If you are not able to employ servants while you two, who have just been made one, are the only occupants of your new home, happy are ye. In this early stage of married life, to venture on boarding, or risk the tyranny of servants, is to deprive yourselves of the sweetest experiences of a true home. No matter how heavy or how light your purse may be, if you are wise, commence small. If young people assume the cares of a large mansion, and with it, of necessity, the supervision of a number of servants, they will soon become disheartened, and vote housekeeping wretched work. But in a small house, before “olive plants” cluster around to tell you that
“The cottage is too small,
And the table wanteth space,”
you become accustomed to the care, and so well versed in all the minutest details of home labor, that you will scarcely feel the additional tax on your energies, either of the olive branches or a larger house, and the additional care of servants, which will, of necessity, come with a more imposing residence.
Then, as to the shrinking from venturing into the new and untried household domains, which young ladies so naturally feel who know absolutely nothing but the “accomplishments” taught in schools, we would say, for your encouragement, that the road to such knowledge as will enable you to form some correct idea of the work which lies before you is not so long or so difficult as your fears have led you to imagine. With a willing heart, with hands made quick and skillful by love, the way will soon become easy and pleasant. If possible, employ much of the few last weeks before your marriage in making yourself familiar with the rudiments of household affairs. Read all you can about it,—how your house should be arranged, what will be necessary in each department. Learn all you can about marketing,—what articles are most desirable, and during what seasons; seek how to judge of the quality of the food you buy, and the honest price for it. These are homely details, but the knowledge will be all needed, indeed it is indispensable to perfect you in good management; but you will secure the most effective knowledge, and the greatest confidence in your own capacity, by going about the house, and, little by little, doing with your own hands the work belonging to each department, under your mother’s supervision, or that of a well-trained housekeeper. At first, as it is all new work to you, it will not be easy or pleasant; but repeat the trial, and with each attempt you will find that you are acquiring skill and courage. Let there be no part of household labor that you do not perform a few times yourself, until you are well assured that you have sufficiently mastered it to do it again, or to detect any mistake or blunder in a servant. If you must keep servants, they will give you little comfort unless they see from the first—and they are usually very quick to discern between an intelligent or ignorant mistress—that you mean to overlook your work daily, and are abundantly able to discover any deviation from the right track. But above all things, unless for a year or two after marriage you can have the privilege of discarding servants entirely, endeavor, before marriage, to feel so much at ease in the kitchen, and so far mistress of cooking, that you will be able easily to detect any failure, and know the reason for it. If bread is brought to the table that is not satisfactory, it is wise to be able to say to your cook, with confidence, “Your bread should have risen longer before being put into the oven. It is not exactly heavy; but it feels solid, and bites tough.” Or, “Your bread is full of holes. You have not kneaded it sufficiently.” Or, “Cook, we must return that barrel of flour. It is not good. See how it ‘runs’ as you are kneading it. We shall have no real good bread from such flour.” “The pastry was not nice to-day. You have handled it too much, and it cuts as tough as leather. Please be more careful about it.”
Thus, by spending an hour a day in your mother’s kitchen, taking an active part in the work to be done there, and going through every department in the same thorough manner, even one month will advance you so that you can see the “silver lining” to all these clouds, and will give you sufficient confidence in your own knowledge and power, to banish all the mystery and dread. Then, when you walk with well-assured steps, knowing that you have conquered so far, and can, of course, conquer all, by patient endurance in well-doing, you will begin to enjoy every step of progress you make. No matter if you are and will be possessed of fabulous wealth, this knowledge should be secured by every young lady. But should you begin with large or small means, in either case your prospects of comfort and happiness are very insecure, if you enter the married state unwilling to acquire that which every woman should know,—the art of housekeeping. In after life, when home cares may be less pressing, become lawyer, judge, or President, if you can; but surely young women can find noble work, sufficient for all their talents and energies, in laying the foundation of and securely establishing a well-ordered and happy home.
XXXVII.
CHOICE OF COLORS IN DRESS.
BLONDES.
IN the selection of articles for dress, one should be guided, not only by the quality of the fabric and durability of color, but also by observing if the color will harmonize with the complexion of the wearer.
Nothing marks refinement and culture, or the want of it, more than the combination of colors in one’s attire. It is folly to spend time and thought upon the adorning of the body, to the exclusion of other and more important matters; but it is always wise to do well whatever is to be done, and to develop and perfect such gifts as God has bestowed, either of body or mind, so as to make them as attractive and valuable as possible. We hold it to be a duty to give such time and thought to dress as will secure the largest amount of pleasure and gratification to one’s family and friends. To labor to secure a prominent position, to become a leader of fashion, is another and very different thing. When seeking to impart pleasure to friends, we are influenced by love; but when striving to be among the most fashionable, we cater to a selfish vanity or a poor and low ambition.