Transcriber's note: Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
Page numbers enclosed by curly braces (example: {25}) have been
incorporated to facilitate the use of the Index.
* * * * *
[Illustration: THE LARDER.]
[Illustration]
THE
ENGLISH HOUSEKEEPER:
OR,
MANUAL OF DOMESTIC MANAGEMENT:
CONTAINING
ADVICE ON THE CONDUCT OF HOUSEHOLD AFFAIRS, AND
Practical Instructions
CONCERNING
THE STORE-ROOM,
THE PANTRY,
THE LARDER,
THE KITCHEN,
THE CELLAR,
THE DAIRY.
THE WHOLE BEING INTENDED
FOR THE USE OF YOUNG LADIES WHO UNDERTAKE THE SUPERINTENDENCE OF THEIR OWN
HOUSEKEEPING.
_SIXTH EDITION._
(IMPROVED BY THE INTRODUCTION OF MANY NEW RECEIPTS.)
BY ANNE COBBETT.
LONDON: PUBLISHED BY A. COBBETT, 137, STRAND.
1851.
[_Price Six Shillings._]
LONDON:
GEO. PEIRCE, PRINTER, 310, STRAND.
{iii}INTRODUCTION.
"She looketh well to the ways of her _Household_, and eateth not the
bread of idleness. Her children arise up, and call her blessed: her
husband also, and he praiseth her. Many daughters have done virtuously,
but thou excellest them all."--PROVERBS, Chap. xxxi., vs. 27, 28, & 29.
I HAVE taken so much pains to make the following work deserving of the
title it bears, that I could not, without affectation, pretend to
undervalue my own performance, by anticipating doubts of its utility, or by
expressing any fear lest my friends should be disappointed when they look
into it. Every publication of this description is necessarily calculated to
be of some essential service; for it must not only be practical in its
descriptions and directions, but must relate to matters touching the daily
and hourly wants of all mankind; and it will, of course, be approved
according as it may happen to meet those wants.
As a mere Cookery-book, mine must submit to be placed in a lower rank than
some others, because I do not profess to bring to light discoveries in the
culinary art, neither do I design to favour epicurism. I have no pretension
beyond that of advising young ladies who are their own housekeepers; and
the receipts which will be found in my selection, are such as appeared to
me suitable to any family of moderate style in living, and such as may be
easily comprehended and put in practice. These have been carefully
{iv}revised and amended in the present edition, and some others added.
While I am offering advice with respect to the manner of conducting
domestic affairs, I cannot refrain from expressing my regret that so large
a proportion of the young ladies of England are sadly deficient in that
information, and in those practices of economy which are the most
essentially necessary to their welfare as persons of influence and
authority in a house. I am by no means singular in lamenting that the
advantages of a knowledge of housekeeping seem to be so entirely lost sight
of by those who have the responsibility of bringing up either their own or
other people's daughters; and I find it frequently the subject of remark
that the ladies of the present day have become incapable of being so
skilful in the discharge of their domestic duties as the ladies of a former
period were, in proportion as they have become more cultivated and more
accomplished. But is it so? Are there now a greater proportion of women
whose minds are really cultivated than there were formerly? Is there not
rather a greater pretence of learning with less of it in reality? It is
erroneous to suppose that persons of real learning look upon the minor
duties of life with contempt, because of their learning; for, though
learning does not, perhaps, give sense, it surely does not destroy it, and
there is not only a want of sense, but a positive folly, in that
affectation of refinement, and that assumption of superiority, which has
led to the result now complained of. But the system of education which has
prevailed of late years is certainly in fault; a system which assigns the
same species of learning, indiscriminately, to young persons of every rank
and degree, without distinction even as to ability. Such a method of
bringing up has unavoidably been productive of very injurious effects; for,
while it withdraws the daughters of farmers and tradespeople, and others,
during a great part of their youth, from the practice of those homely arts
which belong to their {v}stations, it leaves them, in nine cases out of
ten, without anything more than the mere fancy that they possess
acquirements of a higher order.
