What quality it
is in human nature that leads a competent housemaid or a truly-talented
culinary artist to abhor the country-side, and to prefer the dark,
cellar-like kitchens of the city houses it is difficult to surmise; why
the suburban housekeeper finds her choice limited every autumn to the
maid that the city folks have chosen to reject is not clear. That these
are the conditions which confront surburban residents only the
exceptionally favored rustic can deny.
In Dumfries Corners, even were there no rich red upon the trees, no
calendar upon the walls, no invigorating tonic in the air to indicate
the season, all would know when autumn had arrived by the anxious,
hunted look upon the faces of the good women of that place as they ride
on the trains to and from the intelligence offices of the city looking
for additions to their _menage_. Of course in Dumfries Corners, as
elsewhere, it is possible to employ home talent, but to do this requires
larger means than most suburbanites possess, for the very simple reason
that the home talent is always plentifully endowed with dependents.
These latter, to the number of eight or ten--which observation would
lead one to believe is the average of the successful local cook, for
instance--increase materially the butcher's and grocer's bills, and, one
not infrequently suspects, the coal man's as well.
Years ago, when he was young and inexperienced, the writer of this
narrative, his suspicions having been aroused by the seeming social
popularity of his cook, took occasion one Sunday afternoon to count the
number of mysterious packages, of about a pound in weight each, which
set forth from his kitchen and were carried along his walk in various
stages of ineffectual concealment by the lady's visitors.
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