PROGRESSIVE AMERICA.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1359, 9 February 1912, Page 9

PROGRESSIVE AMERICA.

British women have ignored most of the labour-saviug methods greedily seized upon by American housekeepers. In America they havo had to pass through such trials iu the matter of domestic labour that they have had to make other arrangements. Often they pride themselves on their skill in using a kitchenette, i.e., a mere strip in a comer of a flat or little house, which contains nothing niore_ than an ice-chest and a cooker. While in England (hero is a lingering taste for coal fires, the American long ago got rid of the worry of coal dust by central . heating or electricity. Washing bills are done away with, because, like the German woman, the American believes in home laundry, and has the necessary appliances fitted in her dwelling as a matter of course. Tho last idea from America is that of turning domestic science into domestic engineering. One woman has taken the mutter up seriously. She has established herself in a suburban home of twenty rooms. She lias furnished it exquisitely in the latest approved style, but she has fitted it with every mechanical appliance that has been invented in these years of experiment. The result is that she runs her own home without the slightest trouble, and so well that every week scores of visitors go out to inspect in amazement. She has, for instance, a silver butler. This is, according to its description, merely a revival of the tabic stand that was discarded by the grandmother of the English housekeeper of today. She has an electric stove with a clock, by means of which breakfast is cooked automatically; she utilises patent washers, sweepers, indeed a whole range of articles to which the English woman has been blissfully indifferent.