How to strengthen the memory is an interesting question. I think the best way is to use it constantly, making it serve you by giving it definite facts and events to carry, as a pack-horse might on a journey. There are many phases of the problem, some people finding that they cannot fix dates in their minds, others forgetting the faces and names of friends, and others still having great trouble in committing anything by rote. Devices of rhymes and associations help some persons, and others simply depend on memoranda, and do not tax their memories at all. As a rule, the more we give the memory to do, however, the more quickly and faithfully it will respond to our wishes. In little children memory is very retentive, because their minds are at the stage when impressions are easily made; you know the line which says that in childhood our minds are "Wax to receive, and marble to retain." So that we should be very careful indeed about what we say, what we do, and what we teach, where the dear little ones are concerned.
Gladys R. S—— has a great deal of trouble in remembering the rules of syntax, the Latin conjugations, and the pages of history which her teacher requires to be recited exactly as they are in the book. Try the method of studying aloud, Gladys. Go away by yourself to commit your lessons to memory, and then, over and over, slowly, carefully, with your mind and attention fixed on what you are doing, read phrases, sentences and formulas, over and over, and over and over, and by-and-by you will have them by heart. I have often done this when I have wished to learn a hymn or a poem, and I know that hearing what one is studying assists the mere seeing. Then having other people in the room, talking and laughing, is very distracting to the attention. Try my method, and report results.
There is a good deal of useless luggage which one does not need to carry in one's memory. An engagement calendar, in which you enter explicitly the several things you have to do, the people you must meet, the places where you are to go—lunching on Monday with Emily, attending the Lookout Committee of the Christian Endeavor at five o'clock on Tuesday, going to the reception of the King's Daughters on Saturday at three—all these engagements may be recorded against their dates, and you need have no concern, beyond consulting your calendar every morning.
Genevieve W.—A short skirt answers every purpose of gaiety and convenience, though there is no objection to your wearing bloomers if you wish to do so.
A luxury is "Any thing which pleases the senses and is also costly or difficult to obtain."
Ivory Soap pleases the senses, but is neither costly nor difficult to obtain. Your grocer keeps it.