s,
and how to cut out to the best advantage. She will then be able to use
common material, buy smaller quantities of them, and will always look
well dressed. Her gown will always be ironed when it wants ironing;
it will be mended whenever a stitch has broken loose; the collars and
cuffs will always be clean and of the right shape and size; and no one
will enquire into the quality and cost of the material of which the
effect is so pleasing.

A lady's-maid that is quick and efficient is the best friend a lady
can have who wishes to be well dressed and at a small expense. She
saves her wages again and again. But not so with a lady's-maid
who does not understand her business. If she is always requiring
assistance, and cannot make the simplest gown without a needle-woman
to help her, and will not attempt a smart dress at all, or who makes
it so slow that either the occasion for which it is required slips
by, or a much longer notice is necessary than the most fashionable
dressmaker would demand in the very height of the London season,
instead of being useful, she is an incumbrance. The dressmaker's bill
is not avoided. A steady lady's-maid who is quick at her needle and
quick with her eye, can always command good wages and a good place,
and they who possess such a treasure will never be willing to part
with her. Any one who has not thoroughly gone into the question would
not believe what a saving it is to "make at home." It is not only that
the milliner's bill is saved, but the materials which are used do not
cost so much. Nor is this all, an efficient lady's-maid can clean and
turn and re-make dresses so as to give them the look of new. To those
who have but small incomes, it is of great importance not to be under
the necessity of making frequent additions to their wardrobes, and
anyone who can, by good management, enable them to wear a dress
longer than they otherwise would, saves them, in the end, considerable
outlay.

We have heard ladies say that nothing has provoked them more than the
way in which their maids can make up for themselves dresses which
they have laid aside. They can, by dint of sponging and washing, and
pressing, and ironing by turning, and many other ways known to them,
make their ladies' cast off clothes look as good as new, and many
a lady has, before now, looked with envy upon an old dress which
reappears in a new character, looking quite as fresh and attractive as
ever, under the magic hand of a cl