ntents, my thoughts being intent on
other matters. The period, too, was one of transition as regards
household service. The old-time American servants were no longer to be
obtained. The Irish girls who supplied their place were for the most
part ignorant and untrained, their performance calling for a discipline
and instruction which I, never having received, was quite unable to give
them.

During the first years of my residence at the Institution for the Blind,
Dr. Howe delighted in inviting his friends to weekly dinners, which cost
me many unhappy hours. My want of training and of forethought often
caused me to forget some very important item of the repast. My husband's
eldest sister, who lived with us, and who had held the reins of the
housekeeping until my arrival, was averse to company, and usually
absented herself on the days of the dinner parties. In her absence, I
often did not know where to look for various articles which were
requisite and necessary. I remember one dinner for which I had relied
upon a form of ice as the principal feature of the dessert. The company
was of the best, and I desired that the feast should correspond with it.
The ice, which had been ordered from town, did not appear. I did my best
to conceal my chagrin, but was scarcely consoled when the missing
refreshment was found, the next morning, in a snowbank near our door,
where the messenger had deposited it without word or comment. The same
mischance might, indeed does sometimes happen at this later date. I
should laugh at it now, but then I almost wept over it. Our kitchen and
dining-room were on one floor, and a convenient slide allowed dishes to
be passed from one room to the other. On a certain occasion, my sister
being with me, I asked her whether my dinner had gone off well enough.
"Oh yes," she replied; "only the slide was left open, and through it I
saw the cook buttering the venison."

I especially remember one summer which I resolved to devote to the study
of cookery, for which there was then no school, and no teacher to be had
at will. Having purchased Miss Catherine Beecher's Cook-book, I devoted
some weeks to an experimental following of its recipes, with no
satisfactory result. A little later, my husband secured the services of
a very competent housekeeper, and my distresses and responsibilities
were much diminished. After some years of this indulgence, I felt bound
to make a second and more strenuous effort at housekeeping,