke in an exultant voice.

"Where in the world did it come from?" enquired Mr. Smith, evincing
a natural surprise.

"I bought it," was my reply.

"When? where?"

"This morning, at auction."

"At auction!"

"Yes; and it's a bargain. Now guess what I gave for it?"

"Ten dollars?"

"Now Mr. Smith! But come; be serious. Isn't it cheap at forty
dollars?"

Mr. Smith examined the sofa with care, and then gave it as his
opinion that it wasn't dear at forty dollars.

"I got it for thirty," said I.

"Indeed! I should really call that a bargain,--provided you don't
discover in it, after a while, some defect."

"I've looked at every part, over and over again," was my response to
this, "and can find a defect nowhere. None exists, I am satisfied."

"Time will show," remarked Mr. Smith.

There was the smallest perceptible doubt in his tone.

Next morning, on going into my parlors, I was a little worried to
see two or three moths flying about the room. They were despatched
with commendable quickness. On the morning that followed, the same
thing occurred again; and this was repeated, morning after morning.
Moreover, in a few days, these insects, so dreaded by housekeepers,
showed themselves in the chambers above. Up to this time I had
neglected to put away my furs, a new set of which had been purchased
during the previous winter. I delayed this no longer.

House-cleaning time had now arrived. My new carpets were taken up
and packed away, to give place to the cooler matting. Our winter
clothing also received attention, and was deposited in chests and
closets for the summer, duly provided with all needful protection
from moths. After this came the calm of rest and self-satisfaction.

One day, about the middle of July, a lady friend called in to see
me.

"That's a neat sofa, Mrs. Smith," said she, in the pause of a
conversation.

"I think it very neat," was my answer.

"It's made from the same pattern with one that I had. One that I
always liked, and from which I was sorry to part."

"You sold it?" said I.

"Yes. I sent it to auction."

"Ah! Why so?"

"I discovered, this spring, that the moth had got into it."

"Indeed!"

"Yes. They showed themselves, every day, in such numbers, in my
parlors, that I became alarmed for my carpets. I soon traced their
origin to the sofa, which was immediately packed off to auction. I
was sorry to part with it; but, there was no other effective
remedy."

"You lost on the sale, I presume," I ventured to remark.

"Yes; that was to be expected. It cost sixty dollars, and brought
only thirty. But this loss was to be preferred to the destruction
such an army of moth as it was sending forth, would have
occasioned."

I changed the subject, dexterously, having heard quite enough about
the sofa to satisfy me that my bargain was likely to prove a bad
one.

All the summer, I was troubled with visions of moth-eaten carpets,
furs, shawls, and overcoats; and they proved to be only the
foreshadowing of real things to come, for, when, in the fall, the
contents of old chests, boxes, drawers, and dark closets were
brought forth to the light, a state of affairs truly frightful to a
housekeeper, was presented. One of the breadths of my handsome
carpet had the pile so eaten off in conspicuous places, that no
remedy was left but the purchase and substitution of a new one, at a
cost of nearly ten dollars. In dozens of places the texture of the
carpet was eaten entirely through. I was, as my lady readers may
naturally suppose, very unhappy at this. But, the evil by no means
found a limit here. On opening my fur boxes, I found that the work
of destruction had been going on there also. A single shake of the
muff, threw little fibres and flakes of fur in no stinted measure
upon the air; and, on dashing my hand hard against it, a larger mass
was detached, showing the skin bare and white beneath. My furs were
ruined. They had cost seventy dollars, and were not worth ten!

A still further examination into our stock of winter clothing,
showed that the work of destruction had extended to almost every
article. Scarcely any thing had escaped.

Troubled, worried, and unhappy as I was, I yet concealed from Mr.
Smith the origin of all this ruin. He never suspected our cheap sofa
for a moment. After I had, by slow degrees, recovered from my
chagrin and disappointment, my thoughts turned, naturally, upon a
disposition of the sofa. What was to be done with it? As to keeping
it over another season, that was not to be thought of for a moment.
But, would it be right, I asked myself, to send it back to auctions
and let it thus go into the possession of some housekeeper, as
ignorant of its real character as I had been? I found it very hard
to reconcile my conscience to such a disposition of the sofa. And
there was still another difficulty in the way. What excuse for
parting with it could I make to Mr. Smith? He had never suspected
that article to be the origination of all the mischief and loss we
had sustained.

Winter began drawing to a close, and still the sofa remained in its
place, and still was I in perplexity as to what should be done with
it.

"Business requires me to go to Charleston," said Mr. Smith, one day
late in February.

"How long will you be away?" was my natural enquiry.

"From ten days to two weeks," replied Mr. Smith.

"So long as that?"

"It will hardly be possible to get home earlier than the time I have
mentioned."

"You go in the Osprey?"

"Yes. She sails day after to-morrow. So you will have all ready for
me, if you please."

Never before had the announcement of my husband that he had to go
away on business given me pleasure. The moment he said that he would
be absent, the remedy for my difficulty suggested itself.

The very day Mr. Smith sailed in the steamer for Charleston, I sent
for an upholsterer, and after explaining to him the defect connected
with my sofa, directed him to have the seating all removed, and then
replaced by new materials, taking particular care to thoroughly
cleanse the inside of the wood work, lest the vestige of a moth
should be left remaining.

All this was done, at a cost of twenty dollars. When Mr. Smith
returned, the sofa was back in its place; and he was none the wiser
for the change, until some months afterwards, when, unable to keep
the secret any longer, I told him the whole story.

I am pretty well cured, I think now, of bargain-buying.




CHAPTER XXII.

A PEEVISH DAY AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.


THERE are few housekeepers who have not had their sick and peevish
days. I have had mine, as the reader will see by the following
story, which I some time since ventured to relate, in the third
person, and which I now take the liberty of introducing into these
confessions.

"It is too bad, Rachel, to put me to all this trouble; and you know
I can hardly hold up my head."

Thus spoke Mrs. Smith, in a peevish voice, to a quiet looking
domestic, who had been called up from the kitchen to supply some
unimportant omission in the breakfast table arrangement.

Rachel looked hurt and rebuked, but made no reply.

"How could you speak in that way to Rachel?" said Mr. Smith, as soon
as the domestic had withdrawn.

"If you felt just as I do, Mr. Smith, you would speak cross, too!"
Mrs. Smith replied a little warmly--"I feel just like a rag; and my
head aches as if it would burst."

"I know you feel badly, and I am very sorry for you. But still, I
suppose it is as easy to speak kindly as harshly. Rachel is very
obliging and attentive, and should be borne with in occasional
omissions, which you of course know are not wilful."

"It is easy enough to preach," retorted Mrs. Smith, whose temper,
from bodily lassitude and pain, was in quite an irritable state. The
reader will understand at least one of the reasons of this, when he
is told that the scene here presented occurred during the last
oppressive week in August.

Mr. Smith said no more. He saw that to do so would only be to
provoke instead of quieting his wife's ill humor. The morning meal
went by in silence, but little food passing the lips of either. How
could it, when the thermometer was ninety-four at eight o'clock in
the morning, and the leaves upon the trees were as motionless as if
suspended in a vacuum. Bodies and minds were relaxed--and the one
turned from food, as the other did from thought, with an instinctive
aversion.

After Mr. Smith had left his home for his place of business, Mrs.
Smith went up into her chamber, and threw herself upon the bed, her
head still continuing to ache with great violence. It so happened
that a week before, the chambermaid had gone away, sick, and all the
duties of the household had in consequence devolved upon Rachel,
herself not very well. Cheerfully, however, had she endeavored to
discharge these accumulated duties, and but for the unhappy, peevish
state of mind in which Mrs. Smith indulged, would have discharged
them without a murmuring thought. But, as she was a faithful,
conscientious woman, and, withal, sensitive in her feelings, to be
found fault with, worried her exceedingly. Of this Mrs. Smith was
well aware, and had, until the latter part of the trying month of
August, acted towards Rachel with consideration and forbearance. But
the last week of August was too much for her. The sickness of the
chamber maid threw such heavy duties upon Rachel, whose daily
headaches and nervous relaxation of body were borne without a
complaint, that their perfect performance was almost impossible.
Slight omissions, which were next to unavoidable, under the
circumstances, became so annoying to Mrs. Smith, herself, as it has
been seen, laboring under great bodily and mental prostration that
she could not bear them.

"She knows better, and she could do better, if she chose," was her
rather uncharitable comment, often inwardly made on the occurrence
of some new trouble.

After Mr. Smith had taken his departure on the morning just referred
to, Mrs. Smith went up into her chamber, as has been seen, and threw
herself languidly upon a bed, pressing her hands to her throbbing
temples, as she did so, and murmuring:

"I can't live at this rate!"

At the same time, Rachel sat down in the kitchen the large waiter
upon which she had arranged the dishes from the breakfast table, and
then sinking into a chair, pressed one hand upon her forehead, and
sat for more than a minute in troubled silence. It had been three
days since she had received from Mrs. Smith a pleasant word, and the
last remark, made to her a short time before, had been the unkindest
of all. At another time, even all this would not have moved her--she
could have perceived that Mrs. Smith was not in a right state--that
lassitude of body had produced a temporary infirmity of mind. But,
being herself affected by the oppressive season almost as much as
her mistress, she could not make these allowances. While still
seated, the chamber bell was rung with a quick, startling jerk.

"What next?" peevishly ejaculated Rachel, and then slowly proceeded
to obey the summons.

"How could you leave my chamber in such a condition as this?" was
the salutation that met her ear, as she entered the presence of Mrs.
Smith, who, half raised upon the bed, and leaning upon her hand,
looked the very personification of languor, peevishness, and
ill-humor. "You had plenty of time while we were eating breakfast to
have put things a little to rights!"

To this Rachel made no reply, but turned away and went back into the
kitchen. She had scarcely reached that spot, before the bell rang
again, louder and quicker than before; but she did not answer it. In
about three minutes it was jerked with an energy that snapped the
wire, but Rachel was immovable. Five minutes elapsed, and then Mrs.
Smith fully aroused, from the lethargy that had stolen over her,
came down with a quick, firm step.

"What's the reason you didn't answer my bell? say?" she asked, in an
excited voice.

Rachel did not reply.

"Do you hear me?"

Rachel had never been so treated before; she had lived with Mrs.
Smith, for three years, and had rarely been found fault with. She
had been too strict in regard, to the performance of her duty to
leave much room for even a more exacting mistress to find fault; but
now, to be overtasked and sick, and to be chidden, rebuked, and even
angrily assailed, was more than she could well bear. She did not
suffer herself to speak for some moments, and then her voice
trembled, and the tears came out upon her cheeks.

"I wish you to get another in my place. I find I don't suit you. My
time will be up day after to-morrow."

"Very well," was Mrs. Smith's firm reply, as she turned away, and
left the kitchen.

Here was trouble in good earnest. Often and often had Mrs. Smith
said, during the past two or three years--"What should I do without
Rachel?" And now she had given notice that she was going to leave
her, and under circumstances which made pride forbid a request to
stay. Determined to act out her part of the business with firmness
and decision, she dressed herself and went out, hot and oppressive
as it was, and took her way to an intelligence office, where she
paid the required fee, and directed a cook and chamber maid to be
sent to her. On the next morning, about ten o'clock, an Irish girl
came and offered herself as a cook, and was, after sundry questions
and answers, engaged. So soon as this negotiation was settled,
Rachel retired from the kitchen, leaving the new-comer in full
possession. In half an hour after she received her wages, and left,
in no very happy frame of mind, a home that had been for three
years, until within a few days, a pleasant one. As for Mrs. Smith,
she was ready to go to bed sick; but this was impracticable. Nancy,
the new cook, had expressly stipulated that she was to have no
duties unconnected with the kitchen. The consequence was, that,
notwithstanding the thermometer ranged above ninety, and the
atmosphere remained as sultry as air from a heated oven, Mrs. Smith
was compelled to arrange her chamber and parlors. By the time this
was done she was in a condition to go to bed, and lie until dinner
time. The arrival of this important period brought new troubles and
vexations. Dinner was late by forty minutes, and then came on the
table in a most abominable condition. A fine sirloin was burnt to a
crisp. The tomatoes were smoked, and the potatoes watery. As if this
were not enough to mar the pleasure of the dinner hour for a hungry
husband, Mrs. Smith added thereto a distressed countenance and
discouraging complaints. Nancy was grumbled at and scolded every
time she had occasion to appear in the room, and her single attempt
to excuse herself on account of not understanding the cook stove,
was met by:

"Do hush, will you! I'm out of all patience!"

As to the latter part of the sentence, that was a needless waste of
words. The condition of mind she described was fully apparent.

About three o'clock in the afternoon, just as Mrs. Smith had found a
temporary relief from a troubled mind and a most intolerable
headache, in sleep, a tap on the chamber door awoke her, there stood
Nancy, all equipped for going out.

"I find I won't suit you, ma'am," said Nancy, "and so you must look
out for another girl."

Having said this, she turned away and took her departure, leaving
Mrs. Smith in a state of mind, as it is said, "more easily imagined
than described."

"O dear! what shall I do!" at length broke from her lips, as she
burst into tears, and burying her face in the pillow, sobbed aloud.
Already she had repented of her fretfulness and fault-finding
temper, as displayed towards Rachel, and could she have made a truce
with pride, or silenced its whispers, would have sent for her
well-tried domestic, and endeavored to make all fair with her again.
But, under the circumstances, this was now impossible. While yet
undetermined how to act, the street bell rung, and she was compelled
to attend the door, as she was now alone in the house. She found, on
opening it, a rough-looking country girl, who asked if she were the
lady who wanted a chamber maid. Any kind of help was better than
none at all, and so Mrs. Smith asked the young woman to walk in. In
treating with her in regard to her qualifications for the situation
she applied for, she discovered that she knew "almost nothing at all
about any thing." The stipulation that she was to be a
doer-of-all-work-in-general, until a cook could be obtained, was
readily agreed to, and then she was shown to her room in the attic,
where she prepared herself for entering upon her duties.

"Will you please, ma'am, show me what you want me to do?" asked the
new help, presenting herself before Mrs. Smith.

"Go into the kitchen, Ellen, and see that the fire is made. I'll be
down there presently."

To be compelled to see after a new and ignorant servant, and direct
her in every thing, just at, so trying a season of the year, and
while her mind was "all out of sorts," was a severe task for poor
Mrs. Smith. She found that Ellen, as she had too good reason for
believing, was totally unacquainted with kitchen work. She did not
even know how to kindle a coal fire; nor could she manage the stove
after Mrs. Smith had made the fire for her. All this did not in any
way tend to make her less unhappy or more patient than before. On
retiring for the night, she had a high fever, which continued
unabated until morning, when her husband found her really ill; so
much so as to make the attendance of a doctor necessary.

A change in the air had taken place during the night, and the
temperature had fallen many degrees. This aided the efforts of the
physician, and enabled him so to adapt his remedies as to speedily
break the fever. But the ignorance and awkwardness of Ellen,
apparent in her attempts to arrange her bed and chamber, so worried
her mind, that she was near relapsing into her former feverish and
excited state. The attendance of an elder maiden sister was just in
time. All care was taken from her thoughts, and she had a chance of
recovering a more healthy tone of mind and body. During the next
week, she knew little or nothing of how matters were progressing out
of her own chamber. A new cook had been hired, of whom she was
pleased to hear good accounts, although she had not seen her, and
Ellen, under the mild and judicious instruction of her sister, had
learned to make up a bed neatly, to sweep, and dust in true style,
and to perform all the little etceteras of chamber-work greatly to
her satisfaction. She was, likewise, good tempered, willing, and to
all appearances strictly trust-worthy.

One morning, about a week after she had become too ill to keep up,
she found herself so far recovered as to be able to go down stairs
to breakfast. Every thing upon the table she found arranged in the
neatest style. The food was well cooked, especially some tender rice
cakes, of which she was very fond.

"Really, these are delicious!" said she, as the finely flavored
cakes almost melted in her mouth. "And this coffee is just the
thing! How fortunate we have been to obtain so good a cook! I was
afraid we should never be able to replace Rachel. But even she is
equalled, if not surpassed."

"Still she does not surpass Rachel," said Mr. Smith, a little
gravely. "Rachel was a treasure."

"Indeed she was. And I have been sorry enough I ever let her go,"
returned Mrs. Smith.

At that moment a new cook entered with a plate of warm cakes.

"Rachel!" ejaculated Mrs. Smith, letting her knife and fork fall.
"How do you do? I am glad to see you! Welcome home again!"

As she spoke quickly and earnestly, she held out her hand, and
grasped that of her old domestic warmly. Rachel could not speak, but
as she left the room she put her apron to her eyes. Hers were
not the only ones dim with rising moisture.

For at least a year to come, both Mrs. Smith and her excellent cook
will have no cause to complain of each other. How they will get
along during the last week of next August, we cannot say, but hope
the lesson they have both received will teach them to bear and
forbear.




CHAPTER XXIII.

WORDS.


"THE foolish thing!" said my aunt Rachel, speaking warmly, "to get
hurt at a mere word. It's a little hard that people can't open their
lips but somebody is offended."

"Words are things!" said I, smiling.

"Very light things! A person must be tender, indeed, that is hurt by
a word."

"The very lightest thing may hurt, if it falls on a tender place."

"I don't like people who have these tender places," said aunt
Rachel. "I never get hurt at what is said to me. No--never! To be
ever picking and mincing, and chopping off your words--to be afraid
to say this or that--for fear somebody will be offended! I can't
abide it!"

"People who have these tender places can't help it, I suppose. This
being so, ought we not to regard their weakness?" said I. "Pain,
either of body or mind, is hard to bear, and we should not inflict
it causelessly."

"People who are so wonderfully sensitive," replied aunt Rachel,
growing warmer, "ought to shut themselves up at home, and not come
among sensible, good tempered persons. As far as I am concerned, I
can tell them, one and all, that I am not going to pick out every
hard word from a sentence as carefully as I would seeds from a
raisin. Let them crack them with their teeth, if they are afraid to
swallow them whole."

Now, for all that aunt Rachel went on after this strain, she was a
kind, good soul, in the main, and I could see, was sorry for having
hurt the feelings of Mary Lane. But she didn't like to acknowledge
that she was in the wrong; that would detract too much from the
self-complacency with which she regarded herself. Knowing her
character very well, I thought it best not to continue the little
argument about the importance of words, and so changed the subject.
But, every now and then, aunt Rachel would return to it, each time
softening a little towards Mary. At last she said:

"I'm sure it was a little thing. A very little thing. She might have
known that nothing unkind was intended on my part."

