II

Which will you spend, brains or money?

PLATE XXXVIIIAN ELECTRIC COOKER(The Jackson Electric Stove Co.)

PLATE XXXVIII

AN ELECTRIC COOKER(The Jackson Electric Stove Co.)

AN ELECTRIC COOKER

(The Jackson Electric Stove Co.)

When planning out the bills of fare the cook must use more brains and less gas.

For instance, let us say that she wants to serve hashed mutton (and Heaven help that it may not be that grey and slimy mass endured in too many an English home!), potatoes, Brussels-sprouts, milk pudding, and stewed fruit.

Let her heat the oven and cook the mutton in a casserole. The potatoes and sprouts can cook in the oven just as well as over a boiling tap, the milk pudding is baked, and the fruit baked in a covered casserole. Managing thus, all the dishes are cooked in the oven.

Then there will come a day when the oven need not be used at all, and the meal be cooked on the top of the stove. After all, cooking is carried out by heat, and it matters little in most cases if the heat surrounds the pan as in the oven, or is kept directly under it as by a tap.

Every oven should be supplied with a solid browning shelf, not a thing with holes in it. Thiscan be placed where needed, and by its use the part of the oven above it can be kept 100 degrees cooler than that which is below.

PLATE XXXIXAN ELECTRIC COOKER (OVENS, HOT-PLATE, GRILL, PLATE HEATER) FOR A LARGE HOUSEHOLD(Messrs. Crompton & Co.)

PLATE XXXIX

AN ELECTRIC COOKER (OVENS, HOT-PLATE, GRILL, PLATE HEATER) FOR A LARGE HOUSEHOLD(Messrs. Crompton & Co.)

AN ELECTRIC COOKER (OVENS, HOT-PLATE, GRILL, PLATE HEATER) FOR A LARGE HOUSEHOLD

(Messrs. Crompton & Co.)

A moderate-sized oven, such as would be needed in a household of not over eight persons, burns about 30 feet of gas per hour when full on. Of that, 10 feet will be required to heat the oven, allowing twenty minutes for that operation. Then the gas should be turned down so that it burns at the rate of 15 feet per hour. Ten minutes later it is turned down again and consumes 10 feet. Thus if you use the oven for one and a half hours it should consume 22½ feet of gas.

In the oven you should find two open grid shelves, a solid shelf, and a drip tin. The drip tin must be kept at the bottom of the stove below the gas flames. The dripping falls into this and does not become brown as it would do if the tin was placed over the flames. The drip tin must be kept in its place, as otherwise too much air would enter from beneath the oven and stop the cooking.

If, instead of hanging the meat from a hook in the oven, it is baked on a tin, use a double baking tin.

When roasting or baking meat, use the upper grid shelf for pastry, and place milk pudding or some other food needing slow cooking above the solid shelf, and then make the very best use of your oven while it is hot. See "Cooking Mornings," p.127.

The temperature of the oven to begin with, for most cakes, should be 280 degrees, for meat 300 degrees, for pastry and bread 340 degrees. An oven thermometer can be procured, and is a great help to inexperienced cooks. Quartern loaves take some three-quarters of an hour to bake, and use about 25 feet of gas.

Large boiling burners, full on, eat about 24 feet of gas per hour. In using boiling burners there is often great waste, as people will turn them full on and have the flames flaring up the sides of the pan, which is a waste of heat and causes a smell of gas. The flame should be kept right underneath the pan or kettle.

The simmering taps consume about 8 feet of gas per hour, and a clever person will, by using a three or four-tier pan, cook several dishes at the cost of about 16 feet of gas per hour, allowing for heating over a boiling tap at first and then simmering for the remainder of the time.

The griller uses as much gas as the oven per hour;but then, of course, grilling is a quick operation. When using the grill, make it red-hot and see that the grill pan is under, and getting hot at the same time. The grill is used for toasting, and if you turn over the toasted side of bread on to a cold surface, it makes it tough.

When the grill is hot, turn the gas down and watch the toast very carefully, as it cooks very quickly. Always keep a large pan or kettle of water over the griller, as it helps to throw down the heat. Do not boil the kettle on a boiling tap and use the griller for toast, but cook over the griller as well as under it; and this applies when grilling chops, steak, bacon, sausages, etc., for the saucepans can heat over the griller as well as over a tap.

