ABSTRACT
The house-mother! what a beautiful, comprehensive word it is! how suggestive of all that is wise and kindly, comfortable and good! Surely, whether the lot comes to her naturally, in the happy gradations of wifehood and motherhood – or as the maiden-mistress of an adopted family, – or, as one could find many instances in this our modern England, when the possession of a large fortune, received or earned, gives her, with all the cares and duties, many of the advantages of matronhood – every such woman must acknowledge that it is a solemn as well as a happy thing to be the mistress of a family.
