Chapter XIII: Part I: Motherly Talks with Young Housekeepers (10)

It is painful to glance into rooms in daily use, and see no indication that a moment’s thought has ever been bestowed upon their adornment, or to fill them with objects that, to the children’s eyes, will unite grace and beauty with usefulness for the family’s every-day life. “O, this will answer! It’s good enough _just for our own family_.” But look into the guest-chamber, for which enough has been expended to compel pinching in all that belongs to home and family comforts, and all for the ostentatious display of hospitality! When you see such incongruities and contrasts between the furnishing of the family apartments and the “spare room,” you will find the same rule runs through everything connected with the family. For every day use the commonest kind of delf, with odd bits of broken or defaced china, mismated cups and saucers, of every variety of color, and the food carelessly prepared, and of the poorest and cheapest quality, showing the same unwise disregard for family comfort. But let a visitor appear, and the table is dazzling with silver and cut-glass, and loaded with dainties over which the utmost skill in cooking has been expended. This is all wrong. _Home_ should be first, company of secondary importance. Let your family always have the best you can reasonably afford; then cordially welcome your friends to share the good and pleasant things with you. It is not easy to teach children to love home, and prefer its society to all others, if they see that all the good and pleasant and beautiful things you possess are only to be used when you have visitors. You have no right to hope that your children will have good manners or be refined, if they see only the coarsest of everything when alone with you, but are called upon, with company, to put on company manners. Love of home, refinement, and good manners are blessings that will rust out and be destroyed, if not brightened by constant daily use.

But we have wandered out of the guest-chamber, and will now return. Because we urge that the family apartments should have the first claim, we would not be understood that no thought should be given to the room your friends will occupy; we only claim that it should not be paramount to all others. Select the furniture with such care and taste as your means will allow. It is not necessary that one should be rich to do this in the most perfect manner. Be sure that the bed is comfortably made, and at all times scrupulously clean. If used only for _one_ night by _one_ person, all the linen should be changed for every new-comer. A white spread, even if not of the best and heaviest, is always an improvement for any bed. Have a spare blanket neatly folded and laid across the foot of the bed, unless you have a closet in the room; then it is a protection from dust to put it there. A low easy-chair or rocker is always desirable, for a lady friend may bring a young infant with her; then, if in accordance with, your ability, furnish easy-chairs or a lounge, but no bedchamber should be crowded with furniture.

A table with a drawer, or small neat writing-desk, with an inkstand, a few pens, paper, and envelopes, are desirable, as friends often come unexpectedly, and neglect to bring the needed articles. To find such conveniences ready at hand will be taken as a kindly attention, which is among the little things that make a guest-chamber homelike.

A brush and comb, a cushion and pins, should be kept on every bureau, and the “spare room” is no exception to this rule. In this room one or two bureau drawers should be left open for the use of guests. The comb and brush, like those in other chambers, should be washed every week if used, or after every new occupant. A few drops of ammonia, put into a little soap and water, will cleanse a brush easily; rinse well in clear water, and stand it up to dry. For the washstand, good soap, plenty of towels, and a nail-brush should be provided. The water-pitcher must be kept filled; a water-bottle, with a glass turned over it, or a decanter with a stopper, is better for drinking water than a pitcher, as water left exposed to the air in a sleeping-room soon becomes impure and unwholesome. A slop pail or jar is needed by the side of the washstand, unless the wash-basins are set to be filled from the pipes, and emptied by the waste-pipe. A match-box, filled, is always an important article in every room, and a little basket or cornucopia is needed to hang by the glass, into which the hair from the comb and burnt matches may be put. This should be emptied when the slops are taken away; but hair must never be thrown in the sink, as it clogs the pipes; always burn it.

Of course, when there is no necessity for close economy, there are a thousand elegances with which it is perfectly proper to beautify, not only the family rooms, but the guest-chamber; but the things here specified are convenient and some really necessary for all sleeping-rooms, and can be procured or made by home ingenuity. Beautify and enrich the guest-room as lavishly as good taste and your ability will allow, only let the family chamber be not neglected for that purpose.

LXII.

THE CARE OF INFANTS.

“ARE our little ones so related to household cares, that Mrs. Beecher will give young mothers, now and then, a few words of instruction on the management of infants? I am a young _mother_ as well as _young housekeeper_, and although not very competent, I, and probably many others, could easier work our way unaided to a respectable standing in all that pertains to the manual labor of the household, than risk mistakes in the care and training of our babies. I think the little ones very necessary to the formation of a true household, and am ready to accept any care and annoyance, if I may only be certain that I am not giving my strength for naught, but so that in these early days I may be enabled to ward off illness, and keep my baby healthy and vigorous. It is usually happy and quiet; but there are times when mind and body are taxed to the utmost limit of my endurance. It often has _spells_ of crying, when no skill which I possess can soothe the disturbance, whatever may be the cause, or lull the little one to sleep. In no way, either by medical advice or the exercise of my own judgment, can I discover the cause, or find any indication which would show the child to be unhealthy.”

