These tables are not so readily comparable as they should be for scientific exactness. The items included under “Travelling” and “Holidays” need to be enumerated. Under the latter head, for instance, are board and lodging included and are railway fares subtracted and placed under “Travelling”? As a fact No. 1 and No. 2 include under “Board and Lodging” only the cost incurred during the school terms; under the head of “Travelling” is only counted the cost of going to school from home and their daily travelling expenses during the school term. The money put down under “Holidays” includes their expenses for the part of their holidays during which they were not at home. The same is, I believe, true in the case of No. 3, but I do not know for what length of time any of them were subsidised by this free board and lodging at home.
On the other hand, No. 4’s accounts are so summarised that the cost of “Holidays” disappears altogether, being broken up into its constituents of board, lodging, travelling fares and amusements. The confusion in this case is remedied in the following detailed table supplied by No. 4.
Table II.
Accounts of Expenditure of a High School Mistress (No. 4) in Furnished Lodgings.
Amount Spent on
| During School Year (39 weeks). | During Holidays (13 weeks). | Total during year. | |
|---|---|---|---|
| £ s. d. | £ s. d. | £ s. d. | |
| Lodgings | 13 7 6 | 0 8 6 | 17 13 0 |
| 3 7 0 | |||
| to be reserved in holidays. | |||
| Board | 34 11 3 | 2 5 0 | 36 16 3 |
| Lunches, teas, &c. | 0 16 8 | 0 16 8 | |
| Furniture | 1 5 6 | 1 5 6 | |
| Washing | 3 7 11³⁄₄ | 3 7 11³⁄₄ | |
| Dress | 16 0 5¹⁄₂ | 16 0 5¹⁄₂ | |
| Books | 2 15 4¹⁄₂ | 2 15 4¹⁄₂ | |
| Fares | 3 16 6¹⁄₂ | 8 3 11 | 12 0 5¹⁄₂ |
| Amusements | 2 18 6 | 0 12 11 | 3 11 5 |
| Subscriptions, donations, &c. | 1 17 11 | 1 17 11 | |
| Presents | 5 18 3³⁄₄ | 5 18 3³⁄₄ | |
| Postage and stationery | 4 15 1¹⁄₂ | 4 15 1¹⁄₂ | |
| Miscellaneous | 1 9 9 | 1 9 9 | |
| Doctor and medicine | 0 19 5 | 0 19 5 | |
| Not spent | 20 12 4¹⁄₂ | 20 12 4¹⁄₂ | |
| Total | 130 0 0 | ||
The social outlook of a working woman is very largely determined by the amount she can afford to spend on dress, and her view of life is perhaps most clearly indicated in the consideration of this item of expenditure. And no accounts of expenditure are of much value without some accompanying expression of the spender’s contentment or dissatisfaction with the results of her expenditure. In reply to my question on the subject of dress, No. 2 informs me that £16 a year was quite enough for her dress:—
“My dresses were always made by a dressmaker, not at home; as we lived in a country town, her charges for making were inexpensive as such things go; I don’t think that with linings and small etceteras (not of course trimmings) they ever exceeded 15s. I cannot say that I was well dressed, but I don’t think that I was exactly badly dressed. I am sure that any one with more judicious taste than I had could have done better on the same money; I myself could do better now, for I certainly several times made mistakes of the kind that writers on dress warn us against, that of buying things, say at sales, which were not really suitable for any likely purpose. I always made a plan of buying my winter dress at the summer sales, which in our country town came in early August, and my summer dress at their winter sale (things really were reduced). Though I did no dressmaking I made my own underclothing.
“I am afraid I don’t quite see the application of the words ‘prettily,’ and ‘admiration’ to the school dress of a high school teacher. I should rather consider neatness as one’s aim in school dressing, but then some people have a talent for dressing for which they very properly receive their reward: I am afraid I don’t possess it.”
No. 3 writes: