Read Ebook: American Woman's Home: Or Principles of Domestic Science; Being a Guide to the Formation and Maintenance of Economical Healthful Beautiful and Christian Homes by Beecher Catharine Esther Stowe Harriet Beecher

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The chief cause of woman's disabilities and sufferings, that women are not trained, as men are, for their peculiar duties--Aim of this volume to elevate the honor and remuneration of domestic employment--Woman's duties, and her utter lack of training for them--Qualifications of the writers of this volume to teach the matters proposed--Experience and study of woman's work--Conviction of the dignity and importance of it--The great social and moral power in her keeping--The principles and teachings of Jesus Christ the true basis of woman's rights and duties.

Object of the Family State--Duty of the elder and stronger to raise the younger, weaker, and more ignorant to an equality of advantages--Discipline of the family--The example of Christ one of self-sacrifice as man's elder brother--His assumption of a low estate--His manual labor--His trade--Woman the chief minister of the family estate--Man the out-door laborer and provider--Labor and self-denial in the mutual relations of home-life, honorable, healthful, economical, enjoyable, and Christian.

True wisdom in building a home--Necessity of economizing time, labor, and expense, by the close packing of conveniences--Plan of a model cottage--Proportions--Piazzas--Entry--Stairs and landings--Large room--Movable Screen--Convenient bedsteads--A good mattress--A cheap and convenient ottoman--Kitchen and stove-room--The stove-room and its arrangements--Second or attic story--Closets, corner dressing-tables, windows, balconies, water and earth-closets, shoe-bag, piece-bag--Basement, closets, refrigerator, washtubs, etc.--Laundry--General wood-work--Conservatories-Average estimate of cost.

Household murder--Poisoning and starvation the inevitable result of bad air in public halls and private homes--Good air as needful as good food--Structure and operations of the lungs and their capillaries and air-cells--How people in a confined room will deprive the air of oxygen and overload it with refuse carbonic acid-Starvation of the living body deprived of oxygen--The skin and its twenty-eight miles of perspiratory tubes--Reciprocal action of plants and animals--Historical examples of foul-air poisoning--Outward effects of habitual breathing of bad air--Quotations from scientific authorities.

An open fireplace secures due ventilation--Evils of substituting air-tight stoves and furnace heating--Tendency of warm air to rise and of cool air to sink--Ventilation of mines--Ignorance of architects--Poor ventilation in most houses--Mode of ventilating laboratories--Creation of a current of warm air in a flue open at top and bottom of the room--Flue to be built into chimney: method of utilizing it.

The general properties of heat, conduction, convection, radiation, reflection--Cooking done by radiation the simplest but most wasteful mode: by convection the cheapest--The range--The model cooking-stove--Interior arrangements and principles--Contrivances for economizing heat, labor, time, fuel, trouble, and expense--Its durability, simplicity, etc.--Chimneys: why they smoke and how to cure them--Furnaces: the dryness of their heat--Necessity of moisture in warm air--How to obtain and regulate it.

Significance of beauty in making home attractive and useful in education--Exemplification of economical and tasteful furniture--The carpet, lounge, lambrequins, curtains, ottomans, easy-chair, centre-table--Money left for pictures--Chromes--Pretty frames-- Engravings--Statuettes--Educatory influence of works of art--Natural adornments--Materials in the woods and fields--Parlor-gardens--Hanging baskets--Fern-shields--Ivy, its beauty and tractableness--Window, with flowers, vines, and pretty plants--Rustic stand for flowers--Ward's case--How to make it economically--Bowls and vases of rustic work for growing plants--Ferns, how and when to gather them--General remarks.

Importance of some knowledge of the body and its needs--Fearful responsibility of entering upon domestic duties in ignorance--The fundamental vital principle--Cell-life--Wonders of the microscope --Cell-multiplication--Constant interplay of decay and growth necessary to life--The red and white cells of the blood--Secreting and converting power--The nervous system--The brain and the nerves--Structural arrangement and functions--The ganglionic system--The nervous fluid--Necessity of properly apportioned exercise to nerves of sensation and of motion--Evils of excessive or insufficient exercise--Equal development of the whole.

Connection of muscles and nerves--Microscopic cellular muscular fibre--Its mode of action--Dependence on the nerves of voluntary and involuntary motion--How exercise of muscles quickens circulation of the blood which maintains all the processes of life--Dependence of equilibrium upon proper muscular activity--Importance of securing exercise that will interest the mind.

