I shall at present, however, only point out
that in hundreds of thousands of homes in the country an opportunity of
gaining a very moderate sum in addition to the present income by the
expenditure of some weeks of care and light work would be hailed as a
Godsend, and that, too, in families where the feeling of self-respect
and the desire to keep the family together are far too strong to permit
the women to go away from home in any way to earn money.
Let any one who doubts this consider the dairy work and similar
industries, and try to calculate how much per diem the women thus
occupied at home gain in money. It may be said with entire accuracy
that, as a rule, anything in which the women can engage at home, by
which something may be earned, will in general be regarded as net profit
through out many sections of the land. In the silk districts of Europe,
agricultural machinery is very much less employed than with us, and in
general every woman who can possibly be spared from other work is a
field laborer and valuable as such. So that time taken for raising silk
must be deducted from her other productive work and charged to the cost
of the silk crop.
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