THE LAUNDRY The contrast between the piles of discarded garments and soiled table linen accumulated at the close of the week, and the same articles when ready to be stored away after having been perfectly laundered, is most striking; but all housekeepers know how difficult it is to bring about this transformation.
If the washing is sent away, or a washerwoman is employed, it is sur prising to find how many different ways there are of washing badly. Either the clothes are not clean, or they take on a yellow or blue tinge, or they are musty and lack the bright ness and glossy whiteness of perfectly laundered articles, or they may even be rotted and entirely ruined. Those who do their own washing know that these difficulties may be overcome by painstaking and hard labor. On the other hand, those who are constantly seeking to find an easy method and try every one of the many labor-sav ing plans recommended to them, often find that they have jumped out of the frying pan into the fire.
There is probably no one " best way " of washing. Family tradition and local individual customs usually control the routine of wash day. In
other words, most women do what their grandmothers have done, what their neighbors do, and what they have always been in the habit of do ing. In many cases the result is, on the whole, satisfactory. We believe, however, that every woman who does her own washing or controls the work of her laundress will be benefited by knowing just what goes on in the washtub and the boiler, and just how results that are undesirable may be changed for those to be preferred. There will always be different ways of ordering the routine of wash day as long as women differ in their tastes and personal preferences. According ly, we outline a number of methods and suggest many different ideas. If these are tried experimentally from time to time we believe that most women will find among them sugges tions that they will wish to adopt permanently, and that in many cases will revolutionize wash day and make it comparatively free from discom fort and hard labor.