On a modern stove, the grill is arranged so that half of it may be lighted at a time for grilling small things. When grilling meat or fish, cook with full heat for two minutes in order to seal the pores and conserve the good of the food, then reduce the heat, turn, increase the heat, and decrease again.

Thin steak needs about 12 minutes' cooking; thicker, 12 to 20 minutes; chops, 10 to 12 minutes; cutlets, 6 minutes; and bacon 1 or 2 minutes.

Pancakes can be cooked by means of the griller first over the grill and then by placing thepan under it, and omelettes can be made in the same way without turning them.

If the oven is not in use, milk puddings, macaroni cheese, etc., may be cooked on a boiling tap and browned under the griller.

PLATE XLAN ELECTRIC KITCHEN IN A PRIVATE HOUSEAbove each switch is a red lamp, which reminds the cook that the current is on.(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XL

AN ELECTRIC KITCHEN IN A PRIVATE HOUSEAbove each switch is a red lamp, which reminds the cook that the current is on.(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

AN ELECTRIC KITCHEN IN A PRIVATE HOUSE

Above each switch is a red lamp, which reminds the cook that the current is on.

(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

It is most important when cooking by gas to choose the right kind of utensils. They should be thin and wide, rather than deep. A deep kettle takes longer to boil and therefore costs more to boil than a shallow one.

Block tin, enamel ware and earthenware casseroles and fireproof china should be used; the two latter whenever possible, because by cooking and serving in one dish you save labour in washing up and generally have the food served hotter. Also food cooked in earthenware tastes better than that cooked in metal pans.

Both cooker and utensils must be kept clean, for dirt, especially soot, is a non-conductor of heat. They must also be dry. I have seen cooks rinse out a pan and put it on the gas wet, forgetting that heat is then wasted in drying the moisture on the outside of the pan.

In the same way they will boil one quart of waterwhen they only need a pint, and waste gas in that way.

PLATE XLITHE "BABY FIRE" IN AN ALTERED POSITION IS NOW USED TO BOIL A KETTLE AND HEAT AN IRON.(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLI

THE "BABY FIRE" IN AN ALTERED POSITION IS NOW USED TO BOIL A KETTLE AND HEAT AN IRON.(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

THE "BABY FIRE" IN AN ALTERED POSITION IS NOW USED TO BOIL A KETTLE AND HEAT AN IRON.

(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLIaTHE "BABY FIRE"A delightful invention for heating small rooms(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLIa

THE "BABY FIRE"A delightful invention for heating small rooms(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

THE "BABY FIRE"

A delightful invention for heating small rooms

(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

A gas cooker is easily cleaned, and should be well washed with hot water and a little soda, loose parts and oven too. Grease should be rubbed off with newspaper as quickly as possible. The black part of the stove is cleaned with enameline and the bright steel with very fine emery-paper and oil, and then polished with a soft rag, or if plated with a leather only.

The best kind of stove is mounted as high as possible so that it may be cleaned underneath. Also it should be set high to avoid fatigue in bending and lifting when using the oven, but not so high that the cook cannot use the hot plate comfortably.

Be sure that no taps are clogged with grease, and remember that when a gas stove smells it is because it is dirty or because the gas is turned on too full and is not being properly consumed, or gas is escaping. Well-managed gas cookers do not smell.

Now and then something may go wrong outside the cook's control, and then the Gas Company must send some one to put it right.

But when cookers are intelligently used theyseldom need attention, and if it should become necessary to change them, they are moved without much trouble or any structural work or dirt-making.

In a household where coal and coke are not used, and in places where the unsanitary habit of collecting refuse but once a week prevails, the careful housewife will ask, what am I to do with the rubbish? I could burn some of it in a coal range, and most of it in a coke furnace, but if I employ gas only, what is to become of it?

The only thing then is to add a gas refuse destructor to your apparatus. In one household known to me (a London flat) there is a gas cooker, water circulator, stove for warming the kitchen when the cooker is not in use, and the neatest little rubbish destructor—all fitted into a surprisingly small space.

