For interior decoration, rooms may be made beautiful with potted rare exotics, or
simple flowering plants, placed within fanciful jars. Tulips massed in various colors, pre-
sent a brilliant effect. Primroses make lovely groupings, while hyacinths fill a room with
beauty and fragrance. Ferns, small palms and palmettoes are imposing in Morocco or
majolica pottery, and even a simple ivy placed on a bracket by a window, without the aid
of the sun, will wreath itself in beauty around a room.
Flowers and plants beautify more .than costly furniture. Plants should be showered
once a week, watered every day, occasionally with a dozen drops of ammonia in a pint of
water. Cut flowers should have the water changed every day at least, removing every
decayed leaf as soon as they show any symptoms of decay; and the ends of the stems cut
off keeps them fresh longer. A more efficacious way, however, is to put nitrate of soda
into the water every time it is changed, which will preserve cut flowers in all beauty for
above a fortnight. Nitrate of potash, that is, saltpetre in powder, has nearly the same
effect but it is not quite as efficacious. Too many flowers should not be crowded together,
loose arrangement is more pleasing, and the flowers remain fresh longer. Vines, placed
in large, wide-mouthed bottles filled with water and hung on the back of pictures, will
soon wreath themselves around the frames.
"A lady gardener gathered a handful of forget-me-nots, and to preserve them as long
a period as possible, they were put in a large soup-plate, filled with rain-water. The
flowers were placed near the window, to enjoy the advantages resulting from an abundance
of light and air, and the water was replenished when needful. In three weeks, white,
thread-like roots were emitted from the portion of the flower-stalk in the water; and they
ultimately formed a thick net-work over the plate. The flowers remained quite fresh,
and as soon as the roots began to run in the water the buds began to expand, and, up to
the middle of November, the bouquet was a dense mass of flowers, and a more beautiful
or chaste ornament cannot be imagined."
WIFE.
" She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth rot
the bread of idleness.
" Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also,
and he praiseth her." — PROVERBS, xxxi., 27, 28.
«\ T 7 HAT do you think the beautiful word 'wife' comes from?" asks Ruskin. "Il
\f V/ is the great word in which the English and Latin languages conquered the
French and Greek. I hope the French will some day get a word for it instead
of that dreadful word femme. But what do you think it comes from ? The great value of
the Saxon words is they mean something. Wife means weaver. You must be either
housewives or housemoths; remember that. In the deep sense, you may either weave
men's fortunes and embroider them, or feed upon and bring them to decay.
Wherever a true wife comes, home is always around her. The stars may be over her
head — the glow-worm in the night-cold grass may be the fire at her foot; but home is
where she is; and for a noble woman it stretches far around her, better than houses
ceiled with cedar or painted with vermillion, shedding its quiet light far for those who
else are homeless. This I believe to be the woman's true place and power."
Page 21
Presented as published in 1891. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
For interior decoration, rooms may be made beautiful with potted rare exotics, or simple flowering plants, placed within fanciful jars. Tulips massed in various colors, present a brilliant effect. Primroses make lovely groupings, while hyacinths fill a room with beauty and fragrance. Ferns, small palms and palmettoes are imposing in Morocco or majolica pottery, and even a simple ivy placed on a bracket by a window, without the aid of the sun, will wreath itself in beauty around a room.
Flowers and plants beautify more than costly furniture. Plants should be showered once a week, watered every day, occasionally with a dozen drops of ammonia in a pint of water. Cut flowers should have the water changed every day at least, removing every decayed leaf as soon as they show any symptoms of decay; and the ends of the stems cut off keeps them fresh longer. A more efficacious way, however, is to put nitrate of soda into the water every time it is changed, which will preserve cut flowers in all beauty for above a fortnight. Nitrate of potash, that is, saltpetre in powder, has nearly the same effect but it is not quite as efficacious. Too many flowers should not be crowded together, loose arrangement is more pleasing, and the flowers remain fresh longer. Vines, placed in large, wide-mouthed bottles filled with water and hung on the back of pictures, will soon wreath themselves around the frames.
"A lady gardener gathered a handful of forget-me-nots, and to preserve them as long a period as possible, they were put in a large soup-plate, filled with rain-water. The flowers were placed near the window, to enjoy the advantages resulting from an abundance of light and air, and the water was replenished when needful. In three weeks, white, thread-like roots were emitted from the portion of the flower-stalk in the water; and they ultimately formed a thick net-work over the plate. The flowers remained quite fresh, and as soon as the roots began to run in the water the buds began to expand, and, up to the middle of November, the bouquet was a dense mass of flowers, and a more beautiful or chaste ornament cannot be imagined."
WIFE.
" She looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth rot the bread of idleness.
" Her children arise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praiseth her." — PROVERBS, xxxi., 27, 28.
«\ T 7 HAT do you think the beautiful word 'wife' comes from?" asks Ruskin. "Il
\f V/ is the great word in which the English and Latin languages conquered the French and Greek. I hope the French will some day get a word for it instead of that dreadful word femme. But what do you think it comes from ? The great value of the Saxon words is they mean something. Wife means weaver. You must be either housewives or housemoths; remember that. In the deep sense, you may either weave men's fortunes and embroider them, or feed upon and bring them to decay.
Wherever a true wife comes, home is always around her. The stars may be over her head — the glow-worm in the night-cold grass may be the fire at her foot; but home is where she is; and for a noble woman it stretches far around her, better than houses ceiled with cedar or painted with vermillion, shedding its quiet light far for those who else are homeless. This I believe to be the woman's true place and power."