310 INDIANA HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS 



"pay attention" to the editor of this paper, it might 

 relieve him from his own native modesty that prevents 

 him from paying attention to them upon the subject of a 

 match, instead of matches in general. My present rec- 

 ommendation is to every housekeeper to keep matches, 

 of which there are three sorts, all of which are articles 

 of household economy. The friction match, which can 

 be bought cheaper than made in small quantities, often 

 saves the cost a thousand fold in one day, by doing away 

 the necessity of "keeping fire." When in N.Y. last sum- 

 mer, boys were hawking them through the streets of an 

 excellent quality, "7 boxes for sixpence." If any of my 

 readers are troubled with one of those pests of a neigh- 

 borhood, the race of which is not yet extinct, I advise 

 them to procure a quantity of those cheap matches, and 

 give a box to every customer that comes "to borrow a 

 little fire," which, like most of the race of borrowers, 

 they never intend to pay. In fact you may consider 

 yourself extremely lucky if you get rid of the nuisance 

 without a coal dropt upon the floor, or perhaps carpet, 

 by which you are damaged to the amount of not only 

 seven boxes of matches, but 7 times 7. As it is useless 

 to recommend one of those habitual fire-borrowers to 

 expend a whole cent in the purchase of a box of matches, 

 I repeat the advice to furnish them gratuitously. 



Then there are brimstone matches, made of pine splin- 

 ters, or little strips of paper, having one end dipt in 

 melted brimstone, and which any child of ten years old 

 can make enough in one evening to last a family ten 

 months, I consider as an almost indispensible article 

 among the comforts of housekeeping. Whenever I see 

 a person puffing away a vast amount of breath and 

 patience in an almost vain endeavor to light a candle 

 with a coal, I wonder whether that person is a great 

 admirer of "labor-saving machinery." If not, I am sure 

 that the labor-saving of a little brimstone match, the 

 cost of which is so small that it cannot be enumerated, 

 would be a sufficient argument. 



