Page:The English housekeeper, 6th.djvu/35

Rh summer, I recalled to mind, with a complacency I had never bestowed on them before, the scrubbing-brushes and the curd-white pails of Philadelphia, and marvelled, as every one must, that in wet and cold countries people wash their houses so much, and that, in hot and dry countries, they do not wash them at all.

With regard to the ordinary expenses of housekeeping, the most important branch of domestic duty which devolves upon the mistress is, to estimate and keep an exact account of the expenditure of her family. She may make this a simple affair by first ascertaining the sum of money to be allotted to it, and then making such arrangements as will confine the expenses rigidly within that sum. By keeping a strict account of every article for the first three months, and making a due allowance for casualties, she will be able to form an estimate for the year; and if she find she has exceeded in these three months the allotted sum, she must examine each article, and decide where she can best diminish the expense; and then, having this average to go by, she may calculate how much to allow each month for meat, bread, groceries, washing, and sundries. Having formed her plan, whatever excess circumstances may have required in one month, she must make up for in the next. I should not advise paying for everything at the moment, but rather once a week; for if a tradesman omit to keep an account of the money received for a particular article, he may, by mistake, make a charge for it, as something had upon trust. A weekly account has every advantage of ready money, and is a more convenient mode of payment. All tradesmen may be paid on a Monday morning, the bills receipted, endorsed, and put by in a portfolio or case (which should have the date of the year on the outside), and they can then be referred to as vouchers, or to refresh the memory as to the price of any particular article. It is a satisfaction, independently of the pecuniary benefit, for the head of a family to be able, at the end of the year, to account to herself for what she has done with her money.

Having, in the arrangement of her house, and in the choice of her servants, kept in view the two main objects, namely, the comfort of her family, and the care of her purse, the young housekeeper ought to commence her career, by strictly adhering to order and regularity in the