The desire which many persons feel to give their children a better
education than has been bestowed upon themselves is laudable, because it
proceeds from sincere affection: but how often is the success equal to the
motive which actuates? How often is the manner of attempting at all
calculated for attaining the object so earnestly sought? An ambition to
promote the welfare of children reconciles parents to part with them at
that tender age when they ought to command more constant care than they
generally need at a more advanced time of life; and this ambition is so
strong that it will even cause little girls to be consigned to the
blighting atmosphere of a crowded schoolroom, there to bewail the loss of
the warm hearth, or the airy room of their own homes, and all the comforts
which depend upon a mother's solicitude. With a view to their being
educated, that is to say, fitted for the world, and for the discharge of
their respective duties in it, girls are sent to school, and are there
condemned to a dull course of lessons, before their minds have sufficient
strength to imbibe any kind of learning that requires mental labour, and
before their understandings are equal to any greater exertion than that of
perceiving the difference between a roasted apple and a sugar-plum.
A knowledge of housekeeping is not difficult to attain. It needs no natural
superiority of talent, and no painful application. It is rather a habit
than a science, and, like the neatness so characteristic of English women,
this knowledge rarely comes to perfection at all, unless it be partly
formed in early life, and by means of our very earliest associations.
Little girls are always prone to imitate the ways of older persons,
particularly in housekeeping matters. They very soon begin to find
amusement in learning to make preserves, pastry, and such things. Those
children, therefore, who are brought up at home, {vi}and have the daily and
hourly practice of domestic duties before their eyes, will naturally fall
into habits of usefulness, and acquire, by degrees and imperceptibly, a
knowledge of what belongs to home, which should constitute the elementary
education of every woman who is not born to rank and to luxury. But the
unhappy little creatures who drag through seven or more years of continuous
monotony within the walls of a school, their minds taking little or no part
in the tasks which their memories are racked upon, have but little chance
of learning any thing which will benefit their after lives; for, those
whose mothers knead the bread, churn the butter, and help to cook the
dinner, have not the benefit of that sort of society that would teach them
to apply their learning, that would call forth their acquirements, or that
would be able to appreciate those acquirements when displayed. During the
period which these children spend at school, their mother continues her
old-fashioned occupations, and, as time passes on, she looks forward,
perhaps, with cheering anticipations to the _help_ which her daughters are
to afford her. But alas! how often do these daughters return from school
with false notions of the lives they are to lead, and with mistaken ideas
of their own consequence, such as lead them to despise the humble
occupations of their home, although their "education" may not have given
them one single idea to justify any pretension of the kind. It is generally
acknowledged, that girls educated at schools are seldom far advanced in
learning. Where history and geography, and other sciences, are learnt by
rote, "a page of Greece on Monday," a "page of Rome on Tuesday," a "page of
Universal Biography on Wednesday," with occasional readings of the middle
ages, of modern times, and application being made to maps, globes, charts,
&c., to fill up the time which is not devoted to the fine arts (for it all
goes on at once), the stock of real solid information which is gained by
the end of the year, will be very scanty, or will probably {vii}have
resolved itself into such a confused mass of imperfect information that all
practical benefit may be despaired of. No wonder, if, after having
undergone a course like this, a young girl is often found to have gained
less from books than others have gained from vulgar report, and be puzzled
to say whether it was Scipio or Washington who was the first President of
the United States of America. They learn lessons, but they do not reason or
think about what they are getting by heart; and many girls, whose education
has cost a large sum of money, are unable to answer a question of name,
place, or date, in their geography or history, without first running over a
certain portion of one whole lesson, the sound of which has left a deeper
impression on the ear, than its sense has left on the understanding. Just
as, when wanting to ascertain the number of days in a particular month, we
repeat the words, "Thirty days hath September," &c., thus recalling by
means of the jingle of words, what of itself had slipped our memories.
Girls so educated are very much to be commiserated. They live, through that
part of their lives in which the mind is most open to receive impressions,
without any opportunity for exercising their powers of observation, till,
at last, those powers fall into a state of inertness; and their education
is finished without their having gained the least knowledge of what the
world really is, or of the part which they are to be called upon to act in
it. Having had no intimate association with persons really well informed,
it is no matter of surprise, if they become conceited of their supposed
attainments, or if they remain in ignorance of the fact, that a little
music, a little drawing, and a very little French and Italian, are not
sufficient to make an accomplished woman, and that merely going the round
of primers will not, of itself, constitute what is looked for in a "good
education." Nor is it, indeed, to be wondered at, if the home, which has
been so cherished in recollection from one holiday time to another, fail to
realise all the anticipations {viii}of pleasure and of happiness which the
thought of it has excited. Its simple occupations are not of a kind to make
them, as novelties, attractive to one who is _only_ a fine lady; the want
of capacity to fill domestic duties will, of course, render them rather
disagreeable than otherwise; and it is but natural that young women who,
during all the early part of their lives, have been unaccustomed to think
of household cares, should entertain some degree of aversion to them, and
feel dissatisfied when called upon to take a part in them. Many a father
has repented that he did not rather lay up for his daughter, the money
which has been expended to no better purpose than to cause her to repine at
the condition in life in which he must leave her. And many a mother's
pride, in the fancied superiority of her daughter, has been saddened by the
recollection, not only that her daughter was incapable of helping her, but
that the time must come when that incompetent daughter would be left to
take care of herself.
My readers may imagine that I forget my proper theme: they may wish me to
remember that this book professes only to aid those young ladies who are
uninformed on this subject, _how to keep house_, and that I am diverging
from that subject, and raising objections to a very common way of bringing
up children. But when it is generally acknowledged that there is, in the
ladies of the present day, a great want of skill as regards the affairs of
their household, an ignorance, in fact, of some of their first duties, it
cannot be impertinent for me to inquire, whether this want of skill, and
this ignorance, be not properly ascribable to a defective, or even to a
mischievous, course of education. I certainly do think that habits of
usefulness, and the cultivation of talents, may be combined, but then the
acquiring of the useful, and the cultivating of the finer accomplishments
must proceed hand in hand. There are, doubtless, many who do not think it
beneath them to be able to make a pudding, merely because they can execute
a difficult piece of music, or sing with good taste; who do not regard
these as things absolutely incongruous; and who do not consider, when they
receive applause for excelling in fashionable powers to charm, that the
offering carries with it an excuse for their being inefficient and helpless
mistresses of families. There are, however, not a few, who do think that
{ix}qualifications of a refined nature render it unbecoming in their
possessors to give that personal superintendence to the affairs of the
kitchen, of the store-room, and of all the other branches of household
arrangement, which is so necessary, that, for the want of it, moderate
fortunes often prove inadequate to the support of families in the middle
rank. Young persons cannot be expected to entertain a proper estimation of
the value of useful habits, as compared with the value of ornamental
acquirements, unless they have grown up in the exercise of those habits.
The idea that capability in the domestic, is incompatible with taste in the
elegant accomplishments, is so deeply rooted in the minds of most persons
who aspire to be fashionable, that I despair of the power to do much
towards eradicating the fatal error. And yet, I would fain represent to
parents, the wrong which is done to children by suffering this idea to
plant itself in their minds; for it not only reduces young women to a
standard of comparatively little consequence, by making them helpless in
all the ordinary business of life, but it produces incidentally, a variety
of injurious effects on the health, on the spirits, and even on the temper.
It is proverbial, that the largest portion of happiness belongs not to the
higher ranks of society; and the reason is, not that the rich and luxurious
are, as a matter of course, unworthy and consequently unhappy; but that
their minds are not diverted by necessary cares, that their amusements are
easily obtained, and that the enjoyment of them is never interrupted by
their having duties to perform. Pleasures fail to excite and interest the
mind, unless they come in the way of relaxation. Therefore it is, that even
in youth, something by way of employment is necessary to keep gaiety from
subsiding into dulness; and in mature life nothing is more salutary than
occupation. To have _something to do_, to be obliged to _be doing_,
withdraws the mind from the contemplation of fancied sorrows, and prevents
its being subdued by the recurrence of unavailing regrets. Women who have
been accustomed, in their youth, to be industriously engaged and to
contribute to the daily happiness of others, are sure to enjoy the greatest
share of tranquillity and satisfaction in a review of days gone by, to show
the most courage in adversity, the most patience in sickness, and to be the
most cheerful and resigned under the infirmities of age; and those parents,
{x}therefore, who instil into the minds of their daughters the principle of
_making themselves useful_, will confer upon them one of the greatest of
blessings.
