"Of course; but I mean it made the family problem simpler," Mrs.
Crawford pursued. "Oh--and I don't know! Everything was so simple. All
this business of sterilizing, and fumigating, and pasteurizing, and
vaccinating, and boiling in boracic acid wasn't done in those days,"
she finished vaguely.

"Now there you are--now there you are!" said Mrs. Carr-Boldt, entering
into the conversation with sudden force. Entirely recovered after her
nervous collapse, as brisk as ever in her crisp linen gown, she was
signing the cheques that Margaret handed her, frowningly busy and
absorbed with her accounts. Now she leaned back in her chair, glanced
at the watch at her wrist, and relaxed the cramped muscles of her
body. "That's exactly it, Rose," said she to Mrs. Crawford. "Life is
more complicated. People--the very people who ought to have children--
simply cannot afford it! And who's to blame? Can you blame a woman
whose life is packed full of other things she simply cannot avoid, if
she declines to complicate things any further? Our grandmothers didn't
have telephones, or motor-cars, or week-end affairs, or even--for that
matter--manicures and hair-dressers! A good heavy silk was full dress
all the year 'round. They washed their own hair. The 'up-stairs girl'
answered the doorbell,--why, they didn't even have talcum powder and
nursery refrigerators, and sanitary rugs that have to be washed every
day! Do you suppose my grandmother ever took a baby's temperature, or
had its eyes and nose examined, or its adenoids cut? They had more
children, and they lost more children,--without any reason or logic
whatever. Poor things, they never thought of doing anything else, I
suppose! A fat old darky nurse brought up the whole crowd--it makes
one shudder to think of it! Why, I had always a trained nurse, and the
regular nurse used to take two baths a day. I insisted on that, and
both nurseries were washed out every day with chloride of potash