I inquired the price for doing them up, and was told a cent a piece. Twelve cents per dozen was the established price for doing up clothes. Table-cloths and similar articles were ironed between rollers constructed to admit their full width. Other articles of more complicated make, were ironed by machines constructed to suit them. Some articles were dressed by having hot air forced rapidly through them. Lace curtains, shawls, veils, spreads, tidies and all similar articles, were by this process made to look like new, and at a cost that I thought ought certainly to reduce the establishment to beggary or insolvency. But here chemistry again was the magician that had made such cheap labor profitable. And such advanced knowledge of chemistry was the result of universal education.
Ladies sent their finest laces to be renewed without fear of having them reduced to shreds. In doing up the frailest laces, nothing but hot air impregnated with ozone was employed. These were consecutively forced through the fabric after it was carefully stretched. Nothing was ever lost or torn, so methodical was the management of the work.
I asked why cooking was not established as the laundry was, as a distinct public business, and was told that it had been tried a number of times, but had always been found impracticable. One kind of work in a laundry would suit everyone, but one course of cooking could not. Tastes and appetites differed greatly. What was palatable to one would be disliked by another, and to prepare food for a large number of customers, without knowing or being able to know exactly what the demand would be, had always resulted in large waste, and as the people of Mizora were the most rigid and exacting economists, it was not to be wondered at that they had selected the most economical plan. Every private cook could determine accurately the amount of food required for the household she prepared it for, and knowing their tastes she could cater to all without waste.
"We, as yet," said my distinguished instructor, "derive all our fruit and vegetables from the soil. We have orchards and vineyards and gardens which we carefully tend, and which our knowledge of chemistry enables us to keep in health and productiveness. But there is always more or less earthy matter in all food derived from cultivating the soil, and the laboratories are now striving to produce artificial fruit and vegetables that will satisfy the palate and be free from deleterious matter."
CHAPTER VII.
One of the most curious and pleasing sights in Mizora was the flower gardens and conservatories. Roses of all sizes and colors and shades of color were there. Some two feet across were placed by the side of others not exceeding the fourth of an inch in order to display the disparity in size.
To enter into a minute description of all the discoveries made by the Mizora people in fruit and floriculture, would be too tedious; suffice to say they had laid their hands upon the beautiful and compelled nature to reveal to them the secret of its formation. The number of petals, their color, shape and size, were produced as desired. The only thing they could neither create nor destroy was its perfume. I questioned the Preceptress as to the possibility of its ever being discovered? She replied:
"It is the one secret of the rose that Nature refuses to reveal. I do not believe we shall ever possess the power to increase or diminish the odor of a flower. I believe that Nature will always reserve to herself the secret of its creation. The success that we enjoy in the wonderful cultivation of our fruits and flowers was one of our earliest scientific conquests."