Let it not be supposed, however, that by _useful_, I mean that a woman
should be a mere household drudge, that all her ideas should be confined
within the limits of her domestic offices, or that her guests as well as
her family, should be entertained by nothing better than details of the
household. Ladies who have houses and servants to look after, should be
capable of superintending the whole in a manner so systematic, as that they
may have a due portion of their time, and of their thoughts, to give to
other, and, if they deem them such, higher matters. I by no means
recommend, as patterns, the fussy people, who are always busy and have
never done, who let you know every thing that they have to do, and who,
sometimes, do very little after all. Neither is it advisable to imitate,
too closely, that class of housewives who are distinguished by the
phrase--"very _particular_:" for even the virtue of neatness, when
incessantly exercised, or manifested too much in matters of little moment,
becomes an intruder upon comfort, and, consequently, offensive. What I
recommend is, that quiet and orderly method of conducting the business of a
house, which tends rather to conceal than to make an appearance of much to
do, which puts all that part of the family, who are not immediately engaged
in it, as little as possible out of the way, and which may enable strangers
to remain under the roof without being constantly reminded of the trouble
they occasion. Every woman who presides over a home, and who wishes to
preserve its attraction, should bear in mind the many minute cares which
all contribute to give to that home, not only the semblance, but the
substance of enjoyment; and I earnestly impress upon my youthful readers
the important fact, that, as far as mere fortune is concerned, those often
prove to be the most poor in reality, who may have been thought to be the
most rich. Competence and ease may be changed for narrowed circumstances,
and a struggle may ensue, to stem a torrent of difficulties which follow in
succession, and threaten to destroy the home which has been hitherto
considered secure. Then she who has passed her life in total listlessness,
possessing no acquirements but of a showy kind, and {xi}ignorant of what is
wanted to preserve the foundation of a family's happiness; then such a
woman will prove as unfitted to lighten sorrow, as she has been careless to
avert it: for herself, she can but quail as difficulties assail her; for
others, she can only seek for protection where, if she were capable, she
might be of assistance; and, instead of aiding to alleviate distress, she
will become the main cause of rendering the common burden intolerable.
How often do we see families stricken to the very dust, by the first, and
perhaps only a slight blow, of misfortune; and this, merely for the want of
a little of that practical knowledge, and that experience, which would have
enabled them to husband their diminished means so that they might still
supply sufficient to meet all real wants, and still procure every material
comfort. From a want of this experience, some of the very best intentioned
persons will so misapply the resources left to them, at one time laying out
money where they ought to refrain altogether, and at another parting with
more than the occasion requires, that, by degrees, those resources dwindle
away to nothing before they seem to be aware of the natural consequences,
and not only poverty, but destitution and misery are let into an abode
where comparative ease and contentment might still have remained. The great
art of economy in domestic life, is comprised in the two very homely
phrases, "_to turn every thing to account_," and "_to make the most of what
you have_." But their meaning is often perverted, and the habit of _turning
every thing to an account_, and of _making the most of every thing_, is
ascribed to those who are actuated, not by a laudable desire to produce as
much comfort as their circumstances will admit, but by an inclination to
indulge in a strong propensity to stinginess. But of this class of persons
I am far from being the advocate; between extravagance and parsimony the
widest possible interval exists; and that economy, that management and
application of means, which I deem perfectly consistent with the most rigid
virtue and the most generous impulse, is of too admirable a character to
partake either of the spendthrift's criminality or of the miser's meanness.
