Sweet heart, I knew it. And your husband knows no more than you do,—although he will pretend to know, that he may look cross when the bills come in. Read what follows; hide the "Atlantic" before he comes home; and you will know more than he knows on the most important point in human life. Vainly, henceforth, will he quote Greek to you, or talk pompous nonsense about the price of Treasury certificates, if you know at what price eggs are really cheap, and at what price they are really dear.
Listen, and remember! Then hide the "Atlantic" away.
When I engaged in the study of Hebrew, which was at that time a "regular" at college, (for why should I blush to own that I am in my one hundred and tenth year?) as I toiled through the rules and exceptions in dear old Stephen Sewall's Hebrew Grammar, I ventured to ask him, one desperately hot June day, whether he could not tell us, were it only for curiosity's sake, which rule would come into play in every verse, and which would be of use only once or twice in the whole Bible. "Ah, Carter," said the dear old fellow, (he taught his beloved language with his own book,) "it is all of use,—all!" And so we had to take it all, and find out as we could which rules would be constant servitors to us, and which occasional lackeys, hired for special occasions. Just so, dear Hero, do you stand about your housekeeping. You wall be fretting yourself to death to economize in each one of one hundred and seven different articles,—for so many are you and Leander to assimilate and make your own special phosphate and carbon, as this sweet honey-year of yours goes on. Of that fret and wear of your sweet temper, child, there is no use at all. Listen, and you shall learn what are to be the great constants of your expense,—what Stephen Sewall would have called the regular verbs transitive of your being, doing, and suffering,—and how many of the one hundred and seven are only exceptional Lamed Hhes, at which you can guess or which you can skip, if the great central movements of your economies go bravely on.
I do not know, of course, whether Leander is fond of coffee, and whether you drink tea or no. I can only tell you what is in our family, and assure you that ours is a model family. Such a model is it, that Lois has just now counted up the one hundred and seven articles for me,—has shown me that they all together cost us nine hundred and twenty-six dollars and thirty-two cents in the year 1863, and how much each of them cost. Now our family consists,—
1. Of the baby, who is king.
2, 3. Of two nurses, who are prime-ministers, one of domestic affairs, one of private education.
4, 5. Of a cook and table-girl, who are chancellor and foreign secretary. These four make the cabinet.
6-8. Three older children; these are in the government, but not in the cabinet.
9 and 10. Lois and I,—who pay the taxes, fight common enemies, and do what the others tell us as well as we can.
This family, you observe, consists of six grown persons, and three children old enough to eat, who are equivalent to a seventh. I may say, in passing, that it therefore consumes just seven barrels of flour a year.