"There are some subjects, aunt," I replied, "to which we cannot bear
the slightest allusion. And a sudden reference to them is very apt
to throw us off of our guard. What you said to Mary, has, in all
probability, touched some weakness of character, or probed some
wound that time has been able to heal. I have always thought her a
sensible, good natured girl."

"And so have I. But I really cannot think that she has shown her
good sense or good nature in the present case. It is a very bad
failing this, of being over sensitive; and exceedingly annoying to
one's friends."

"It is, I know; but still, all of us have a weak point, and when
that is assailed, we are very apt to betray our feelings."

"Well, I say now, as I have always said--I don't like to have any
thing to do with people who have these weak points. This being hurt
by a word, as if words were blows, is something that does not come
within the range of my sympathies."

"And yet, aunt," said I, "all have weak points. Even you are not
entirely free from them."

"Me!" aunt Rachel bridled.

"Yes; and if even as light a thing as a word were to fall upon them,
you would suffer pain."

"Pray, ma'am," said, aunt Rachel, with much dignity of manner; she
was chafed by my words, light as they were; "inform me where these
weaknesses, of which you are pleased to speak, lie?"

"Oh, no; you must excuse me. That would be very much out of place.
But I only stated a general fact that appertains to all of us."

Aunt Rachel looked very grave. I had laid the weight of words upon a
weakness of her character, and it had given her pain. That weakness
was a peculiarly good opinion of herself. I had made no allegation
against her; and there was none in my mind. My words simply
expressed the general truth that we all have weaknesses, and
included her in their application. But she imagined that I referred
to some particular defect or fault, and mail-proof as she was
against words, they had wounded her.

For a day or two, aunt Rachel remained more sober than was her wont.
I knew the cause, but did not attempt to remove from her mind an
impression my words had made. One day, about a week after, I said to
her:

"Aunt Rachel, I saw Mary Lane's mother this morning."

"Ah?" The old lady looked up at me enquiringly.

"I don't wonder your words hurt the poor girl," I added.

"Why? What did I say?" quickly asked aunt Rachel.

"You said that she was a jilt."

"But I was only in jest, and she knew it. I did not really mean any
thing. I'm surprised that Mary should be so foolish."

"You will not be surprised when you know all," was my answer.

"All? What all? I'm sure I wasn't in earnest. I didn't mean to hurt
the poor girl's feelings."

My aunt looked very much troubled.

"No one blames you, aunt Rachel," said I. "Mary knows you didn't
intend wounding her."

"But why should she take a little word so much to heart? It must
have had more truth in it than I supposed."

"Did you know that Mary refused an offer of marriage from Walter
Green, last week?"

"Why, no! It can't be possible! Refused Walter Green?"

"Yes."

"They've been intimate for a long time."

"I know."

"She certainly encouraged him."

"I think it more than probable."

"Is it possible, then, that she did really jilt the young man?"
exclaimed aunt Rachel.

"This has been said of her," I replied. "But, as far as I can learn,
she was really attached to him, and suffered great pain in rejecting
his offer. Wisely she regarded marriage as the most important event
of her life, and refused to make so solemn a contract with one in
whose principles she had not the fullest confidence."

"But she ought not to have encouraged Walter, if she did not intend
marrying him," said aunt Rachel, with some warmth.

"She encouraged him so long as she thought well of him. A closer
view revealed points of character hidden by distance. When she saw
these, her feelings were already deeply involved. But, like a true
woman, she turned from the proffered hand, even though, while in
doing so, her heart palpitated with pain. There is nothing false
about Mary Lane. She could no more trifle with a lover than she
could commit a crime. Think, then, how almost impossible it would be
for her to hear herself called, under existing circumstances, even
in sport, a jilt, without being hurt. Words sometimes have power to
hurt more than blows. Do you not see this now, aunt Rachel?"

"Oh, yes, yes. I see it; and I saw it before," said the old lady.
"And, in future, I will be more careful of my words. It is pretty
late in life to learn this lesson--but we are never too late to
learn. Poor Mary! It grieves me to think that I should have hurt her
so much."

Yes, words often have in them a smarting force, and we cannot be too
guarded how we use them. "Think twice before you speak once," is a
trite, but wise saying. We teach it to our children very carefully,
but are too apt to forget that it has not lost its application to
ourselves.




CHAPTER XXIV.

MAY BE SO.


"NEXT time you go out, you'll buy me a wagon, won't you, mother?"
said my little boy to me, one day.

I didn't want to say "no," and destroy his happy feelings; and I was
not prepared to say "yes;" and so I gave the evasive reply so often
used under such circumstances, "May be so," and which was meant
rather as a negative than an affirmative. The child was satisfied;
for he gave my words the meaning he wished them to have. In a little
while after, I had forgotten all about it. Not so my boy. To him the
"May be so" was "yes," and he set his heart, confidently, on
receiving the wagon the next time I should go out. This happened on
the afternoon of that very day. It was towards evening when I
returned. The moment I rung the bell at my own door, I heard his
pattering feet and gleeful voice in the entry.

"Where's my wagon?" said he, as I entered, a shade of disappointment
falling suddenly upon his excited, happy face.

"What wagon, dear?" I asked.

"My wagon. The wagon you promised to buy me."

"I didn't promise to buy a wagon, my son."

"Oh, yes you did, mother! You promised me this morning."

Tears were already in his eye, and his face wore a look of
distressing disappointment.

"I promised to buy you a wagon? I am sure I remember nothing about
it," I replied confidently. "What in the world put that into your
head?"

"Didn't I ask you?" said the child, the tears now overflowing his
cheeks.

"Yes, I believe you did ask me something about a wagon; but I didn't
promise to buy you one."

"Oh, yes you did, mother. You said may be so."

"But 'may be so' doesn't mean yes."

At this the little fellow uttered a distressing cry. His heart was
almost broken by disappointment. He had interpreted my words
according to his own wishes, and not according to their real
meaning.

Unprepared for an occurrence of this kind, I was not in the mood to
sympathise with my child fully. To be met thus, at the moment of my
return home, disturbed me.

"I didn't promise to buy you a wagon; and you must stop crying about
it," said I, seeing that he had given way to his feelings, and was
crying in a loud voice.

But he cried on. I went up stairs to lay off my things, and he
followed, still crying.

"You must hush, now," said I, more positively. "I cannot permit
this. I never promised to buy you a wagon."

"You said may be so," sobbed the child.

"May be so, and yes, are two different things. If I had said that I
would buy you a wagon, then there would have been some reason in
your disappointment; but I said no such thing."

He had paused to listen; but, as I ceased speaking, his crying was
renewed.

"You must stop this now. There is no use in it, and I will not have
it," said I, resolutely.

My boy choked down for a few moments at this, and half stifled his
grief; but o'ermastering him, it flowed on again as wildly as ever.
I felt impatient.

"Stop this moment, I say!" And I took hold of his arm firmly. My
will is strong, and when a little excited, it often leads me beyond
where I would go in moments of reflection. My boy knew this by
experience. By my manner of speaking he saw that I was in earnest,
and that, if he did not obey me, punishment would follow. So, with
what must have been a powerful effort for one so young, he stifled
the utterance of his grief. But, the storm within raged none the
less violently, and I could see his little frame quiver as he strove
to repress the rising sobs.

Turning away from me, he went and sat down on a low seat in a corner
of the room. I saw his form in the glass as I stood before it to
arrange my hair, after laying aside my bonnet; and for the first
time my feelings were touched. There was an abandonment in his whole
attitude; an air of grief about him that affected me with pity and
tenderness.

"Poor child!" I sighed. "His heart is almost broken. I ought to have
said yes or no; and then all would have been settled."

"Come," said I, after a few moments, reaching my hand towards the
child--"let us go down and look out for father. He will be home
soon."

I spoke kindly and cheerfully. But he neither moved, looked up, nor
gave the smallest sign that he heard me.

"Oh, well," said I, with some impatience in my voice--"it doesn't
matter at all. If you'd rather sit there than come down into the
parlor and look out for dear father, you can please yourself."

And turning away as I spoke, I left the chamber, and went down
stairs. Seating myself at the window, I looked forth and endeavored
to feel unconcerned and cheerful. But, this was beyond my power. I
saw nothing but the form of my grieving child, and could think of
nothing but his sorrow and disappointment.

"Nancy," said I to one of my domestics, who happened to come into
the parlor to ask me some question, "I wish you would run down to
the toy store in the next block, and buy Neddy a wagon. His heart is
almost broken about one."

The girl, always willing, when kindly spoke to, ran off to obey my
wishes, and in a little while came back with the article wanted.

"Now," said I, "go up into my room and tell Neddy that I've got
something for him. Don't mention the wagon; I want to take him by
surprise."

Nancy went bounding up the stairs, and I placed the wagon in the
centre of the room where it would meet the child's eyes on the
moment of his entrance, and then sat down to await his coming, and
enjoy his surprise and delight.

After the lapse of about a minute, I heard Nancy coming down slowly.

"Neddy's asleep," said she, looking in at the door.

"Asleep!" I felt greatly disappointed.

"Yes, ma'am. He was on the floor asleep. I took him up, and laid him
in your bed."

"Then he's over his troubles," said I, attempting to find a relief
for my feelings in this utterance. But no such relief came.

Taking the wagon in my hand, I went up to the chamber where he lay,
and bent over him. The signs of grief were still upon his innocent
face, and every now and then a faint sigh or sob gave evidence that
even sleep had not yet hushed entirely, the storm which had swept
over him.

"Neddy!" I spoke to him in a voice of tenderness, hoping that my
words might reach his ear, "Neddy, dear, I've bought you a wagon."

But his senses were locked. Taking him up, I undressed him, and
then, after kissing his lips, brow, and cheeks, laid him in his
little bed, and placed the wagon on the pillow beside him.

Even until the late hour at which I retired on that evening, were my
feelings oppressed by the incident I have described. My "May be so,"
uttered in order to avoid giving the direct answer my child wanted,
had occasioned him far more pain than a positive refusal of his
request could have done.

"I will be more careful in future," said I, as I lay thinking about
the occurrence, "how I create false hopes. My yea shall be yea, and
my nay nay. Of these cometh not evil."

In the morning when I awoke, I found Neddy in possession of his
wagon. He was running with it around the room, as happy as if a tear
had never been upon his cheek. I looked at him for many minutes
without speaking. At last, seeing that I was awake, he bounded up to
the bedside, and, kissing me, said:

"Thank you, dear mother, for buying me this wagon! You are a good
mother!"

I must own to having felt some doubts on the subject of Neddy's
compliment at the time. Since this little experience, I have been
more careful how I answer the petitions of my children; and avoid
the "May be so," "I'll see about it," and other such evasive answers
that come so readily to the lips. The good result I have experienced
in many instances.




CHAPTER XXV.

"THE POOR CHILD DIED."


MY baby, nine months old, had some fever, and seemed very unwell.
One neighbor said:

"You'd better send for the doctor."

Another suggested that it had, no doubt, eaten something that
disagreed with it, and that a little antimonial wine would enable it
to throw it off; another advised a few grains of calomel, and
another a dose of rheubarb. But I said:

"No. I'll wait a little while, and see if it won't get better."

"You should give him medicine in time. Many a person dies from not
taking medicine in time;" said a lady who expressed more than usual
concern for the well-being of my baby. She had a very sick child
herself.

"Many more die," I replied, "from taking medicine too soon. I
believe that one half of the diseases in the world are produced by
medicines, and that the other half are often made worse by their
injudicious administration."

"You'd better send for the doctor," urged the lady.

"No. I'll wait until the morning, and then, if he's no better, or
should be worse, I'll call in our physician. Children often appear
very sick one hour, and are comparatively well again in the next."

"It's a great risk," said the lady, gravely. "A very great risk. I
called in the doctor the moment my dear little Eddy began to droop
about. And it's well I did. He's near death's door as it is; and
without medical aid I would certainly have lost him before this.
He's only been sick a week, and you know yourself how low he is
reduced. Where do you think he would have been without medicine? The
disease has taken a terrible hold of him. Why, the doctor has bled
him twice; and his little chest is raw all over from a blister. He
has been cupped and leeched. We have had mustard plasters upon his
arms and the calves of his legs. I don't know how many grains of
calomel he has taken; and it has salivated him dreadfully. Oh! such
a sore mouth! Poor child! He suffers dreadfully. Besides, he has
taken some kind of powder almost every hour. They are dreadfully
nauseous; and we have to hold him, every time, and pour them down
his throat. Oh, dear! It makes my heart sick. Now, with all this,
the disease hangs on almost as bad as ever. Suppose we hadn't sent
for the doctor at first? Can't you see what would have been the
consequence? It is very wrong to put off calling in a physician upon
the first symptoms of a disease."

"Pardon me, Mrs. Lee, for saying so," was my reply, "but I cannot
help thinking that, if you had not called the doctor, your child
would have been quite well to-day."

Mrs. Lee--that was the lady's name--uttered an exclamation of
surprise and disapproval of my remark.

"But, cannot you see, yourself; that it is not the disease that has
reduced your child so low. The bleeding, blistering, cupping,
leeching, and calomel administrations, would have done all this, had
your child been perfectly well when it went into the doctor's
hands."

"But the disease would have killed him inevitably. If it requires
all this to break it, don't you see that it must have taken a most
fatal hold on the poor child's system."

"No, Mrs. Lee, I cannot see any such thing," was my reply. "The
medicine probably fixed the disease, that would, if left alone, have
retired of itself. What does the doctor say ails the child?"

"He does not seem to know. There seems to be a complication of
diseases."

"Produced by the treatment, no doubt. If there had been scarlet
fever, or small pox, or croup, active and energetic treatment would,
probably, have been required, and the doctor would have known what
he was about in administering his remedies. But, in a slight
indisposition, like that from which your child suffered, it is, in
my opinion, always better to give no medicine for a time. Drugs
thrown into the tender system of a child, will always produce
disease of some kind, more or less severe; and where slight
disorders already exist, they are apt to give them a dangerous hold
upon the body, or, uniting with them, cause a most serious, and, at
times, fatal illness."

But Mrs. Lee shook her head. She thought the doctors knew best. They
had great confidence in their family physician. He had doctored them
through many dangerous attacks, and had always brought them through
safely. As to the new-fangled notions about giving little or no
medicine, she had no confidence in them. Medicine was necessary at
times, and she always gave her children medicine at least two, or
three times a year, whether they were sick or well. Prevention, in
her eyes, was better than cure. And where there was actual sickness,
she was in favor of vigorous treatment. One good dose of medicine
would do more good than a hundred little ones; with much more to the
same effect.

On the next morning, my dear baby, who was just as sick for a few
hours as Mrs. Lee's child was at first, was as well as ever.

Not long after breakfast, I was sent for by Mrs. Lee. Her poor child
was much worse. The servant said that she was sure it was dying. I
changed my dress hurriedly, and went over to the house of my
neighbor.

Shall I describe the painful object that met my sight? It was three
days since I had seen the little sufferer; but, oh! how it had
changed in that brief time. Its face was sunken, its eyes far back
in their sockets, and its forehead marked with lines of suffering.
The whole of its breast was raw from the blister, and its mouth,
lying open, showed, with painful distinctness, the dreadful injury
wrought by the mercury thrown, with such a liberal hand, into its
delicate system. All the life seemed to have withdrawn itself from
the skin; for the vital forces, in the centre of its body, were
acting but feebly.

The doctor came in while I was there. He said but little. It was
plain that he was entirely at fault, and that he saw no hope of a
favorable issue. All his, "active treatment" had tended to break
down the child, rather than cure the disease from which it at first
suffered. There was a great deal of heat about the child's head, and
he said something about having it shaved for a blister.

"Wouldn't ice do better, doctor?" I felt constrained to suggest. He
turned upon me quickly and seemed annoyed.

"No, madam!" he replied with dignity.

I said no more, for I felt how vain my words would be. The blister,
however, was not ordered; but, in its stead, mustard plasters were
directed to be placed over the feet and legs to the knees, and a
solution of iodine, or iron, I don't now remember which, prescribed,
to be given every half hour.

I went home, some time after the doctor left, feeling sick at heart.
"They are murdering that child," I could not help saying to myself.
My own dear babe I found full of health and life; and I hugged it to
my breast with a feeling of thankfulness.

Before the day closed, Mrs. Lee's poor child died. Was it a cause of
wonder?




CHAPTER XXVI.

THE RIVAL BONNETS.


I HAVE a pleasant story to relate of a couple of fashionables of our
city, which will serve to diversify these "Confessions," and amuse
the reader. To the incidents, true in the main, I have taken the
liberty of adding some slight variations of my own.

A lady of some note in society, named Mrs. Claudine, received a very
beautiful bonnet from New York, a little in advance of others, and
being one of the rival leaders in the fashionable world, felt some
self-complacency at the thought of appearing abroad in the elegant
head-gear, and thereby getting the reputation of leading the
fashion.

Notwithstanding Mrs. Claudine's efforts to keep the matter a secret,
and thus be able to create a surprise when she appeared at church on
the next Sunday, the fact that she had received the bonnet leaked
out, and there was some excitement about it. Among those who heard
of the new bonnet, was a Mrs. Ballman, who had written to a friend
to get for her the very article obtained first by Mrs. Claudine.
From some cause or other a delay had occurred, and to her chagrin
she learned that a rival had the new fashion, and would get the
_eclat_ that she so much coveted. The disappointment, to one whose
pleasures in life are so circumscribed as those of a real
fashionable lady, was severe indeed. She did not sleep more than a
few hours on the night after she received the mortifying
intelligence.

The year before, Mrs. Claudine had led the fashion in some article
of dress, and to see her carry off the palm in bonnets on this
occasion, when she had striven so hard to be in advance, was more
than Mrs. Bellman could endure. The result of a night's thinking on
the subject was a determination to pursue a very extraordinary
course, the nature of which will be seen. By telegraph Mrs. Bellman
communicated with her friend in New York, desiring her to send on by
the evening of the next day, which was Saturday, the bonnet she had
ordered, if four prices had to be paid as an inducement to get the
milliner to use extra exertions in getting it up. In due time,
notice came back that the bonnet would be sent on by express on
Saturday, much to the joy of Mrs. Ballman, who from the interest she
felt in carrying out her intentions, had entirely recovered from the
painful disappointment at first experienced.

Saturday brought the bonnet, and a beautiful one it was. A few
natural sighs were expended over the elegant affair, and then other
feelings came in to chase away regrets at not having been first to
secure the article.

