TO FARMERS' WIVES. 183 



CHAPTER XIII. 

 TO FARMERS' WIVES. 



A vigorous and truthful English writer declares that 

 " unless a woman lives with a sister or a faithful woman- 

 friend, it must be scored one against her chances for 

 good health, that she has no wife to take care of her ! 

 There is seldom any one to do for her what she does for 

 her husband. Nobody reminds her to change her boots 

 when they are damp, or tenderly jogs her attention as to 

 draughts, or gives her the little cossetings which so often 

 ward off colds, headaches, and similarly small ills." 



When she is half sick from any of these same petty 

 ills, she can not, or at any rate will not, turn her back 

 upon the kitchen and the children, and go off to the com- 

 fort and quiet of half a day's repose in her bedroom, with 

 no notion ^of being intruded upon. Her husband would 

 do this and come out refreshed, and perhaps cured ; but 

 for herself such "laying off" is generally out of the 

 question. The bread-sponge will be rising up in judg- 

 ment against her, the baby will be falling down stairs, or 

 tumbling into the well ; the morning dishes will be all the 

 harder to do if left standing ; and then there is the inevita- 

 ble dinner, and the roaring lions coming home to it by and 

 by ! Of course, she can not rest. She "drags around" 

 through the day, and, by leaving a few things undone, gets 

 to bed by nine o'clock for the much needed rest and sleep, 

 if she is not too ill to sleep, or if the possible baby does 

 not disturb her. 



It is because of this lack of time for self -nursing that 

 farmers' wives ought to take the best precautions against 

 having any illness. "An ounce of prevention" is par- 

 ticularly valuable to those who have no one to take care 

 of them when they become ill. 