Apportionment of elements in food: carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, calcium, iron, silicon, etc.--Large proportion of water in the human body--Dr. Holmes on the interchange of death and life--Constituent parts of a kernel of wheat--Comparison of different kinds of food--General directions for diet--Hunger the proper guide and guard of appetite--Evils of over-eating--Structure and operations of the stomach--Times and quantity for eating--Stimulating and nourishing food--Americans eat too much meat--Wholesome effects of Lenten fasting--Matter and manner of eating--Causes of debilitation from misuse of food.

Stimulating drinks not necessary--Their immediate evil effects upon the human body and tendency to grow into habitual desires--The arguments for and against stimulus--Microscopic revelations of the effects of alcohol on the cellular tissue of the brain--Opinions of high scientific authorities against its use--No need of resorting to stimulants either for refreshment, nourishment, or pleasure--Tea and coffee an extensive cause of much nervous debility and suffering--Tend to wasteful use in the kitchen--Are seldom agreeable at first to children--Are dangerous to sensitive, nervous organizations, and should be at least regulated--Hot drinks unwholesome, debilitating, and destructive to teeth, throat, and stomach--Warm drinks agreeable and not unhealthful--Cold drinks not to be too freely used during meals--Drinking while eating always injurious to digestion.

Health and comfort depend on cleanliness--Scientific treatment of the skin, the most complicated organ of the body--Structure and arrangement of the skin, its layers, cells, nerves, capillaries, absorbents, oil-tubes, perspiration-tubes, etc.--The mucous membrane--Phlegm--The secreting organs--The liver, kidney, pancreas, salivary and lachrymal glands--Sympathetic connection of all the bodily organs--Intimate connection of the skin with all the other organs--Proper mode of treating the skin--Experiment showing happy effects of good treatment.

Fashion attacks the very foundation of the body, the bones--Bones composed of animal and mineral elements--General construction and arrangement--Health of bones dependent on nourishment and exercise of body--Spine--Distortions produced by tight dressing--Pressure of interior organs upon each other and upon the bones--Displacement of stomach, diaphragm, heart, intestines, and pelvic or lower organs--Women liable to peculiar distresses--A well-fitted jacket to replace stiff corsets, supporting the bust above and the under skirts below--Dressing of young children--Safe for a healthy child to wear as little clothing as will make it thoroughly comfortable--Nature the guide--The very young and the very old need the most clothing.

Good manners the expression of benevolence in personal intercourse--Serious defects in manners of the Americans-Causes of abrupt manners to be found in American life--Want of clear discrimination between men--Necessity for distinctions of superiority: and subordination--Importance that young mothers should seriously endeavor to remedy this defect, while educating their children--Democratic principal of equal rights to be applied, not to our own interests but to those of others--The same courtesy to be extended to all classes--Necessary distinctions arising from mutual relations to be observed--The strong to defer to the weak--Precedence yielded by men to women in America--Good manners must be cultivated in early life--Mutual relations of husband and wife--Parents and children--The rearing of children to courtesy--De Tocqueville on American manners.

Relative importance and difficulty of the duties a woman is called to perform--Her duties not trivial--A habit of system and order necessary--Right apportionment of time--General principles-- Christianity to be the foundation--Intellectual and social interests to be preferred to gratification of taste or appetite--Neglect of health a sin in the sight of God--Regular season of rest appointed by the Creator--Divisions of time--Systematic arrangement of house articles and other conveniences--Regular employment for each member of a family--Children--Family work--Forming habits of system--Early rising a very great aid--Due apportionment of time to the several duties.

No point of duty more difficult to fix by rule than charity--First consideration--Object for which we are placed in this world--Self- denying Benevolence.--Second consideration--Natural principles not to be exterminated, but regulated and controlled.--Third consideration--Superfluities sometimes proper, and sometimes not--Fourth consideration--No rule of duty right for one and not for all--The opposite of this principle tested--Some use of superfluities necessary--Plan for keeping an account of necessities and superfluities--Untoward results of our actions do not always prove that we deserve blame--General principles to guide in deciding upon objects of charity--Who are our neighbors--The most in need to be first relieved--Not much need of charity for physical wants in this country--Associated charities--Indiscriminate charity--Impropriety of judging the charities of others.

