Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1906-11-28
HOW TO LIVE WELL ON A SMALL
INCOME.
Many WastefuI Expenditures Incurred
That Could Easily Be Done Away
With-Practice Small
Economies.
BY MARGARET E. sANGsTER.

meaning of the adjective small as ap-
piled to an income.
l have known a couple who started
in life with what their friends thought
flying colors. The man had a bust
ness berth with a salary of $4,000 a
year. The mans wife went to house
keeping with him in beautiful house
furnished completely from roof to
basement by her liberal father. Her
mother agreed to give her all her
clothes just as when she had been a
girl at home. At the end of year
these two people came to their re-
spective parents, and with tears and
protestations declared that they
could not live in town on the meager
pittance of the husbands salary.
Either they must have twice as much
money or else they must emigrate to
some cheap country place. Parents
proving memorable, the establishment
in town was broken up and messieur
and madame betook themselves to
rural environment. What became of
them 1 never learned, or whether they
discovered Utopia in cheap village,
If such a village there be under the
blue canopy that stretches over our
heads.
EXtravagant people can run through
immense sums without much trouble.
1t is only necessary to want every
thing one sees, buy everything one
wants, take no care of anything, do
nothing ones self and be wasteful and
improvident generally, to achieve bril-
liant success in this direction.
All over this country there are peo-
pie who have solved the problem of
living comfortably on incomes that
range from $500 or 5000 to $4,000
year.
The first thing to be thought of is
shelter. A place to protect one from
the weather and to provide ones fam
lily with the outside shell of that
sweet intangible thing we call home.
is the initial requisite. The home be-
ing selected, its furnishing comes
next; this may be simple or elabor-
ate, costly or inexpensive. 1t may be
and often is, fully as artistic and fully
as refined and beautiful when it's cost
has been trifiing as when large sums
have been absorbed in the item of up
holstery, of chairs, tables, wall paper
and decorations.
If it be practicable to build and own
ones home, it is in the long run an
economical procedure, as in few
years rent eats up in actual cash
sufficient amount to buy and wholly
pay for a comfortable home. 1t is not
an unwise thing to have mortgage
on the home to begin with, if there is
enough forethought and self denial
to make payments and reduce it an
nually, until the house is altogether
ones own.
A great deal of wasteful expenditure
Is incurred by those who have the too
prevalent American habit of frequent
ly changing their residences. At
times this tendency almost indicates
morbid and diseased social restless
ness. People move apparently only to
try another house on another street
when there is not the least advantage
gained by the change and considerable
money and strength are lost in the
needless removal.
People who make a study of it and
| who have very small incomes on
| which to draw, have assured me that
| they can live best by purchasing
household supplies in very small
| quantity. In Paris, where frugality is
reduced to it's lowest terms, the house
holder buys tiny pat of butter, a
single chop or single egg at need.
In America great deal is thrown
away for the reason that too much
was originally bought. A house
keeper who tided her family over a
particularly difficult crisis in it's at
fairs, told me that she knew precisely
how many potatoes to cook for fam
| lily of four, how many spoonsful of
coffee should be used in a week. and
how many Jumps of sugar. 1t must
have been rather a strain to calculate
so closely as she did. but her husband
and children had enough to eat and
made a good appearance when they
went respectively to business and to
school. and they got over their
troubles and swept triumphantly for.
ward into financial ease. A family in
the neighborhood with three times
their income. but none of their man
agement. were always on the ragged
edge of distress and were at last sold
1eut by the sheriff.
Fuel is always expensive and Is the
one feature that resists the careful
manager. In winter we cannot freeze
and in most parts of this country we
have plenty of cold weather 1t is the
provoking nature of fire to burn fierce
ly on hot day and to smolder OF
give out only little heat on cold day.
Many time the heads of the hnuse