Bedford inquirer. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1857-1884, 1870-02-04
OUR GRANDMoTHERs.
BY GAIL HAMILTON.

Its simply impossible-listen now, Ipray,
all knights of high and low degree, march
ing along thousand score strong, great
hearted gentlemen singing this song ofwo-
man S sphereicity-it is simply impossible
for any woman to do the whole work of her
household and make her life what woman's
life ought to be- This is a rule that admits
of no exception The machinery of the
family is so complicated and so exacting that
one woman cannot have the sole charge of
it without neglecting other and equally i'm
portant matters
The duties which a woman owes to socie-
ty, and to the moral and spiritual part of
her household, are just as imperative as
those which she owes to its physical com
fort And if she alone ministers to the lat
ter the former must be neglected, and the
latter will hardly be thoroughly accomplish
ed. know all about our noble grandmoth-
ers. / have heard of them before. | think
we could run race with them any day.
But if we cannot, whose fault is it? If the
women Of to-day are puny, fragile, degener-
ate, are they not the grandchildren of their
grandmothers-bearing such constitutions
as their grandmothers could transmit
1t was the duty of those venerable ladies
not only to be strong themselves, but to see
to it that their children were strong A
sturdy race should leave a sturdy race. 1t
was far more their duty to give to their
children vigorous minds, stalWart bodies,
healthy nerves, firm principles, than il was
to spin and weave and make butter and
cheese all day. We should have got along
just as well with less linen laid up in laven-
der; and if cur grandmothers could only have
waited We would have woven them more
cloth in a day than their hand looms would
turn out ia lifetime But there is no
royal road to a healthy manhood and wo-
manhood. Nothing less costly than human
life goes into the construction ofhuman life.
We should have more reason to be CRATE
full to our ancestors if they would have given
up their superfuous industries, called off
their energy from its perishable objects, and
let more of their soul and strength flow lei
surely in to build up the soul and strength
of the generations that we're to follow after
them. Nobody Is to blame for being born
weak. If this generation of women is fec
bic compared with its handy and laborious
grandmothers it is simply because the grand
mothers put SO much Of their vitality, their
physical nerve and moral fibre, into their
work that they had but an insufficient quan-
tity left wherewithal to endow their children;
and so they wrought us evil
One would not willingly quarrel with his
grandmothers. All agree in awarding them
praise for heroic qualities They fought
good fght-perhaps the best they could uu-
der the circumstances with their light. We
would gladly overlook all in their lives that
was defective, and fasten our eyes only on
that which was noble But when their fault
is distinctly pointed outas their virtue, when
their necessity is exalted into our ensample,
when their narrowness is held up to our am
bition, we must say that it was fault and
need and narrowness, grandmother or no
grandmother.
Indeed those excellent gentlewomen, no
doubt, long before this have seen the error
Of their ways, and, if they could find voice,
would be the first to avow that they did set
too great store by chests Of sheets, and bu.
reaus, of blankets, aud pillow cases Of stock
logs, and stacks of provisions; and that if it
were given them to live life over again, they
would ,,endeayor rather to lay up treasure in
the bodies and brains and hearts Of their
children, where moth and mildew do not
corrupt, which time does not dissipate nor
use destroy, and whereof we stand in sorer
need than Of purple or scarlet or fne-twined
/ linen. Ha1per's Bazdr