Suppose, for instance, you waste only ten cents a day in bread or meat that you allow to be thrown away, or in candles burned unneces- sarily, or in any other item of household expense : you would say to the friend who told you that you could as well save that ten cents a day, that it amounted to nothing in the total, and that so long as you al- lowed no reckless extravagance you were practising as much economy as a liberal housekeeper ought, unless she wished to set an example of meanness. But you forget — and all waste in the home is the result of forgetting — that if you take care of the pennies the pounds will take care of themselves. You wonder, perhaps, to see a stone hollowed out beneath a waterfall. One day's dripping of water only wetted the stone, and a year's dripping did not perceptibly hollow it, but as an old poet remarked nearly two thousand years ago : " The drop of water hollows the stone, not by force, but by constantly falling." So it is with economy. Do you know what the ten cents a day, which you could easily save, would amount to at the end of fifty years, when it would do so much good to your children, if not to yourself, if you were to put it in a bank at 6 per cent, interest ? It ECONOMY IN THE HOME. 219 would amount to ^9,564. Here is a table that shows what would be the result at the end of fifty years of saving a certain sum every day and putting it to interest every day at the rate of 6 per cent. : One cent saved every day at 6 per cent, in fifty years would Ten cents " " " " Twenty cents « « « « Thirty cents « « « « Forty cents « « « « Fifty cents « <( « l< Sixty cents (< (* « « Seventy cents « « M « Eighty cents <( t* (C « Ninety cents « « « « One dollar « « « (( Five dollars « « « « Ten dollars « « « « be 5950 9.564 19,008 28,512 38,016 47.520 57.024 66,528 76,032 85.537 95.041 475.203 950,406 Of course, no one who is able to put by ten dollars or five dollars a day is under the necessity of practising domestic economy, but the table is useful as showing the v^ast increase of capital and interest in a course of years from the one cent, which every one could put by without feeling it. Baron Wilhelm de Rothschild, of Frankfort-on- the-Main, one of the famous firm of bankers, has an income of four cents a second. Four cents is not much, and a second is not much, yet four cents a second is two dollars and forty cents a minute, which is one hundred and forty-four dollars an hour, which is three thousand four hundred and fifty-six dollars a day, which is twenty-four thousand one hundred and ninety-two dollars a week. Go on multiplying and you will become giddy at the amount which four cents a second will come to in a month, a year, ten years, fifty years. But there are 31,536,000 seconds in each year. Put by your cents and you will soon have saved many dollars. The foundation principle of economy in the home, therefore, is to be saving and careful in little things, which seem nothing in them- selves, but which amount to a great deal when put together at the end of a given time. It is not economy to buy bad things because 220 THE hearthstone; OR, LIFE AT HOME.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

Suppose, for instance, you waste only ten cents a day in bread or meat that you allow to be thrown away, or in candles burned unnecessarily, or in any other item of household expense : you would say to the friend who told you that you could as well save that ten cents a day, that it amounted to nothing in the total, and that so long as you allowed no reckless extravagance you were practising as much economy as a liberal housekeeper ought, unless she wished to set an example of meanness. But you forget — and all waste in the home is the result of forgetting — that if you take care of the pennies the pounds will take care of themselves. You wonder, perhaps, to see a stone hollowed out beneath a waterfall. One day's dripping of water only wetted the stone, and a year's dripping did not perceptibly hollow it, but as an old poet remarked nearly two thousand years ago : " The drop of water hollows the stone, not by force, but by constantly falling." So it is with economy. Do you know what the ten cents a day, which you could easily save, would amount to at the end of fifty years, when it would do so much good to your children, if not to yourself, if you were to put it in a bank at 6 per cent, interest ? It would amount to $9,564. Here is a table that shows what would be the result at the end of fifty years of saving a certain sum every day and putting it to interest every day at the rate of 6 per cent. : One cent saved every day at 6 per cent, in fifty years would Ten cents " " " " Twenty cents « « « « Thirty cents « « « « Forty cents « « « « Fifty cents « <( « l< Sixty cents (< (* « « Seventy cents « « M « Eighty cents <( t* (C « Ninety cents « « « « One dollar « « « (( Five dollars « « « « Ten dollars « « « « be 5950 9.564 19,008 28,512 38,016 47.520 57.024 66,528 76,032 85.537 95.041 475.203 950,406 Of course, no one who is able to put by ten dollars or five dollars a day is under the necessity of practising domestic economy, but the table is useful as showing the v^ast increase of capital and interest in a course of years from the one cent, which every one could put by without feeling it. Baron Wilhelm de Rothschild, of Frankfort-onthe-Main, one of the famous firm of bankers, has an income of four cents a second. Four cents is not much, and a second is not much, yet four cents a second is two dollars and forty cents a minute, which is one hundred and forty-four dollars an hour, which is three thousand four hundred and fifty-six dollars a day, which is twenty-four thousand one hundred and ninety-two dollars a week. Go on multiplying and you will become giddy at the amount which four cents a second will come to in a month, a year, ten years, fifty years. But there are 31,536,000 seconds in each year. Put by your cents and you will soon have saved many dollars. The foundation principle of economy in the home, therefore, is to be saving and careful in little things, which seem nothing in themselves, but which amount to a great deal when put together at the end of a given time. It is not economy to buy bad things because 220 THE hearthstone; OR, LIFE AT HOME.

The hearthstone; or, Life at home