The Daily News. TUESDAY, JUNE 14.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 55, 14 June 1910, Page 4

The Daily News. TUESDAY, JUNE 14.

"THE HAND THAT ROCKS." The hand that rocks the cradle not only rules the world, >but 'boils the pot in order that the millions may be fed. Some people live luxuriously on a few pence a day. survive to an old age, and die .peacefully. Others live in luxury and indigestion, die early, and are glad to go. The nation is made in the home, and the nation depends largely on the kitchens of the people and the household management of the women. Although most .people could do their best possible work on a quarter the fbod they eat and one-tenth of the liquor they drink, modern man, who does not have to slay his dinner, is a difficult animal to feed. The modern man likes to be "well" fed; he desires that his home shall be a model of comfort, economy, and bliss, his wife a perfect housekeeper, and a careful guardian of his pocket. The modem man, or the ancient man, or any man at all,, does not in the first place marry a woman because she can cook, because she can dress on ninepence a week, because she has an ability to keep the accounts down, because anything—except that she is a woman. He takes her on trust, and if he does not make a good bargain it is his fault, or the fault of nature, propinquity, opportunity, and so on. Although he desires perfection of management in his wife—after marriage —he has not enquired into this matter 'before marriage. He assumes the right to demand the most profitable expenditure of'his money, because he earns it, but in nearly all cases the wife does work of a higher value than his. Nowadays the skilled nation beats the unskilled nation. The clever artisan climbs and the careless artisan sinks. ( Competition of nations is merely an exaggeration of man-to-mian competition. The simple people, .the well-fed people, the people who ;make comfort out of meagre materials, are the successful people and eompose the successful nations. A millionaire is not necessarily a gourmand or extravagant. The lowly artisan is frequently both. Most practical modern education is by way of improving the earning power of men, but the man who gets the best wages does not necessarily get the best results from them. He may be extravagant and expect his wife to be economical, and his wife may be wasteful and himself mean. He does not pick his wife from a parade of domestic economists. We hear wonderful tales about the marvellous skill of the German and French housewives and their, aibility to produce a delicious fricassee from a disused boot. Somebody alleged the other day that a German "hausfrau" could make a pound go "as far again" as an, English housewife, and that an English housewife could make the same money go "as far again" as the colonial housewife. We do not .believe a word of it. But if the "hausfrau" has one pound a week, the Englishwoman thirty shillings, and the New Zealand woman three pounds,' what encouragement is there for the latter to Germanise herself and her family? Domestic excellence is found oftener in the houses of the very humble and the very poor than in the houses of the well-to-do. The unlettered .peasant woman of Germany or France, Wiles, the highlands of Scotland, and the West of England surpasses other women in house-management and "domestic economy" because it is absolutelv necessary for her to do so. The New Zealand woman, who is accused of caHess handling of money, lack of skill in the house, overdressing, and all the rest of the sins men are so fond of talking about, would probably "buckle to" in real German, French, or Welsh style if the necessity arose. And it may arise. No country in the world misses trouble. New Zealand' did not miss it in the early days, and domestic economy was not taught in the universities, because there were none. Rut the household arts flourished, and money "went much further" then than now. Because-there has been little necessity for capable management since, the household arts have decayed. We are prosperous and badly fed, we have money and indigestion, we have wages and no balance at the end of the week, and some one has suggested to us that it is all the fault of the women. Man is still very Adamic. And so, because of prosperity, high wages, and all the other blessings borrowed money have poured on us. our womenfolk don't know anything about housework and the cutting down of grocers' hills, and' the grilling of steak and the making of bread. We have allowed woman to enter the sacred portals of places where men once worked, we have shown adoration of her clothes, we have patronised innumerable "shows." we love races, we are passionately devoted to football, we still have the "tote." and we wonder whv women are losing- the housewifely arts, and are not able to save ten shilling's in the pound for us to back Flyblow in the Steeplechase. We are a marvellous p«ople. we men. But because we have allowed woman to have half the ono- 1 time we alTow ourselves, she has lost her skill, and we certainly can't allow this. Some solemn professors, who have never fried n chop in their lives, are be<rinuing to £?et red in the face about it down .South. They have .probably had indigestion, or the grocer has overcharged them, or any one •of seventeen things mav have happened, tlmt show conclusively that woman Is nn extra yap-ant creatine, 'iv' no" - w ''"■>•" rnfivvipd her we rrm* to trnin h nv dfinrrhters so thflt. rhev wni't mm the men of thp next generation. Domestic

economy will probably be taught in schools in New Zealand directly. Seeing that the natural genius for domestic economy normal women possess has died out in New Zealand, we hope that it may be taught as soon as possible. Frankly, we believe people get their strange notions of the extravagance, ignorance, and inability of women from the surface examination of a few specimens. One man has seen what a fool a general servant is. another has had a wasteful cook, and a third has an aunt who spends all her money on clothes and doesn't pay the .baker. But we shall still hold, although the Germans make two shillings go as far as two pound.:-:, and although the Frenchwoman can keep her family of a man and one baby on a franc a day, that the necessity for economy and the housewifely arts has always been the reason of their exercise. Impoverish the pockets of New Zealanders to-morrow, and the womanly and housewifely arts would flourish again like green toy trees.