On the day previous, Friday, Mrs. Ballman called upon a fashionable
milliner, and held with her the following conversation.

"You have heard of Mrs. Claudine's new bonnet, I presume?"

"Yes, madam," replied the milliner.

"Do you think it will take?" asked Mrs. Ballman.

"I do."

"You have not the pattern?"

"Oh, yes. I received one a week ago."

"You did!"

"Yes. But some one must introduce it. As Mrs. Claudine is about
doing this there is little doubt of its becoming the fashion, for
the style is striking as well as tasteful."

Mrs. Ballman mused for some moments. There she drew the milliner
aside, and said, in a low confidential tone.

"Do you think you could get up a bonnet a handsome as that, and in
just as good taste?"

"I know I could. In my last received London and Paris fashions are
several bonnets a handsome as the one that is about being adopted in
New York, and here also without doubt."

"I am not so sure of its being adopted here," said the lady.

"If Mrs. Claudine introduces it, as I understand she intends doing
on Sunday, it will certainly be approved and the style followed."

"I very much doubt it. But we will see. Where are the bonnets you
spoke of just now?"

The milliner brought forth a number of pattern cards and plates, and
pointed out two bonnets, either of which, in her judgment, was more
beautiful than the one Mrs. Claudine had received.

"Far handsomer," was the brief remark with which Mrs. Ballman
approved the milliner's judgment. "And now," she added, "can you get
me up one of these by Sunday?"

"I will try."

"Try won't do," said the lady, with some excitement in her manner.
"I must have the bonnet. Can you make it?"

"Yes."

"Very well. Then make it. And let it be done in your very best
manner. Why I wish to have this bonnet I need hardly explain to you.
I believed that I would have received the bonnet, about to be
adopted in New York, first. I had written to a friend to procure it;
but, by some means, Mrs. Claudine has obtained hers in advance of
me. Mine will be here to-morrow, but I don't mean to wear it. I wish
to lead."

"If you were both to appear in this bonnet, the fashion would be
decided," said the milliner.

"I know. But I have no wish to share the honor with Mrs. Claudine.
Make me the bonnet I have selected, and I will see that it puts
hers down."

"You will remember," said the milliner, "that hers has been
already adopted in New York. This will be almost sure to give it the
preference. It would be better that you did not attempt a rivalry,
than that you should be beaten."

"But I don't mean to be beaten," replied the lady. "I have taken
measures to prevent that. After Sunday you will hear no more of the
New York bonnet. Mine will go, and this, I need not tell you, will
be a feather in your cap, and dollars in your pocket; as I will
refer to you as the only one who can get it up. So do your best, and
improve the pattern we have selected, if it will bear improvement."

The milliner promised to do her "prettiest," and Mrs. Ballman
returned home in a state of considerable elation at the prospect of
carrying off the palm, and humiliating her rival at the same time.

Mrs. Claudine, though a little vain, and fond of excelling, was a
woman of kind feelings, and entirely superior to the petty
jealousies that annoyed Mrs. Ballman, and soured her towards all who
succeeded in rivalling her in matters of taste and fashion. Of what
was passing in the mind of the lady who had been so troubled at her
reception of a new style of bonnet from New York, she was entirely
ignorant. She was not even aware that Mrs. Ballman had ordered the
same article, nor that she had suffered a disappointment.

Saturday came. Mrs. Claudine was busy over some little article of
dress that was to add to her appearance on the next day, when an
Irish girl, who had formerly lived with her, entered her room.

"Ah! Kitty!" said the lady pleasantly. "How do you do?"

"I'm right well, mum, thankee," replied Kitty, with a courtesy.

"Where do you live now, Kitty?" inquired Mrs. Claudine.

"I'm living with Mrs. Ballman," said the girl.

"A very good place, I have no doubt."

"Oh, yes, mum. It is a good place. I hain't much to do, barrin'
going out with the children on good days, and seein' after them in
the house; and I get good wages."

"I'm very glad to hear it, Kitty; and hope you will not give up so
good a home."

"No, indeed, mum; and I won't do that. But Mrs. Claudine--"

Kitty's face flushed, and she stammered in her speech.

"What do you wish to say?" inquired the lady, seeing that Kitty
hesitated to speak of what was on her mind.

"Indade, mum," said Kitty, evincing much perplexity, "I hardly know
what I ought to do. But yez were good to me, mum, when I was sick
and didn't send me off to the poor house like some girls are sent;
and I never can forget yez while there's breath in me body. And now
I've come to ask yez, just as a favor to me, not to wear that new
bonnet from New York, to-morrow."

It was some moments before, the surprise occasioned by so novel and
unexpected a request left Mrs. Claudine free to make any reply.

"Why, Kitty!" she at length exclaimed, "what on earth can you mean?"

"Indade, mum, and yez mustn't ask me what I mane, only don't wear
the bonnet to church on the morrow, because--because--och, indade,
mum, dear! I can't say any more. It wouldn't be right."

Mrs. Claudine told Kitty to sit down, an invitation which the girl,
who was much agitated, accepted. The lady then remained silent and
thoughtful for some time.

"Kitty," she remarked, at length, in a serious manner, "what you
have said to me sounds very strangely. How you should know that I
intended appearing in a new bonnet to-morrow, or why you should be
so much interested in the matter is more than I can understand. As
to acting as you desire, I see no reason for that whatever."

This reply only had the effect of causing Kitty to urge her request
more strenuously. But she would give no reason for her singular
conduct. After the girl had gone away, Mrs. Claudine laid aside her
work--for she was not in a state of mind to do any thing but
think---and sat for at least an hour, musing upon the strange
incident which had occurred. All at once, it flashed upon her mind
that there must be some plot in progress to discredit or rival her
new bonnet, which Kitty had learned at Mrs. Ballman's. The more she
thought of this, the more fully did she become satisfied that it
must be so. She was aware that Mrs. Ballman had been chagrined at
her leading off in new fashions once or twice before; and the fact,
evident now, that she knew of her reception of the bonnet, and
Kitty's anxiety that she should not wear it on Sunday, led her to
the conviction that there was some plot against her. At first, she
determined to appear in her new bonnet, disregardful of Kitty's
warning. But subsequent reflection brought her to a different
conclusion.

The moment Mrs. Claudine settled it in her mind that she would not
appear in the new bonnet, she began dressing herself, hurriedly, to
go out. It was as late as five o'clock in the afternoon when she
called at the store of the milliner who had been commissioned by
Mrs. Ballman to get the rival bonnet.

"Have you the last fashions from abroad?" enquired Mrs. Claudine.

"We have," replied the milliner.

"Will you let me see them?"

"Certainly, ma'am."

And the patterns were shown. After examining them carefully, for
some time, Mrs. Claudine selected a style of bonnet that pleased her
fancy, and said--

"You must get me up this bonnet so that I can wear it to-morrow."

"Impossible, madam!" replied the milliner. "This is Saturday
evening."

"I know it is; but for money you can get one of your girls to work
all night. I don't care what you charge; but I must have the
bonnet."

The milliner still hesitated, and seemed to be confused and uneasy.
She asked Mrs. Claudine to sit down and wait for a little while, and
then retired to think upon what she had better do. The fact was,
Mrs. Claudine had pitched upon the very bonnet Mrs. Ballman had
ordered, and her earnestness about having it made in time to wear on
the next day, put it almost beyond her power to say no. If she were
to tell her that Mrs. Ballman had ordered the same bonnet, it would,
she knew, settle the matter. But, it occurred to her, that if both
the ladies were to appear at church in the same style of bonnet, the
fashion would be sure to take, and she, in consequence, get a large
run of business. This thought sent the blood bounding through the
milliner's veins, and decided her to keep her own counsel, and take
Mrs. Claudine's order.

"She's as much right to the bonnet as Mrs. Ballman," settled all
ethical questions that intruded themselves upon the milliner.

"I will have it ready for you," she said, on returning to Mrs.
Claudine.

"Very well. But mind," said the lady, "I wish it got up in the very
best style. The hurry must not take from its beauty. As for the
price, charge what you please."

The milliner promised every thing, and Mrs. Claudine went home to
think about the important events of the approaching Sabbath. On
Sunday morning both bonnets were sent home, and both the ladies
fully approved the style, effect, and all things appertaining to the
elegant affairs.

At ten o'clock, Kitty, who was a broad-faced, coarse-looking Irish
girl, came into the chamber of Mrs. Ballman, dressed up in her best,
which was not saying much for the taste and elegance of her
appearance.

"Are you all ready?" asked her mistress.

"Yes, mum."

"Very well, Kitty, here's the bonnet. Now, remember, you are to go
into the pew just in front of ours. The Armburner's are all out of
town, and there will be no one to occupy it."

Kitty received the elegant bonnet which had come on express from New
York, and placed it upon her head.

"You really look charming," said the lady.

But Kitty was not flattered by her words, and evinced so little
heart in what she was doing that Mrs Ballman said to her, in a half
threatening tone, as she left the room--

"Mind, Kitty, I shall expect to see you at church."

"Oh, yes, mum; I'll be there," replied Kitty, courtesying awkwardly,
and retiring.

Not long after Kitty had retired, Mrs. Ballman, after surveying, for
many minutes, the effect of her new bonnet, becoming more and more
pleased with it every moment, and more and more satisfied that it
would "take," left her room, and was descending the stairs for the
purpose of joining the family, who were awaiting her below. Just at
that unlucky moment, a servant, who was bringing down a vessel of
water, slipped, and a portion of the contents came dashing over the
head and shoulders of the richly attired lady, ruining her elegant
bonnet, and completely destroying the happy frame of mind in which
she was about attending public worship. No wonder that she cried
aloud from the sudden shock and distress so untoward an event
occasioned; nor that she went back weeping to her chamber, and
refused to be comforted.

Mr. Ballman and the children proceeded alone to church on that day.
On their return home they found the lady in a calmer frame of mind.
But Mr. Ballman looked grave and was unusually silent. Kitty came
home and gave up her elegant head-dress; and when her mistress told
her that she might keep it, she thanked her, but declined the
present.

"You went to church, of course," she said.

"Oh, yes, mum," replied Kitty.

"And sat in the Armburner's pew?"

"Yes, mum."

"Alone."

"Yes, mum."

"Was Mrs. Claudine there?"

"Yes, mum."

"Did she wear her new bonnet?"

"Yes, mum."

"It was exactly like this?"

"Oh, no, mum, it was exactly like the new one you had sent home this
morning."

"What!" The face of the lady flushed instantly. "Wasn't it like
this?"

"No, mum."

Mrs. Ballman sunk into a chair.

"You can retire, Kitty," she said, and the girl withdrew, leaving
her to her own feelings and reflections, which were not of the most
pleasing character.

The appearance of Kitty at church, fully explained to Mrs. Claudine
the ungenerous game that had been played against her. Her first
thought was to retaliate. But reflection brought other and better
feelings into play. Instead of exposing what had been done, she
destroyed the bonnet received from New York, and made an effort to
keep what had occurred a secret. But Kitty's appearance at church in
such an elegant affair, naturally created some talk. One surmise
after another was started, and, at last, from hints dropped by the
milliner, and admissions almost extorted from Mrs. Claudine, the
truth came out so fully, that all understood it; nor was Mrs.
Ballman long left in ignorance on this head.

As to the fashion, Mrs. Claudine's bonnet became the rage; though,
as might be supposed, Mrs. Ballman refused to adopt it.

Who will be the successful rival next season, I am unable to
predict. But it is believed that Mrs. Claudine intends giving Mrs.
Ballman an advance of two weeks, and then coming in with a different
style, and beating her in spite of the advantage.




CHAPTER XXVII.

MY WASHERWOMAN.


WE were sitting at tea one evening--Mr. Smith, my sister and her
husband, Mr. John Jones, and myself. In the midst of a pleasant
conversation, Bridget looked into the dining-room.

"What is wanted?" said I.

"Mary Green is down stairs."

"Oh! the washerwoman."

"Yes ma'am."

"Well, what does she want?"

I knew what she wanted well enough. She had come for two dollars
that I owed her. I felt annoyed. "Why?" the reader asks.
"Obligations of this kind should always be met promptly and
cheerfully."

True; and I am of those who never grudge the humble poor the reward
of their labor. But, it so happened that I had received a pretty
liberal supply of money from my husband on this very day, all of
which I had spent in shopping. Some of my purchases could not be
classed exactly under the head, "Articles of Domestic Economy," and
I was, already, in rather a repentant mood--the warmth of admiration
at the sight of sundry ornamental trifles having subsided almost as
soon as I found myself their owner. To my question, Bridget very
promptly answered,

"She's come for her money."

When a woman feels annoyed, she is rarely able to repress its
exhibition. Men are cooler, and have a quicker self control. They
make better hypocrites.

"She's very prompt," I remarked, a little fretfully, as I took out
my porte-monnaie. Now I did not possess twenty cents, and I knew it;
still, I fingered among its compartments as if in search of the
little gold dollars that were not there.

"Hav'nt you the change?" enquired Mr. Smith, at the same time
drawing forth his purse, through the meshes of which the gold and
silver coin glittered in the gas light.

"No dear," I replied, feeling instant relief.

"Help yourself;" said he, as he tossed the purse to my side of the
table. I was not long in accepting the invitation you may be sure.

"Don't think," said I, after Bridget had retired, "that I am one of
those who grudge the toiling poor the meagre wages they earn. I
presume I looked, as I spoke, a little annoyed. The fact is, to tell
the honest truth, I have not a dollar in my porte-monnaie; this with
the not very pleasant consciousness of having spent several dollars
to-day rather foolishly, fretted me when the just demand of the
washerwoman came."

"I will exonerate my wife from any suspicion of grinding the faces
of the poor." Mr. Smith spoke promptly and with some earnestness of
manner. After a slight pause, he continued,

"Some people have a singular reluctance to part with money. If
waited on for a bill, they say, almost involuntarily, 'Call
to-morrow,' even though their pockets are far from being empty.

"I once fell into this bad habit myself; but, a little incident,
which I will relate, cured me. Not many years after I had attained
my majority, a poor widow named Blake did my washing and ironing.
She was the mother of two or three little children, whose sole
dependance for food and raiment was on the labor of her hands.

"Punctually, every Thursday morning, Mrs. Blake appeared with my
clothes, 'white as the driven snow;' but, not always, as punctually,
did I pay the pittance she had earned by hard labor.

"'Mrs. Blake is down stairs,' said a servant tapping at my room
door, one morning, while I was in the act of dressing myself.

"'Oh, very well,' I replied. 'Tell her to leave my clothes. I will
get them when I come down.'

"The thought of paying the seventy-five cents, her due, crossed my
mind. But, I said to myself, 'It's but a small matter, and will do
as well when she comes again.'

"There was in this a certain reluctance to part with money. My funds
were low, and I might need what change I had during the day. And so
it proved! As I went to the office in which I was engaged, some
small article of ornament caught my eye in a shop window.

"'Beautiful!' said I, as I stood looking at it. Admiration quickly
changed into the desire for possession; and so I stepped in to ask
the price. It was just two dollars.

"'Cheap enough,' thought I. And this very cheapness was a further
temptation.

"So I turned out the contents of my pockets, counted them over, and
found the amount to be two dollars and a quarter.

"'I guess I'll take it,' said I, laying the money on the
shopkeeper's counter.

"'Better have paid Mrs. Blake.' This thought crossed my mind, an
hour afterwards, by which time, the little ornament had lost its
power of pleasing. 'So much would at least have been saved.'

"I was leaving the table, after tea, on the evening that followed,
when the waiter said to me--

"'Mrs. Blake is at the door, and wishes to see you.'

"I felt worried at hearing this; for there was no change in my
pockets, and the poor washerwoman, had, of course, come for her
money.

"'She's in a great hurry,' I muttered to myself as I descended to
the door.

"'You'll have to wait until you bring home my clothes next week,
Mrs. Blake.' I havn't any change this evening.'

"The expression of the poor woman's face, as she turned slowly away,
without speaking, rather softened my feelings.

"'I'm sorry,' said I--'but, it can't be helped now. I wish you had
said, this morning, that you wanted money. I could have paid you
then.'

"She paused, and turned partly towards me as I said this. Then she
moved off, with something so sad in her manner, that I was touched,
sensibly.

"'I ought to have paid her this morning when I had the change about
me. And I wish I had done so. Why didn't she ask for her money if
she wanted it so badly.'

"I felt, of coarse, rather ill at ease. A little while afterwards, I
met the lady with whom I was boarding.

"'Do you know anything about this Mrs. Blake, who washes for me?' I
enquired.

"'Not much; except that she is very poor, and has three children to
feed and clothe. And what is worst of all, she is in bad health. I
think she told me this morning, that one of her little ones was very
sick.'

"I was smitten with a feeling of self-condemnation, and soon after
left the room. It was too late to remedy the evil, for I had only a
sixpence in my pocket; and, moreover, I did not know where to find
Mrs. Blake. Having purposed to make a call upon some young ladies
that evening, I now went up into my room to dress. Upon my bed lay
the spotless linen brought home by Mrs. Blake in the morning. The
sight of it rebuked me; and I had to conquer, with some force, an
instinctive reluctance, before I could compel myself to put on a
clean shirt, and snow-white vest, too recently from the hand of my
unpaid washerwoman.

"One of the young ladies upon whom I called was more than a mere
pleasant acquaintance. (And here Mr. Smith glanced, with a tender
smile, towards me.) My heart had, in fact been warming towards her
for some time; and I was particularly anxious to find favor in her
eyes. On this evening she was lovelier and more attractive than
ever.

"Judge then, of the effect produced upon me by the entrance of her
mother--at the very moment when my heart was all a-glow with love,
who said, as she came in--

"'Oh, dear! This is a strange world!'

"'What new feature have you discovered now, mother?' asked one of
her daughters, smiling.

"'No new one, child; but an old one that looks more repulsive than
ever,' was answered. 'Poor Mrs. Blake came to see me just now, in
great trouble.'

"'What about, mother?' All the young ladies at once manifested
unusual interest.

"Tell-tale blushes came instantly to my countenance, upon which the
eyes of the mother turned themselves, as I felt, with a severe
scrutiny.

"'The old story in cases like hers,' was answered. 'Can't get
her money when earned, although, for daily bread, she is dependent
on her daily labor. With no food in the house, or money to buy
medicine for her sick child, she was compelled to seek me to-night,
and to humble her spirit, which is an independent one, so low as to
ask bread for her little ones, and the loan of a pittance with which
to get what the doctor has ordered for her feeble sufferer at home.'