The mere word "kitchen" suggests warmth, but the mistress who uses gas must not forget that when the cooker is not in use (which may often be from 1.30 to 6 or 6.30 in the evening, except for the boiling of a kettle), and if the circulator is also turned out,the kitchen would probably be too cold for the maids to sit in. When there is a servants' hall this does not matter; but if the kitchen is also the sitting-room, a small gas fire should be supplied.

In order to cater for people of small income whom it suits to pay for the gas they consume in small sums, and also in some cases to check the consumption of gas, slot meters have been introduced. No charge is made for the meter, for the piping of the house or for the stove, but in order to cover this more is charged for the gas. It may still be sold at a nominal 3s. per 1000 feet (the price of gas varies in various localities), but the person using a penny-slot meter obtains less gas for a penny than he would do did he not require a meter. The same applies to the "shilling-in-the-slot" meter. Small users, however, often find it convenient to use slot meters, which entails no first cost for installation and no quarterly rentals, and certainly when the housekeeping allowance is small it is better to pay so much a day or a week instead of having to face a quarterly bill; also the constant production of pennies or shillings does bring home to the person using the gas that it is not just gasbut hard cash which is being used. In some residential hotels and chambers each room is fitted with a slot fire and the bathrooms with slot geysers, so that the guest knows the exact cost of fire and bath, and pays it there and then.

Finally, all gas users should learn to read the meter, a simple task which the lady demonstrator will teach or which can be learned from a card of instructions. Then the meter should be watched. If an increased expenditure of gas is noticed the matter should be inquired into, as there may be an escape, or some one may be forgetting to turn out the fire or lights when they are not needed.

But it is so expensive to fit up a "Labour-Saving House," you object.That depends on many circumstances, the length of your lease, for example. Allow for the interest on the capital you spend, and possibly a sinking fund to repay it, and then count what you save in cleaning, in wages, in fuel, etc. Often you will find that you get back the money you have spent in a few years.

But it is so expensive to fit up a "Labour-Saving House," you object.

That depends on many circumstances, the length of your lease, for example. Allow for the interest on the capital you spend, and possibly a sinking fund to repay it, and then count what you save in cleaning, in wages, in fuel, etc. Often you will find that you get back the money you have spent in a few years.

CHAPTER IXWhat this Chapter is AboutElectricity as the Poor Man's Light—Basement Rate and Checking of Waste—When Putting in Electric Light—To Avoid Waste of Current—Makes of Lamps—Electric Fires—The Electric House—In the Kitchen—The Cost of Current—Labour-Saving and Comfort-Giving Appliances.

What this Chapter is About

Electricity as the Poor Man's Light—Basement Rate and Checking of Waste—When Putting in Electric Light—To Avoid Waste of Current—Makes of Lamps—Electric Fires—The Electric House—In the Kitchen—The Cost of Current—Labour-Saving and Comfort-Giving Appliances.

CHAPTER IXThe Electric House. Heating, Cooking, Cleaning, and Lighting by Electricity

CHAPTER IX

The Electric House. Heating, Cooking, Cleaning, and Lighting by Electricity

Some five-and-twenty years ago, when sixpence a unit was considered a very low charge for electricity, Colonel Crompton, R.E., C.B., claimed that before many years electricity would be "the poor man's light"; and if the various supply companies had been developed on the broad lines he advocated, there is no doubt that his prophecy would by now have come true in every town of medium size and in many villages in the area of supply, and we now might have been using electric current to light and warm our houses, to cook by, and to work various labour-saving machines.

As it is, there are very few places where this term can be applied. Still, in nearly every town the charge for current has been considerably reduced, and with the great strides which have been made inthe efficiency of various lamps, it can with certainty be said that electricity is the light for those of small means. As the charge for electricity is reduced, so will it be used on a larger scale for heating and cooking; but at present the percentage of people using it for cooking is so small when compared with those using it for lighting that I propose to deal first with this latter application of it.

When considering the question of illumination of a house, oil, gas, and electricity are the three possible alternatives; and when analysed further, bearing in mind always the question of cost of labour and the difficulty of obtaining it, and the cost of cleaning and decorating, it will be found that the most suitable and economical is electricity.

