the useful man fifty; the pantry maid twenty-five. My house payroll is,
therefore, six hundred and fifty dollars a month, or seventy-eight
hundred a year.

We could not possibly get along without every one of these servants. To
discharge one of them would mean that the work would have to be done in
some other way at a vastly greater expense. Add this to the yearly sum
represented by the house itself, together with the cost of heating and
lighting, and you have twenty-eight thousand four hundred dollars.

Unforeseen extras make this, in fact, nearer thirty thousand dollars.
There is usually some alteration under way, a partition to be taken out,
a hall to be paneled, a parquet floor to be relaid, a new sort of
heating apparatus to be installed, and always plumbing. Generally, also,
at least one room has to be done over and refurnished every year, and
this is an expensive matter. The guest room, recently refurnished in
this way at my daughter's request, cost thirty-seven hundred dollars.
Since we average not more than two guests for a single night annually,
their visits from one point of view will cost me this year eighteen
hundred and fifty dollars apiece.

Then, too, styles change. There is always new furniture, new carpets,
new hangings--pictures to be bought. Last season my wife changed the
drawing room from Empire to Louis Seize at a very considerable outlay.

Our food, largely on account of the number of our servants, costs us
from a thousand to twelve hundred dollars a month. In the spring and
autumn it is a trifle less--in winter it is frequently more; but it
averages, with wine, cigars, ice, spring water and sundries, over
fifteen thousand dollars a year.