"'Oh, what a shame!' fell from the lips of her in whom my heart felt
more than a passing interest; and she looked at me earnestly as she
spoke.

"'She fully expected,' said the mother, 'to get a trifle that was
due her from a young man who boards with Mrs. Corwin; and she went
to see him this evening. But he put her off with some excuse. How
strange that any one should be so thoughtless as to withhold from
the poor their hard-earned pittance! It is but a small sum, at best,
that the toiling seamstress or washerwoman can gain by her wearying
labor. That, at least, should be promptly paid. To withhold it an
hour is to do, in many cases, a great wrong.'

"For some minutes after this was said, there ensued a dead silence.
I felt that the thoughts of all were turned upon me as the one who
had withheld from poor Mrs. Blake the trifling sum due her for
washing. What my feelings were, it is impossible for me to describe;
and difficult for any one, never himself placed in so unpleasant a
position, to imagine.

"My relief was great when the conversation flowed on again, and in
another channel; for I then perceived that suspicion did not rest
upon me. You may be sure that Mrs. Blake had her money before ten
o'clock on the next day, and that I never again fell into the error
of neglecting, for a single week, my poor washerwoman."

"Such a confession from you, Mr. Smith, of all men," said I, feeling
a little uncomfortable, that he should have told this story of
himself.

"We are none of us perfect," he answered, "He is best, who,
conscious of natural defects and evils, strives against, and
overcomes them."




CHAPTER XXVIII.

MY BORROWING NEIGHBOR.


"I THINK, my dear," said I to my husband one day, "that we shall
have to move from here."

"Why so?" asked Mr. Smith, in surprise. "It is a very comfortable
house. I am certain we will not get another as desirable at the same
rent."

"I don't know that we will. But--"

Just as I said this, my cook opened the door of the room where we
were sitting and said--

"Mrs. Jordon, ma'am, wants to borrow half a pound of butter. She
says, they are entirely out, and their butter-man won't come before
to-morrow."

"Very well, Bridget, let her have it."

The cook retired.

"Why do you wish to move, Jane?" asked my husband, as the girl
closed the door.

"Cook's visit was quite apropos," I replied. "It is on account of
the 'half pound of butter,' 'cup of sugar,' and 'pan of flour'
nuisance."

"I don't exactly comprehend you, Jane," said my husband.

"It is to get rid of a borrowing neighbor. The fact is, Mrs. Jordon
is almost too much for me. I like to be accommodating; it gives me
pleasure to oblige my neighbors; I am ready to give any reasonable
obedience to the Scripture injunction--_from him that would borrow
of thee, turn thou not away_; but Mrs. Jordon goes beyond all
reason."

"Still, if she is punctual in returning what she gets, I don't know
that you ought to let it annoy you a great deal."

"There lies the gist of the matter, my dear," I replied. "If there
were no 'if,' such as you suggest, in the case, I would not think a
great deal about it. But, the fact is, there is no telling the cups
of sugar, pans of flour, pounds of butter, and little matters of
salt, pepper, vinegar, mustard, ginger, spices, eggs, lard, meal,
and the dear knows what all, that go out monthly, but never come
back again. I verily believe we suffer through Mrs. Jordon's habit
of borrowing not less than fifty or sixty dollars a year. Little
things like these count up."

"So bad as that, is it?" said my husband.

"Indeed it is; and when she returns anything, it is almost always of
an inferior quality, and frequently thrown away on that account."

While we were talking, the tea bell rang, and we retired to the
dining-room.

"What's the matter with this tea?" asked Mr. Smith, pushing the cup
I had handed him aside, after leaving sipped of its contents. "I
never tasted such stuff. It's like herb tea."

"It must be something in the water," replied I. "The tea is the same
we have been using all along."

I poured some into a cup and tasted it.

"Pah!" I said, with disgust, and rang the bell. The cook entered in
a few moments.

"Bridget, what's the matter with your tea? It isn't fit to drink. Is
it the same we have been using?"

"No, ma'am," replied Bridget. "It is some Mrs. Jordon sent home. I
reminded Nancy, when she was here for butter, that they owed us some
tea, borrowed day before yesterday, and she came right back with it,
saying that Mrs. Jordon was sorry it had slipped her mind. I thought
I would draw it by itself, and not mix it with the tea in our
canister."

"You can throw this out and draw fresh tea, Bridget; we can't drink
it," said I, handing her the tea-pot.

"You see how it works," I remarked as Bridget left the room, and my
husband leaned back in his chair to wait for a fresh cup of tea.
"One half of the time, when anything is returned, we can't use it.
The butter Mrs. Jordon got a little while ago, if returned
to-morrow, will not be fit to go on our table. We can only use it
for cooking."

"It isn't right," sententiously remarked my husband. "The fact is,"
he resumed, after a slight pause, "I wouldn't lend such a woman
anything. It is a downright imposition."

"It is a very easy thing to say that, Mr. Smith. But I am not
prepared to do it. I don't believe Mrs. Jordon means to do wrong, or
is really conscious that she is trespassing upon us. Some people
don't reflect. Otherwise she is a pleasant neighbor, and I like her
very much. It is want of proper thought, Mr. Smith, and nothing
else."

"If a man kept treading on my gouty toe for want of thought," said
my husband, "I should certainly tell him of it, whether he got
offended I or not. If his friendship could only be retained on these
terms, I would prefer dispensing with the favor."

"The case isn't exactly parallel, Mr. Smith," was my reply. "The
gouty toe and crushing heel are very palpable and straightforward
matters, and a man would be an egregious blockhead to be offended
when reminded of the pain he was inflicting. But it would be
impossible to make Mrs. Jordon at all conscious of the extent of her
short-comings, very many of which, in fact, are indirect, so far as
she is concerned, and arise from her general sanction of the
borrowing system. I do not suppose, for a moment, that she knows
about everything that is borrowed."

"If she doesn't, pray who does?" inquired my husband.

"Her servants. I have to be as watchful as you can imagine, to see
that Bridget, excellent a girl as she is, doesn't suffer things to
get out, and then, at the last moment, when it is too late to send
to the store, run in to a neighbor's and borrow to hide her neglect.
If I gave her a _carte blanche_ for borrowing, I might be as
annoying to my neighbors as Mrs. Jordon."

"That's a rather serious matter," said my husband. "In fact, there
is no knowing how much people may suffer in their neighbors' good
opinion, through the misconduct of their servants in this very
thing."

"Truly said. And now let me relate a fact about Mrs. Jordon, that
illustrates your remark." (The fresh tea had come in, and we were
going on with our evening meal.) "A few weeks ago we had some
friends here, spending the evening. When about serving refreshments,
I discovered that my two dozen tumblers had been reduced to seven or
eight. On inquiry, I learned that Mrs. Jordon had ten--the rest had
been broken. I sent to her, with my compliments, and asked her to
return them, as I had some company, and wished to use them in
serving refreshments. Bridget was gone some time, and when she
returned, said that Mrs. Jordon at first denied having any of my
tumblers. Her cook was called, who acknowledged to five, and, after
sundry efforts on the part of Bridget to refresh her memory, finally
gave in to the whole ten. Early on the next morning Mrs. Jordon came
in to see me, and seemed a good deal mortified about the tumblers.

"'It was the first I had heard about it,' she said. 'Nancy, it now
appears, borrowed of you to hide her own breakage, and I should have
been none the wiser, if you had not sent in. I have not a single
tumbler left. It is too bad! I don't care so much for the loss of
the tumblers, as I do for the mortifying position it placed me in
toward a neighbor.'"

"Upon my word!" exclaimed my husband. "That is a beautiful
illustration, sure enough, of my remarks about what people may
suffer in the good opinion of others, through the conduct of their
servants in this very thing. No doubt Mrs. Jordon, as you suggest,
is guiltless of a good deal of blame now laid at her door. It was a
fair opportunity for you to give her some hints on the subject. You
might have opened her eyes a little, or at least diminished the
annoyance you had been, and still are enduring."

"Yes, the opportunity was a good one, and I ought to have improved
it. But I did not and the whole system, sanctioned or not sanctioned
by Mrs. Jordon, is in force against me."

"And will continue, unless some means be adopted by which to abate
the nuisance."

"Seriously, Mr. Smith," said I, "I am clear for removing from the
neighborhood."

But Mr. Smith said,

"Nonsense, Jane!" A form of expression he uses, when he wishes to
say that my proposition or suggestion is perfectly ridiculous, and
not to be thought of for a moment.

"What is to be done?" I asked. "Bear the evil?"

"Correct it, if you can."

"And if not, bear it the best I can?"

"Yes, that is my advice."

This was about the extent of aid I ever received from my husband in
any of my domestic difficulties. He is a first-rate abstractionist,
and can see to a hair how others ought to act in every imaginable,
and I was going to say unimaginable case; but is just as backward
about telling people what he thinks of them, and making everybody
with whom he has anything to do toe the mark, as I am.

As the idea of moving to get rid of my borrowing neighbor was
considered perfect nonsense by Mr. Smith, I began to think seriously
how I should check the evil, now grown almost insufferable. On the
next morning the coffee-mill was borrowed to begin with.

"Hasn't Mrs. Jordon got a coffee-mill of her own?" I asked of
Bridget.

"Yes, ma'am," she replied, "but it is such a poor one that Nancy
won't use it. She says it takes her forever and a day to grind
enough coffee for breakfast."

"Does she get ours every morning?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Nancy opened the kitchen door at this moment--our back gates were
side by side--and said--

"Mrs. Jordon says, will you oblige her so much as to let her have an
egg to clear the coffee? I forgot to tell her yesterday that ours
were all gone."

"Certainly," I said. "Bridget, give Nancy an egg."

"Mrs. Jordon is very sorry to trouble you, Mrs. Smith," said Nancy,
re-appearing in a little while, and finding me still in the kitchen,
"but she says if you will lend her a bowl of sugar it will be a
great accommodation. I forgot to tell her yesterday that the sugar
was all gone."

"You appear to be rather forgetful of such matters, Nancy," I could
not help saying.

"I know I am a little forgetful," the girl said, good humoredly, "but
I have so much to do, that I hardly have time to think."

"Where is the large earthen dish that you use sometimes in making
bread?" I asked, after Mrs. Jordon's cook had withdrawn, missing it
from its usual place on the shelf.

"Nancy borrowed it last week."

"Why don't she bring it home?"

"I've told her about it three or four times."

Nancy opened the door again.

"Please, ma'am to let Mrs. Jordon have another half pound of butter.
We haven't enough to do for breakfast, and the butter man don't come
until the middle of the day."

Of course, I couldn't refuse, though I believe I granted the request
with no very smiling grace. I heard no more of Nancy until toward
dinner-time. I had given my cook orders not to lend her anything
more without first coming to me.

"Mrs. Jordon has sent in to know if you won't lend her two or three
scuttles full of coal," said Bridget. "Mr. Jordon was to have sent
home the fires are going down."

"Certainly," I replied, "let her have it, but I want you to see that
it is returned."

"As to that, ma'am, I'll do my best; but I can't get Nancy to return
one half what she borrows. She forgets from one day to another."

"She mustn't forget," I returned, warmly. "You must go to Mrs.
Jordon yourself. It isn't right."

"I shall have to go, I guess, before I'm able to get back a dozen
kitchen things of ours they have. I never saw such borrowing people.
And then, never to think of returning what they get. They have got
one of our pokers, the big sauce-pan and the cake-board. Our muffin
rings they've had these three months. Every Monday they get two of
our tubs and the wash-boiler. Yesterday they sent in and got our
large meat-dish belonging to the dinner-set, and haven't sent it
home yet. Indeed, I can't tell you all they've got."

"Let Nancy have the coal," said I. "But we must stop this in some
way, if it be possible."

For three or four days the same thing was kept up, until I lost all
patience, and resolved, offence or no offence, to end a system that
was both annoying and unjust.

Mrs. Jordon called in to see me one day, and sat conversing in a
very pleasant strain for an hour. She was an agreeable companion,
and I was pleased with the visit. In fact, I liked Mrs. Jordon.

About an hour after she was gone, Nancy came into the kitchen, where
I happened to be.

"What's wanted now?" said I. My voice expressed quite as much as my
words. I saw the color flush in Nancy's face.

"Mrs. Jordon says, will you please to lend her a pan of flour? She
will return it to-morrow."

"Tell Mrs. Jordon," I replied, "that we are going to make up bread
this afternoon, and haven't more than enough flour left, or I would
let her have what she wants. And, by the way, Nancy, tell Mrs.
Jordon that I will be obliged to her if she will send in my large
earthen dish. We want to use it."

Nancy didn't seem pleased. And I thought she muttered something to
herself as she went away.

Not five minutes elapsed before word came to my room that Mrs.
Jordon was in the parlor and wished to speak to me.

"Now for trouble," thought I. Sure enough, when I entered the
parlor, the knit brow, flushed face, and angry eyes of my neighbor
told me that there was to be a scene.

"Mrs. Smith," she began, without ceremony or apology for her
abruptness of manner, "I should like to know what you mean by the
manner in which you refused to let me have a little flour just now?"

"How did I refuse?" I was cool enough to inquire.

"You refused in a manner which plainly enough snowed that you
thought me a troublesome borrower. 'What's wanted now?' I think
rather strange language to use to a domestic of mine."

Really, thought I, this caps the climax.

"To speak the plain truth, Mrs. Jordon," said I, "and not wishing to
give any offence, you do use the privilege of a neighbor in this
respect rather freely--more freely, I must own, than I feel
justified in doing."

"Mrs. Smith, this is too much!" exclaimed Mrs. Jordon. "Why you
borrow of me twice where I borrow of you once. I am particularly
careful in matters of this kind."

I looked at the woman with amazement.

"Borrow of you?" I asked.

"Certainly!" she replied, with perfect coolness. "Scarcely a day
passes that you do not send in for something or other. But dear
knows! I have always felt pleasure in obliging you."

I was mute for a time.

"Really, Mrs. Jordon," said I, at length, as composedly as I could
speak, "you seem to be laboring under some strange mistake. The
charge of frequent borrowing, I imagine, lies all on the other side.
I can name a dozen of my things in your house now, and can mention
as many articles borrowed within the last three days."

"Pray do so," was her cool reply.

"You have my large wash-boiler," I replied, "and two of my washing
tubs. You borrow them every Monday, and I have almost always to send
for them."

"I have your wash-boiler and tubs? You are in error, Mrs. Smith. I
have a large boiler of my own, and plenty of tubs."

"I don't know what you have, Mrs. Jordon; but I do know that you get
mine every week. Excuse me for mentioning these things--I do so at
your desire. Then, there is my coffee-mill, borrowed every morning."

"Coffee-mill! Why should I borrow your coffee-mill? We have one of
our own."

"Yesterday you borrowed butter, and eggs, and sugar," I continued.

"I?" my neighbor seemed perfectly amazed.

"Yes; and the day before a loaf of bread--an egg to clear your
coffee--salt, pepper, and a nutmeg."

"Never!"

"And to-day Nancy got some lard, a cup of coffee, and some Indian
meal for a pudding."

"She did?" asked Mrs. Jordon in a quick voice, a light seeming to
have flashed upon her mind.

"Yes," I replied, "for I was in the kitchen when she got the lard
and meal, and Bridget mentioned the coffee as soon as I came down
this morning."

"Strange!" Mrs. Jordon looked thoughtful. "It isn't a week since we
got coffee, and I am sure our Indian meal cannot be out."

"Almost every week Nancy borrows a pound or a half pound of butter
on the day before your butter man comes; and more than that, doesn't
return it, or indeed anything she gets more than a third of the
time."

"Precisely the complaint I have to make against you," said Mrs.
Jordon, looking me steadily in the face.

"Then," said I "there is something wrong somewhere, for to my
knowledge nothing has been borrowed from you or any body else for
months. I forbid anything of the kind."

"Be that as it may, Mrs. Smith; Nancy frequently comes to me and
says you have sent in for this, that, and the other thing--coffee,
tea, sugar, butter; and, in fact, almost everything used in a
family."

"Then Nancy gets them for her own use," said I.

"But I have often seen Bridget in myself for things."

"My Bridget!" I said, in surprise.

I instantly rang the bell.

"Tell Bridget I want her," said I to the waiter who came to the
door. The cook soon appeared.

"Bridget, are you in the habit of borrowing from Mrs. Jordon without
my knowledge?"

"No, ma'am!" replied the girl firmly, and without any mark of
disturbance in her face.

"Din't you get a bar of soap from our house yesterday?" asked Mrs.
Jordon.

"Yes, ma'am," returned Bridget, "but it was soap you owed us."

"Owed you!"

"Yes, Ma am. Nancy got a bar of soap from me last washing-day, and I
went in for it yesterday."

"But Nancy told me you wanted to borrow it," said Mrs. Jordon.

"Nancy knew better," said Bridget, with a face slightly flushed; but
any one could see that it was a flush of indignation.

"Will you step into my house and tell Nancy I want to see her?"

"Certainly, ma'am." And Bridget retired.

"These servants have been playing a high game, I fear," remarked
Mrs. Jordon, after Bridget had left the room. "Pardon me, if in my
surprise I have spoken in a manner that has seemed offensive."

"Most certainly there is a game playing that I know nothing about,
if anything has been borrowed of you in my name for these three
months," said I.

"I have heard of your borrowing something or other almost every day
during the time you mention," replied Mrs. Jordon. "As for me, I
have sent into you a few times; but not oftener, I am sure, than
once in a week."

Bridget returned, after having been gone several minutes, and said
Nancy would be in directly. We waited for some time, and then sent
for her again. Word was brought back that she was nowhere to be
found in the house.

"Come in with me, Mrs. Smith," said my neighbor, rising. I did so,
according to her request. Sure enough, Nancy was gone. We went up
into her room, and found that she had bundled up her clothes and
taken them off, but left behind her unmistakable evidence of what
she had been doing. In an old chest which Mrs. Jordon had let her
use for her clothes were many packages of tea, burnt coffee, sugar,
soap, eggs; a tin kettle containing a pound of butter, and various
other articles of table use.

Poor Mrs. Jordon seemed bewildered.

"Let me look at that pound lump of butter," said I.

Mrs. Jordon took up the kettle containing it. "It isn't my butter,"
she remarked.

"But it's mine, and the very pound she got of me yesterday for you."

"Gracious me!" ejaculated my neighbor. "Was anything like this ever
heard?"

"She evidently borrowed on your credit and mine--both ways," I
remarked with a smile, for all my unkind feelings toward Mrs. Jordon
were gone, "and for her own benefit."

