20 HOME-MADE SOAr. [CHAP. XXL 



her surprise to hear that ladies in that country were 

 in the habit of buying the article in shops, and would 

 be much puzzled if called upon to manufacture it 

 for themselves. As it was evident she had never 

 studied Adam Smith on the Division of Labour, she 

 looked upon this fine-lady system of purchasing 

 every article at retail stores, as very extravagant. 

 &quot; That s the way they do in the North,&quot; said she, 

 (&amp;lt; though I never could understand where all their 

 money comes from.&quot; She then explained how eco 

 nomically she was able to supply herself with soap. 

 &quot;First, there is the wood, which costs nothing but 

 the trouble of felling the trees ; and, after it has 

 served for fuel, it yields the ashes, from which we 

 get the potash. This is mixed with the fat of sixty 

 hogs, which costs nothing, for what else could I do 

 with all this fat at killing time ? As for the labour, 

 it is all done by my own people. I have nine maids, 

 and they make almost everything in the house, even 

 to the caps I wear.&quot; Touching the soap, she ob 

 served, we must be careful to select the ashes of the 

 oak, hiccory, ash, and other hard wood, for the pines 

 yield no potash ; a remark which led me to speculate 

 on the luxuriant growth of the long-leaved pines 

 in the purely siliceous tertiary soils, from which it 

 would have been difficult to conceive how the roots 

 of the trees could extract any alkaline matter, 

 whereas the soil of the &quot; hiccory grounds&quot; is derived 

 from the disintegration of granitic rocks, which are 

 very felspathic here, and are decomposing in situ. 



Having occasion to hire a horse, I found that the 

 proprietor of the livery stables was a coloured man, 



