The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-10-23
AS an American
Woman Finds It

! lean home. A very great item of ex-
pense in London are the incessant clean
/ ing and securing made necessary by the
/ greasy, horrible soft coal smoke. The
4 SCOT and CRIME also involve wash bills
of stupendous length Where the fam
I lily wash could be done at home in the
/ States, because of its size it must be
sent to laundry in London. All the
bed and table linen in London becomes
gray from the unspeaka BILE coal SCOT.
To keep it white is impossible and that
IS one affection to which the tidy Amer
lean housekeeper can never accustom
herself.
The comparative prices of food re-
main to be considered. Two articles
found cheap and good-nanely. bread
and bacon. The bakers bread of Lon
don is better than that of America so
is the bacon. Coffee is very high priced
being one of the commodities on which
Britain charges a duty. I was never
able to obtain any an American would
consider fit to use for less than 4S cents
a pound Quite as good can be bought
in America for rs cents The American
hcusekeeper will find, however, that tea
is very cheap.
Meat in general is high priced so high
that quite a hundred thousand of Lon
don's 1000 600 inhabitants scarcely taste
/
times year. Women and children Of
ten live almost entirely on bread and
tea, with oatmeal porridge for variety.
For relief from this deadly monotony
! of unattractive diet women sometimes
resort to gin and porter. Poultry of all
| kinds is dearer than in America as are
also butter and eggs. Milk ranges
nearly the same in price and is of ex-
cellent quality. Butter as an article of
4 10 g.,
question I once was told by an expe-
rienced English housekeeper that to put
both butter and jam upon piece of
| bread at once was objectionable ex-
| traVagance.
| Cauliflowers, strawberries and goose
berries are in their glory in the British
isles and are cheap and delicious But
of the vegetables which vary the menu
In America-squashes tomatoes. lima
| beans, navy beans. green corn, olzra
and sweet potatoes-what of these
You will find none of them except to-
matoes. and these are grown generally
under glass in the Channel islands and
are correspondingly expensive The av-
erage price is l6 cents a pound
Not a watermelon grows in England,
or an orange, lemon or banana, and hard
| ~ a grape, except under glass. There
are no large peach orchards, no great
vineyards out of which come baskets
of luscious grapes that are sold for 5
cents a pound, sometimes less Lemons
cost always twice as much as in Amer
lea, sometimes more than twice Ap-
pies in America are much cheaper and,
always excepting that gay ard ruddy
| deceiver the Ben Davis, better than
those of Great Britain; but gooseberries
and strawberries cost considerably
more in the States. Finally, if you add
to your living expenses the cab hire
and the everlasting. almost incomputa-
BILE. tipping and feeling whereby both the
native and the foreigner are 7bled from
day to day the United States will ac-
tually have the advantage in the matter
of economy, while the comfort and con-
venience of householding in England
cannot be named alongside of what the
family of moderate means get for the
same money in the States.
If the family of moderate means have
children. where and how can they be
| educated in London? To every corner