In many districts special rates are offered where heating or cooking apparatus, or motors for pumping, etc., are used during the daytime, also for basement lights. So when arranging for a supply enquiry should be made as to terms. In the case of basement lights in small houses the saving is nearly all swallowed up in the extra meter rent, but in houses having large basements where it is necessary to use the lights for many hours a day the advisabilityof going on the special rate is a point well worth inquiring into closely. In spite of the extra hours necessarily burnt by basement lights, there is no doubt that great waste often occurs in the domestic offices—lights are switched on at dusk in passages, kitchen, pantry, and servants' hall, and even when all the servants are having supper in one room every light will be found alight in all the others. It is difficult to guard against this, but if a small notice is fixed to the wall above the switches asking that the light shall be turned off when not in use, it sometimes has the desired effect. These notices can be bought ready printed.

Another source of waste which was never realised until the special constable came into being is in the servants' bedrooms. I am told by a member of that body that one of the things which has struck him more than anything since he took up his lonely patrol is the number of lights which are kept burning all night in the top rooms.

This can be obviated by a master switch controlling the top floor, which can be in charge of one of the head servants. It is not advisable to have this in one of the lower bedrooms, as is sometimes done, as it necessitates the mistress waking up early in winter when lights are needed beforebreakfast, and, further, might lead to confusion in the case of a fire or illness in the night.

It is impossible to lay down any definite rules for the lighting of the various rooms, as tastes differ so much as to the amount of light required; but whatever the individual taste may be, the naked lights should be so placed that they cannot be seen. This can be accomplished by well-shaded wall or portable lamps or indirect lighting. This latter form has much to commend it, as it is economical and gives an even distribution of light all over the room.

It is as well to err on the side of extravagance in the number of wall plugs. When the floor-boards are up it is not a very costly matter to have them put in, and then when the furniture of a room is altered from the position originally assigned to it, as is so often done with a new house, it will not be found that the writing-table or sofa is on the opposite side of the room to the plug to which the lamp required to light it is attached.

The placing of the lights and the careful use of them would do much to lessen the bill for current—a fact proved to me when we let our house onewinter to a family of the same size, who used the same number of rooms as we had used. The bill for light was sent in to us, and thus we discovered that it was just double what ours had been for the same quarter the year before.

I put this down to the fact that basement and passage lights must have been burned when not needed, and that instead of using one or two table lamps when reading and writing in the evening all the wall lights were lighted.

The staircase lights should be on two-way switches, so that they can be controlled from each floor—that is to say, from the hall you can switch on the hall and first-floor lights. From the first floor you can switch off the hall and light the second floor, and so on up the house, the reverse process taking place in descending. If the lights are installed in this way it is not necessary to keep all the staircase lights burning, as is done in so many houses; the extra cost of installing is trifling.

In bedrooms where there are two or three lights in addition to a table-lamp at the side of the bed itis advisable and convenient to have at least one of the lights in a two-way switch.

As regards the candle-power of the various lamps, so much depends on the size and decoration of the room and the individual tastes of the occupiers as regards the standard of illumination that it is impossible to give any useful guide on this subject. Naturally the lowest available candle-power lamps will be fitted in passages, bathrooms, bedroom table-lamps, etc., but the smallest wire-drawn filament lamps will in many cases be found to be more than is necessary. Owing to the construction of these lamps, they have so far not been made lower than 16 candle-power for 200 volts, which is a common pressure in towns, but to compensate for this it must be borne in mind that a 25 c.p. metal filament lamp consumes about the same current as an 8 c.p. carbon filament lamp, and it is undoubtedly only a question of time before lamps of smaller candle-power and taking less current are put on the market.

PLATE XLIIA BREAKFAST COOKER FOR TOASTING, GRILLING AND BOILING(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLII

A BREAKFAST COOKER FOR TOASTING, GRILLING AND BOILING(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

A BREAKFAST COOKER FOR TOASTING, GRILLING AND BOILING

(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLIIaA TOASTER FOR THE BREAKFAST TABLEYou do not need to ring for more toast but make it yourself and eat it while hot and crisp.(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLIIa

A TOASTER FOR THE BREAKFAST TABLEYou do not need to ring for more toast but make it yourself and eat it while hot and crisp.(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

A TOASTER FOR THE BREAKFAST TABLE

You do not need to ring for more toast but make it yourself and eat it while hot and crisp.

