A PLEA FOR HOUSEWIFERY

WE live in an age which may well be called the age of the purveyor; and, if we continue travelling along the road upon which we have entered, the time cannot be far distant when it will be held ridiculous to do anything at all for ourselves. To appreciate, to criticize, to display taste in selection—these are the hall-marks of to-day, and home is but another name for a private restaurant. Homes such as those in which Goldsmith and Dickens delighted are now calculated to bring a blush to the cheeks of the superior and the “artistic.” Of few of our fine ladies can it be said that “they are excellent Housewives, and as capable of descending to the kitchen with propriety as of acting in their exalted stations with dignity.”

We are nowadays far more willing to applaud and reward the woman who throws her “Letters”—real or imaginary—before the eyes of the bored and lazy world, than the one who is merely efficient in the sphere allotted to her sex by nature. An occasional grant, such as Stow records as being made by Henry VIII., would do much to remedy the position of the housewife. King Henry’s grant was of an estate in Leadenhall Street to “Mistris Cornewallies, widdow, and her heires, in reward of Fine Puddings by her made.”

But suppers have gone out—not the midnight meals of the Strand and Piccadilly—cider has gone out, and home-cured hams, with home-brewed ale and home-stilled cordials, have gone the way of Mrs. Primrose’s gooseberry wine and Mr. Frank Churchill’s spruce beer.

Little economies are now as unfashionable as quiet generosity, hospitality, and comfort. If it is not beneath the dignity of a man to spend enjoyable hours of labour in laboratory or malthouse, in sick-ward or workshop, woman need not feel degraded by the apportionment to her of those duties which are more immediately bound up with the creation of happy and refreshing homes.

A private latch-key is no doubt part of the universal birthright, but it does not in itself afford a sufficient aim in life. To be able to discourse cleverly of Browning and Wagner is an accomplishment easily acquired, and affords pleasure to no one. To acquire a reputation for the excellence of our home-made gooseberry wine, of our home-baked bread, or of our home-brewed beer is much more difficult and much more worthy. There is more scope for the use of brains in housewifery than in almost any of the other careers open to women, and this possibly is why so many women are fighting shy of it. In housewifery there can be but little pretence, for no ignorance may remain hid. Bluff and a ready tongue or pen go a long way towards creating many a “brilliant reputation” in the “artistic” and vapid world which lives at clubs and restaurants, and runs societies for improving other people. But no bluff will ever avail in the presence of the food or drink in the preparation of which our skill has been employed. The products of housewifery speak for themselves; they are no empty expressions of sentiments which may be false or true.

In no way, indeed, can affection be displayed with more subtle grace and delicacy than by the thoughtfulness of the housewife. The greatest of poets has no such instrument at his command. Not that women, in order to be efficient in their homes, need be ignorant of the events and thoughts which are in progress outside. Quite otherwise, they should be able to be the boon companions of men. But what I would urge is that they should take over as their share of the necessary work of mankind the management of that department which is immediately associated with domestic life. In this there is nothing degrading. For, after all, it is housewifery to which nearly all the arts and sciences bring their secrets. Home and comfort, food and drink—it will be a long time before we can get quite away from the need of these things. To introduce science and order into the domestic kingdom is a task worthy of the finest intellect; and that woman who by the use of brains organizes and systematizes her household work is she who can best front with a smiling face the difficulty of obtaining servants—which appears to be the great omnipresent trouble of Englishwomen.

In his summary of the “inward and outward vertues which ought to be in a compleate woman,” Gervase Markham laid it down that she must be “of chast thought, stout courage, patient, untyred, watchfull, diligent, witty, pleasant, constant in friendship, full of good Neighbourhood, wise in discourse, but not frequent therein, sharpe and quicke of speech, but not bitter or talkative, secret in affaires, comfortable in her counsels, and generally skilfull in the worthy knowledges which doe belong to her Vocation.” Later he says that, of all these “outward and active knowledges,” “the first and most principall is a perfect skill and knowledge in Cookery, together with all the secrets belonging to the same, because it is a duty rarely belonging to a woman; and shee that is utterly ignorant therein, may not by the Lawes of strict Justice challenge the freedome of marriage, because indeede shee can then but performe halfe her vow; for she may love and obey, but shee cannot cherish, serve, and keepe him with that true duty which is ever expected.” The work that is most personal and nearest to our hand may be the most important and most valuable after all. It may also, as has been said, be the finest and most dignified if we approach it in the right spirit.

The chipping away of the gross and unessential, with the consequent liberation of the true and fine, is as noble a process in cookery as in sculpture. Yet how different is the attitude of even the humblest artist in words or marble or paint towards his material and his work from that of the average housewife towards the flavours and fragrances which she is privileged to elucidate and to blend. It is a ludicrous thing that women cry out for spheres in which to display their power. And all these centuries they have been entrusted with the practice of an art with almost boundless possibilities, yet scarcely any of them have proved capable of rising above the status of artisans in that craft. Equally, one looks in vain for the Roger Bacons, the Harveys, the Darwins, or the Hubers of the kitchen. The processes of cooking do not seem to inspire women with any of the wonder, religion, and scientific zeal such as almost every branch of labour has inspired in man. Mechanically and brainlessly the recipes of the cookery books are followed by myriads of women everywhere, so that the compounding of foods and drinks is usually as uninteresting a piece of drudgery as can be conceived. One may well pray for a reaction, if indeed the art of housewifery is not past praying for.