hundred dollars.
Since we average not more than two guests for a single night annually,
their visits from one point of view will cost me this year eighteen
hundred and fifty dollars apiece.

Then, too, styles change. There is always new furniture, new carpets,
new hangings--pictures to be bought. Last season my wife changed the
drawing room from Empire to Louis Seize at a very considerable outlay.

Our food, largely on account of the number of our servants, costs us
from a thousand to twelve hundred dollars a month. In the spring and
autumn it is a trifle less--in winter it is frequently more; but it
averages, with wine, cigars, ice, spring water and sundries, over
fifteen thousand dollars a year.

We rent a house at the seashore or in the country in summer at from five
to eight thousand dollars, and usually find it necessary to employ a
couple of men about the place.

Our three saddle-horses cost us about two thousand dollars for
stabling, shoeing and incidentals; but they save me at least that in
doctors' bills.

Since my wife and daughters are fond of society, and have different
friends and different nightly engagements, we are forced to keep two
motors and two chauffeurs, one of them exclusively for night-work. I pay
these men one hundred and twenty-five dollars each a month, and the
garage bill is usually two hundred and fifty more, not counting tires.
At least one car has to be overhauled every year at an average expense
of from two hundred and fifty to five hundred dollars. Both cars have to
be painted annually. My motor service winter and summer costs on a
conservative estimate at least eight thousand dollars.

I allow my wife five thousand dollars; my daughters three thousand each;
and my son, who is not entirely independent, twenty-five hundred. This
is supposed to cover everything; but it does not--it barely covers their
bodies. I myself expend, having no vices, only about twenty-five hundred
dollars.

The bills of our family doctor, the specialists and the dentist are
never less than a thousand dollars, and that is a minimum. They would
probably average more than double that.

Our spring trip to Paris, for rest and clothing, has never cost me less
than thirty-five hundred dollars, and when it comes to less than five
thousand it is inevitably a matter of mutual congratulation.

Our special entertaining, our opera box, the theater and social
frivolities aggregate no inconsiderable sum, which I will