If my censures upon the present system of educating young ladies should
appear to be presumptuous, I greatly fear that any disapproval of that
which is now so {xii}universally adopted with regard to _the poor_ will be
still more unpopular; but it does appear to me that _there_, there exists a
mistake also, which, perhaps, in its consequences, will prove still more
fatal. It appears to me that something better might be done, more
advantageous to both rich and poor, by educating the latter to be useful
members of society; and I think that ladies who live in the country may
have ample opportunities of training up good servants, by attending to the
education of poor neighbours of their own sex. By _education_, I do not
mean that kind of teaching which merely qualifies them for reading letters
and words. Small literary accomplishments, accompanied by idle habits, are
already but too common, though the fact is more generally known than
acknowledged. Nor do I mean that sort of education which creates
expectations of gaining a livelihood by any other means than those of
honest industry; or which tends to raise the ideas of persons who are born
to work above the duties which fortune has assigned to them. I mean such an
education as shall better their condition, by making them better servants.
In large establishments, where there are old and experienced persons in
service, it is very much the custom to have younger ones as helpers, and
thus the latter have the benefit of learning all the duties of the
household; but these establishments are comparatively few in number. The
fashion of the day is opposed to my opinion, and the same ladies who now
condescend to teach poor children to read and write, because it is the
fashion to do so, would, in many cases, think it beneath them to teach a
little girl to make a pudding. It would, in a work of this nature, be a
hopeless and presumptuous attempt, to argue against the all-powerful
influence of fashion, against which the keenest shafts of invective and
ridicule, and in short every weapon of satire, have been so often aimed in
vain; but, all are not under the dominion of so senseless and so capricious
a tyranny, and I have to regret my inability to set before my readers the
benefits which mistresses of families would confer and receive, from
bringing up young country girls to be good servants. There might always, in
a country-house, be one or more young girls, according to the size of the
establishment; to be placed under older servants, or be instructed by the
mistress herself, in all household occupations, from {xiii}the hardest work
and most simple offices, to the more delicate arts of housekeeping,
including needle-work. This practice would not only insure more good
servants than there now are; but, young girls so trained would, by the
force of hourly tuition and good example, imbibe a right sense of duty, and
acquire good habits, before they could have had time to become vicious or
unmanageable.
When ladies take the trouble to teach the poor to read and write, they mean
well, no doubt, and think they are doing the best they can for their
pupils. But teaching industry is more to the purpose; for when learning has
been found insufficient to preserve the morals of princes, nobles, and
gentry, how can it be supposed that it will preserve those of their
dependents? The supposition is, in fact, injurious to the cause of true
learning, since the system founded upon it has been attended by no moral
improvement. Our well-being is best secured by an early habit of earning
our bread by honest labour; and
"Not to know at large of things remote
From use, obscure, and subtle, but to know
That which before us lies in daily life,
Is the prime wisdom; what is more, is fume.
Or emptiness, or fond impertinence,
And renders us in things that most concern,
Unpractis'd, unprepar'd, and still to seek."
A country girl, the daughter of a labourer, would, by making herself in
some way practically useful to society, and gaining a respectable
livelihood, be more profitably employed than in going through that long
course of literary exercise which has, of late, been so generally bestowed
on the children of poor people, but which, I fear, has not generally
imparted to them much of what MILTON styles "the prime wisdom." It should
also be considered, that the literary education of the poor, such as it is,
cannot be much more than half completed at the age when the children cease
to receive lessons from their charitable instructors. They are taught to
read, to write a little, and perhaps something of the elements of
arithmetic. The reading, however, is the principal attainment; and in this,
they generally become well enough schooled before they are eleven, or, at
most, twelve years of age. But alas! have they at that age, or at the age
of thirteen or fourteen, {xiv}been taught all that is necessary for girls
so young to learn, with regard to the _choice of books_? With the use of
_letters_, indeed, as the mere components of words, they have been made
acquainted. But why have they been taught to read at all, unless there be
some profit to be derived from their reading; and how can any profit be
looked for from that reading, unless there be the same kind of pains taken
to point out the proper objects of study as there have been to teach the
little scholars to spell? Surely that advice which is required by all young
persons in the pursuit of book-learning, is at least as necessary to those
who can do no more than just read their own native language, as it is to
those who are brought up in a superior way. The education of youth, among
the higher and middle classes, does not terminate, or, at least, it never
should, immediately on their leaving school. At that period, a fresh series
of anxieties occur to the parent or the guardian, who is quite as sedulous
as before, to finish that which has been, in fact, only begun at school. If
this be not the case, how is it, that though the son may have been eight or
ten years at the best schools, the father, after the schooling is ended,
finds it necessary to consult the most discreet and experienced advisers,
concerning the right guidance of his child in the course of his future
studies? The attention paid to the studies of young ladies, after they come
from school, is, to be sure, not precisely the same as that which parents
think requisite for their sons. But, while the daughter has generally the
advantage of being with her mother, or with some female relative much older
than herself; and while the success in life of our sex does not so
frequently depend upon literary acquirements, and the proper employment of
them; yet under such circumstances, favourable as they are, we all know
that there is still much wanting, both in the way of counsel and attractive
example, from the parent or guardian, to render the learning which a young
girl has acquired at school, of substantial service to her in after years.
