labor saved. For instance, when you are sewing, carefully de posit your bits of thread, &c., in a little basket or box, instead of throwing them on the floor. And again: set your chairs out a little from the wall, instead of putting them close to it which would not only rub the paint from the chairs, but would soon deface the beauty of the wall-paper. These appear like trifling things-but nothing is too trifling to demand our attention, when we are endeavoring to fulfil the duties of our sphere.

817. Cheerfulness.-Does it seem singular that cheerfulness is placed among the requisites for good house-keeping? But it is of far more importance than you would, at first view, imagine. What matters it to a brother or husband, if the house be ever so neat, or the meals punctually and well prepared, if the mistress of it is fretful and fault-finding-ever discontented and complaining. The outside of such a house is ever the most attractive to him, and any and every excuse will be made for absenting himself; and the plea of business or engagements will be made to her who is doomed to pass her hours needlessly in solitude.

818. Of Economy in Expenditure.-Economy should be the first point in all families, whatever be their circumstances. A prudent housekeeper will regulate the ordinary expenses of a family, according to the annual sum allowed for housekeeping. By this means, the provision will be uniformly good, and it will not be requisite to practise meanness on many occasions, for the sake of meeting extra expense on one.

The best check upon outrunning an income is to pay bills weekly, for you may then retrench in time. This practice is likewise a salutary check upon the correctness of the accounts themselves.

To young beginners in housekeeping, the following brief hints on domestic economy, in the management of a moderate income, may perhaps not prove unacceptable.

A bill of parcels and receipt should be required, even if the money be paid at the time of purchase; and, to avoid mistakes, let the goods be compared with these when brought home; or, if paid or at future periods, a bill should be sent with the article, and regularly filed on separate files for each tradesman.

An inventory of furniture, linen, and china should be kept,

and the things examined by it twice a-year, or oftener if there be a change of servants; the articles used by servants should be intrusted to their care, with a list, as is done with the plate. In articles not in common use, such as spare bedding, tickets of parchment, numbered and specifying to what they belong, should be sewed on each; and minor articles in daily use, such as household cloths and kitchen requisites, should be occasion ally looked to.

819. Books and Accounts.-Housekeeping books, with printed forms for the various heads of expenditure, and the several articles, are used in many families; but accounts may be kept with as much certainty in plain books.

820. Servants. In the hiring of Servants, it is an excellent plan to agree to increase their wages annually to a fixed sum, where it should stop, and to recommend that a portion of it should be regularly placed in a savings-bank. An incentive will thus be offered to good conduct; and when the hoard saved up amounts to any considerable sum, the possessor will generally feel more inclined to enlarge than to expend it.

A kindly feeling of indulgence on the part of the mistress towards her servants, in the matter of petty faults, coupled with good-natured attention to their daily comforts, and occasional permission to visit and receive a few of their near friends, would go far to create a cordial degree of attachment, which must be ever desirable to a respectable family, and cheaply purchased by such consideration. Mildness of language will generally be met by respectful language on the part of a servant, and of itself will produce a saving of temper at least to the master or mistress. Due praise will mostly be found a powerful stimulus to good, and in some measure a preventive to bad conduct, on the part of a servant.

Do not speak harshly or imperatively to servants, or tell them of their faults in the presence of strangers or visitors; but take the earliest opportunity of reproving them after your company have left.

821. Store-room.--A store-room is essential for the custody of articles in constant use, as well as for others which are only occasionally called for. These should be at hand when wanted, each in separate drawers, or on shelves and pegs, all under the

lock and key of the mistress, and never be given out to the ser vants but under her inspection.

Pickles and preserves, prepared and purchased sauces, and all sorts of groceries, should be there stored; the spices pounded and corked up in small bottles, sugar broken, and everything in readiness for use. Lemon-peel, thyme, parsley, and all sorts of sweet herbs, should be dried and grated for use in seasons of plenty; the tops of tongues saved, and dried, for grating into omelets, &c.; and care taken that nothing be wasted that can be turned to good account.

Coarse nets suspended in the store-room are very useful in preserving the finer kinds of fruit, lemons, &c., which are spoiled if allowed to touch. When lemons and oranges are cheap, a proper quantity should be bought and prepared, both for preserving the juice, and keeping the peel for sweetmeats and grating, especially by those who live in the country, where they cannot always be had; and they are perpetually wanted in cookery.

