The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1900-06-22
IS GOSSIP FOR THE LADIES. s.

own homes than upon the finest French
entrees and such stuff He says, too,
that hotel is the worst possible place
to bring up children in, and Il perfect hot
bed Of gossip-and much more of the
same sort have not patience to repeat.
people are giving up the housekeeping
experiment every year as a hopeless UNI
dertaking. Finer and finer hotels are be-
ing built and filled with families. AS
l ask my husband-if so many people are
'dsgusted with that, way Of living, why
to be unreasonable, but after all these
years of toll and worry, it does seem as
if l might have relief and rest. Ameri-
can housekeeping is mistake, out and
out! l am weary! weary! of studying
| what to have for breakfast, luncheon
weary sometimes think, almost unto
death! The smell Of the kitchen clings
to y my my,,! life, and servants arg NUS
l give the long lctter-apparently the
work of an educated womanAhecallse it
expresses the sentiments and feelings of
a large class Of housekeepers and be
cause there is much force in some things
my correspondent says.
Let me answer. first, that she is worn
and weary and needs il Temporary change.
1t must surely be practicable for her to
take vacation from ordering meals and
managing servants; for a few weeks.
kitchen out of the nostrils of her mag
ination. The machine must have rest,
now and then, to restore temper" and
brace nervous forces.
AS to hotel life-I question if many of
the thousands who crowd our splendid
live in them all the year round. AS
town houses are given up the number of
seaside and mountain cottages multi
plies. The gayest lover of pleasure longs
for a taste of domestic life; the matron
who has, abandoned housekeeping as Il
failure, is not contented without the
breath of the old life in an Adirondack
where she can have her family to her
self and get away from the glare and
stare of what call contract living
The ''indulgent husband is altogether
right in what he says of the sameness of
hotel fare, however palatable it may be
for a few weeks. 1t pals upon the taste
as the plain food prepared in our own
times that we are ''tired of our own
cooking but it never bores the appetite
as do the catalogued delicacies that come
from the hands of the salaried Chef
confess myself unable to account for
this to my own satisfaction or to my cor
respondents. | know that l speak the
truth i'll asserting that in time-and not
so long time, cither-what once pleased
the palate Of IL hotel hoarder becomes in
sipid or distasteful. Roast turkey tastes
as much like chicken as it does like the
bird whose name it bears. and cannot be
distinguished from duck if the eater
closes his eyes. Beef. mutton, veal and
yenison, might all have been cooked in
one rooster and at the same time. How
ever alluring the list of crouuettes, ris-
soles. timbalcs. outlets and salmis, one
becomes unccmfcrtaby familiar with
them all. and would honestly prefer a
juicy steak blood rare broiled in his
mcther's Kitchen and served with a mcaly
potato, to the entire collection
Some part of this gastrononlic boredom
is due to the circumstance that hotel
cookery is done on so large scale that
it is next to impossible to preserve dis
tinctive flavors. l incline to the belief
that more is owing to the lack of what
may be STYLED the personal and individual
element that is wrought into each dish
which appears on the home table. 1
wish had time to discuss this interest
ing point.
indulgent husbands remark that hotel or
boarding house is an undesirable place
in which to bring up children. | won
der if he-SenSible parent as he iS-knuwS
how forcible is this objection! The
mightiest safeguard our children can
have against the manifold evils of this
present world is Home influence: the holy
and tender associations that cling to the
name and the reality of the home which
is theirs and Of which they are an inte-
grail part.
My frank and full reply" to letter
that has cost me much and grave
thought, is to cntreat this particular wife
and mother to think long and seriously
before she and hcr now united household
join the nomadic tribes who are making
American home life a by-word and a
Kissing to other Christian nations
Recreation she may, and apparently
does, need. When the approaching sum
mer is upon her. let her seek this for
herself and her brood in hillside farm
house or seaside hotel Let her not hope
-or-try to find the fine exquisite. mimi
table essence of HOME in either, much
less in the gilded hives, swarming with
human incongruities, which my CORE
spondent reminds me are growing more
superb and populous every year.
All! the pity of it!