We most certainly consider the little ones very peculiarly a part of “The Household” department, and will cheerfully give any assistance to young mothers that is within our power. We have before this been called upon to answer similar questions, and see no reason to change the answers we have felt to be correct.

Young mothers are frequently told, we think very unwisely, “You have no cause for anxiety. Most infants either have their crying spells until they are three months old, or are very quiet and serene up to that period, and then change and cry, and are restless most of the time till some months later.” Believing this, the young mother tries to possess her soul in patience, and struggles on, waiting for the good time coming. But we think there is always some definite cause for a trouble which robs the mother for months of a large portion of the pleasure her infant should bring her, and makes the new world into which the little pilgrim has just entered so truly “a vale of tears.” The cause once ascertained, there must be some remedy found, through the large experience of so many mothers who have been harassed and perplexed by similar trials.

Often kind friends manifest their affection and interest injudiciously through their anxiety to see the new-comer, when both mother and child would be much safer for a few days of perfect, uninterrupted quiet. In the early days when an infant should be forming the habit of long naps, and at regular times, and when the mother should be kept from any excitement, these friendly calls begin, and each caller has great curiosity _just_ to look at the new baby, or _just_ to wake it one moment to see whose eyes it has borrowed. This incense offered to maternal pride is too mighty, and the mother’s judgment bows down before it. If she allows this foolish innovation once, she must twice, and soon a restless habit is formed, and short naps and long cries may be expected. It takes but two or three such friendly visits in the course of one day, to excite the child so that sleep becomes impossible; and then, although it is not needing food, when all other means fail to quiet it, what more natural than to put it to the breast? But broken rest and nursing too frequently will assuredly cause pain, and crying will, of course, be the result. In such cases, no remedy may be hoped for until those to whom the child is committed, and who alone should be responsible for forming its habits, have learned that sound judgment and good common-sense must be their guides in the care of their helpless little ones, and not maternal pride.

But, on the other hand, take a child who from its birth is trained in the most sensible manner,--washed, dressed, and fed at fixed hours, and laid, without rocking, to sleep in the crib, where no foolish friend, indulgent aunt, or grandmother is permitted to disturb or see it until it wakes naturally and is ready for the next meal. All through the day it sleeps, or serenely watches the dancing shadows on the wall, or the bright sun through the curtains; and but for the little cooing, rippling sounds that occasionally give token of its presence, one hardly realizes that there is a babe in the house. But at night the little one becomes restless and begins to cry. Every means for quieting it are resorted to. It is patted, trotted, rocked, and sung to, but all is of no avail. What can be the matter?

Let us take this uneasy little mortal. Ah! we see. In dressing it in the morning you pinned the little waists as tightly as you could draw them, so that the body is as round and unyielding as a marble pillar. The morning bath and change of clothes brought some relief from the night’s fetters; and for the first part of the day, or, if uncommonly strong and healthy, until night, the child may be quiet and endure; but by night, release from so many hours’ bondage is absolutely needed. How would you like to have your clothes thus bound about you? No room for free breathing, no elasticity of body! What chance for healthy digestion? After many hours, during the day, of perfect inactivity, what wonder if by night the poor baby feels this compression insupportable! Its little limbs must ache, and the whole body become stiff and numb. But instead of relief, when the child is disrobed and night-clothes substituted, it is only to tighten the bands, and leave it to pass the long hours of darkness as much like a mummy as before.

When we see a child thus bound, we think it would afford us pleasure to act as dressing-maid to the mother long enough to teach her what torture she is thoughtlessly inflicting on her helpless babe. It has no way of attracting your attention and begging for relief but through tears. If the mother was subjected to the same distress for once, she would ever after understand why her baby lifts up its voice like a trumpet, to tell her of her sins.

Whenever an infant begins to cry, without any apparent cause, by day or by night, let your first act be to examine its clothing; loosen it, remove the pins, or untie the strings, and see if the lungs have free space to expand, and the body a chance to move every limb and muscle. Rub the body gently with your warm hand, particularly the back, lungs, and bowels, to promote the circulation which the barbarous swaddling-bands have all day impeded. Try this remedy, particularly at night, and, unless you again “put on the screws,” in most cases your baby will fall into a peaceful slumber, and you may hope for unbroken rest.

