If
she spend too much on dress, she will have too little for food or
education. She will commit extravagances in one direction or another,
and thus subject her household to great discomfort. She may also bring
her husband into trouble through the debts she has contracted, and make
a beginning of his misfortunes and sometimes of his ruin.
Much might be said in favour of household management, and especially in
favour of improved cookery. Ill-cooked meals is a source of discomfort
in many families. Bad cooking is waste,--waste of money and loss of
comfort. Whom God has joined in matrimony, ill-cooked joints and
ill-boiled potatoes have very often put asunder. Among the "common
things" which educators should teach the rising generation, this ought
certainly not to be overlooked. It is the commonest and yet most
neglected of the branches of female education.
The greater part of human labour is occupied in the direct production of
the materials for human food. The farming classes and their labourers
devote themselves to the planting, rearing, and reaping of oats and
other cereals; and the grazing farmer to the production of cattle and
sheep, for the maintenance of the population at large. All these
articles--corn, beef, mutton, and such-like--are handed over to the
female half of the human species to be converted into food, for the
sustenance of themselves, their husbands, and their families.
Pages:
450
451
452
453
454
455
456
457
458
459
460
461
462
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474