Vermont farmer. [volume] (Newport, Orleans County, Vt.) 1870-1877, 1875-02-05
For the VERMONT FARMER.
Dressing the Girls.

They say women folks are weakly now-a-
days, and guess they are. They certainly
can't endure what girls did when | was
young. Before was ten years old, used
to milk two cows. night and morning, help
ed mother about tho washing and ironing,
and | really thought the cheese couldn't be
made without my chubby fingers had hand
in it. How proud | used to be of keeping the
pals white and clean, and how | used to
deluge the floor and scrub 1t till mother said
she had rs lief eat of it rs off the table.
| shouldn't wonder if one reason that girls
are weakly is because they are so miserably
dressed. We used to wear flannel IN winter ;
genuine, home made flannel inside and out
side in fact pretty much all our winter gar
ments were flannel, even to our aprons.
And our shoes were calf-skin, and custom
work too. Our shoe-maker's name was
Welcome Handy and his work did not rip.
shoe that wouldn't turn water was unfit to
wear, except in the hottest and dryest sum
mer weather, and then we went barefoot.
Our skin wasn't SO delicate but that we
could wear wooden stockings, made ofthe
finest WOOL carefully clcansed and dried in
the June sunshine, picked by the whole fam
lily in odd moments, sent to the eardng ma
chine to BIO formed INTO rolls, spun by our
mothers def fingers on the great wheel"
and doubled, twisted and knit by the daugh-
ter in the long winter evenings, while father
read the Bible or Sewell's History aloud by
the light of u tallow candle.
We had hoods, too, that were comfortable,
made Of silk or merIno, wadded and quilted,
and We had warm wooden shawls, and for long
rides we had cloaks which completely cover
ed us; and so thick that we could defy the
liercest winds that ever swept over the hills
that hemmed in the valley of the Otter
Creek.
Inover had pair of kid gloves till was
eighteen years old; but we knew how to
knit double striped mittens for the boys, and
beautiful white ones with shaded gauntlet
tops of Berlin wool for ourselves. We could
take long walks over the hills on the crisp
snow crust and without getting chilled, and
come in with rosy cheeks, and the pure
healthful blood tingling to our very toes and
finger tips. l used to go to pasture and
catch and harness horse before / was in
my teens and drive up and down the long
steep hills without thought of fear. But
girls can't do 1t nowadays, and rs | said
before, believe half of it comes from their
being so miserably dressed. They wear Han
nels, to be sure, but rs fine rs cobweb and
about as fit as cobweb to withstand the rig
ors of Mount Holly thaw; and instead OF q
wooden gown, spun and woven Mt home and
colored in the caldron kettle with butternut
bark, behold them clothed In cashmere or
alpaca or even calico, Then their shoes
they can't step out doors without wetting
their feet so they have to wear rubbers which
give them rheumatism and consumption.
Cotton stockings or the finest merino are no
sort of protection against such climate as
ours, 1t is no wonder that they have catarri
and bronchitis and neuralgia, with an alb
surd little hat with partridge wing on it
perched on the crown Of her head and KEEP
there with pins or rubber cord. If folk