But here is another whose garments are all sensibly adjusted, yet its piteous cries are enough to make the heart ache. What is the matter? Touch the little blue hands, and you will find them like ice. Take the child in your lap; draw your chair to the fire; heat a blanket and wrap about it; lay it on the stomach, across your lap, holding the cold hands in one of yours; shake out the foolishly long robes, till, hidden somewhere in this mass of flannel and embroidery, you find the numb little toes, and hold them toward the fire till warm. See how it stretches its feet to the fire, and puts the pretty face close up to your warm hands. Many a child who has cried for hours, taxing all the mother’s strength and skill, and filling her heart with alarm, will, under this simple treatment, in a few minutes be fast asleep. Only turning a child over in the crib--anything to change its position when you find that it begins to cry or becomes restless before its nap is finished--will sometimes soothe it to quiet slumber, give it the benefit of a long sleep, and you sufficient time to accomplish many things which must have been laid aside had baby waked too soon.

Endeavor to imagine yourself in an infant’s place when it manifests symptoms you do not well understand. You wrap its hands and feet so closely, when you lay it down to sleep, that it cannot stir. Could you remain two hours thus fettered without becoming cramped and full of pain? Loosen the wrappings; shake up the pillow and turn it over occasionally that the little head may rest on a cool spot (and, by the way, a good hair pillow, not too full, and well beaten every day, that it may not become lumpy, is far more healthful for any child than feathers). If awake, change its position; or if it has lain long, take it up, toss it gently, and play with it awhile to give it a pleasant variety, and cause the blood to circulate freely through the whole body.

If these simple methods do not pacify a crying child, it is very probable that some of the above-mentioned causes have produced colic; but do not give the simplest medicine till you have tried what virtue there is in an _enema_ of tepid water. Unless the crying indicates the beginning of some acute disease, we have invariably found the effects almost magical, and in no case will it be hurtful.

Never nurse your child when you are chilled, fatigued, or terrified. The child, however hungry, must wait, or be otherwise fed, until your own system becomes quiet. It must be a very strong child who will not suffer from the nourishment the mother offers while under such disturbance. If your excitement proceeds from fear, go to your husband or some friend who has the power to soothe or talk you into quietude, before you see your child. If fatigued, sit down and rest; if overheated, wash your face and hands in cool water, keeping out of any current of air, and become thoroughly cool before you nurse your baby.

If, unfortunately, you have allowed yourself to be overcome by anger, keep far away from the little one, till you have asked God to still the tempest, and feel that by his grace you are at peace. If in such an unhappy state you dare to perform a mother’s sweetest duty, your child will bring you to repentance before many hours elapse.

In early youth we were once compelled to watch by a child in convulsions. This was among our first painful experiences, and when we were absent from home. To our dying day we shall never forget the mother’s dumb anguish when told that the child must die. We afterward learned that she had been furiously angry with her husband. The angry voices frightened the child, and to still its crying, even in the fierce heat of her passion, she put the babe to her breast. The physician knew of her ungovernable temper, and, boarding with her, had been the witness of the morning’s tornado. Over the suffering little creature, he sternly told her that her temper had killed her child. We never saw her but once after that sad trial, but the marks of the penalty which followed so quickly upon her sin were still stamped upon her face.

Mothers do not enough understand or believe these facts, because they are not accustomed to trace the effect to the cause; but a physician who looks carefully into the cases which come under his care will assure you that this is no fiction. A mother at all times is called upon to guard well her own actions, and to practice much self-denial for the sake of her offspring, but never more than when her child draws its nourishment from her breast; and never are judgment and care in the clothing, in the fashioning and adjusting of it, more important than while the babe is incapable of making known its wants or discomforts except by crying.

LXIII.

PERSONAL NEATNESS.

THOSE who have the oversight of household affairs, and perhaps are also compelled to perform much of the manual labor themselves, cannot be expected to keep their garments at all times spotlessly clean, still less can they preserve their hands soft and delicate; yet there is far too much inexcusable carelessness about personal appearance, among those who are called upon to be always active and industrious, as well as among those who have fewer responsibilities.

“Well, I, for one, don’t see how a farmer’s or mechanic’s wife can help it; she is obliged to rise early to prepare the breakfast, or see that it is being properly prepared; then the milk requires early attention, or perhaps butter and cheese are to be made: one duty follows another in such quick succession, that from the time the housewife rises in the morning until after dinner, at least, she is compelled to work rapidly if she would be through in proper season. What time has she to think about her own personal appearance? A fine housewife that must be, who would feel obliged to stop in the midst of some important work to see if her hair was in _company order_, or that no spot of any kind had soiled her dress or apron. It is all very well for _ladies_ to be thus particular, but laboring people have no spare moments for any such ill-timed neatness.”

We do not expect you to be always “in company order,” as you understand that term: that would be exceedingly inconsistent; yet we could never understand why one’s own family--those whom we love, and with whom we hope to spend our days--should not have as strong claims upon our thoughts, time, and personal appearance as those whom we seldom see; and we do know that one can work, and work hard, and yet be at all times so tidy that she need not be mortified to be _caught by company_. Let us give you a few hints which good common-sense can easily enlarge.

