The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-01-21
COOKING AND READING.

The following sensible remarks on
reading and cooking are extracted from
an article in the December number of
the Woman's Magazine, addressed to
country girls, by Rose Terry Cooke. We
think the city girls will be none the
worse for them, and would commend
them to the consideration of young wo
men everywhere:
Now, there are novels which are part
of a liberal education, which breathe life
and interest into the dry bones of his
toric record or impress great moral
truths by vivid illustrations, but the sort
these girls read are trash, if no worse.
They live by such reading in an atmos-
phere of finery, over-drawn sentiment,
upgovernable and therefore bewitohing
passion, lofty airs of "high" society,
falsehood, perjury, indecency, even crime.
This sort of reading ruins the intellect
of our girls, destroys their delicacy, de-
grades their moral fibre and makes their
language high-Aown and absurd. Now, If
you would, each and all Of you, learn to
do housework, to help your mother first,
and secondsrily to fit yourself for USE
full future, how good and how fitting to
your position and destiny it would be!
Oh, my dear girls! do take care of your
mothers! You do not know what you are
doing, am sure, when you thwart their
wishes, are disobedient, careless, cold
perhaps contemptuous. Some day, when
you are yourselves mothers, you will look
back and wonder with remofse why you
did not love your mother more and help
her more while she lived. There is no
love on earth like a mothers; once lost
you can never replace it; no other hu-
man being will give you that tireless, I'M
selfish, fervent, faithful affection, love
that "many waters cannot quench, neith
or can the foods drown" That is the gift
of a real mother. Cherish it, girls; even
ifher care and provision is little irksome
now to your careless, eager young souls;
believe me, the time will come when you
will long, with thirst of soul and body,
for one day of her presence, and you can
not have it.
Besides this, what are you going to do
when you are married, as you all expect
to be, if you do not know how to keep
house? There is an old, what is consid-
cred scornful, saying, 'That the way to
reach mans heart is through his stom.
sch," but il is physiological fact. No
man, coming from hard or continuous
labor of brain or hand, can sit down to an
unpalatable, indigestible meal, without
producing a gastric irritation that also
reaches the systematic brain; if you cook
ed or had cooked that tough, undone
steak, those greasy fried oysters, that
lumpy potato, that sour bread, that do
not satisfy his hunger and do excite
his dyspepsia, do you think he will be
grateful or affectionate to you? 1t is folly
to expect it.
But let the same man, equally tired
and hungry, sit down to palatable soup,
no matter how simple, if well-havored
and hot; thick tender steak just red
under its brown exterior and full of rich
juices; potato mashed to the aspect of
thick cream and exactly sailed; bread
that is light and sweet; you will zee his
face gradually settle into satisfaction, his
eyes begin to smile, his knitted brows
smooth themselves, and his whole man
ner become pleasant and tender. Now
this is not because the man is pig, but
because he is human being, and has q
stomach full of radiating nerves that are
irritated or Gained by the hard or easy
work of the organ to which they impart
the discretion OF constituencies.
/ Moreover, half the trouble OF servants
will be spared you, il you know what
they ought to do and how they ought to
do it; ignorant and exacting mistresses
will always have impairment and rebel
lious servants while the world endures.
Then when you have learned housework,
learn how to sew; you may say that ma
chimes render this needless, but no one
can run a sewing machine properly and
turn out good work from it, who does
not understand sewing.
No msehine can finish a garment as
fingers can-I mean instructed fingers.
Then Danish your silly novels; read
good ones that any well-educated friend
can select for you; read biographies, and
SO learn what others have suffered and
attained to give you hope and courage to
live nobler life. Read history, and