It can clearly be seen that in the way of tunnel engineering Uncle Sam
is not a whit behind his European competitors.




CHAPTER X

ELECTRICITY IN THE HOUSEHOLD

Electrically Equipped Houses--Cooking by Electricity--Comforts and
Conveniences.


Science has now pressed the invisible wizard of electricity into doing
almost every household duty from cleaning the windows to cooking the
dinner. There are many houses now so thoroughly equipped with
electricity from top to bottom that one servant is able to do what
formerly required the service of several, and in some houses servants
seem to be needed hardly at all, the mistresses doing their own cooking,
ironing, and washing by means of electricity.

In respect to taking advantage of electricity to perform the duties
of the household our friends in Europe were ahead of us, though America
is pre-eminently the land of electricity--the natal home of the science.
We are waking up, however, to the domestic utility of this agent and
throughout the country at present there are numbers of homes in which
electricity is employed to perform almost every task automatically
from feeding the baby to the crimping of my lady's hair in her scented
boudoir.