When retiring at night give the hair a thorough brushing, not only for your own comfort and to promote a healthy condition of the hair, and remove all dust that through the day will naturally settle in it, but also to secure greater expedition in dressing in the morning; this done, fold it up loosely, draw a net or very thin cap over to prevent tangling: with this precaution it should not take long when you rise to smooth and arrange it neatly, though, unfortunately, smooth and neatly arranged hair is no longer fashionable; but it is hoped that while at work, even those who bow down most subserviently to the fickle goddess, Fashion, so arrange that no loose hairs are flying.

It is convenient to have morning-wrappers made with a narrow ruffle round the neck of the same material as the dress; or, if yours are not so made, before retiring baste or pin in a simple collar or ruffle, that no needless time may be spent in dressing. If you are not accustomed to a full bath every morning, a thorough bath at night is very desirable, even if only a sponge bath can be obtained, and then a copious washing before dressing will occupy but a few moments. The teeth should be well brushed, and the mouth and throat faithfully rinsed in cold water morning and night and after each meal; no hurry of work should be an excuse for neglecting this duty, if not for neatness and comfort, for health’s sake. The hair in order, face and hands washed, and teeth brushed, it will then require but a few minutes’ time longer to be ready to leave your chamber and go to your early morning labors in the neatest working order.

A large apron made from heavy brown or white “butchers’ linen” is much neater and more serviceable than calico or gingham; it does not wrinkle so easily, and if wet will not become limp and useless so soon. The sleeve of a morning-dress should be large enough at the bottom to be easily folded back above the elbow and pinned up; or, if preferred, a deep cuff is very convenient, as during work it can be unbuttoned and turned back in the same way. Put a button and a loop of tape or strong cord about a quarter of a yard apart, on four seams of the skirt at least,--before, behind, and on each side,--so that you can loop up the dress evenly instead of pinning it awkwardly back; it is much neater and in the end will save time, and certainly it keeps the dress from being soiled at the bottom, and thus saves much washing.

Now go to work with bare arms, a large, long apron, and dress looped up, too short to be drabbled; and it is very seldom, except in cases of uncommon accident, that one’s working attire may not be kept in suitable condition to meet any stranger or friend who may chance to call during the busy hours of the day. With smooth hair and a clean dress, you may consider yourself perfectly presentable; all preparation needed should not occupy five minutes, and no caller should be kept waiting longer. Unpin the sleeves, unbutton the dress where looped up, take off the apron, wash hands and face, and smooth the hair if need be,--that is all. To keep a visitor waiting is not in good taste; we think it inexcusable, unless compelled by some unusual hindrance. In that case, send in your reasons or some apology for delay, when the caller will either wait patiently, knowing that you could not help it, or, if in haste, return regrets and leave. This is far more kind and courteous than to keep any one waiting fifteen or twenty minutes, in haste perhaps, but not daring to leave, because thinking each moment you will enter.

If, while preserving, or in any other way, you stain your hands, a few drops of muriatic acid will remove the stain at once. It is very convenient to have a bottle of this liquid always in the house, for a black, ugly stain on the hand is a very disagreeable sight; but the bottle should be put in a secure place, where children or careless servants cannot meddle with it. It is poisonous, but perfectly safe if kept securely and used as directed. Wet the spot with the acid, rub quickly over the stain, and immediately wash in clear water, else it will burn and make your hands uncomfortably rough. After washing off the acid, give your hands a good washing in hot soapsuds, using a nail- or finger-brush to clean all round the nails, which in preserving or paring fruit are usually badly discolored. Those brushes which have a nail-cleaner at the top of the handle are the best. No one should be without a finger-brush, and to none is it more indispensable than to those who have the most of the family work to do. Wet the brush and rub soap on it; then brush the nails and inside of the hands with it before you finish washing them. Nothing more effectually removes the stains and dirt, which will of course settle on the inside of the hands when handling pots and kettles or working over the stove; and even if your hands are roughened by no such labor, the nail-brush is of great service.

Often when in haste, the dress or apron is caught against a hook or nail, and a sad rent is made. Whatever your hurry, do not go a moment with this accident unrepaired. If it happens while some article is over the fire which may not be left a moment without danger or injury, you can at least pin up the unsightly hole. Always carry a small pincushion, filled with pins, in your pocket; if you do not need one yourself, somebody else may be in trouble for want of only a pin; and make it a point, as far as possible, to keep a needle ready threaded near by, so that at a moment’s warning you can temporarily run up any rent made while at work, which, if in your power, is far better than pinning it up. A big grease spot or prominent rent on a woman’s dress is a poor recommendation, and we confess we never see them without forming an unfavorable opinion, if a stranger, or experiencing a feeling of mortification and annoyance, if a friend.