If the daughters of the rich require to be taught, not merely to read, but,
also, _what_ to read, why should not this be the case with the daughters of
the poor? in whose fate, it is too often proved, that "a little learning is
a dangerous thing," owing to the want of that discretion which is necessary
to prevent the little learning becoming worthless, and even mischievous, to
its possessor.
{xv}In the way of practical education, there are many things of importance
to the poor, which ought to be taught them in early youth. At the age of
fifteen or sixteen, a girl should already have learned many of the duties
of a servant; for if her education up to that age have been neglected, she
must necessarily, for the next three or four years of her life, be
comparatively useless and little worthy of trust. The poor do not, as some
may suppose, inhale with the air they breathe any of that knowledge which
is necessary to make them useful in the houses of their parents or their
employers. To learn cookery, in its various branches; making bread;
milking, butter-making, and all the many things that belong to a dairy;
household offices innumerable; besides the nice art of getting up fine
linen, and plain work with the needle; not only requires considerable time,
but, also, unless the learner be uncommonly quick and willing, great
attention on the part of the person who undertakes to teach them. It is
lamentable to see how deficient many female servants are in some things,
the knowledge of which ought to be thought indispensable. Some are so
ignorant of plain needle-work as to be incapable of making themselves a
gown; and this, too, where they happen to be what the country-people call
"scholars," from their ability to read a little, and to make an awkward use
of the pen. A maid-servant who can assist her mistress in plain
needle-work, is a really valuable person. Strange as it may seem, however,
there are but few common servants who can do so, notwithstanding that
superiority in learning by which the present generation of the labouring
people are said to be distinguished from their predecessors.
With young servants, nothing has a better effect than _encouragement_. If
they are, by nature, only good tempered, and blest with as much right
principle as those who have not been spoiled generally possess, whatever
you say or do in the way of encouraging them, can hardly fail to produce
some good, though it may not always accomplish everything that you would
desire. A cheerful tone in giving directions, a manner of address which
conveys the idea of confidence in the willingness, as well as the ability,
of the person directed, has great influence upon the minds of all young
persons whose tempers and inclinations have not been warped by ill-usage,
or soured {xvi}by disappointment. Very young servants frequently take pride
in their work, though of the most laborious kind, and many a young girl
might be proud to improve in the more refined departments of housewifery,
and would regard a little congratulation upon the lightness of her pastry,
or the excellence of her cakes, as worth ten times all the thought and care
which she had bestowed upon them. There is no mistress who does not
acknowledge the importance of a servant who can assist in preserving,
pickling, wine-making, and other things of this description, which demand
both skill and labour, and which must, where there is no one but the
mistress herself sufficiently acquainted with them to be trusted, take up
much of her time and give her considerable trouble.