Economy, value, and right apportionment of time--Laws appointed by God for the Jews--Christianity removes the restrictions laid on the Jews, but demands all our time to be devoted to our own best interests and the good of our fellow-men--Enjoyment connected with every duty--Various modes of economizing time--System and order--Uniting several objects in one employment--Odd intervals of time--Aiding others in economizing time--Economy in expenses--Contradictory notions--General principles in which all agree--Knowledge of income and expenses--Evils of want of system and forethought--Young ladies should early learn to be systematic and economical.

Intimate connection between the body and mind--Brain excited by improper stimulants taken into the stomach--Mental faculties then affected--Causes of mental disease--Want of oxygenized blood--Fresh air absolutely necessary--Excessive exercise of the intellect or feelings--Such attention to religion as prevents the performance of other duties, wrong--Unusual precocity in children usually the result of a diseased brain--Idiocy often the result, or the precocious child sinks below the average of mankind--This evil yet prevalent in colleges and other seminaries--A medical man necessary in every seminary--Some pupils always needing restraint in regard to study--A third cause of mental disease, the want of appropriate exercise of the various faculties of the mind--Extract from Dr. Combe--Beneficial results of active intellectual employments--Indications of a diseased mind.

Herbert Spencer on the treatment of offspring--Absurdity of undertaking to rear children without any knowledge of how to do it--Foolish management of parents generally the cause of evils ascribed to Providence--Errors of management during the first two years--Food of child and of mother--Warning as to use of too much medicine--Fresh air-- Care of the skin--Dress--Sleep--Bathing--Change of air--Habits--Dangers of the teething period--Constipation--Diarrhea--Teething--How to relieve its dangers--Feverishness--Use of water.

Children need more amusement than older persons--Its object, to afford rest and recreation to the mind and body--Example of Christ--No amusements to be introduced that will tempt the weak or over-excite the young--Puritan customs--Work followed by play--Dramatic exercises, dancing, and festivity wholesomely enjoyed--The nine o'clock bell--The drama and the dance--Card-playing--Novel-reading--Taste for solid reading--Cultivation of fruits and flowers--Music--Collecting of shells, plants, and minerals--Games--Exercise of mechanical skill for boys--Sewing, cutting, and fitting--General suggestions--Social and domestic duties--Family attachments--Hospitality.

Preservation of the aged, designed to give opportunity for self-denial and loving care--Patience, sympathy, and labor for them to be regarded as privileges in a family--The young should respect and minister unto the aged--Treating them as valued members of the family--Engaging them in domestic Games and sports--Reading aloud-Courteous attention to their opinions--Assistance in retarding decay of faculties by helping them to exercise--Keeping up interest of the infirm in domestic affairs--Great care to preserve animal heat--Ingratitude to the aged, its baseness--Chinese regard for old age.

Origin of the Yankee term "help"--Days of good health and intelligent house-keeping--Growth of wealth tends to multiply hired service-- American young women should be trained in housekeeping for the guidance of ignorant and shiftless servants--Difficulty of teaching servants--Reaction of society in favor of women's intellectuality, in danger of causing a new reaction--American girls should do more work--Social estimate of domestic service--Dearth of intelligent domestic help--Proper mode of treating servants--General rules and special suggestions--Hints from experience--Woman's first "right," liberty to do what she can--Domestic duties not to be neglected for operations in other spheres--Servants to be treated with respect--Errors of heartless and of too indulgent employers--Mistresses of American families necessarily missionaries and instructors.

Prominence given to care and cure of the sick by our Saviour--Every woman should know what to do in the case of illness--Simple remedies best--Fasting and perspiration--Evils of constipation--Modes of relieving it--Remedies for colds--Unwise to tempt the appetite of the sick--Suggestion for the sick-room--Ventilation--Needful articles--The room, bed, and person of the patient to be kept neat--Care to preserve animal warmth--The sick, the delicate, the aged--Food always to be carefully prepared and neatly served--Little modes of refreshment-- Implicit obedience to the physician--Care in purchasing medicines-- Exhibition of cheerfulness, gentleness, and sympathy--Knowledge and experience of mind--Lack of competent nurses--Failings of nurses-- Sensitiveness of the sick--"Sisters of Charity," the reason why they are such excellent nurses--Illness in the family a providential opportunity of training children to love and usefulness.