A looking-glass, comb, and brush are out of place in the kitchen, but a small glass in a back hall or entry close by, with a shelf beneath for the comb and brush, are quite necessary for your servants, and it is a great convenience to have another near by for your own use, so that if hastily summoned from the kitchen, you can smooth your hair, and by the glass assure yourself that there is nothing untidy about you.

There is one kind of personal neglect that we often see, with great surprise, and quite frequently among a class of people who have little to do with hard work, and no excuse for the carelessness from lack of time. We have seen, just above point-lace and diamonds, _ears_ that have long been unacquainted with a plentiful supply of soap and water. A pretty ear is very attractive to us. We always notice particularly the eye and ear in every one we meet; and if we see brown, dirty-looking streaks behind the ear, or the rim and inside dirty, with unseemly accumulations of ear-wax remaining uncared for,--if it is on a girl who applies for a place, we would not receive her; if on a “lady,” we find it hard to feel much respect for her. Unless in a desert, unblessed by water, there is no manner of excuse to be found for such neglect.

These hints may seem quite insignificant, but we cannot think them so. Aside from the comfort and respectability of scrupulous neatness in your own habits, you are, by your example as you should be by your precepts, giving ideas of neatness and order to your children and servants. But if they see you come down in the morning with your hair in disorder, your garments dirty or torn, shoes or boots slipshod or unbuttoned, you may be sure your example will be very readily imitated, and probably greatly exaggerated. If a girl is uncleanly in her person, there is every reason to presume she will be slatternly about her work, and particularly so about her cooking. Therefore, if only for selfish reasons, it is most desirable that young housekeepers should have a high standard for personal cleanliness, and live in full accordance with it.

LXIV.

ARE HOUSE-PLANTS INJURIOUS TO THE HEALTH?

“MRS. BEECHER: My wife and I are both attentive readers of the ‘Christian Union,’ and we venture to ask for a few words of information upon the subject of _house-plants_. We are passionately fond of flowers, but have frequently seen it stated that plants, especially flowering plants, vitiate the air, rendering it unfit for breathing purposes. Is that really true? We like plants in our sleeping-rooms, but of course would give them up if convinced that they were injurious to the health. We have heliotropes, roses, geraniums, lilies, fuchsias, and a number of other plants. Do these render the atmosphere noxious to life and health? As plants liberate oxygen and absorb carbonic gas, we think they ought to be wholesome. Or is it the _blossom_ that does the mischief? Is a sweet-smelling flower poisonous? Will you please set us right upon this matter, and oblige

“TWO YOUNG HOUSEKEEPERS.”

We copy this letter entire, hoping by so doing to bring this subject to the attention of those whose opinion and judgment are of greater worth than our own. There are many conflicting opinions concerning the effect which plants and vines, growing in the house, and filling it by day and by night with their delightful atmosphere, have upon the health of their worshipers. If the wise and scientific among our readers will give this matter attentive and sober thought, we hope to find in the multitude of counselors the wisdom which is so much needed.

It is not very many years since physicians lifted up their voices against this pleasant adornment of our homes, by which some portion of the joyous summer may be wrested from the grasp of the frost king, and which enables us while indoors, to forget that fingers and toes are in danger the moment we venture outside of the carefully tended parlor garden.

But our physicians change their opinions like other mortals, and at the present time some affirm that plants and vines in the house, or even in the sleeping-apartments, are health-giving. They tell us that the carbonic gas which is being constantly set free from our lungs, and which is detrimental, is at once absorbed by our flowers, while these at the same time give to us, in exchange, the oxygen which, in its proper place and quantity, is so necessary to health and life.

Other physicians assume that a growing plant is not noxious or in any way detrimental, but that as soon as it begins to blossom it should be at once removed from a bedchamber, and if allowed to remain in the house at all, should be placed, while in bloom, as far as possible from the family apartments.

Again, it is stated--and all these conflicting opinions, we are told, come to us from the “best and most reliable authority”--that no plant, in flower or not, is at all injurious in any part of the house, so long as the perfume from the blossom is not powerful and not at all offensive. “Who shall decide when doctors disagree?” It seems to us very important that our learned, scientific men--those who make the effects of the various gases on life and health a careful study--should give this question a thorough investigation, and when, after mature research, they arrive, as they suppose, at a proper conclusion, should publish their opinion in simple terms, such as all can comprehend. We should rejoice if the conclusion of the whole matter might be such that all could lean upon it with no fear of its proving by and by a broken reed; but it is difficult to keep pace with changes in the results of scientific investigations.

One year certain health-principles are established, the next they are set aside for some other thing. Some articles of food are prohibited as being very injurious, but in a few months the prohibition is cast aside. One mode of diet is declared pernicious, shortening the days, and making the few that are granted undesirable. Yet, just as you are ready to accept this theory, you are told of those who have lived wellnigh to a hundred years, or perhaps have passed that period, always healthful and cheerful, yet the proscribed diet or article of food has been habitually indulged in by them.

