When washing painted walls and ceilings, take care in drying them that they are wiped in straight lines, from top to bottom, and not unevenly, or in circles; for however clean you may wash the paint, careless wiping will give it a streaked and untidy appearance.
Brush wall-paper carefully with a feather duster, and then pin a large towel tightly to a clean soft broom, and placing it up to the ceiling, bring it, with an even pressure, in a straight line down to the mop-board or casing. Proceed in this way until you have gone over the entire paper. It will be necessary to change the towel when it looks soiled. If this work is well done, the paper will look almost as fresh as new.
In cleaning door-knobs, bell-pulls, or speaking-trumpets, cut a hole in a piece of oil-silk or soft oil-cloth, and put it round the knob or bell-pull, etc., to protect the paper or paint from being soiled.
We have no room to carry these suggestions further at present, and leave your good, earnest, common-sense to practice and improve upon them.
VI.
WASHING-DAY.
“IF it were not for the washing, housekeeping would lose half its terror. But I rise every Monday morning in a troubled and unhappy state of mind, for it is washing-day! The breakfast will surely be a failure, coffee muddy, meat or hash uncooked or burnt to a coal, everything untidy on the table, and the servants on the verge of rebellion. With a meek and subdued countenance, with fear and trembling, lest some unlucky word of mine may infringe upon their dignity and cause them to leave before the washing is finished, I go softly about the house.”
This ought not so to be. In the first place, if you allow yourself to be kept thus in bondage to your servants, you destroy all hope of comfort. Let them once see that you fear to give them offence, and from that hour they are your tyrants.
Define, distinctly, the appropriate duties of each; but with this proviso, that in emergencies they will be required to lend a helping hand in any department where their services are needed. Let them understand, unmistakably, what your rules are,—for you cannot manage a household without well-digested laws and regulations,—then kindly, but firmly, make them know that you will have no infringement upon those rules.
“I wonder how long any girl, my Bridget, for instance, would stay, were I to take such independent ground.”
Probably not long, if she has learned that she can intimidate you; and once aware of that, the sooner she takes her leave the better for your future peace,—that is, if you will be taught by this experience to begin right with her successor. Those servants who fully recognize the lady as their mistress, in something more than name, are generally the most respectful and reliable.