Part 5 (1/2)

Just around Cape Horn lies the strange, wild land of Tierra del Fuego, of which little is known. Darwin, however, wrote of it in his ”Voyage of a Naturalist,” and scientists find in it much of interest.

CHAPTER VI

THE BUSINESS OF BEING A HOUSEKEEPER

The following topics have been arranged in ten groups, but as many more may be added by dividing each main group into two, or even three or four. There may be readings at each meeting from the books given for reference, and discussion by club members.

I--INTRODUCTORY

The subject for the first meeting may be the Old Housekeeping and the New. One paper may take the comparison of housekeeping twenty years ago and more and that of to-day. Is there a real difference, or only a seeming one! Are rents, food, and clothing actually higher for the same things, or does life to-day demand that we add to what we then had?

a.s.suming that prices have really gone up, and are to stay there, what can women do to adjust themselves to the fact?

The second paper should speak of the necessity of a woman's knowing exactly what she can have to spend; of knowledge of her husband's business; of an allowance; of the need of training in keeping within a fixed sum.

The third paper is to be on the budget. That is, on preparing a list of expenses, setting them down in a book, apportioning the income among the items, and then putting down each day and month the actual outgo, and so, year by year, altering and arranging the expenses to meet the income. The discussion should take the form of personal experiences in keeping household accounts.

II--SYSTEMATIC HOUSEKEEPING

The introductory paper on this subject may speak of the complex way in which our houses are furnished, and the superfluity of things in them.

Also the fact that the day's work of caring for them is not always clearly defined and carried out.

The second paper may treat of the relief of a weekly schedule of work to be done.

The third paper may take the topic of the conservation of a woman's energy, and the carelessness with which she runs up and down stairs and does unnecessary and foolish things. Mention here the help to be found in vacuum cleaners, modern dusters, carpet sweepers, and other housekeeping helps.

Discuss the question: How shall we make our brains save our bodies?

III--ECONOMY IN FOOD

By way of opening the meeting a brief paper may be read on What Is True Economy? This will point out the fallacy of buying poor foods because they are cheap, wilted vegetables, stale cereals, inferior canned goods, and the like. This may be followed by one on the question of buying.

Where shall a housekeeper buy--at a large market or a small one? How can one learn how to buy good and still cheap meats? How can one do with less meat? And is buying in large quant.i.ties a good plan?

The third paper may take up markets, their cleanliness; the housewives'

leagues of certain cities and their work; what can country women do whose market is limited?

The last paper should speak of the necessity of personal supervision by the housekeeper; of the imprudence of ordering by telephone, and of the system of giving orders at the door to the grocer.

The discussion may turn on the question of paying cash for everything or charging.

IV--COOKING

A good beginning is a review of the cooking of our grandmothers, cooking in various parts of the country, and cooking in foreign lands.