For our own part, we find it difficult to believe that the plants cultivated in our homes, and which so beautify and enliven our winters, can be injurious, provided the rooms in which they are placed are kept _well ventilated_. In severely cold weather it may not be advisable to open a window just over the plants, but when windows are raised to air adjacent rooms, where there are no flowers, then open the doors leading from them to the parlor, or winter garden, that the cold breeze from without may sweep through the whole suite of rooms for a few moments until the air is entirely changed. This, even in the coldest winter, will do the plants no harm, nor their owners either, but, on the contrary, will be very beneficial, making both more healthy and vigorous. Many a lady in mid-winter sits by the fire or register, yawning and stupidly sleepy, with a dull heavy pain over the eyes foreboding a severe headache, who could throw off all this torpidity, defy the headache, and rise up refreshed and vigorous, if she would simply throw open her doors or windows just long enough to drive out the overcharged air in the room, and by so doing bring in exchange a pure and invigorating atmosphere from the outdoor world; and house-plants will be equally benefited by the same prescription.

We should not think it wise to have plants in bloom in the sleeping-apartment, unless the room was large, and the doors so arranged as to favor frequent and complete change of the air.

It is always desirable, just before retiring, to raise the windows for a few moments, not only in the parlors, but in the sleeping-apartments, particularly if they have been used through the day as sewing-rooms. It will insure a more refreshing sleep, and also a brighter awakening in the morning. House-plants should be placed on a stand having castors, so that they can be easily rolled away from the windows when opened, until the room is fully aired; or, if freezing cold, an old cloth kept for the purpose, or old newspapers, should be thrown over the plants to protect them from being chilled.

_Cut flowers_, we think, should not be left in a bedroom overnight. Just before retiring, set them into a cool, dark closet. They will keep fresh much longer by using this precaution, and the occupants of the chamber escape any possible injury from them. The water in which cut flowers are put ought to be changed every night and morning, or it will become slimy and offensive, as well as injurious.

The love of flowers is very desirable in children, and should be cultivated from their earliest years. For that reason, if for no other, we should be exceedingly sorry to have any physician whose judgment we respected forbid the cultivation of house-plants, particularly in the nursery. In that room every bright and pretty thing should be gathered, and certainly nothing more quickly attracts the attention of children than a choice collection of flowers. To find these all about the house, but especially in the nursery,--their own peculiar domain,--secures a taste for them far more surely than to see them kept exclusively in the green-house, or in rooms set apart for their culture and nothing more. Yet no mother will risk her children’s health in the least degree, and if her physician assures her flowers in any part of the house are harmful, she will eject them at once. We do not at all believe they are injurious to the health, and know that they greatly increase the happiness of those who cultivate them. But we are open to conviction, and if any one of reliable judgment can bring sound reasons against keeping these house-gardens, we should be glad to know of them.

LXV.

BAD BUTTER.

OF all the needless discomforts common to boarding-houses and hotels, we know of none so truly inexcusable, nor which subtracts more from one’s enjoyment, than the use of bad butter for cooking purposes. When placed on the table in the butter-dish, if found to be imperfect or quite unpalatable the butter can easily be rejected. To eat good bread without butter, or, if the bread is unsatisfactory, a fine mealy potato with a little salt, is by no means the greatest hardship that you may be subjected to. But imagine yourself seated at the table, and a large dish of fresh peas, green and tender, brought in. You have been hoping, almost impatiently, to see them each day, and now what a feast is yours, in anticipation. You can hardly wait till the soup is removed. Visions of the splendid peas, of sweet and delicious flavor, which you used to eat at your father’s table, are floating before you; and tender remembrances of the dear hand that then so deftly ministered to your childish appetite are rising, until you are fast verging toward sentimentality, when your turn comes to be helped. These peas are the first real _country_ peas, picked right from the vines, you have tasted since your home was established in the city, and you eagerly bid farewell to sentiment, and address yourself to the full enjoyment of visible, tangible things. How you would like to take a real big mouthful in a childlike manner! But you control your eagerness, and, ladylike, demurely carry the spoon to the mouth. O horrors! Have you fortitude and self-possession sufficient to enable you to swallow that detestable morsel? Politeness and unwillingness to exhibit your disgust to others at the table control you. With a shuddering gulp you swallow, but hold your breath till you snatch a piece of bread or a mouthful of water to send after, with some faint hope of removing the vile taste. What is it that so disturbs you? _Rancid butter!_ Is there anything, any taste more revolting and abominable? That delicious dish of peas spoiled, irretrievably, by a spoonful of the nauseous abomination, manufactured by careless dairy-women, and bought by easily gulled grocers, or by those persons possessed of india-rubber consciences, capable of stretching to any imaginable length, who will sell this abomination for good butter. Or it may be some sharp, managing landlady has bought it, knowing its bad character, for economical reasons. Her boarders will not eat very heartily of any dish that is flavored with such butter, and yet they will be compelled to eat something, even if distasteful. We know such ideas of economy--not honesty--are common; but boarders are very foolish who submit to this imposition. If they choose, they can easily teach such unscrupulous managers that being “penny wise and pound foolish,” in the long run, will not secure prosperity.

