CHAPTER XII. The Parlor. HAVE no hesitation in saying that the parlor is the room for which we can longest wait, and which we can most readily dispense with if necessary. Where a parlor is simply a room reserved for company, and seldom used, it may be the pride of a woman's soul, but it is not of much genuine utility. By common consent our parlors are our best rooms, where we keep our richest bric-a-brac, our most beautiful furniture and our most prized possessions. But, why not have instead of a stiff seldomoccupied parlor, a pleasant living room to which everybody turns with freedom and yet with a sense of rest; why not accustom the children to come hither, only enjoining them not to romp and range noisily in this room, but telling them that fine manners befit a fine apartment. Uniformity was once considered the proper thing for the parlor. I remember when a marble-topped table, a sofa upholstered in horse-hair with chairs to match, a few family pictures and some china vases and sea shells were regarded as the acme of elegance in the parlor. Now, the fashion is for individuality, and we prefer a cozy interior to a formal one. A hard wood floor is liked better than a carpeted one by many women. Rugs are popular. Books lie about. Engravings adorn the walls. Plants stand in the windows. If there is a piano it invites the fingers of the musician; or there is a mandolin or a banjo, and with either a hint of jolly times at home. The parlor is not shut up and cold and stuffy. It is airy, sweet, bright and winsome. Lively chat is the rule here, and snatches of song, and invariable good temper. It is a room to enjoy but as it is a luxury it may be waited for. CHAPTER XIII. Order and System. VERY sensible person knows that the affairs of life are carrie.. on to much better advantage when they are managed with a certain regard to routine than when the duties of the day are left to accident. Especially in the beginning of housekeeping it is a good plan to regulate the various dates according to system: to have certain days. for certain work, and as a rule not to vary very much in the schedule laid down. Monday, by time-honored custom, is in most families devoted to washing. If the housekeeper rises early, and has taken the precaution to sort her clothes the night before, putting those which are most soiled into water to soak, keeping the fine and the coarse things apart, and taking this hardest labor of the house with a cheerful spirit, she will find it a good thing out of the way when Monday's sun goes down. Tuesday again is ironing day. Wednesday may be taken for mending and putting in needful stitches before laying away the freshly laundered clothes. Thursday and Friday divide between them washing windows and sweeping and general cleaning, while Saturday is by common consent appropriated to baking, enough in the way of bread, pies and cakes being easily prepared then for the wants of an ordinary household. If one must bake twice a week, Wednesday is the better day for the second campaign of this kind. Then, too, in all well-regulated households the hours for meals are a matter of arrangement. Necessarily these are regulated by the business of the man of the house, by the custom of the place where one lives, and also with some regard to the convenience of children going to school. An early breakfast is a necessity in many households. Unless the family rise soon after dawn in winter and about six o'clock in summer, they cannot sit down comfortably to a half-past six or seven o'clock breakfast, which is a needs-be in many cases. A good deal of the breakfast can be arranged for the night before where one does her own work. Oatmeal, for instance, is the better for being soaked over night in water, unless the housekeeper prefers to put it on in the afternoon and allow it to simmer slowly for a long time on the back of her range, in which case it is very nearly cooked and has only to be warmed over in the morning. All cereals are the better for very thorough cooking. It is a mistake to suppose, whatever the labels on the packages may tell you, that either wheat or oatmeal or Indian meal may be cooked to advantage in a few minutes. They all need a rather slow and leisurely cooking to bring out their best qualities. Coffee may be ground and placed ready for the morning; potato cakes may be made and set aside; and eggs in any form are quickly cooked. If there is to be a hash for breakfast it is always best to prepare it the night before. So much of a man's comfort and health depends on his having a good start for the day, that the wife should always feel it incumbent upon her to have his morning meal ready for him so that he need not be too much hurried and obliged to swallow it in frantic haste, and then rush wildly to his train or the place of his work for the day. On the other hand, the man himself, father, husband, brother or son, owes it to the women of the household to get up when he is called, if not before. Where there are no domestics kept, and fires are to be lighted, it would seem that the man, who is the stronger, should rise first and prepare the fire so that it may be all ready for his wife when she arrives at the preparation of the breakfast. But whatever he does or does not do, it is incumbent on every son of Adam to get up when he is called in the morning, and not to oblige people to rap at his door repeatedly to call him in a voice that might awake the dead. For growing children there is some excuse, and whenever it is possible they should be allowed to sleep their sleep out, but a strong man need not shield himself beside so flimsy an excuse. It is quite in his power to retire as early as he pleases and take the needed sleep before midnight instead of after dawn. In families where there are invalids, or where there is no occasion for catching a train or going to business early-where, perhaps, nobody goes to business at all -breakfast may be as late as one chooses or as may suit the convenience of the family. I remember a charming visit paid at a beautiful home in the vastness of the Berkshire Hills. Here in this household of luxury, where there was no obligation on any one to stir earlier than he or she pleased, the breakfast hour was most comfortably late and people came and went as they pleased, the maid simply bringing in breakfast to each as he or she desired it. This arrangement is ideal, but it is not possible for us all. Where it is practicable to have breakfast a moveable feast, let the housekeeper adjust her system to the convenience of the family, instead of compelling the family to adjust their convenience to her system. System is to be our servant, not our tyrant. We are very foolish to put ourselves under its control. It is simply an efficient means of aiding us in the work we have to do. In many parts of our country dinner is served in the middle of the day, and wherever this arrangement can obtain, it certainly is the best for health and pleasure. In cities, however, where distances are great and men do not come. |