It is peculiar to housework, says correspondent in The Times," that most of its operations result in making still more work—maintenance rether than production is its keynote—and half the labour entailed in a well-kept home, large or small, comes within the category of removing dirt, arising for the most part from methods of producing heat and light which custom alone prevents us from regarding as intolerable, By attacking the chief cause of dirt and deterioration "t its source, electricity, providing a flameless and smokeless form of light and heat, offers the most promising prospect for the automatic or ser-ventless house, which is every day becoming a more urgent need in England CueaninG any Coorixe.
Excluding the mansion or great estate where electric power is used for lifts, pumping, s: wing wood. and si yy purposes, and considering only the dweller' in flats and houses, we find that electric power is in regular use—for operating vacuum clerners and sweepers, machines for polishing boots, knives and silver or brass work, clothes and dish washers, sewing machines, and in fact for assisting in any and all of those tasks which have been associated with "elbow grease," kneeling, and physical effort discomfort. generally.
The position to-day with regard to the general cooking of food by electricity is a simple one—many restaurants and buffets have scrap ped all the older methods, and now cook entirely by means of electric hent, accounting for a smaller consumption of coal than is possible by any other means ¢nd avoiding altogether the heavy pense of fuel and ash handling, chimney sweeping and cleaning. whilst offering to their customers a standard of cooking excellence and a uniformity in results which actually saves in raw food used and food values amounts greater than the cost of electricity used in the process.
For the home the complete electric cooking range is now <vailable and in extensive use in many districts compact appliance, containing oven, grill, hot cupboard, and hot plates or radiator dise for boiling end stewing; it can be placed in any convenient position without foundation, brick work, or five any part or the whole of it can be brought into use at any time of the day or night without preparation, waiting, or any dirty work <fter use.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.