But you will try to judge charitably. Perhaps this was a mistake; and it may be that only the peas have suffered. You will try to look cheerful and satisfied, and turn to the nice piece of broiled chicken on your plate. Alas, alas! Juicy and tender, broiled just right to a perfect brown, but all destroyed by this miserably rancid butter! “The offence is rank. It smells to heaven!” What can you do? Where turn? Beets, beans, succotash,--that dish to which, with green peas, you swore allegiance in early childhood, and have faithfully kept the vow,--all destroyed by this most villainous compound. You nibble at a bit of bread or piece of potato, and try to wait patiently till the dessert is brought in, for you see no alternative but to make that your principal meal. You wonder if others are as uncomfortable, but, conscious of the intense disgust your face may exhibit, fear to look boldly around.

Well, there is a balm for almost every woe, and here comes the dessert; it may bring healing for your wounded feelings. What a delicious-looking apple-dumpling! This atones! Will you take wine sauce or hard sauce? You don’t like wine sauce; but the _butter_ in the hard sauce,--dare you venture? Why, surely no one will risk such butter as the vegetables were seasoned with in a delicate sauce! But one taste is sufficient to show you that you have not yet fathomed the depths of economical audacity. You put back your plate and try a bit of pie. Even into the pastry the enemy has found entrance.

But you say, “What is one to do? The rooms are engaged for a month, and I must stay the limited time or forfeit the price of the rooms, and that I cannot afford to do; yet I shall surely starve. I hardly feel that I can eat a meal without butter. The table butter is not so intolerable as that used in cooking, but even that is all I can endure. What can I do?” Will it not be better economy to leave at once, and lose the rent of your rooms, rather than stay and starve a month, or attempt to “fill the aching void” by that which may derange your stomach, and induce fever, dyspepsia, or other sickness, which will cost, in doctors’ bills, ten times the price of your rooms to eradicate?

This great evil will never be remedied while those who board, either regularly or only for a few weeks in the summer, continue to “put up” with this discomfort as one of the ills of life which _must_ be borne. Let it be once fully understood that all boarders--all who frequent fashionable resorts--are fixed in their determination to endure this cruel imposition no longer, and that as soon as they find poor butter is a part of the regular diet, and good butter only an occasional luxury, they will at once leave, and we think the hotels and boarding-houses will soon find means to procure a good article. Let this class of purchasers alone refuse to buy any but the best, and the large number of poor butter makers will soon be taught the necessity of greater carefulness in their dairies.

Bad butter is entirely a needless discomfort. The fault begins, of course, with the manufacturers. They have no excuse, as a general thing. Once in a great while, there may be a reason for a few pounds of poor butter in the dairy, which, though it should be a source of regret, is not necessarily a disgrace. Sickness in the family may sometimes compel the overtaxed housekeeper to neglect the dairy, or leave it for a short time in incompetent hands, who, either indolently or ignorantly, fail to give the milk-pans a thorough scalding, or leave the cream too long on the milk and too long unchurned, who do not understand salting or working over the butter; but in such cases no one with any self-respect will allow the butter to leave their own house. If at all usable, they will sooner submit to the disagreeable necessity of using it for their own food, or put it at once into the only place where poor butter has any right to be,--the soap-grease pot; anything rather than do themselves the discredit, and their customers the injustice, of sending it into the market. That is a species of meanness that should be considered unpardonable; and just as soon as the grocer learns that his customers will not, under any consideration, buy poor butter of him, and the dairymen understand that the grocer will not look at any but the very best, this mischief will be rooted out, “the plague be stayed”; poor butter makers will find their occupation gone, and leave the field to more conscientious and more competent manufacturers, or at once, from self-interest, if not from self-respect, resolutely set about securing instruction, and learn the only way to make good butter. This is easily done; care, neatness, and good judgment are all that is requisite after the mode of operation is understood, and the preliminary steps are simple and easily taken. It is a marvel that this nuisance has been so long tolerated. It is just as easy to make good butter as poor. It is simply want of neatness or deficiency of judgment that fills our markets with a miserable preparation that is only fit for soap-grease or the pigs.

First, take care that your cows are not allowed food that will affect the taste of the milk,--such as turnips, cabbage, or onions; then the cows’ bags and the milkers’ hands must be washed perfectly clean before beginning to milk; any dirt or bad flavor from the cow’s bag or the hands, that may find its way into the milk-pail, will taint the milk and injure the flavor of the butter; for it should be borne in mind constantly, that there is nothing that receives any foreign taste so readily as butter.