(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLIIbA PRETTY LITTLE ELECTRIC HOT PLATE FOR TABLE USE(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

PLATE XLIIb

A PRETTY LITTLE ELECTRIC HOT PLATE FOR TABLE USE(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

A PRETTY LITTLE ELECTRIC HOT PLATE FOR TABLE USE

(The British Electric Transformer Co.)

The invention and development of the drawn-wire lamp, made by various firms and sold under trade names such as "Osram," "Mazda," and "Z," have made a great saving in the annual bill for electric light, and at the same time have raised the standard of illumination. With the carbon filament, a 32 c.p. lamp would burn for seven and a half hours with the expenditure of one unit of electricity. Now the same light can be obtained for twenty-five hours at the same cost with the metal filament lamp. Against this saving must be set the increased cost of the lamps and the fact that higher candle-power lamps are being used, so the saving is not as large as the above figures would indicate. This type of lamp will undoubtedly be further developed, and the time is not far distant when the present consumption will be considerably reduced, so that a combination of lower charges and improved lamps will bring the electric light within the reach of even "the poor man."

Scarcity of labour and the difficult state of the domestic labour market have made many people look round for labour- and dirt-saving methods of warming and of cooking; and certainly if not as attractive as a coal fire, an electric fire is both convenient and dirt and labour saving; it is likewise a boon in bedrooms and other rooms which need to be heated only for an hour or two at a time.

PLATE XLIIIAN ELECTRIC COOKER OF CONVENIENT MAKE SUITABLE FOR FAMILY USE(Messrs. Townshends, Ltd.)

PLATE XLIII

AN ELECTRIC COOKER OF CONVENIENT MAKE SUITABLE FOR FAMILY USE(Messrs. Townshends, Ltd.)

AN ELECTRIC COOKER OF CONVENIENT MAKE SUITABLE FOR FAMILY USE

(Messrs. Townshends, Ltd.)

Various makes of fires are illustrated in this book.

A great advantage of the electric fire is that it is red-hot in a few seconds and may be placed where it is most required.

Now let us see how things are done in a house which is worked by electricity throughout. A maid is awakened by an electric alarum (she cannot say that her clock was wrong, because all the clocks are controlled by a master pendulum). She goes downstairs, touches a switch, and sets the hot-water apparatus going. To warm or light a room, to set the cooker to work, needs but a touch. An electric service lift makes the laying and clearing and serving of meals a quick and easy matter. There are no heavy trays and cans and coal boxes to haul about the house upstairs and down. The cleaning of the rooms is eased by the use of electric vacuum cleaners, and when there is no dust and smoke from coal fires the house does not become nearly so dirty.

The breakfast dishes are kept hot on a heater. If more boiling water or more toast is needed, it can be obtained in a moment or two without leaving the dining-room. If you wish to speakto a servant, you do not ring and wait for her to run up or down stairs, you telephone your instructions.

Let us descend to the kitchen. In the average kitchen the coal range is placed where it is difficult to see the contents of the pots and pans, and each time the cook wishes to put anything into the oven or take it out she must stoop. To stoop and then lift a weight from oven to table adds considerably to the labour of the day. In the intervals of cooking the fire must be made up, and not only must all the pots and pans be cleaned inside, but the outside becomes black and sooty, and must be scrubbed. Dampers must be pulled in and out, and the cooking of the household and supply of hot water attended to.

In an electrically fitted kitchen what do we see? A clean, bright-looking oven and a hot plate for boiling and simmering, and probably a grill, completed by a plate heater, all standing on a table placed in a good light and conveniently near the sink. The cook may sit at ease peeling apples and put out a hand to alter the heat of the oven or hot plate, or to move a saucepan. If she is a forgetfulperson, a red lamp reminds her of the fact that she has not switched off the current from any portion of the cooking apparatus no longer needed. This is not a fairy story. It is a statement of plain fact, and one into which the public must enquire if it will solve the labour question.

PLATE XLIVELECTRIC OVEN AND HOT PLATE(The Dowsing Radiant Heat Co.)

PLATE XLIV

ELECTRIC OVEN AND HOT PLATE(The Dowsing Radiant Heat Co.)

