rd from a person who, call
her what you like, is still _fellow servant,_ it does appear strange
that they should forego the performance of this at once important
and pleasing part of their duty.

"I am, however, addressing myself, in this work, to persons in the
middle ranks of life; and here a knowledge of domestic affairs is so
necessary in every wife, that the lover ought to have it continually
in his eye. Not only a knowledge of these affairs--not only to know
how things _ought to be done_, but how to _do them_; not only to
know what ingredients ought to be put into a pie or a pudding, but
to be able _to make_ the pie or the pudding.

"Young people, when they come together, ought not, unless they have
fortunes, or are to do unusual business, to think about _servants_!
Servants for what! To help them eat, and drink, and sleep? When
they have children, there must be some _help_ in a farmer's or
tradesman's house, but until then, what call is there for a servant
in a house, the master of which has to _earn_ every mouthful that
is consumed?

"Eating and drinking come _three times every day_; they must come;
and, however little we may, in the days of our health and vigor,
care about choice food and about cookery, we very soon get _tired_
of heavy or burnt bread, and of spoiled joints of meat. We bear them
for once or twice perhaps; but about the third time, we begin to
lament; about the fifth time, it must be an extraordinary affair
that will keep us from complaining; if the like continue for a month
or two, we begin to _repent_; and then adieu to all our anticipated
delights. We discover, when it is too late, that we have not got a
help-mate, but a burden; and, the fire of love being damped, the
unfortunately educated creature, whose parents are more to blame
than she is, unless she resolve to learn her duty, is doomed to lead
a life very nearly approaching to that of misery; for, however
considerate the husband, he never can esteem her as he would have
done, had she been skilled in domestic affairs.

"The mere _manual_ performance of domestic labors is not, indeed,
absolutely necessary in the female head of the family of
professional men; but, even here, and also in the case of great
merchants and of gentlemen living on their fortunes, surely the head
of the household ought to be able to give directions as to the
purchasing of meal, salting meat, making bread, making preserves of
all sorts; and ought to see the t