"But isn't it dreadful to think of, Mrs. Smith? See what harm the
creature has done! Over and over again have I complained of your
borrowing so much and returning so little; and you have doubtless
made the same complaint of me."

"I certainly have. I felt that I was not justly dealt by."

"It makes me sick to think of it." And Mrs. Jordon sank into a
chair.

"Still I don't understand about the wash-boiler and tubs that you
mentioned," she said, after a pause.

"You remember my ten tumblers," I remarked.

"Perfectly. But can she have broken up my tubs and boiler, or
carried them off?"

On searching in the cellar we found the tubs in ruins, and the
wash-boiler with a large hole in the bottom.

I shall never forget the chagrin, anger, and mortification of poor
Mrs. Jordon when, at her request, Bridget pointed out at least
twenty of my domestic utensils that Nancy had borrowed to replace
such as she had broken or carried away. (It was a rule with Mrs.
Jordon to make her servants pay for every thing they broke.)

"To think of it!" she repeated over and over again. "Just to think
of it! Who could have dreamed of such doings?"

Mrs. Jordon was, in fact, as guiltless of the sin of troublesome
borrowing from a neighbor as myself. And yet I had seriously urged
the propriety of moving out of the neighborhood to get away from
her.

We both looked more closely to the doings of our servants after this
pretty severe lesson; and I must freely confess, that in my own
case, the result was worth all the trouble. As trusty a girl as my
cook was, I found that she would occasionally run in to a neighbor's
to borrow something or other, in order to hide her own neglect; and
I only succeeded in stopping the the evil by threatening to send her
away if I ever detected her in doing it again.




CHAPTER XXIX.

EXPERIENCE IN TAKING BOARDERS.


I HAVE no experiences of my own to relate on this subject. But I
could fill a book with the experiences of my friends. How many poor
widows, in the hope of sustaining their families and educating their
children, have tried the illusive, and, at best, doubtful experiment
of taking boarders, to find themselves in a year or two, or three,
hopelessly involved in debt, a life time of labor would fail to
cancel. Many, from pride, resort to this means of getting a living,
because--why I never could comprehend--taking boarders is thought to
be more genteel than needlework or keeping a small store for the
sale of fancy articles.

The experience of one of my friends, a Mrs. Turner, who, in the
earlier days of her sad widowhood, found it needful to make personal
effort for the sustenance of her family, I will here relate. Many
who find themselves in trying positions like hers, may, in reviewing
her mistakes, be saved from similar ones themselves.

"I don't know what we shall do!" exclaimed Mrs. Turner, about six
months after the death of her husband, while pondering sadly over
the prospect before her. She had one daughter about twenty, and two
sons who were both under ten years of age. Up to this time she had
never known the dread of want. Her husband had been able to provide
well for his family; and they moved in a very respectable, and
somewhat showy circle. But on his death, his affairs were found to
be much involved, and when settled, there was left for the widow and
children only about the sum of four thousand dollars, besides the
household furniture, which was very handsome. This sad falling off
in her prospects, had been communicated to Mrs. Turner a short time
before, by the administrator on the estate; and its effect was to
alarm and sadden her extremely. She knew nothing of business, and
yet, was painfully conscious, that four thousand dollars would be
but a trifle to what she would need for her family, and that effort
in some direction was now absolutely necessary. But, besides her
ignorance of any calling by which money could be made, she had a
superabundance of false pride, and shrunk from what she was pleased
to consider the odium attached to a woman who had to engage in
business. Under these circumstances, she had a poor enough prospect
before her. The exclamation as above recorded, was made in the
presence of Mary Turner, her daughter, a well educated girl, who had
less of that false pride which obscured her mother's perceptions of
right. After a few moments' silence the latter said--

"And yet we must do something, mother."

"I know that, Mary, too well. But I know of nothing that we can do."

"Suppose we open a little dry goods' store?" suggested Mary. "Others
seem to do well at it, and we might. You know we have a great many
friends."

"Don't think of it, Mary! We could not expose ourselves in that
way."

"I know that it would not be pleasant, mother; but, then, we must do
something."

"It must be something besides that, Mary. I can't listen to it. It's
only a vulgar class of women who keep stores."

"I am willing to take in sewing, mother; but, then, all I could earn
would go but a little way towards keeping the family. I don't
suppose I could even pay the rent, and that you know, is four
hundred dollars."

"Too true," Mrs. Turner said, despondingly.

"Suppose I open a school?" suggested Mary.

"O no! no! My head would never stand the noise and confusion. And,
any way, I never did like a school."

"Then I don't know what we shall do, unless we take some boarders."

"A little more genteel. But even that is low enough."

"Then, suppose, mother we look for a lower rent, and try to live
more economically. I will take in sewing, and we can try for awhile,
and see how we get along."

"O no, indeed, child. That would never do. We must keep up
appearances, or we shall lose our place in society. You know that it
is absolutely necessary for you and your brothers, that we should
maintain our position."

"As for me, mother," said Mary, in a serious tone, "I would not have
you to take a thought in that direction. And it seems to me that our
true position is the one where we can live most comfortably
according to our means."

"You don't know anything about it, child," Mrs. Turner replied, in a
positive tone.

Mary was silenced for the time. But a banishment of the subject did
not, in any way, lesson the difficulties. Thoughts of these soon
again became apparent in words; and the most natural form of these
was the sentence--

"I don't know what we _shall_ do!" uttered by the mother in a tone
of deep despondency.

"Suppose we take a few boarders?" Mary urged, about three weeks
after the conversation just alluded to.

"No, Mary; we would be too much exposed: and then it would come very
hard on you, for you know that I cannot stand much fatigue," Mrs.
Turner replied, slowly and sadly.

"O, as to that," said Mary, with animation: "I'll take all the
burden off of you."

"Indeed, child, I cannot think of it," Mrs. Turner replied,
positively; and again the subject was dismissed.

But it was soon again recurred to, and after the suggestion and
disapproval of many plans, Mary again said--

"Indeed, mother, I don't see what we will do, unless we take a few
boarders."

"It's the only thing at all respectable, that I can think of," Mrs.
Turner said despondingly; "and I'm afraid it's the best we can do."

"I think we had better try it, mother, don't you?"

"Well, perhaps we had, Mary. There are four rooms that we can spare;
and these ought to bring us in something handsome."

"What ought we to charge?"

"About three dollars and a half for young men, and ten dollars for a
man and his wife."

"If we could get four married couples for the four rooms, that would
be forty dollars a week, which would be pretty good," said Mary,
warming at the thought.

"Yes, if we could, Mary, we might manage pretty well. But most
married people have children, and they are such an annoyance that I
wouldn't have them in the house. We will have to depend mainly on
the young men."

It was, probably, three weeks after this, that an advertisement,
running thus, appeared in one of the newspapers:

"BOARDING--Five or six genteel young men, or a few gentlemen and
their wives, can be accommodated with boarding at No.--Cedar street.
Terms moderate."

In the course of the following day, a man called and asked the terms
for himself and wife.

"Ten dollars," said Mrs. Turner.

"That's too high--is it not?" remarked the man.

"We cannot take you for less."

"Have you a pleasant room vacant?"

"You can have your choice of the finest in the house?"

"Can I look at them, madam?"

"Certainly, sir." And the stranger was taken through Mrs. Turner's
beautifully furnished chambers.

"Well, this is certainly a temptation," said the man, pausing and
looking around the front chamber on the second floor. "And you have
named your lowest terms?"

"Yes, sir; the lowest."

"Well, it's higher than I've been paying, but this looks too
comfortable. I suppose we will have to strike a bargain."

"Shall be pleased to accommodate you, sir."

"We will come, then, to-morrow morning."

"Very well, sir." And the stranger departed.

"So much for a beginning," said Mrs. Turner, evidently gratified.
"He seems to be much of a gentleman. If his wife is like him, they
will make things very agreeable I am sure."

"I hope she is," said Mary.

On the next morning, the new boarders made their appearance, and the
lady proved as affable and as interesting as the husband.

"I always pay quarterly. This is the custom in all the boarding
houses I have been in. But if your rules are otherwise, why just say
so. It makes no difference to me," remarked the new boarder, in the
blandest manner imaginable.

"Just suit yourself about that, Mr. Cameron. It is altogether
immaterial," Mrs. Turner replied, smiling. "I am in no particular
want of money."

Mr. Cameron bowed lower, and smiled more blandly, if possible, than
before.

"You have just opened a boarding house, I suppose, madam?" he said.

"Yes sir, I am a new beginner at the business."

"Ah--well, I must try and make you known all I can. You will find
Mrs. Cameron, here, a sociable kind of a woman. And if I can serve
you at any time, be sure to command me."

"You are too kind!" Mrs. Turner responded, much pleased to have
found, in her first boarders, such excellent, good-hearted people.

In a few days, a couple of young men made application, and were
received, and now commenced the serious duties of the new
undertaking. Mary had to assume the whole care of the house. She had
to attend the markets, and oversee the kitchen, and also to make
with her own hands all the pastry. Still, she had, a willing heart,
and this lightened much of the heavy burden now imposed upon her.

"How do you like your new boarding house?" asked a friend of one of
the young men who had applied, and been received. This was about two
weeks after his entrance into Mrs. Turner's house.

"Elegant," responded the young man, giving his countenance a
peculiar and knowing expression.

"Indeed? But are you in earnest?"

"I am that. Why, we live on the very fat of the land."

"Pshaw! you must be joking. Whoever heard of the fat of the land
being found in a boarding house. They can't afford it."

"I don't care, myself, whether they can afford it or not. But we do
live elegantly. I wouldn't ask to sit down to a better table."

"What kind of a room have you? and what kind of a bed?"

"Good enough for a lord."

"Nonsense!"

"No, but I am in earnest, as I will prove to you. I sleep on as fine
a bed as ever I saw, laid on a richly carved mahogany bedstead, with
beautiful curtains. The floor is covered with a Brussels carpet,
nearly new and of a rich pattern. There is in the room a mahogany
wardrobe, an elegant piece of furniture--a marble top dressing
bureau, and a mahogany wash-stand with a marble slab. Now if you
don't call that a touch above a common boarding house, you've been
more fortunate than I have been until lately."

"Are there any vacancies there, Tom?"

"There is another bed in my room."

"Well, just tell them, to-night, that I'll be there to-morrow
morning."

"Very well."

"And I know of a couple more that'll add to the mess, if there is
room."

"It's a large house, and I believe they have room yet to spare."

A week more passed away, and the house had its complement, six young
men, and the polite gentleman and his wife. This promised an income
of thirty-one dollars per week.

As an off-set to this, a careful examination into the weekly
expenditure would have shown a statement something like the
following: Marketing $12; groceries, flour, &c., $10; rent, $8;
servants' hire-cook, chambermaid, and black boy, $4; fuel, and
incidental expenses, $6--in all, $40 per week. Besides this, their
own clothes, and the schooling of the two boys did not cost less
than at the rate of $300 per annum. But neither Mrs. Turner nor Mary
ever thought that any such calculation was necessary. They charged
what other boarding house keepers charged, and thought, of course,
that they must make a good living. But in no boarding house, even
where much higher prices were obtained, was so much piled upon the
table.

Every thing, in its season, was to be found there, without regard to
prices. Of course, the boarders were delighted, and complimented
Mrs. Turner upon the excellent fare which they received.

Mr. and Mrs. Cameron continued as affable and interesting as when
they first came into the house. But the first quarter passed away,
and nothing was said about their bill, and Mrs. Turner never thought
of giving them a polite hint. Two of her young men were also remiss
in this respect, but they were such gentlemanly, polite, attentive
individuals, that, of course, nothing could be said.

"I believe I've never had your bill, Mrs. Turner, have I?" Mr.
Cameron said to her one evening, when about six months had passed.

"No; I have never thought of handing it in. But it's no difference,
I'm not in want of money."

"Yes, but it ought to be paid. I'll bring you up a check from the
counting-room in a few days."

"Suit your own convenience, Mr. Cameron," answered Mrs. Turner, in
an indifferent tone.

"O, it's perfectly convenient at all times. But knowing that you
were not in want of it, has made me negligent."

This was all that was said on the subject for another quarter,
during which time the two young men alluded to as being in arrears,
went off, cheating the widow out of fifty dollars each.

But nothing was said about it to the other boarders, and none of
them knew of the wrong that had been sustained. Their places did not
fill up, and the promised weekly income was reduced to twenty-four
dollars.

At the end of the third quarter, Mr. Cameron again recollected that
he had neglected to bring up a check from the counting-room, and
blamed himself for his thoughtlessness.

"I am so full of business," said he, "that I sometimes neglect these
little things."

"But it's a downright shame, Mr. Cameron, when it's so easy for you
to draw off a check and put it into your pocket," remarked his wife.

"O, it's not a particle of difference," Mrs. Turner volunteered to
say, smiling--though, to tell the truth, she would much rather have
had the money.

"Well, I'll try and bear it in mind this very night," and Mr.
Cameron hurried away, as business pressed.

The morning after Mr. Cameron's fourth quarter expired, he walked
out, as usual, with his wife before breakfast. But when all
assembled at the table, they had not (something very uncommon for
them) returned.

"I wonder what keeps Mr. and Mrs. Cameron?" remarked Mrs. Turner.

"Why, I saw them leave in the steamboat for the South, this
morning," said one of the boarders.

"You must be mistaken," Mrs. Turner replied.

"O no, ma'am, not at all. I saw them, and conversed with them before
the boat started. They told me that they were going on as far as
Washington."

"Very strange!" ejaculated Mrs. Turner. "They said nothing to me
about it."

"I hope they don't owe you any thing," remarked one of the boarders.

"Indeed, they do."

"Not much, ma'am; I hope."

"Over five hundred dollars."

"O, that is too bad! How could you trust a man like Mr. Cameron to
such an amount?"

"Why, surely," said Mrs. Turner, "he is a respectable and a
responsible merchant; and I was in no want of the money."

"Indeed, Mrs. Turner, he is no such thing."

"Then what is he?"

"He is one of your gentlemen about town, and lives, I suppose, by
gambling. At least such is the reputation he bears. I thought you
perfectly understood this."

"How cruelly I have been deceived!" said Mrs. Turner, unable to
command her feelings; and rising, she left the table in charge of
Mary.

On examining Mr. and Mrs. Cameron's room, their trunk was found, but
it was empty. The owners of it, of course, came not back to claim
their property.

The result of this year's experience in keeping boarders, was an
income of just $886 in money, and a loss of $600, set off against an
expense of $2380. Thus was Mrs. Turner worse off by $1494 at the end
of the year, than she was when she commenced keeping boarders. But
she made no estimates, and had not the most remote idea of how the
matter stood. Whenever she wanted money, she drew upon the amount
placed to her credit in bank by the administrator on her husband's
estate, vainly imagining that it would all come back through the
boarders. All that she supposed to be lost of the first year's
business were the $600, out of which she had been cheated. Resolving
to be more circumspect in future, another year was entered upon. But
she could not help seeing that Mary was suffering from hard labor
and close confinement, and it pained her exceedingly. One day she
said to her, a few weeks after they had entered upon the second
year--

"I am afraid, Mary, this is too hard for you. You begin to look pale
and thin. You must spare yourself more."

"I believe I do need a little rest, mother," said Mary; "but if I
don't look after things, nobody will, and then we should soon have
our boarders dissatisfied."

"That is too true, Mary."

"But I wouldn't mind it so much, mother, if I thought we were
getting ahead. But I am afraid we are not."

"What makes you think so, child?"

"You know we have lost six hundred dollars already, and that is a
great deal of money."

"True, Mary; but we must be more careful in future. We will soon
make that up, I am sure."

"I hope so," Mary responded, with a sigh. She did not herself feel
so sanguine of making it up. Still, she had not entered into any
calculation of income and expense, leaving that to her mother, and
supposing that all was right as a matter of course.

As they continued to set an excellent table, they kept up pretty
regularly their complement of boarders. The end of the second year
would have shown this result, if a calculation had been made: cash
income, $1306--loss by boarders, $150--whole expenses, $2000.
Consequently, they were worse off at the end of the year by $694; or
in the two years, $2188, by keeping boarders.

And now poor Mrs. Turner was startled on receiving her bank book
from the bank, settled up, to find that her four thousand dollars
had dwindled down to $1812. She could not at first believe her
senses. But there were all her checks regularly entered; and, to
dash even the hope that there was a mistake, there were the
cancelled checks, also, bearing her own signature.

"Mary, what _shall_ we do?" was her despairing question, as the full
truth became distinct to her mind.

"You say we have sunk more than two thousand dollars in two years?"

"Yes, my child."

"And have had all our hard labor for nothing?" Mary continued, and
her voice trembled as she thought of how much she had gone through
in that time.

"Yes."

"Something must be wrong, mother. Let us do what we should have done
at first, make a careful estimate of our expenses."

"Well."

"It costs us just ten dollars each week for marketing--and I know
that our groceries are at least that, including flour; that you see
makes twenty dollars, and we only get twenty-eight dollars for our
eight boarders. Our rent will bring our expenses up to that. And
then there are servants' wages, fuel, our own clothes, and the boys'
schooling, besides what we lose every year, and the hundred little
expenses which cannot be enumerated."

"Bless me, Mary! No wonder we have gone behindhand."

"Indeed, mother, it is not."

"We have acted very blindly, Mary."

"Yes, we have; but we must do so no longer. Let us give up our
boarders, and move into a smaller house."

"But what shall we do Mary? Our money will soon dwindle away."

"We must do something for a living, mother, that is true. But if we
cannot now see what we shall do, that is no reason why we should go
on as we are. Our rent, you know, takes away from us eight dollars a
week. We can get a house large enough for our own purposes at three
dollars a week, or one hundred and fifty dollars a year, I am sure,
thus saving five dollars a week there, and that money would buy all
the plain food our whole family would eat."

"But it will never do, Mary, for us to go to moving into a little
bit of a pigeon-box of a house."

"Mother, if we don't get into a cheaper house and husband our
resources, we shall soon have no house to live in!" said Mary, with
unwonted energy.

"Well, child, perhaps you are right; but I can't bear the thought of
it," Mrs. Turner replied. "And any how, I can't see what we are
going to do then."

"We ought to do what we see to be right, mother, had we not?" Mary
asked, looking affectionately into her mother's face.

"I suppose so, Mary."

"Won't it be right for us to reduce our expenses, and make the most
of what we have left?"

"It certainly will, Mary."

"Then let us do what seems to be right, and we shall see further, I
am sure, as soon as we have acted."

