would not set about moving the same day in Holland. In that sensible, prudent land, not more, perhaps, than a dozen householders at a time, are expected to sacrifice comfort and furniture by such a step. On the Zuyder Zee, it probably takes a family at least a year to make up their minds to move, and a year more to choose a new dwelling. But see what this custom has become under the influence of go-aheadism! May-day, for ages associated with rhymes, sweet blossoms, gayety, and kindly feeling, has become the most anti-poetical, dirty, dusty, unfragrant, worrying, scolding day in the year to the Manhattanese. So it is with this cleaning process. Most civilized people clean their dwellings: many nations are as neat as ourselves; some much neater than we are; but few, indeed, make such a fuss about these necessary labors; they contrive to manage matters more quietly. Even among ourselves, some patriotic women, deserving well of their country, have made great efforts to effect a change in this respect, within their own sphere, at least; but alas! in each instance they have, we believe, succumbed at length to general custom, a tyrant that few have the courage to face, even in a good cause.
It must be confessed, however, that after the great turmoil is over—when the week, or fortnight, or three weeks of scrubbing, scouring, drenching are passed, there is a moment of delightful repose in a family; there is a refreshing consciousness that all is sweet and clean from garret to cellar; there is a purity in the household atmosphere which is very agreeable. As you go about the neighborhood, the same order and cleanly freshness meet you as you cross every threshold. This is very pleasant, but it is a pity that it should be purchased at the cost of so much previous confusion—so many petty annoyances.