To teach poor children to become useful servants, may, perhaps, be thought
a serious task; but it surely cannot be said that this sort of instruction
is at all more difficult than that which is necessary to give them even a
tolerable proficiency in the lowest branches of literature. The learning
here recommended, seems naturally more inviting, as well as more needful,
than that which is taught in the ordinary course of school education; and
it possesses this advantage, that while its benefits are equally lasting,
they are immediately perceptible. It is sometimes said that the poor are
ungrateful, and that after all the pains and trouble which may have been
taken in making them good servants, it often happens, that instead of
testifying a proper sense of the obligation, they become restless, and
desirous of leaving those who have had all the trouble of qualifying them
for better places and higher wages. Servants cannot be prevented from
bettering themselves, as they call it, but that constant changing of place
which operates as one of the worst examples to young women who are at
service, would become less frequent if their employments were occasionally
varied by relaxation and amusement, and their services now and then
rewarded by small presents. The influence of early habits is so universally
felt and acknowledged, that it seems almost superfluous to ask why an early
and industrious education of the poor, and the teaching of the youth of
both sexes to look upon prosperity and right endeavour as inseparable,
should not produce a taste, the reverse of that which leads to a
discontented and unsettled existence.
{xvii}It is equally the interest of the rich and of the poor, that the
youthful inhabitants of the mansion and those of the cottage, should grow
up with sentiments of mutual good will. If the poor are indebted to their
opulent neighbours for the assistance which makes a hard lot tolerable,
there exists a reciprocal obligation on the part of the rich, since they
could not obtain the comforts and the luxuries which they enjoy, without
the aid of those who are less fortunate than themselves. But there is
another and superior motive, which ought to narrow the distance between the
poor and the rich: the lady of the mansion, when she meets her washerwoman
in the village church, must know that, in that place, she and the
hard-working woman are equals. The lady of the mansion, when she beholds
the ravages which but a few years of toil have wrought in the once blooming
and healthful country girl, is astonished, perhaps, that her own looks and
health have not undergone a similar change; but, she forgets that the
pitiable creature before her has been exposed to the damp floors and steams
of a wash-house, to the chill of a cold drying-ground, and the oppressive
heat of an ironing stove, in order to earn her miserable portion of the
necessaries of life. No wonder that her beauty has vanished; that her
countenance betrays the marks of premature age, and that her air of
cheerfulness is exchanged for that of a saddened resignation. But the lady
of the mansion should not, in the confidence of her own happier fate, lose
sight of the fact, that this poor and destitute creature is a _woman_ as
well as herself; that her poor inferior is liable to all those delicacies
and weaknesses of constitution of which she herself is sensible; and that,
in the eyes of their Maker, the peeress and the washerwoman hold equal
rank.
The ingratitude of the poor is often made a pretext for neglecting to
relieve their wants. But are not their superiors ungrateful? Is "the
ingratitude of the world," of which philosophers of the earliest ages have
said so much, confined to the lowly and unrefined? By no means. High birth
and refinement in breeding do not, alone, ensure feelings of honour and of
kindness to the heart, any more than they ensure common sense and sound
judgment to the head; for these qualities seem to be in the very nature of
some, while it passes the power of all art to implant them in
{xviii}others. It is for those who have known what adversity is to say
whether they have not met with instances of devoted attachment, of
generosity, and of every other good feeling, on the part of servants, at
the very time when they have been depressed by the heart-sick sensation
caused by the desertion of friends. Those have been unfortunate in their
experience of human nature, who cannot bear testimony to the admirable
conduct of servants in fulfilling that wearisome, and often most trying,
but at the same time most imperative of all earthly duties, attendance upon
a sick bed. Perhaps it has not occurred to most others, as it has to me, to
witness such proofs of virtue in poor people. Among the truly charitable
there are, no doubt, many in whom disgust has been excited by ingratitude;
but has it been excited by the hard-working and the half-starving only? It
is but a very limited acquaintance with this life, which can justify the
unselfish and noble nature in denouncing the _poor_, for being ungrateful.
Be this, however, as it may, one thing is certain, that no probability of
disappointment, no apprehensions of an ungrateful return, ought to have any
influence with the mind of a Christian, and that such obstacles were never
yet a hinderance to any man or woman whose desire was to do good.
{xix}TABLE OF CONTENTS.
PAGE
INTRODUCTION iii
CHAPTER I.
General observations relating to Housekeeping, with remarks on
the fitting up of a House, and conducting its affairs. On the
choice and management of Servants. 1