Thus urged, Mrs. Turner consented to relinquish her boarders, and to
move into a small house, at a rent very considerably reduced.

Many articles of furniture they were obliged to dispose of, and this
added to their little fund some five hundred dollars. About two
months after they were fairly settled, Mary said to her mother--

"I've been thinking a good deal lately, mother, about getting into
something that would bring us in a living."

"Well, child, what conclusion have you come to?"

"You don't like the idea of setting up a little store?"

"No, Mary, it is too exposing."

"Nor of keeping a school?"

"No."

"Well, what do you think of my learning the dress-making business?"

"Nonsense, Mary!"

"But, mother, I could learn in six months, and then we could set up
the business, and I am sure we could do well. Almost every one who
sets up dress-making, gets along."

"There was always something low to me in the idea of a milliner or
mantua maker, and I cannot bear the thought of your being one," Mrs.
Turner replied, in a decided tone.

"You know what Pope says, mother--

  'Honor and shame from no _condition_ rise;
  Act well your part, there all the honor lies.'"

"Yes, but that is poetry, child."

"And song is but the eloquence of truth, some one has beautifully
said," responded Mary, smiling.

The mother was silent, and Mary, whose mind had never imbibed,
fully, her mother's false notions, continued--

"I am sure there can be no wrong in my making dresses. Some one must
make them, and it is the end we have in view, it seems to me, that
determines the character of an action. If I, for the sake of
procuring an honest living for my mother, my little brothers, and
myself, am willing to devote my time to dress-making, instead of
sitting in idleness, and suffering James and Willie to be put out
among strangers, then the calling is to me honorable. My aim is
honorable, and the means are honest. Is it not so, mother?"

"Yes, I suppose it is so. But then there was always something so
degrading to me in the idea of being nothing but a dress-maker!"

Just at that moment a young man, named Martin, who had lived with
them during the last year of their experiment in keeping boarders,
called in to see them. He kept a store in the city, and was reputed
to be well off. He had uniformly manifested an interest in Mrs.
Turner and her family, and was much liked by them. After he was
seated. Mrs. Turner said to him--

"I am trying, Mr. Martin, to beat a strange notion out of Mary's
head. She has been endeavouring to persuade me to let her learn the
dress-making business."

The young man seemed a little surprised at this communication, and
Mary evinced a momentary confusion when it was made. He said,
however, very promptly and pleasantly, turning to Mary--

"I suppose you have a good reason for it, Miss Mary."

"I think I have, Mr. Martin," she replied, smiling. "We cannot live,
and educate James and William, unless we have a regular income; and
I cannot shut my eyes to the fact that what we have cannot last
long--nor to another, that I am the only one in the family from whom
any regular income can be expected."

"And you are willing to devote yourself to incessant toil, night and
day, for this purpose?"

"Certainly I am," Mary replied, with a quiet, cheerful smile.

"But it never will do, Mr. Martin, will it?" Mrs. Turner remarked.

"Why not, Mrs. Turner?"

"Because, it is not altogether respectable."

"I do not see any thing disrespectable in the business; but, with
Mary's motive for entering into it, something highly respectable and
honorable," Mr. Martin replied, with unusual earnestness.

Mrs. Turner was silenced.

"And you really think of learning the business, and then setting it
up?" said Mr. Martin, turning to Mary, with a manifest interest,
which she felt, rather than perceived.

"Certainly I do, if mother does not positively object."

"Then I wish you all success in your praiseworthy undertaking. And
may the end you have in view support you amid the wearisome toil."

There was a peculiar feeling in Mr. Martin's tone that touched the
heart of Mary, she knew not why. But certain it was, that she felt
doubly nerved for the task she had proposed to herself.

As Mr. Martin wended his way homeward that evening, he thought of
Mary Turner with an interest new to him. He had never been a great
deal in her company while he boarded with her mother, because Mary
was always too busy about household affairs, to be much in the
parlor. But what little he had seen of her, made him like her as a
friend. He also liked Mrs. Turner, and had from these reasons,
frequently called in to see them since their removal. After going
into his room, on his return home that evening, he sat down and
remained for some time in a musing attitude. At length he got up,
and took a few turns across the floor, and again seated himself,
saying as he did so--

"If that's the stuff she's made of, she's worth looking after."

From this period, Mr. Martin called to see Mrs. Turner more
frequently, and as Mary, who had promptly entered upon the duties of
a dress-maker's apprentice, came home every evening, he had as many
opportunities of being with her and conversing with her as he
desired. Amiable accomplished, and intelligent, she failed not to
make, unconsciously to herself, a decided impression upon the young
man's heart. Nor could she conceal from herself that she was
happier in his company than she was at any other time.

Week after week, and month after month, passed quickly away, and
Mary was rapidly acquiring a skill in the art she was learning,
rarely obtained by any. After the end of four months, she could turn
off a dress equal to any one in the work-room. But this constant
application was making sad inroads upon her health. For two years
she had been engaged in active and laborious duties, even beyond her
strength. The change from this condition to the perfectly sedentary,
was more than her constitution could bear up under, especially as
she was compelled to bend over her needle regularly, from ten to
twelve hours each day. As the time for the expiration of her term of
service approached, she felt her strength to be fast failing her.
Her cheek had become paler and thinner, her step more languid, and
her appetite was almost entirely gone.

These indications of failing health were not unobserved by Mr.
Martin. But, not having made up his mind, definitely, that she was
precisely the woman he wanted for a wife, he could not interfere to
prevent her continuance at the business which was too evidently
destroying her health. But every time he saw her his interest in her
became tenderer. "If no one steps forward and saves her," he would
sometimes say to himself, as he gazed with saddened feelings upon
her colorless cheek, "she will fall a victim in the very bloom of
womanhood."

And Mary herself saw the sad prospect before her. She told no one of
the pain in her side, nor of the sickening sensation of weakness and
weariness that daily oppressed her. But she toiled on and on, hoping
to feel better soon. At last her probation ended. But the determined
and ambitious spirit that had kept her up, now gave way.

Martin knew the day when her apprenticeship expired, and without
asking why, followed the impulse that prompted him, and called upon
her in the evening.

"Is any thing the matter, Mrs. Turner?" he asked, with a feeling of
alarm, on entering the house and catching a glance at the expression
of that lady's countenance.

"Oh, yes, Mr. Martin, Mary is extremely ill," she replied, in
evident painful anxiety.

"What ails her?" he asked, showing equal concern.

"I do not know, Mr. Martin. She came home this evening, and as soon
as she reached her chamber fainted away. I sent for the doctor
immediately, and he says that she must be kept very quiet, and that
he will be here very early in the morning again. I am afraid she has
overworked herself. Indeed, I am sure she has. For many weeks back,
I have noticed her altered appearance and loss of appetite. It was
in vain that I urged her to spare herself for a few weeks and make
up the time afterwards. She steadily urged the necessity of getting
into business as soon as possible, and would not give up. She has
sacrificed herself, Mr. Martin, I very much fear, to her devotion to
the family." And Mrs. Turner burst into tears.

We need not say how sad and depressed Martin was, on turning away
from the house, without the chance of seeing Mary, under the idea,
too, of her dangerous illness. He called about ten o'clock the next
morning, and learned that she was no better; that the doctor had
been there, and pronounced her in a low nervous fever. Strict
injunctions had been left that no one should be admitted to her room
but the necessary attendants.

Regularly every morning and evening Martin called to ask after Mary,
for the space of fifteen days, and always received the sad
information that she was no better. His feelings had now become
intensely excited. He blamed himself for having favored the idea of
Mary's going to learn a trade.

"How easily I might have prevented it!" he said to himself. "How
blind I was to her true worth! How much suffering and toil I might
have saved her!"

On the evening of the sixteenth day, he received the glad
intelligence that Mary was better. That although greatly emaciated,
and feeble as an infant, a decidedly healthy action had taken place,
and the doctor expressed confident hopes of her recovery.

"May I not see her, Mrs. Turner?" he asked, earnestly.

"Not yet, Mr. Martin, The doctor is positive in his directions to
have her kept perfectly quiet."

Martin had, of course, to acquiesce, but with great reluctance. For
five days more he continued to call in twice every day, and each
time found her slightly improved.

"May I not see her now?" he again asked, at the end of these
additional days of anxious self-denial.

"If you will not talk to her," said Mrs. Turner.

Martin promised, and was shown up to her chamber. His heart sickened
as he approached the bed-side, and looked upon the thin, white,
almost expressionless face, and sunken eye, of her who was now the
ruler of his affections. He took her hand, that returned a feeble,
almost imperceptible pressure, but did not trust himself to utter
her name. She hardly seemed conscious of his presence, and he soon
turned away, sad, very sad, yet full of hope for her recovery.

The healthy action continued, and in a week Mary could bear
conversation. As soon as she could begin to sit up, Martin passed
every evening with her, and seeing, as he now did, with different
eyes, he perceived in her a hundred things to admire that had before
escaped his notice. Recovering rapidly, in a month she was fully
restored to health, and looked better than she had for years.

Just about this time, as Martin was making up his mind to declare
himself her lover, he was surprised, on entering their parlor one
evening, to find on the table a large brass door-plate, with the
words, "MARY TURNER, FANCY DRESS MAKER," engraved upon it.

"Why, what are you going to do with this Mary?" he asked, forgetting
that she did not know his peculiar thoughts about her.

"I am going to commence my business," she replied in a quiet tone.
"I have learned a trade, and now I must turn it, if possible, to
some good account."

"But your health won't bear it, Mary," he urged. "Don't you know
that you made yourself sick by your close application in learning
your trade?"

"I do, Mr. Martin; but still, you know why I learned my trade."

Mr. Martin paused for a few moments, and then looking into her face,
said--

"Yes, I know the reason, Mary, and I always admired your noble
independence in acting as you did--nay," and he took her hand, "If
you will permit me to say so, have loved you ever since I had a true
appreciation of your character. May I hope for a return of kindred
feelings?"

Mary Turner's face became instantly crimsoned with burning blushes,
but she did not withdraw her hand. A brief silence ensued, during
which the only sounds audible to the ears of each, was the beating
of their own hearts. Martin at length said--

"Have I aught to hope, Mary?"

"You know, Mr. Martin," she replied, in a voice that slightly
trembled, "that I have duties to perform beyond myself. However much
my feelings may be interested, these cannot be set aside. Under
present circumstances, my hand is not my own to give."

"But, your duties will become mine, Mary; and most gladly will I
assume them. Only give me your hand, and in return I will give you a
home for all you love, and you can do for them just as your heart
desires. Will you now be mine?"

"If my mother object not," she said, bursting into tears.

Of course, the mother had no objection to urge, and in a few weeks
they were married. It was, perhaps, three months after this event,
that the now happy family were seated in a beautifully furnished
parlor, large enough to suit even Mrs. Turner's ideas. Something had
turned their thoughts on the past, and Mary alluded to their sad
experience in keeping boarders.

"You did not lose much, did you?" asked her husband.

"We sunk over two thousand dollars," Mary replied.

"Is it possible! You paid rather dear, then, for your experience in
keeping a boarding house."

"So I then thought," Mary answered, looking into his face with a
smile, "But I believe it was money well laid out. What you call a
good investment."

"How so?"

Mary stooped down to the ear of her husband, who sat a little behind
her mother, and whispered,

"You are dull, dear--I got you by it, didn't I?"

His young wife's cheek was very convenient, and his lips touched it
almost involuntarily.

"What is that, Mary?" asked her mother, turning towards them, for
she had heard her remark, and was waiting for the explanation.

"Oh, nothing, mother, it was only some of my fun."

"You seem quite full of fun, lately," said Mrs. Turner, with a quiet
smile of satisfaction, and again bent her eyes upon the book she was
reading.




CHAPTER XXX.

TWO WAYS WITH DOMESTICS.


"AH, good morning, dear! I'm really glad to see you," said Helen
Armitage to her young friend Fanny Milnor, as the latter came in to
sit an hour with her. "I just wanted a little sunshine."

"There ought to be plenty of sunshine here," returned Fanny smiling.
"You always seem happy, and so does your mother and sister Mary,
whenever I meet you abroad."

"Abroad, or at home, makes quite a difference, Fanny. Precious
little sunshine have we here. Not a day passes over our heads, that
we are not thrown into hot water about something or other, with our
abominable servants. I declare! I never saw the like, and it grows
worse and worse every day."

"Indeed! That is bad, sure enough. But can't you remedy this defect
in some way?"

"We try hard enough, dear knows! I believe we have had no less than,
six cooks, and as many chambermaids in the last three months. But
change only makes the matter worse. Sometimes they are so idle and
dirty that we cannot tolerate them for a week. And then again they
are so ill-natured, and downright saucy, that no one can venture to
speak to them."

As Helen Armitage said this, she arose from her chair, and walking
deliberately across the room, rang the parlor bell, and then quietly
walked back again and resumed her seat, continuing her remarks as
she did so, upon the exhaustless theme she had introduced. In a
little while a domestic entered.

"That door has been left open by some one," the young lady said, in
a half vexed tone of authority, and with a glance of reproof, as she
pointed to the door of the back parlor leading into the passage.

The servant turned quickly away, muttering as she did so, and left
the parlor, slamming the door after her with a sudden, indignant
jerk.

"You see that!" remarked Helen, the color deepening on her cheeks,
and her voice indicating a good deal of inward disturbance. "That's
just the way we are served by nine out of ten of the people we get
about us. They neglect every thing, and then, when reminded of their
duty, flirt, and grumble, and fling about just as you saw that girl
do this moment. I'll ring for her again, and make her shut that door
as she ought to do, the insolent creature!"

Helen was rising, when Fanny laid her hand on her arm, and said, in
a quiet persuasive tone,

"No--no--don't, Helen. She is out of temper, and will only retort
angrily at further reproof. The better way is to pass over these
things as if you did not notice them."

"And let them ride over us rough shod, as they most certainly will!
The fact is, with all our efforts to make them know and keep their
places, we find it impossible to gain any true subordination in the
house."

"We never have any trouble of this kind," Fanny said.

"You must be very fortunate then."

"I don't know as to that. I never recollect an instance in which a
domestic opposed my mother or failed to obey, cheerfully, any
request. And we have had several in our house, within my
recollection. At least half a dozen."

"Half a dozen! Oh, dear! We have half a dozen a month sometimes! But
come, let us go up to my room; I have some new prints to show you.
They are exquisite. My father bought them for me last week."

The two young ladies ascended to Helen's chamber in the third story.
But the book of prints was not to be found there. "It is in the
parlor, I recollect now," said Helen, ringing the bell as she spoke,
with a quick, strong jerk.

In about three or four minutes, and just as the young lady's
patience was exhausted and her fingers were beginning to itch for
another pull at the bell rope, the tardy waiting women appeared.

"Hannah--Go down into the parlor, and bring me off of the piano a
book you will find there. It is a broad flat book, with loose sheets
in it."

This was said in a tone of authority. The domestic turned away
without speaking and went down stairs. In a little while she came
back, and handed Helen a book, answering the description given. But
it was a portfolio of music.

"O no! Not this!" said she, with a curl of the lip, and an impatient
tossing of her head. "How stupid you are, Hannah! The book I want,
contains prints, and this is only a music book! There! Take it back,
and bring me the book of prints."

Hannah took the book, and muttering as she went out, returned to the
parlor, down two long flights of stairs, and laid it upon the piano.

"If you want the pictures, you may get them yourself, Miss; you've
got more time to run up and down stairs than I have."

As she said this Hannah left the parlor, and the book of prints
lying upon the piano, and went back to the chamber she had been
engaged in cleaning up when called away by Helen's bell. It was not
long after she had resumed her occupation, before the bell sounded
loudly through the passages. Hannah smiled bitterly, and with an air
of resolution, as she listened to the iron summons.

"Pull away to your heart's content, Miss!" she said, half audibly.
"When you call me again take care and know what you want me for.
I've got something else to do besides running up and down stairs to
bring you pictures. Why didn't you look at them while you were in
the parlor, or, take them up with you, if you wanted them in your
chamber?"

"Did you ever see the like!" ejaculated Helen, deeply disturbed at
finding both her direction and her subsequent summons unattended to.
"That's just the way we are constantly served by these abominable
creatures."

Two or three heavy jerks at the bell rope followed these remarks.

"Pull away! It's good exercise for you!" muttered Hannah to herself.
And this was all the notice she took of the incensed young lady, who
was finally compelled to go down stairs and get the prints herself.
But she was so much disturbed and caused Fanny to feel so
unpleasantly that neither of them had any real enjoyment in
examining the beautiful pictures. After these had been turned over
and remarked upon for some time, and they had spent an hour in
conversation, the bell was again rung. Hannah, who came with her
usual reluctance, was directed to prepare some lemonade, and bring
it up with cake. This she did, after a good deal of delay, for which
she was grumbled at by Helen. After the cake bad been eaten, and the
lemonade drank, Hannah was again summoned to remove the waiter. This
was performed with the same ill grace that every other service had
been rendered.

"I declare! these servants worry me almost to death!" Helen again
broke forth. "This is just the way I am served whenever I have a
visiter. It is always the time Hannah takes to be ill-natured and
show off her disobliging, ugly temper."

Fanny made no reply to this. But she had her own thoughts. It was
plain enough to her mind, that her friend had only herself to blame,
for the annoyance she suffered. After witnessing one or two mote
petty contentions with the domestic, Fanny went away, her friend
promising, at her particular request, to come and spend a day with
her early in the ensuing week.

It can do no harm, and may do good, for us to draw aside for an
instant the veil that screened from general observation the domestic
economy of the Armitage family. They were well enough off in the
world as regards wealth, but rather poorly off in respect to
self-government and that domestic wisdom which arranges all parts of
a household in just subordination, and thus prevents collisions, or
encroachments of one portion upon another. With them, a servant was
looked upon as a machine who had nothing to do but to obey all
commands. As to the rights of servants in a household, that was
something of which they had never dreamed. Of course, constant
rebellion, or the most unwillingly preformed duties, was the
undeviating attendant upon their domestic economy. It was a maxim,
with Mrs. Armitage, never to indulge or favor one of her people in
the smallest matter. She had never done so in her life, she said,
that she had got any thanks for it. It always made them presumptuous
and dissatisfied. The more you did for them, the more they expected,
and soon came to demand as a right what had been at first granted as
a favor. Mrs. Armitage was, in a word, one of those petty domestic
tyrants, who rule with the rod of apparent authority. Perfect
submission she deemed the only true order in a household. Of course,
true order she never could gain, for such a thing as perfect
submission to arbitrary rule among domestics in this country never
has and never will be yielded. The law of kindness and consideration
is the only true law, and where this is not efficient, none other
will or can be.

