MOTHER’S
DUTY
.
CONFESSIONS OF A HOUSEKEEPER.
CHAPTER I.
MY SPECULATION IN CHINA WARE.
THIS happened a very few years after, my marriage, and is one of
those feeling incidents in life that we never forget. My husband’s
income was moderate, and we found it necessary to deny ourselves
many little articles of ornament and luxury, to the end that there
might be no serious abatement in the comforts of life. In furnishing
our house, we had been obliged to content ourselves mainly with
things useful. Our parlor could boast of nine cane-seat chairs; one
high-backed cane-seat rocking chair; a pair of card tables; a pair
of ottomans, the covers for which I had worked in worsted; and a few
illustrated books upon the card tables. There were no pictures on
the walls, nor ornaments on the mantle pieces.
For a time after my marriage with Mr. Smith, I did not think much
about the plainness of our style of living; but after a while,
contracts between my own parlors and those of one or two friends,
would take place in my mind; and I often found myself wishing that
we could afford a set of candelabras, a pair of china vases, or some
choice pieces of Bohemian glass. In fact, I set my heart on
something of the kind, though I concealed the weakness from my
husband.
Time stole on, and one increase after another to our family, kept up
the necessity for careful expenditure, and at no time was there
money enough in the purse to justify any outlay beyond what the
wants of the household required. So my mantel pieces remained bare
as at first, notwithstanding the desire for something to put on them
still remained active.
One afternoon, as I sat at work renovating an old garment, with the
hope of making it look almost “as good as new,” my cook entered and
said—
“There’s a man down stairs, Mrs. Smith, with a basket full of the
most beautiful glass dishes and china ornaments that you ever did
see; and he says that he will sell them for old clothes.”
“For old clothes?” I responded, but half comprehending what the girl
meant.
“Yes ma’am. If you have got an old coat, or a pair of pantaloons
that ain’t good for nothing, he will buy them, and pay you in glass
or china.”
I paused for a moment to think, and then said—
“Tell him to come up into the dining room, Mary.”
The girl went down stairs, and soon came back in company with a dull
looking old man, who carried on his arm a large basket, in which
were temptingly displayed rich china vases, motto and presentation
cups and saucers, glass dishes, and sundry other articles of a like
character.