Mode of treating cuts, wounds, severed arteries--Bad bruises to be bathed In hot water--Sprains treated with hot fomentation and rest--Burns cured by creosote, wood-soot, or flour--Drowning; most approved mode of treatment--Poisons and their antidotes--Soda, saleratus, potash, sulphuric or oxalic acid, lime or baryta, iodine or iodide of potassium, prussic acid, antimony, arsenic, lead, nitrate of silver, phosphorus, alcohol, tobacco, opium, strychnia--Bleeding at the lungs, stomach, throat, nose--Accidents from lightning-- Stupefaction, from coal-gas or foul air--Fire--Fainting--Coolness and presence of mind.

Different kinds of Stitch--Overstitch--Hems--Tucks--Fells--Gores-- Buttonholes--Whipping--Gathering--Darning--Basting--Sewing--Work- baskets--To make a frock--Patterns--Fitting--Lining--Thin Silks-- Fitted and plain silks--Plaids--Stripes--Linen and Cotton--How to buy--Shirts--Chemises--Night-gowns--Under-skirts--Mending--Silk dresses--Broadcloth--Hose--Shoes, etc.--Bedding--Mattresses-- Sheeting--Bed-linen.

Wood fires--Shallow fireplaces--Utensils--The best wood for fires --How to measure a load--Splitting and piling--Ashes--Cleaning up-- Stoves and grates--Ventilation--Moisture--Stove-pipe thimbles-- Anthracite coal--Bituminous coal--Care to be used in erecting stoves and pipes--Lights--Poor economy to use bad light--Gas--Oil--Kerosene-- Points to be considered: Steadiness, Color, Heat--Argand burners-- Dangers of kerosene--Tests of its safety and light-giving qualities-- Care of lamps--Utensils needed--Shades--Night-lamps--How to make candles--Moulded--Dipped--Rush-lights.

Parlors--Cleansing--Furniture--Pictures--Hearths and jambs--Stains in marble--Carpets--Chambers and bedrooms--Ventilation--How to make a bed properly--Servants should have single beds and comfortable rooms--Kitchens--Light--Air--Cleanliness--How to make a cheap oil-cloth--The sink--Washing dishes--Kitchen furniture--Crockery-- Ironware--Tinware--Basketware--Other articles--Closets--Cellars--Dryness and cleanliness imperative necessities--Store-rooms--Modes of destroying insects and vermin.

Preparation of soil for pot-plants--For hot-beds--For planting flower seeds--For garden seeds--Transplanting--To re-pot house plants--The laying out of yards and gardens--Transplanting trees--The care of house plants.

A pleasant, easy, and profitable occupation--Soil for a nursery-- Planting of seeds--Transplanting--Pruning--Filberts--Figs--Currants-- Gooseberries--Raspberries--Strawberries--Grapes--Modes of preserving fruit trees--The yellows--Moths--Caterpillars--Brulure-Curculio--Canker- worm.

Interesting association of animals with man, from childhood to age--Domestic animals apt to catch the spirit of their masters-- Important necessities--Good feeding--Shelter--Cleanliness--Destruction of parasitic vermin--Salt and water--Light--Exercise--Rule for breeding--Care of Horses: feeding, grooming, special treatment--Cows: stabling, feed, calving, milking, tethering--Swine: naturally cleanly, breeding, fresh water, charcoal, feeding--Sheep: winter treatment--Diet --Sorting--Use of sheep in clearing land-Pasture--Hedges and fences--Poultry--Turkeys--Geese--Ducks--Fowls--Dairy work generally--Bees--Care of domestic animals, occupation for women.

Deodorization and preservation of excrementitious matter--The earth-closet--Waring's pamphlet--The agricultural argument--Necessity of returning to the soil the elements taken from it--Earth-closet based on power of clay and inorganic matter to absorb and retain odors and fertilizing matter--Its construction--Mode of use--The ordinary privy--The commode or portable house-privy--Especial directions: things to be observed--Repeated use of earth--Other advantages--Sick-rooms--House-labor--Cleanliness--Economy.

Open fireplace nearest to natural mode by which earth is warmed and ventilated--Origin of diseases--Necessity of pure air to life --Statistics--General principles of ventilation--Mode of Lewis Leeds--Ventilation of buildings planned in this work--The pure-air conductor--The foul-air exhausting-flue--Stoves--Detailed arrangements--Warming--Economy of time, labor, and expense in the cottage plan--After all schemes, the open fireplace the best.

