nts a sonnet to regale his fancy, there are a million
clamouring for men to make or mend their shoes.' Aye, and this is the
reason, why shoemakers are proverbially the most independent part of the
people, and why they, in general, show more public spirit than any other
men. He who lives by a pursuit, be it what it may, which does not
require a considerable degree of _bodily labour_, must, from the nature
of things, be, more or less, a _dependent_; and this is, indeed, the
price which he pays for his exemption from that bodily labour. He _may_
arrive at riches, or fame, or both; and this chance he sets against the
certainty of independence in humbler life. There always have been, there
always will be, and there always ought to be, _some_ men to take this
chance: but to do this has become the _fashion_, and a fashion it is the
most fatal that ever seized upon a community.

327. With regard to young women, too, to sing, to play on instruments of
music, to draw, to speak French, and the like, are very agreeable
qualifications; but why should they _all_ be musicians, and painters,
and linguists? Why _all_ of them? Who, then, is there left to _take care
of the houses_ of farmers and traders? But there is something in these
'accomplishments' worse than this; namely, that they think themselves
_too high_ for farmers and traders: and this, in fact, they are; much
_too high_; and, therefore, the servant-girls step in and supply their
place. If they could see their own interest, surely they would drop this
lofty tone, and these lofty airs. It is, however, the fault of the
parents, and particularly of the father, whose duty it is to prevent
them from imbibing such notions, and to show them, that the greatest
honour they ought to aspire to is, thorough skill and care in the
economy of a house. We are all apt to set too high a value on what we
ourselves have done; and I may do this; but I do firmly believe, that to
cure any young woman of this fatal sublimation, she has only patiently
to read my COTTAGE ECONOMY, written with an anxious desire to promote
domestic skill and ability in that sex, on whom so much of the happiness
of man must always depend. A lady in Worcestershire told me, that until
she read COTTAGE ECONOMY she had never _baked in the house_, and had
seldom had _good beer_; that, ever since, she had looked after both
herself; that the pleasure she had derived from it, was equal to the
profit, and that the latter was very