ELECTRIC OVEN AND HOT PLATE

(The Dowsing Radiant Heat Co.)

That electrical household labour-saving appliances are no longer in the experimental stages, and that now they can be depended upon to work satisfactorily, is shown by the number of schools and restaurants and canteens in which electricity is used.

Yet all the cook has to do is to turn the switches and so obtain different degrees of heat. If she needs a fierce heat, she can secure it in a moment, while if she requires a gentle heat, she can secure that, in either case by turning a switch. If a fuse should go, it is an easy matter to replace it, and the watchful red lamp makes it impossible to leave the current on unawares. No one who has seen an electrically fitted kitchen can doubt that it is labour and dirt saving.

In a school where three cooks were kept, two now do the work with ease, and where a cook and kitchen-maid were needed, now that all coal carrying, range cleaning, stooping, and so much dirt have been eliminated, the cook does the work cheerfully and single-handed, except for the help of a woman once a week to clean areas, kitchen stairs, and passage, and to scrub. The cost of a woman one day a week at 2s. 6d. plus 1s. 6d. worth of food amounts to 4s. a week; while a kitchen-maid at as low a wage as £16, with washing, insurance, and food, would not cost less than 18s. a week.

But there is not only the economy of labour and dirt to consider. There is the saving in the food itself.

PLATE XLVAN ELECTRIC FIREPLACE SUITABLE FOR OPEN HEARTHS(Messrs. Crompton & Co.)

PLATE XLV

AN ELECTRIC FIREPLACE SUITABLE FOR OPEN HEARTHS(Messrs. Crompton & Co.)

AN ELECTRIC FIREPLACE SUITABLE FOR OPEN HEARTHS

(Messrs. Crompton & Co.)

PLATE XLVaAN ELECTRIC FIREOne great advantage about electric fires is that there is no waiting for them "to burn up." They become red hot in a few seconds. (Messrs. Belling & Co.)

PLATE XLVa

AN ELECTRIC FIREOne great advantage about electric fires is that there is no waiting for them "to burn up." They become red hot in a few seconds. (Messrs. Belling & Co.)

AN ELECTRIC FIRE

One great advantage about electric fires is that there is no waiting for them "to burn up." They become red hot in a few seconds. (Messrs. Belling & Co.)

I will confine myself to the question of meat. When roasting with coal the loss of weight on a joint is anything between 25 per cent. and 35 per cent. A really bad cook who gallops the meat and does not baste it can effect a shrinkage of even 50 per cent.; but, fortunately, in this land of bad cooks there are few who sin so deeply as this. Twenty-five per cent., however, is quite a common loss, and even good and careful cooks will account for a 20 per cent. loss. In proof of this weigh the meat before and after cooking.

It is the boast of those who cook by electricity that they reduce this loss to 8 per cent. Even when cooking electrically it would be easy to cause a shrinkage of 10 to 15 per cent.; while, on the other hand, very clever cooks will bring down the shrinkage to 5 per cent. Allowing, then, to be fair, a loss of 25 per cent. when cooking by coal (that is a quarter) and a loss of 10 per cent, when cooking by electricity, you have a saving of 15 per cent. on your meat bill. Put this at £50 a year, and you have saved £7 10s. on that item alone.

In one case when cooking on a large scale it was found that plates of meat which had cost 5d. could be provided for 4d., a point which the authorities responsible for the running of canteens for troops and munition workers might do well to note.

We must now consider the question of cost of current, and here we are in many cases up against a difficulty, for unless current can be obtained at a reasonable price the use of electricity in the household is not a paying proposition. Speaking without inside knowledge of the workings of the power companies, it would appear that they are greatly to blame that electricity is not in more general use.Apparently few of them make any effort to induce their customers to use current for aught but lighting purposes. The offer of a flat rate of 1d. per unit for all domestic purposes, added to an energetic pushing of electrical apparatus and demonstration of its value, would result in an enormous betterment in the conditions of domestic labour and in the purifying of the air of towns.