Next, all the utensils--pails, strainers, pans, skimmers, churn, butter-bowl, and ladles--must be kept as sweet and clean as scalding water and a hot sun can make them. The cream, even in the coldest weather, must not be allowed to remain on the milk over thirty-six hours, and in warm weather even less. In hot days remove the cream as soon as the milk begins to sour: none will rise after the milk changes. Although it will, of course, become _thicker_ by souring, it does not follow that it will be any better; on the contrary, every moment the cream is left on sour milk takes from the sweetness, quality, and purity of the butter. In churning, the motion should be even, not too rapid, and, when gathered, the butter must be well worked over and salted, and set on the ice, or in a place so cool that it will soon harden and keep so; but be sure that no meat, fish, fruit, or vegetables are put in the milk-room or cellar,--nothing from which the milk or butter will contract any taste. It will require a second salting the next morning, to remove what buttermilk may be left from the first working. One of the great merits of the Blanchard churn is the facility with which the buttermilk can be freed from the butter, as the less manipulation the better for the butter, provided you secure entire freedom from buttermilk.

Many put in a little saltpetre, to make the butter hard and firm,--a bad practice, we think, not only because it gives a slightly unpleasant taste to the butter, but also because it may prove injurious to the consumer. A butter-pail or pot, perfectly sweet, should be well rubbed with salt, and the butter be packed in it, and well pounded down so as to leave no air-holes; then cover the butter an inch deep with brine strong enough to bear up an egg, and put to the _brine_ two table-spoonfuls of pulverized saltpetre. This will help to keep the butter sweet and hard; and, used in the brine, will neither impart any acrid taste to the butter nor be in the least degree unhealthful.

These rules strictly followed by our dairy-women, we are confident that there will be no complaints of _bad butter_, but the comfort and happiness of the consumers be greatly increased, and the labor of the butter makers in nowise augmented thereby.

We lately saw a receipt for keeping dairy utensils pure and sweet, which we mean to try, as we think it cannot but be advantageous. Keep close by the table on which the milk things are washed “a small tub or a hogshead, according to the size of your dairy. In this, slack some good quicklime, enough to make a thin whitewash; fill with water, cover closely to keep out dirt and dust. The lime will settle, leaving a saturated solution of lime-water over it, as clear as spring water. Wash the utensils as usual; then dip each article into the cask of lime-water, giving them a quick turn, so that every part shall be immersed in the lime-water, then set them up to drain and dry, and the purification is complete.” We presume in the case of a churn, cheese-tub, cheese-press, or other large article, that pouring the lime-water over it will answer the purpose just as well, though using the lime-water up sooner than by dipping into the cask.

The lime in the clear water instantly neutralizes the acidity of the milk which may yet remain in the cracks or seams of the milk-vessels. The lime keeps the water pure all summer, and the waste and evaporation may be made up by adding clear water when needed, as the lime settled at the bottom will keep up the strength of the saturated solution.

LXVI.

OCTOBER.

THE brilliant hues in the mountains, the falling leaves in the lanes (over which the horses’ feet make such sweet yet melancholy music), remind us that October, the brightest, dearest month in the whole year, has come; but while we rejoice in anticipation of the glorious hours it promises, we must not forget that during these mild, invigorating days our houses must be set in order properly to meet the sharp November weather, which is close at hand, and the fiercer blasts of winter which will follow.

Now the frosty nights and cool days will soon relieve us from the plague of flies, which have by their unconquerable impertinence so perplexed and disheartened all good housekeepers through the summer; at least we may promise this relief, if they are hunted every night and morning from the dark corners where they delight to hide at the first approach of frost. Attack them every evening with brush and broom, driving them out doors into the cold night air, closing doors and windows after them, and a few frosty nights will rid you of this evil for the winter. After each battle sweep up all the dead and disabled and burn them, that from out of the pile which you will have gathered no stunned or crippled fly may be ready to rise up against you with the morning sun. As the cold increases they become stupid and less active, and huddle together in masses on the ceiling or windows, where they cling, too stiff and torpid to shun your approach, thus affording a good opportunity to brush down and destroy them in large quantities. If up each morning before the sun, as every good housekeeper should be, you will have another favorable time to remove them; but if both night and morning these opportunities for banishing your enemies have been neglected, you will find as soon as the fires are kindled, or the bright warm October sun shines through your windows, they will come out from their hiding-places and be just as busy through the day, and far more annoying, than in July and August. If you have been vigilant, the frost and snow, combined with your unwearied skirmishes, will soon set you free, and the flies be remembered only as trials of the past; and through the winter, at least, you may hope to rest from your labors in this particular direction.