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.