There are, of course, electric supply companies who are more enterprising—Marylebone, West Ham, and Poplar, for instance, and some provincial town companies. The engineers of these supply companies have formed what is known as the "Point Five" Club, their object being to supply current for heating and cooking at ½d. per unit. Still, when Marylebone represents the only district in highly rented residential parts of London willing to do this, I think I am not unjust when I say that the electrical companies are sadly behind the times in their methods.

It is said that the current used for cooking (allowing for late dinner) should be 1 unit per day per person, and that the amount should diminish with the number of persons cooked for, until, when cooking for 100 persons, the saving would be as much as 50 per cent. This, naturally, depends tosome extent upon the cook, who can, if she will, waste current and spoil food by cooking it at too high a temperature; for, as all cooks know, after the first ten minutes' cooking in a hot oven the meat should be cooked quite gently. Those of my readers who are interested in the question of electrically fitted houses can see the various utensils, stoves, etc., at the showrooms of the makers; they can attend demonstrations at Tricity House, 48, Oxford Street (the Electrical Restaurant); and also add to their knowledge of the subject by the perusal of "Electric Cooking, Heating, and Cleaning," an excellent book, published by Constable and Co., price 3s. 6d. net.

At Tricity House, a most popular restaurant near the Tottenham Court Road end of Oxford Street, all the cooking is done by electricity, and a clever lady demonstrator will show the enquirer exactly how the various apparatus is used.

But even when all the cooking is not done by electricity, the would-be labour-saver may avail himself of a large number of labour-saving inventions and comfort-giving inventions in the shape of chafing dishes, kettles, toasters, and dish-heaters.Examples of these are to be found in all electrical showrooms, and these, even when cheap current is not available, may prove a great convenience and indirectly a saving of money. In one house known to me, where one servant only has been employed since the war, the owner switches on an electric fire, and grills the bacon, and makes toast and coffee in the dining-room, the table being laid and the materials left ready over night, thus saving any breakfast cooking and table-laying at the busiest time in the morning. The table is covered with a wrapper, and the room is swept and dusted later in the day.

Another useful small appliance is the electric fan. In the sick-room it is invaluable, also for clearing a room of the smell of smoke, and being portable it can be carried from room to room and attached to an ordinary wall socket.

For large houses there is a great demand for small domestic motors, and great saving of labour can be effected by using them for driving boot-cleaning machines, washing-up machines, and polishing hobs for brass and silver cleaning.

Before writing these articles I visited kitchens where coal, gas, or electricity were in use, and I have also cooked on coal ranges and gas and electriccookers. Excellent results may be obtained by all three, but there is no possible doubt that as regards labour and dirt-saving, gas or electricity is preferable to coal. At the same time, as one cannot in many cases use either, it is only fair to say that some of the modern coal ranges do their work admirably, at the least possible consumption of fuel.

As, however, a coal range cannot be regarded as a labour-saving apparatus, I do not give any consideration to them in these pages, which are, as I have already said, devoted, not to ideal homes and dream homes, but to those where the scarcity of labour makes it necessary to save work, and ultimately cost, as much as possible.

A FINAL WORD

Just as the book was going to press I received this letter—

"I must tell you how thankful I have been for your labour-saving ideas. My cook left to make munitions; my housemaid's fancy led her to become the driver of a tradesman's cart; the parlourmaid remained, and still remains, bless her! I have had to rely on what temporary help I could obtain, for cooks so far turn a deaf ear to my entreaties. Had it not been for our gas fires, circulator, and cooker, our washing-rooms and our lift, Heaven knows what would have become of us.

"As it is we really have managed extraordinarily well. Most people's houses are too full of things which no one wants. Most people eat too much and serve the food with unnecessary elaboration, and vast numbers of women spend their lives fussing over trifles and making unnecessary work for vast numbers of other women.

"Will it be different after the war?

"Let us hope so."

The greatest Labour-Saving apparatus we possess is the Brain; it has not been worn out by too much use.This statement appears on the first page of this book, and again on the last.It bears repetition.

The greatest Labour-Saving apparatus we possess is the Brain; it has not been worn out by too much use.

This statement appears on the first page of this book, and again on the last.

It bears repetition.

PLATE XLVIAN ELECTRIC RADIATOR(The Dowsing R. H. Co.)

PLATE XLVI

AN ELECTRIC RADIATOR(The Dowsing R. H. Co.)