822. Sugar. The lowest-priced and coarsest sugar is not the cheapest in the end, as it is heavy, dirty, and of a very inferior degree of sweetness; that which is most refined is the sweetest: the best has a bright and gravelly appearance. East India sugars appear finer in proportion to the price; but they do not contain so much sweetness as the other kinds. Loaf-sugars should be chosen as fine and as close in texture as possible, except they are for preserving, when the coarse, strong, open kind is preferable.

823. Pepper. The finest Cayenne pepper consists of powdered bird-pepper; but, as this is of a bad color, it is often adulterated to heighten the color. English chilies, dried and pounded, make good pepper.

White pepper is inferior to black, although the former is sold at the highest price. White pepper is merely black pepper deprived of its outer coating, which has a stimulating property; so that white pepper is much weaker than black.

824. Cinnamon, when good, is rather thin and pliable, and about the substance of thick paper, of yellowish-brown color, sweetish taste, and pleasant odor: that which is hard, thick, and dark-colored, should be rejected.

825. Articles in Season.-Some weak-minded persons affect to despise articles of food when they are plentiful and cheap, not knowing that such is the time when the articles are in the greatest perfection.

Young and inexperienced housekeepers sometimes incur unnecessary expense by ordering articles of food when they are scarce, dear, and hardly come into season. This can only be prevented by attention to the seasons of different articles.

826. Every Family to make their own Sweet Oil.-With a small hand-mill, every family might make their own sweet oil. This may easily be done, by grinding or beating the seeds of white poppies into a paste, then boil it in water, and skim off the oil as it rises; one bushel of seed weighs fifty pounds, and produces two gallons of oil. Of the sweet olive oil sold, onehalf is oil of poppies. The poppies will grow in any garden; it is the large-head white poppy, sold by apothecaries. Large fields are sown with poppies in France and Flanders, for the purpose of expressing oil from their seed for food. When the seed is taken out, the poppy head when dried is boiled to an extract, which is sold at two shillings per ounce, and it is to be preferred to opium, which now sells very high. Large fortunes may be acquired by the cultivation of poppies. Women and children could attend to the cultivation of any quantity required for their own use, in making oil, and it would be found a profitable branch of industry, when engaged in on a large scale.

827. Candles and Lamps.-In purchasing wax, spermaceti, or composition candles for company, there will be a saving by proportioning the length and size of the lights to the probable duration of the party. Mixed wax and spermaceti make the best candles, of which a long four (that is, four to the pound,) will last ten hours; a short six will burn six hours; a three, twelve hours.

A moderate-sized French table-lamp, will consume a quarter of a pint of oil in twelve hours and a half.

A common japanned kitchen-lamp, with one burner, will consume one-eighth of a pint of oil in nine hours.

828. Neats'-foot Oil.-Boil the feet for several hours, as for making stock for jelly; skim off the oily matter from time to

time as it rises, and, when it ceases to come up, pour off the water; next day, take off the cake of fat and oil which will be found on the top; boil it and the oil before obtained, together with a little cold water; let it cool; pour off the water, and bottle the oil for use. This oil being perfectly pure, and free from smell, may be used with the French lights in a sick-room.

829. Soap.-Soap, as well as candles, is improved by keeping. Buy your store for the winter as early as September, and cut the large bars of soap into pieces, to dry. It goes farther, and is better.

830. Coals.-Lay in your stock of coal and wood, during summer, when fuel of all kinds is cheapest.

831. Good method of making Fires.--In managing your fires during the day, first lay on a shovelful of the dust and ashes from under the grate, then a few coals, then more ashes, and afterwards a few more coals, and thus proceed till your grate is properly filled, placing a few round coals in front. You will find that the ashes retain the heat better than coals alone; you will have less smoke, a pleasant fire, and a very little waste left at night.

832. Kitchen-Paper.-Whited-brown and common writing is much used: it should be bought by the ream or half-ream, which will be much cheaper than by the quire. White paper only should be used for singeing, and for covering meat, pastry, &c.

833. Economy in Tinder.--The very high price of paper, at present, renders the saving of even the smallest quantity of linen or cotton rags of consequence, as they sell very dear. Trifling as it may be thought, yet it will be found that a considerable quantity of rags may be saved in a family, by using as tinder for lighting matches, the contents of the common snuffers, collected in the course of the evening.

834. To prevent Accidents, from leaving a poker in the fire.The following invention is equally simple and secure:--Immediately above that square part of the poker, by blacksmiths