As for Mrs. Armitage and her daughters, each one of whom bore
herself towards the domestics with an air of imperiousness and
dictation, they never reflected before requiring a service whether
such a service would not be felt as burdensome in the extreme, and
therefore, whether it might not be dispensed with at the time.
Without regard to what might be going on in the kitchen, the parlor
or chamber, bells were rung, and servants required to leave their
half finished meals, or to break away in the midst of important
duties that had to be done by a certain time, to attend to some
trifling matter which, in fact, should never have been assigned to a
domestic at all. Under this system, it was no wonder that a constant
succession of complaints against servants should be made by the
Armitages. How could it be otherwise? Flesh and blood could not
patiently bear the trials to which these people were subjected. Nor
was it any wonder, that frequent changes took place, or that they
were only able to retain the most inferior class of servants, and
then only for short periods.

There are few, perhaps, who cannot refer, among their acquaintances,
to a family like the Armitages. They may ordinarily be known by
their constant complaints about servants, and their dictatorial way
of speaking whenever they happen to call upon them for the
performance of any duty.

In pleasing contrast to them were the Milnors.

Let us go with Helen in her visit to Fanny. When the day came which
she had promised to spend with her young friend, Helen, after
getting out of patience with the chambermaid for her tardy
attendance upon her, and indulging her daily murmurs against
servants, at last emerged into the street, and took her way towards
the dwelling of Mr. Milnor. It was a bright day, and her spirits
soon rose superior to the little annoyances that had fretted her for
the past hour. When she met Fanny she was in the best possible
humor; and so seemed the tidy domestic who had admitted her, for she
looked very cheerful, and smiled as she opened the door.

"How different from our grumbling, slovenly set!" Helen could not
help remarking to herself, as she passed in. Fanny welcomed her with
genuine cordiality, and the two young ladies were soon engaged in
pleasant conversation. After exhausting various themes, they turned
to music, and played, and sang together for half an hour.

"I believe I have some new prints that you have never seen," said
Fanny on their leaving the piano, and she looked around for the
portfolio of engravings, but could not find it.

"Oh! now I remember--it is up stairs. Excuse me for a minute and I
will run and get it." As Fanny said this, she glided from the room.
In a few minutes she returned with the book of prints.

"Pardon me, Fanny--but why didn't you call a servant to get the
port-folio for you? You have them in the house to wait upon you."

"Oh, as to that," returned Fanny, "I always prefer to wait upon
myself when I can, and so remain independent. And besides, the girls
are all busy ironing, and I would not call them off from their work
for any thing that I could do myself. Ironing day is a pretty hard
day for all of them, for our family is large, and mother always
likes her work done well."

"But, if you adopt that system, you'll soon have them grumbling at
the merest trifle you may be compelled to ask them to do."

"So far from that, Helen, I never make a request of any domestic in
the house, that is not instantly and cheerfully met. To make you
sensible of the good effects of the system I pursue of not asking to
be waited on when I can help myself, I will mention that as I came
down just now with these engravings in my hand, I met our
chambermaid on the stairs, with a basket of clothes in her
hands--'There now, Miss Fanny,' she said half reprovingly, 'why
didn't you call me to get that for you, and not leave your company
in the parlor?' There is no reluctance about her, you see. She knows
that I spare her whenever I can, and she is willing to oblige me,
whenever she can do so."

"Truly, she must be the eighth wonder of the world!" said, Helen in
laughing surprise. "Who ever heard of a servant that asked as a
favor to be permitted to serve you? All of which I ever saw, or
heard, cared only to get out of doing every thing, and strove to be
as disobliging as possible."

"It is related of the good Oberlin," replied Fanny, "that he was
asked one day by an old female servant who had been in his house for
many years, whether there were servants in heaven. On his inquiring
the reason for so singular a question, he received, in substance,
this reply--'Heaven will be no heaven to me, unless I have the
privilege of ministering to your wants and comfort there as I have
the privilege of doing here. I want to be your servant even in
heaven.' Now why, Helen, do you suppose that faithful old servant
was so strongly attached to Oberlin?"

"Because, I presume, he had been uniformly kind to her."

"No doubt that was the principal reason. And that I presume is the
reason why there is no domestic in our house who will not, at any
time, do for me cheerfully, and with a seeming pleasure, any thing I
ask of her. I am sure I never spoke cross to one of them in my
life--and I make it a point never to ask them to do for me what I
can readily do for myself."

"Your mother must be very fortunate in her selection of servants.
There, I presume, lies the secret. We never had one who would bear
the least consideration. Indeed, ma makes it a rule on no account to
grant a servant any indulgences whatever, it only spoils them, she
says. You must keep them right down to it, or they soon get good for
nothing."

"My mother's system is very different," Fanny said--"and we have no
trouble."

The young ladies then commenced examining the prints, after which,
Fanny asked to be excused a moment. In a little while she returned
with a small waiter of refreshments. Helen did not remark upon this,
and Fanny made no allusion to the fact of not having called a
servant from the kitchen to do what she could so easily do herself.
A book next engaged their attention, and occupied them until dinner
time. At the stable, a tidy domestic waited with cheerful alacrity,
so different from the sulky, slow attendance, at home.

"Some water, Rachael, if you please." Or, "Rachael, step down and,
bring up some hot potatoes." Or--"Here, Rachael," with a pleasant
smile, "you have forgotten the salt spoons," were forms of
addressing a waiter upon the table so different from what Helen had
ever heard, that she listened to them with utter amazement. And she
was no less surprised to see with what cheerful alacrity every
direction, or rather request, was obeyed.

After they all rose from the table, and had retired to the parlor, a
pleasant conversation took place, in which no allusions whatever
were made to the dreadful annoyance of servants, an almost unvarying
subject of discourse at Mr. Armitage's, after the conclusion of
nearly every badly cooked, illy served meal.--A discourse too often
overheard by some one of the domestics and retailed in the kitchen,
to breed confirmed ill-will, and a spirit of opposition towards the
principal members of the family.

Nearly half an hour had passed from the time they had risen from the
table, when a younger sister of Fanny's, who was going out to a
little afternoon party, asked if Rachael might not be called up from
the kitchen to get something for her.

"No, my dear, not until she has finished her dinner," was the mild
reply of Mrs. Milnor.

"But it won't take her over a minute, mother, and I am in a hurry."

"I can't help it, my dear. You will have to wait. Rachael must not
be disturbed at her meals. You should have thought of this before,
dinner. You know I have always tried to impress upon your mind, that
there are certain hours in which domestics must not be called upon
to do any thing, unless of serious importance. They have their
rights, as well, as we have, and it is just as wrong for us to
encroach upon their rights, as it is for them to encroach upon
ours."

"Never mind, mother, I will wait," the little girl said, cheerfully.
"But I thought, it was such a trifle, and would have taken her only
a minute."

"It is true, my dear, that is but a trifle. Still, even trifles of
this kind we should form the habit of avoiding; for they may
seriously annoy at a time when we dream not that they are thought of
for a moment. Think how, just as you had seated yourself at the
table, tired and hungry, you would like to be called away, your food
scarcely tasted, to perform some task, the urgency of which to you,
at least, was very questionable?"

"I was wrong I know, mother," the child replied, "and you are
right."

All this was new and strange doctrine to Helen Armitage, but she was
enabled to see, from the manner in which Mrs. Milnor represented the
subject, that it was true doctrine. As this became clear to her
mind, she saw with painful distinctness the error that had thrown
disorder into every part of her mother's household; and more than
this, she inwardly resolved, that, so far as her action was
concerned, a new order of things should take place. In this she was
in earnest--so much so, that she made some allusion to the
difference of things at home, to what they were at Mrs. Milnor's,
and frankly confessed that she had not acted upon the kind and
considerate principles that seemed to govern all in this
well-ordered family.

"My dear child!" Mrs. Milnor said to her, with affectionate
earnestness, in reply to this allusion--"depend upon it, four-fifths
of the bad domestics are made so by injudicious treatment. They are,
for the most part, ignorant of almost every thing, and too often,
particularly, of their duties in a family. Instead of being borne
with, instructed, and treated with consideration, they are scolded,
driven and found fault with. Kind words they too rarely receive; and
no one can well and cheerfully perform all that is required of her
as a domestic, if she is never spoken to kindly, never
considered--never borne with, patiently. It is in our power to make
a great deal of work for our servants that is altogether
unnecessary--and of course, in our power to save them many steps,
and many moments of time. If we are in the chambers, and wish a
servant for any thing, and she is down in the kitchen engaged, it is
always well to think twice before we ring for her once. It may be,
that we do not really want the attendance of any one, or can just as
well wait until some errand has brought her up stairs. Then, there
are various little things in which we can help ourselves and ought
to do it. It is unpardonable, I think, for a lady to ring for a
servant to come up one or two pairs of stairs merely to hand her a
drink, when all she has to do is to cross the room, and get it for
herself. Or for a young lady to require a servant to attend to all
her little wants, when she can and ought to help herself, even if it
takes her from the third story to the kitchen, half a dozen times a
day. Above all, domestics should never be scolded. If reproof is
necessary, let it be administered in a calm mild voice, and the
reasons shown why the act complained of is wrong. This is the only
way in which any good is done."

"I wish my mother could only learn that," said Helen, mentally, as
Mrs. Milnor ceased speaking. When she returned home, it was with a
deeply formed resolution never again to speak reprovingly to any of
her mother's domestics--never to order them to do any thing for
her,--and never to require them to wait upon her when she could just
as well help herself. In this she proved firm. The consequence was,
an entire change in Hannah's deportment towards her, and a cheerful
performance by her of every thing she asked her to do. This could
not but be observed by her mother, and it induced her to modify, to
some extent, her way of treating her servants. The result was
salutary, and now she has far less trouble with them than she ever
had in her life. All, she finds, are not so worthless as she had
deemed them.




CHAPTER XXXI.

A MOTHER'S DUTY.


I CLOSE my volume of rambling sketches, with a chapter more didactic
and serious. The duties of the housekeeper and mother, usually unite
in the same person; but difficult and perplexing as is the former
relation, how light and easy are all its claims compared with those
of the latter. Among my readers are many mothers--Let us for a
little while hold counsel together.

To the mind of a mother, who loves her children, no subject can have
so deep an interest as that which has respect to the well being of
her offspring. Young mothers, especially, feel the need, the great
need of the hints and helps to be derived from others' experience.
To them, the duty of rightly guiding, forming and developing the
young mind is altogether a new one; at every step they feel their
incompetence, and are troubled at their want of success. A young
married friend, the mother of two active little boys, said to me,
one day, earnestly,

"Oh! I think, sometimes, that I would give the world if I only could
see clearly what was my duty towards my children. I try to guide
them aright--I try to keep them from all improper influences--but
rank weeds continually spring up with the flowers I have planted.
How shall I extirpate these, without injuring the others?"

How many a young mother thus thinks and feels. It is indeed a great
responsibility that rests upon her. With the most constant and
careful attention, she will find the task of keeping out the weeds a
hard one; but let her not become weary or discouraged. The enemy is
ever seeking to sow tares amid her wheat, and he will do it if she
sleep at her post. Constant care, good precept, and, above all, good
example, will do much. The gardener whose eye is ever over, and
whose hand is ever busy in his garden, accomplishes much; the
measure of his success may be seen if the eye rest for but a moment
on the garden of his neighbor, the sluggard. Even if a weed springs
here and there, it is quickly plucked up, and never suffered to
obstruct or weaken the growth of esculent plants. A mole may enter
stealthily, marring the beauty of a flower-bed, and disturbing the
roots of some garden-favorite, but through the careful husbandman's
well set enclosure, no beasts find an entrance. So it will be with
the watchful, conscientious mother. She will so fence around her
children from external dangers and allurements, that destructive
beasts will be kept out; and she will, at the same time cultivate
the garden of their good affections, and extirpate the weeds, that
her children may grow up in moral health and beauty.

All this can be done. But the right path must be seen before we can
walk in it. Every mother feels as the one I have alluded to; but
some, while they feel as deeply, have not the clear perceptions of
what is right that others have. Much has been written on the subject
of guiding and governing children--much that is good, and much that
is of doubtful utility. I will here present, from the pen of an
English lady, whose work has not, we believe, been re-printed in
this country, a most excellent series of precepts. They deserve to
be written in letters of gold, and hung up in every nursery. She
says--

"The moment a child is born into the world, a mother's duties
commence; and of all those which God has allotted to mortals, there
are none so important as those which devolve upon a mother.

More feeble and helpless than any thing else of living creatures is
an infant in the first days of its existence--unable to minister to
its own wants, unable even to make those wants known: a feeble cry
which indicates suffering, but not what or where the pain is, is all
it can utter. But to meet this weakness and incapacity on the part
of the infant, God has implanted in the heart of the mother a
yearning affection to her offspring, so that she feels this almost
inanimate being to be a part of herself, and every cry of pain acts
as a dagger to her own heart.

And to humanity alone, of all the tribes of animated beings, has a
power been given to nullify this feeling. Beast, bird, and insect,
attend to the wants of their offspring, accordingly as those wants
require much or little assiduity. But woman, if she will, can drug
and stupefy this feeling. She can commit the charge of her child to
dependants and servants, and need only to take care that enough is
provided to meet that child's wants, but need not see herself that
those wants are actually met.

But a woman who does this is far, very far, from doing her duty. Who
is so fit to watch over the wants of infancy as she who gave that
infant birth? Can a mother suppose, that if she can so stifle those
sensibilities which prompt her to provide for the wants of her
children, servants and dependants, in whom no such sensibilities
exist, will be very solicitous about their charge? How many of the
infant's cries will be unattended to, which would at once have made
their way to the heart of a mother! and, therefore, how many of the
child's wants will in consequence remain uncared for!

No one can understand so well the wants of a child as a mother--no
one is ever so ready to meet those wants as she; and, therefore, to
none but a mother, under ordinary circumstances, should the entire
charge of a child be committed, And in all countries in which,
luxury has not so far attained the ascendency, that in order to
partake of its pleasures a mother will desert her offspring, the
cares and trials of maternal love are entered upon as the sweetest
of enjoyments and the greatest of pleasures. It was a noble saying
of a queen of France, "that none should share with her the
privileges of a mother;" and if the same sentiment found its way
into every heart, a very different aspect would soon be produced.
How many, through ill-treatment and neglect in childhood, carry the
marks to their dying day in weak and sickly constitutions! how many
more in a distorted body and crippled limbs! These are but the too
sure consequences of the neglect of a mother, and, consequent upon
that, the neglect of servants, who, feeling the child a burden,
lessen their own trouble; and many a mother who, perhaps, now that
her child has grown up, weeps bitter tears over his infirmities,
might have saved his pain and her own sorrow by attending to his
wants in infancy.

"Can a mother forget her sucking child?" asks the inspired penman,
in a way that it would seem to be so great an anomaly as almost to
amount to an impossibility. Yet modern luxury not only proves that
such a thing can be done, but it is one even of common occurrence.
But if done, surely some great stake must be pending--something on
which life and property are concerned--that a mother can thus forget
the child of her bosom? Alas! no; the child is neglected, that no
interruption may take place in the mother's stream of pleasure. For
the blandishments of the theatre, or the excitements of the dance,
is a child left to the charge of those who have nothing of love for
it--no sympathy for its sufferings, no joyousness in sharing in its
pleasures.

A woman forfeits all claim to the sacred character of a mother if
she abandon her offspring to the entire care of others: for ere she
can do this, she must have stifled all the best feelings of her
nature, and become "worse than the infidel"--for she gives freely to
the stranger, and neglects her own.

Therefore should a woman, if she would fulfil her duty, make her
child her first care. It is not necessary that her whole time should
be spent in attending to its wants; but it is necessary that so much
of the time should be spent, that nothing should be neglected which
could add to the child's comfort and happiness. And not only is it
needful that a woman should show a motherly fondness for her child,
so that she should attend to its wants and be solicitous for its
welfare; it is also necessary that she should know how those wants
are best to be provided for, and how that welfare is best to be
consulted: for to the natural feelings which prompt animals to
provide for their offspring, to humanity is added the noble gift of
reason; so that thought and solicitude are not merely the effects of
blind instinct, but the produce of a higher and nobler faculty.

As we have already adverted to this point, we shall only say, that
without a knowledge of how the physical wants of a child are to be
met in the best manner, a mother cannot be said to be performing her
duty; for the kindness which is bestowed may be but the result of
natural feeling, which it would be far harder to resist than to
fulfil; whereas the want of knowledge may have resulted from
ignorance and idleness, and the loss of this knowledge will never be
made up by natural kindness and love: it will be like trying to work
without hands, or to see when the eyes are blinded.

But there is yet a higher duty devolving upon woman. She has to
attend to the mental and moral wants of her offspring, as well as to
the physical. And helpless as we are born into the world if
reference be made to our physical wants, we are yet more helpless if
reference be made to our mental and moral. We come into the world
with evil passions, perverted faculties, and unholy dispositions:
for let what will be said of the blandness and attractiveness of
children, there are in those young hearts the seeds of evil; and it
needs but that a note be taken of what passes in the every-day life
of a child, to convince that all is not so amiable as at first sight
appears, but that the heart hides dark deformity, headstrong
passions, and vicious thoughts. And to a mother's lot it falls to be
the instructress of her children--their guide and pattern, and she
fails in her duty when she fails in either of these points. But it
may be said, that the requirement is greater than humanity can
perform, and that it would need angelic purity to be able fully to
meet it; for who shall say that she is so perfect that no
inconsistencies shall appear between what she teaches and what she
practises?

It would be, indeed, to suppose mothers more than human to think
that their instructions should be perfect. The best of mothers are
liable to err, and the love a mother has for her child may tempt her
frequently to pass over faults which she knows ought to be
corrected. But making due allowance for human incompetency and human
weakness, still will a mother be bound to the utmost of her power to
be the instructress of her child, equally by the lesson she
inculcates and the pattern she exhibits.