AN ELECTRIC RADIATOR

(The Dowsing R. H. Co.)

[1]This incident occurred in the early part of 1915.

[2]See note on p.155.

[3]When discussing this matter with a great gas expert I find that his opinion is contrary to mine."I strongly disagree. The system is wasteful and unsatisfactory," were his words.With regard to simmering taps, he also holds a contrary opinion."I again disagree. You can easily turn down a boiling burner to simmering point, but you can't turn up a simmering burner to boiling point," he objected.True, but to me that is the advantage of the simmering burner, for it seems to me that nothing short of a burner which refuses to give out more than a certain degree of heat will deter the English cook from cooking too quickly and by too fierce a heat.—D. C. P.

[3]When discussing this matter with a great gas expert I find that his opinion is contrary to mine.

"I strongly disagree. The system is wasteful and unsatisfactory," were his words.

With regard to simmering taps, he also holds a contrary opinion.

"I again disagree. You can easily turn down a boiling burner to simmering point, but you can't turn up a simmering burner to boiling point," he objected.

True, but to me that is the advantage of the simmering burner, for it seems to me that nothing short of a burner which refuses to give out more than a certain degree of heat will deter the English cook from cooking too quickly and by too fierce a heat.

—D. C. P.

INDEX

Advantages, some financial,63Advice, useful,149Appliances, household,49labour-saving,185-186simplicity of labour-saving,180Architects, reasons for women,31Arrangements, advantages of labour-saving,70Basement, general description of,65house, disadvantages of,54-55Bath,45Bedroom,45Bills, gas, coke, coal,146Coke, economy of,144Colleges, need of training,20Companies, Electrical Supply,183Cook, wages of,120Cookers, gas,83good idea for gas,154Cooker, size of,155Cooking, advantages of advanced,127economy of electrical,182Cost, counting the,141,145Current, electric, cost of,182how to avoid waste of,175Decoration,44Dinner bogey, how to abolish the,133Domestic premises,41,43Domestic problem, solving of,25Domestic service, advantages and disadvantages of,19Domestic training, advantages of,13-14for all girls,11national importance of,12Dressing-room, clever idea for,45Electric house, description of,178Electric light, fitting and arranging of,174Electricity, economy of,171cooking by,134Employer, ignorance of,8Entertaining,137Equipment, personal,138Family arrangements,93Fare, planning of bills of,159Fires, advantage of electric,153various makes of electric,178Flat, description of,77-78general arrangement of,100labour-saving,99Fuel, economy of,147Furnace, feeding of,94lighting of,143Furniture,44Gas, cost of cooking by,160use of,148Geysers,151Governesses, secretaries, companions,18Grill, management of,162Heating, water,150Home, the ideal,37House, labour-saving,66condition of the modern,53country,95-97furnishing of,69heating and lighting of,46how to reduce work of,36inconvenience of the modern,29suggestions for rebuilding,30Houses, labour-saving method of heating,142Kitchen, electrically fitted,179warming of,165Labour-making house, condition of,76conversion of,57description of,56some experiences of,75work of,73-74Labour-saving house, arrangement of,89-91convenience of,110description of,88domestic arrangements of,79-80economy of,115London,87menu of,113provincial,108reasons for,3-4suggestion for,64the ideal,35Labour-saving ideas, test of,107Lamp, makes of,176-177Lights, rate of basement,172checking of waste of,173Lighting, various means of,152Look-ahead plan, advantage of,130Meals, arrangement of,114Meat, saving of,181Menu,121-124Meters, slot,166-169Mistresses, new race wanted,10Nurse and Nursery,62Ordering, method of,125Oven, temperature of,161Restaurant, the electrical,184Rooms, arrangement of,109Rubbish, destruction of,165Servants,9shortage of,7their dislikes,21-22Service, cost of,141Service room,42Shopping,126Soups,128Stove, cleaning of,164Suburban house, description of,101furniture and fittings of,102-103Sweets,129Table, useful advice for,49Time, division of,114saving of,119Utensils, cleaning,135gas-cooking,163Waste, checking of,173Water service,32Water system, question of hot,58Work, dislike of menial,17organization of,92-93Worker, how to obtain best results,26

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