For the love of old books...

This blog may give have given you the impression that we spend all of our time in the garden or kitchen. I do post often about our adventures with creating a cottage garden or growing vegetables and making our produce into home made cakes and preserves.  Another passion of both of ours is books.  We do own a large number of books, and Mr C is currently building a large floor to ceiling bookshelf in what will be our study, to cope with the number of books we have.  

As the weather is not particularly summery, my thoughts turned to some of the interesting books we've found recently.  One of the most beautiful was this one, 'The Young Lady's Book' edited by Mrs Henry Mackarness and dated 1876.

It begins 'How common amongst  our young ladies between school-days and the much-looked-forward-to possession, a "home of their own" is the exclamation "I have nothing to do!"'  The book then gives advice on "What to do and how to do it", from housekeeping, nursing the sick, and working for the poor to home studies and indoor and outdoor occupations.  There are chapters on things like gardening and illumination and wonderful plates to accompany them.

I shall end with a quote from the chapter on reading:

"The habit of reading is one of the most valuable means of securing amusement; we can read when little else could be done without trouble...every book read makes us better able to understand others."