Spirit of Christian Missions--Present organizations under church direction too mechanical--Christian family influence the true instrument of Gospel propagation--Practical suggestions for gathering a Christian family in neglected neighborhoods--Plan of church, school-house, and family-dwelling in one building--Mode of use for various purposes--Nucleus and gathering of a family--Christian work for Christian women--Children--Orphans--Servants--Neglected ones--Household training--Roman Catholic Nuns--The South--The West--The neglected interior of older States--Power of such examples--Rapid spread of their influence--Anticipation of the glorious consummation to be hoped for--Prophecy in the Scriptures--Cowper's noble vision of the millennial glory.

APPEAL TO AMERICAN WOMEN.

GLOSSARY OF WORDS AND REFERENCES

INTRODUCTION.

The authors of this volume, while they sympathize with every honest effort to relieve the disabilities and sufferings of their sex, are confident that the chief cause of these evils is the fact that the honor and duties of the family state are not duly appreciated, that women are not trained for these duties as men are trained for their trades and professions, and that, as the consequence, family labor is poorly done, poorly paid, and regarded as menial and disgraceful.

To be the nurse of young children, a cook, or a housemaid, is regarded as the lowest and last resort of poverty, and one which no woman of culture and position can assume without loss of caste and respectability.

It is the aim of this volume to elevate both the honor and the remuneration of all the employments that sustain the many difficult and sacred duties of the family state, and thus to render each department of woman's true profession as much desired and respected as are the most honored professions of men.

When the other sex are to be instructed in law, medicine, or divinity, they are favored with numerous institutions richly endowed, with teachers of the highest talents and acquirements, with extensive libraries, and abundant and costly apparatus. With such advantages they devote nearly ten of the best years of life to preparing themselves for their profession; and to secure the public from unqualified members of these professions, none can enter them until examined by a competent body, who certify to their due preparation for their duties.

Woman's profession embraces the care and nursing of the body in the critical periods of infancy and sickness, the training of the human mind in the most impressible period of childhood, the instruction and control of servants, and most of the government and economies of the family state. These duties of woman are as sacred and important as any ordained to man; and yet no such advantages for preparation have been accorded to her, nor is there any qualified body to certify the public that a woman is duly prepared to give proper instruction in her profession.

This unfortunate want, and also the questions frequently asked concerning the domestic qualifications of both the authors of this work, who have formerly written upon such topics, make it needful to give some account of the advantages they have enjoyed in preparation for the important office assumed as teachers of woman's domestic duties.

The sister whose name is subscribed is the eldest of nine children by her own mother, and of four by her step-mother; and having a natural love for children, she found it a pleasure as well as a duty to aid in the care of infancy and childhood. At sixteen, she was deprived of a mother, who was remarkable not only for intelligence and culture, but for a natural taste and skill in domestic handicraft. Her place was awhile filled by an aunt remarkable for her habits of neatness and order, and especially for her economy. She was, in the course of time, replaced by a stepmother, who had been accustomed to a superior style of housekeeping, and was an expert in all departments of domestic administration.

Under these successive housekeepers, the writer learned not only to perform in the most approved manner all the manual employments of domestic life, but to honor and enjoy these duties.

At twenty-three, she commenced the institution which ever since has flourished as "The Hartford Female Seminary," where, at the age of twelve, the sister now united with her in the authorship of this work became her pupil, and, after a few years, her associate. The removal of the family to the West, and failure of health, ended a connection with the Hartford Seminary, and originated a similar one in Cincinnati, of which the younger authoress of this work was associate principal till her marriage.

These two works have been entirely remodeled, former topics rewritten, and many new ones introduced, so as to include all that is properly embraced in a complete Encyclopedia of Domestic Economy.

During the upward progress of the age, and the advance of a more enlightened Christianity, the writers of this volume have gained more elevated views of the true mission of woman--of the dignity and importance of her distinctive duties, and of the true happiness which will be the reward of a right appreciation of this mission, and a proper performance of these duties.

There is at the present time an increasing agitation of the public mind, evolving many theories and some crude speculations as to woman's rights and duties. That there is a great social and moral power in her keeping, which is now seeking expression by organization, is manifest, and that resulting plans and efforts will involve some mistakes, some collisions, and some failures, all must expect.

But to intelligent, reflecting, and benevolent women--whose faith rests on the character and teachings of Jesus Christ--there are great principles revealed by Him, which in the end will secure the grand result which He taught and suffered to achieve. It is hoped that in the following pages these principles will be so exhibited and illustrated as to aid in securing those rights and advantages which Christ's religion aims to provide for all, and especially for the most weak and defenseless of His children.

CATHARINE E. BEECHER.

THE CHRISTIAN FAMILY.

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