There is, indeed, too much neglect shown in the instruction of
children. Mothers seem to think, that if amiable qualities are shown
in the exterior, no instruction is necessary for the heart. But this
is a most futile attempt to make children virtuous; it is like
attempting to purify water half-way down the stream, and leaving it
still foul at the source. The heart should be the first thing
instructed; a motive and a reason should be given for every
requirement--a motive and a reason should be given for every
abstinence called for--and when the heart is made to love virtue,
the actions will be those of virtue; for it is the heart which is
the great mover of all actions--and the moment a child can
distinguish between a smile and a frown, from that moment should
instruction commence--an instruction suited indeed to infantine
capacities, but which should be enlarged as the child's capacities
expand. It is very bad policy to suffer the first years of a child's
life to pass without instruction; for if good be not written on the
mind, there is sure to be evil. It is a mother's duty to watch the
expanding intellect of her child, and to suit her instructions
accordingly: it is equally so to learn its disposition--to study its
wishes, its hopes and its fears, and to direct, control, and point
them to noble aims and ends.

Oh! not alone is it needful that a mother be solicitous for the
health and happiness of her child on earth: a far higher and more
important thought should engage her attention--concern for her child
as an immortal and an accountable being.

To all who bear the endearing name of mother, thus would we speak:

That child with whom you are so fondly playing--whose happy and
smiling countenance might serve for the representation of a
cherub, and whose merry laugh rings joyously and free--yes! that
blooming child, notwithstanding all these pleasing and attractive
smiles, has a heart prone to evil. To you is it committed to be the
teacher of that child; and on that teaching will mainly if not
entirely depend its future happiness or misery; not of a few brief
years--not of a life-time, but of eternity; for though a dying
creature, it is still immortal, and the happiness or misery of that
immortality depends upon your instruction.

Will you neglect or refuse to be your child's teacher? Shall the
world and its pleasures draw off your attention from your duty when
so much is at stake? or, will you leave your child to glean
knowledge as best it can, thus imbibing all principles and all
habits, most of them unwholesome, and many poisonous? You can
decide--you, the mother. You gave it life, you may make that life a
blessing or a curse, as you inculcate good or evil; for if
through your neglect, or through bad example, you let evil passions
obtain an ascendency, that child may grow into a dissolute and
immoral man; his career may be one of debauchery and profaneness;
and then, when he comes to die, in the agonies of remorse, in the
delirium of a conscience-stricken spirit, he may gasp out his last
breath with a curse on your head, for having given him life, but not
a disposition to use it aright, so that his has been a life of shame
and disgrace here, and will be one of misery hereafter. That child's
character is yet untainted; with you that decision rests--his
destiny is in your hands. He may have dispositions the most dark and
foul--falseness, hatred and revenge; but you may prevent their
growth. He may have dispositions the most bland and attractive; you
can so order it that contact with the world shall never sully them.
Yes, you--the mother--can prevent the evil and nurture the good. You
can teach that child--you can rear it, discipline it. You can make
your offspring so love you, that the memory of your piety shall
prevent their wickedness, and the hallowed recollection of your
goodness stimulate their own.

And equally in your power is it to neglect your child. By suffering
pleasure to lure you--by following the follies of fashion, or by the
charm of those baubles which the world presents to the eye, but
keeps from your grasp--you may neglect your child. But you have
neglected a plain and positive duty--a duty which is engraven on
your heart and wound into your nature: and a duty neglected is sure,
sooner or later, to come back again as an avenger to punish; while,
on the other hand, a duty performed to the best of the ability
returns back to the performer laden with a blessing.

But it may be said, how are children to be trained in order that
happiness may be the result?

It is quite impossible to lay down rules for the management of
children; since those which would serve for guidance in regulating
the conduct of one child, would work the worst results when applied
to another. But we mention a few particulars.

The grand secret in the management of children is to treat them as
reasonable beings. We see that they are governed by hope, fear, and
love: these feelings, then, should be made the instruments by which
their education is conducted. Whenever it is possible (and it is
very rarely that it is not), a reason should be given for every
requirement, and a motive for the undertaking any task: this would
lead the child to see that nothing was demanded out of caprice or
whim, but that it was a requirement involving happiness as well as
duty.

This method would also teach the child to reverence and respect the
parent. She would be regarded as possessed of superior knowledge;
and he would the more readily undertake demands for which he could
see no reason, from a knowledge that no commands of which he
understood the design were ever unreasonable.

The manner of behaving to children should be one of kindness, though
marked by decision of character. An over fondness should never allow
a mother to gratify her child in any thing unreasonable; and after
having once refused a request--which she should not do hastily or
unadvisedly--no coaxing or tears should divert her from her purpose;
for if she gives way, the child will at once understand that he has
a power over his mother, and will resort to the same expedient
whenever occasion may require; and a worse evil than this is, that
respect for the parent will be lost, and the child, in place of
yielding readily to her wishes, will try means of trick and evasion
to elude them.

In order to really manage a child well, a mother should become a
child herself; she should enter into its hopes and fears, and share
its joys and sorrows; she should bend down her mind to that of her
offspring, so as to be pleased with all those trivial actions which
give it pleasure, and to sorrow over those which bring it pain. This
would secure a love firm and ardent, and at the same time lasting;
for as a child advanced in strength of intellect, so might the
mother, until the child grew old enough to understand the ties which
bound them; and then, by making him a friend, she would bind him to
her for life.

There are none of the human race so sagacious and keensighted
as children: they seem to understand intuitively a person's
disposition, and they quickly notice any discrepancies or
inconsistencies of conduct. On this point should particular
attention be paid, that there be nothing practised to cheat the
child. Underhand means are frequently resorted to, to persuade a
child to perform or abstain from some particular duty or object; but
in a very short time it will be found out, and the child has been
taught a lesson in deception which it will not fail to use when
occasion requires.

And under this head might be included all that petty species of
deceit used towards children, whether to mislead their apprehension,
or to divert their attention. If any thing be improper for a child
to know or do, better tell him so at once, than resort to an
underhand expedient. If a reason can be given for requiring the
abstinence; it should; but if not tell the child that the reason is
such that he could not comprehend it, and he will remain satisfied.
But if trick or scheming be resorted to, the child will have learned
the two improper lessons of first being cunning, and then telling a
falsehood to avoid it.

In whatever way you wish to act upon a child, always propose the
highest and noblest motive--this will generally be a motive which
centres in God. Thus, in teaching a child to speak the truth, it
should be proposed not so much out of obedience to parents, as out
of obedience to God; and in all requirements the love and fear of
God should be prominently set forth.

A child is born with feelings of religion; and if these feelings are
properly called forth, the actions will generally have a tendency to
good. Thus, with a child whose disposition is to deceive, a mother
has no hold upon such an one; for the child will soon perceive that
his mother cannot follow him every where, and that he can commit
with impunity many actions of deceit. But, impress the child with
the truth that a Being is watching these actions, and that though
done with the greatest cunning, they cannot be committed with
impunity, and it is more than probable that they will never be
committed at all. A temptation may be thrown in the way of such a
child, but it will not be powerful enough to overcome the feeling
that the action is watched. That child may eagerly pant to perform
the forbidden action, or to partake of the forbidden pleasure; but
he will not be able to rid himself of the feeling that it cannot be
done without being observed. He will stand in a state of anxiety,
and steal a glance around, in order to see the Being he feels is
looking upon him, and every breeze that murmurs will be a voice to
chide him, and every leaf that whistles will seem a footstep, and
never will he be able to break the restraint; for wherever he goes
and whatever he does, he will feel that his actions are watched by
one who will punish the bad and reward the good.

And in the same way might this be applied to all dispositions and
feelings. How cheering is it to a timid child to be told that at no
time is he left alone: but that the Being who made every thing
preserves and keeps every thing, and that nothing can happen but by
his permission! This is to disarm fear of its terrors, and to
implant a confidence in the mind, for the child will feel that while
his actions are good he is under the protection of an Almighty
Parent. In the same way, in stimulating a child to the performance
of a duty, the end proposed should be the favour of God. This would
insure the duty being entered upon with a right spirit--not merely
for the sake of show and effect, but springing from the heart and
the mind--and, at the same time, it would prevent any thing of
hypocrisy. If it were only the estimation of the world which was to
be regarded, a child could soon understand that the applause would
be gained by the mere exterior performance, be the motive what it
might: but when the motive is centered in God, it is readily
understood that the feeling must be genuine; otherwise, whatever the
world may say, God will look upon it as unworthy and base. We
believe it would be found to work the best results, if all the
actions of a child were made thus to depend upon their harmony with
the will of God; for it would give a sacredness to every action,
make every motive a high and holy one, and harmonise the thoughts of
the heart with the actions of the life.

But in this mode of teaching, it is essentially necessary that a
mother should herself be an example of the truth she teaches. It
will be worse than useless to teach a child that God is always at
hand, 'and spieth out all our ways,' if she act as though she did
not believe in the existence of a Deity.

In the same way will it hold good of every requirement. It will be
vain to teach a child that lying is a great crime in God's sight,
when a mother in her own words shows no regard to truth; and equally
so of all other passions and feelings. It is idle to teach a child
that pride--hatred--revenge--anger, are unholy passions, if a
mother's own conduct displays either of them. How useless is it to
teach that vanity should never be indulged in, when a mother
delights in display! Such instruction as this is like the web of
Penelope--unpicked as fast as done. The greatest reverence is due to
a child; and previously to becoming a teacher, a mother should learn
this hardest of all lessons--'Know thyself.' Without this, the
instruction she gives her children will at best prove very
imperfect. It is quite useless to teach children to reverence any
thing, when a mother's conduct shows that, practically at least, she
has no belief in the truths she inculcates. And a very hard
requirement this is: but it is a requirement absolutely necessary,
if education is meant to be any thing more than nominal. The finest
lesson on the beauty of truth is enforced by a mother never herself
saying what is false; for children pay great regard to consistency,
and very soon detect any discrepancies between that which is taught
and that which is practised.

The best method of inculcating truth on the minds of children is by
analogy and illustration. They cannot follow an argument, though
they readily understand a comparison: and, by a judicious
arrangement, every thing, either animate or inanimate, might be made
to become a teacher. What lesson on industry would be so likely to
be instructive as that gathered from a bee-hive? The longest
dissertation on the evils of idleness and the advantages of industry
would not prove half so beneficial as directing the observation to
the movements of the bee--that ever-active insect, which, without
the aid of reason, exercises prudence and foresight, and provides
against the wants of winter. A child will readily understand such
instruction as this, and will blush to be found spending precious
hours in idleness. And in the same way with other duties, whether to
God or mankind, the fowls of the air and the flowers of the field
might be made profitable teachers, and the child would, wherever he
went, be surrounded with instruction.

This mode of teaching has this special recommendation--it raises up
no evil passions: and a child which would display an evil temper by
being reproved in words, will feel no such rancor at a lesson being
inculcated in a way like this.

This instruction will also be much longer remembered than one
delivered in words, forasmuch as the object upon which the
instruction is based would be continually presented to the eye.

And, we believe, almost all duties might be inculcated in this
manner. Thus, humility by the lily, patience by the spider,
affection by the dove, love to parents by the stork,--all might be
rendered teachers, and in a way never to be forgotten. And that this
mode of teaching is the best, we have the example of Christ himself,
who almost invariably enforced his instructions by an allusion to
some created thing. What, for instance, was so likely to teach men
dependence upon God as a reference to the 'ravens and the lilies,'
which without the aid of reason had their wants cared for? And in
the same way with children--what is so likely to teach them their
duties, as a reference to the varied things in nature with whose
uses and habits they are well acquainted?

God should be the object upon which the child's thoughts are taught
to dwell--for the minds even of children turn to the beautiful, and
the beautiful is the Divine. All thoughts and actions should be
raised to this standard; and the child would raise above the
feelings of self-gratification and vanity, and the panting for
applause, to the favor and love of God. Thus should religion be the
great and the first thing taught; and a mother should be careful
that neither in her own actions, nor in the motives she holds out to
her children, should there be any thing inimical or contrary to
religion.

And by this course the best and happiest results may be expected to
follow. The perverse and headstrong passions of the human heart are
so many, that numerous instructions may seem to be useless, and a
mother may have often to sigh over her child as she sees him
allowing evil habits to obtain the mastery, or unholy dispositions
to reign in his heart; but, as we have before said, we do not think
that the instruction will be lost, but that a time will come when
she will reap the fruits of her toil, care and anxiety.

Such then is the duty of woman as a mother--to tend and watch over
the wants of her child, to guard it in health, to nurse it in
sickness, to be solicitous for it in all the changes of life, and to
prevent, as much as possible, those many ills to which flesh is heir
from assailing her fondly cherished offspring.

It is also her province to instruct her children in those duties
which will fall to their lot both as reasonable and as immortal
creatures; and by so doing she will make her own life happy--leave
to her children a happy heritage on earth, and a prospect of a
higher one in heaven. But if a mother neglect her duty, she will
reap the fruits of her own negligence in the ingratitude of her
children--an ingratitude which will bring a double pain to her, from
the thought that her own neglect was the cause of its growth, as an
eagle with an arrow in his heart might be supposed to feel an agony
above that of pain on seeing the shaft now draining its life's blood
feathered from its own wing.

Mrs. Child, in her excellent "Mother's Book," a volume that should
be in the hands of every woman who has assumed the responsibilities
of a parent, gives some valuable suggestions on the subject of
governing children. I make a single extract and with it close my
present rambling work. She says:

"Some children, from errors in early management, get possessed with
the idea that they may have every thing. They even tease for things
it would be impossible to give them. A child properly managed will
seldom ask twice for what you have once told him he should not have.
But if you have the care of one who has acquired this habit, the
best way to cure him of it is never to give him what he asks for,
whether his request is proper or not; but at the same time be
careful to give him such things as he likes, (provided they are
proper for him,) when he does not ask for them. This will soon break
him of the habit of teasing.

"I have said much in praise of gentleness. I cannot say too much.
Its effects are beyond calculation, both on the affections and the
understanding. The victims of oppression and abuse are generally
stupid, as well as selfish and hard-hearted. How can we wonder at
it? They are all the time excited to evil passions, and nobody
encourages what is good in them. We might as well expect flowers to
grow amid the cold and storm of winter.

"But gentleness, important as it is, is not all that is required in
education. There should be united with it firmness--great firmness.
Commands should be reasonable, and given in perfect kindness; but
once given, it should be known that they must be obeyed. I heard a
lady once say, 'For my part, I cannot be so very strict with my
children. I love them too much to punish them every time they
disobey me.' I will relate a scene which took place in her family.
She had but one domestic, and at the time to which I allude, she was
very busy preparing for company. Her children knew by experience
that when she was in a hurry she would indulge them in any thing for
the sake of having them out of the way. George began, 'Mother, I
want a piece of mince-pie.' The answer was, 'It is nearly bed-time;
and mince-pie will hurt you. You shall have a piece of cake, if you
will sit down and be still.' The boy ate his cake; and liking the
system of being hired to sit still, he soon began again, 'Mother, I
want a piece of mince-pie.' The old answer was repeated. The child
stood his ground, 'Mother, I want a piece of mince-pie--I _want_ a
piece--I _want_ a piece,' was repeated incessantly. 'Will you leave
off teasing, If I give you a piece?' 'Yes, I will--certain true,' A
small piece was given, and soon devoured. With his mouth half full,
he began again, 'I want another piece--I want another piece.' 'No,
George; I shall not give you another mouthful. Go sit down, you
naughty boy. You always act the worst when I am going to have
company.' George continued his teasing; and at last said, 'If you
don't give me another piece, I'll roar.' This threat not being
attended to, he kept his word. Upon this, the mother seized him by
the shoulder, shook him angrily, saying, 'Hold your tongue, you
naughty boy!' 'I will if you will give me another piece of pie,'
said he. Another small piece was given him, after he had promised
that he certainly would not tease any more. As soon as he had eaten
it, he, of course, began again; and with the additional threat, 'If
you don't give me a piece, I will roar after the company comes, so
loud that they can all hear me.' The end of all this was, that the
boy had a sound whipping, was put to bed, and could not sleep all
night, because the mince-pie made his stomach ache. What an
accumulation of evils in this little scene! His health injured--his
promises broken with impunity--his mother's promises broken--the
knowledge gained that he could always vex her when she was in a
hurry--and that he could gain what he would by teasing. He always
acted upon the same plan afterward; for he only once in a while
(when he made his mother very angry) got a whipping; but he was
_always_ sure to obtain what he asked for, if he teased her long
enough. His mother told him the plain truth, when she said the
mince-pie would hurt him; but he did not know whether it was the
truth, or whether she only said it to put him off; for he knew that
she did sometimes deceive. When she gave him the pie, he had reason
to suppose it was not true it would hurt him--else why should a kind
mother give it to her child? Had she told him that if he asked a
second time, she would put him to bed directly--and had she kept her
promise, in spite of entreaties--she would have saved him a
whipping, and herself a great deal of unnecessary trouble. And who
can calculate all the whippings, and all the trouble, she would have
spared herself and him? I do not remember ever being in her house
half a day without witnessing some scene of contention with the
children.

"Now let me introduce you to another acquaintance. She was in
precisely the same situation, having a comfortable income and one
domestic; but her children were much more numerous, and she had had
very limited advantages for education. Yet she managed her family
better than any woman I ever saw, or ever expect to see again. I
will relate a scene I witnessed there, by way of contrast to the one
I have just described. Myself and several friends once entered her
parlor unexpectedly, just as the family were seated at the
supper-table. A little girl, about four years old, was obliged to be
removed, to make room for us. Her mother assured her she should have
her supper in a little while, if she was a good girl. The child
cried; and the guests insisted that room should be made for her at
table. 'No,' said the mother; 'I have told her she must wait; and if
she cries, I shall be obliged to send her to bed. If she is a good
little girl, she shall have her supper directly.' The child could
not make up her mind to obey; and her mother led her out of the
room, and gave orders that she should be put to bed without supper.
When my friend returned, her husband said, 'Hannah, that was a hard
case. The poor child lost her supper, and was agitated by the
presence of strangers. I could hardly keep from taking her on my
knee, and giving her some supper. Poor little thing! But I never
will interfere with your management; and much as it went against my
feelings, I entirely approve of what you have done.' 'It cost me a
struggle,' replied his wife; 'but I know it is for the good of the
child to be taught that I mean exactly what I say.'

"This family was the most harmonious, affectionate, happy family I
ever knew. The children were managed as easily as a flock of lambs.
After a few unsuccessful attempts at disobedience, when very young,
they gave it up entirely; and always cheerfully acted from the
conviction that their mother knew best. This family was governed
with great strictness; firmness was united with gentleness. The
indulgent mother, who said she loved her children too much to punish
them, was actually obliged to punish them ten times as much as the
strict mother did."




THE END.










End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Trials and Confessions of a Housekeeper, by 
T. S. Arthur

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