On Saturday night of that first week I came home with nine dollars in my pocket. I'll never be prouder again than I was when I handed them over to Ruth. And Ruth will never again be prouder than she was when, after she had laid aside three of them for the rent and five for current expenses, she picked out a one-dollar bill and, crossing the room, placed it in the ginger jar. This was a little blue affair in which we had always dropped what pennies and nickels we could spare. "There's our nest-egg," she announced. "You don't mean to tell me you're that much ahead of the game the first week?" "Look here, Billy," she answered. She brought out an itemized list of everything she had bought from last Monday, including Sunday's dinner. I've kept that list. Many of the things she had bought were not yet used up but she had computed the cost of the amount actually used. Here it is as I copied it off: Flour, .25 Lard, .15 Cream of tartar and soda, .05 Oat meal, .04 Molasses, .05 Sugar, .12 Potatoes, .20 Rice, .06 Milk, 1.12 Eggs, .24 Rye bread, .10 Sausages, .22 Lettuce, .03 Beans, .12 Salt pork, .15 Corn meal, .06 Graham meal, .05 Butter, .45 Cheese, .06 Shin of beef, .39 Fish, .22 Oil, .28 Soap, .09 Vinegar, salt and pepper, about .05 Can of corn, .07 Onions, .06 Total $4.68 In this account, too, Ruth was liberal in her margins. She did better than this later on. A fairer estimate could have been made at the end of the month and a still fairer even than that, at the end of the year. It sounded almost too good to be true but it was a fact. We had lived, and lived well on this amount and as yet Ruth was inexperienced. She hadn't learned all she learned later. For the benefit of those who may think we went hungry I have asked Ruth to write out the bill of fare for this week as nearly as she can remember it. One thing you must keep in mind is that of everything we had, we had enough. Neither Ruth, the boy, nor myself ever left the table or dinner pail unsatisfied. Here's what we had and it was better even than it sounds for whatever Ruth made, she made well. I copy it as she wrote it out. Monday. Breakfast: oatmeal, griddle-cakes with molasses, cream of tartar biscuits, milk. Luncheon: for Billy: cold biscuits, two hard-boiled eggs, bowl of rice, cold coffee; for Dick and me: cold biscuits, milk, rice. Dinner: baked potatoes, griddle-cakes, milk. Tuesday. Breakfast: baked potatoes, graham muffins, oatmeal, milk. Luncheon: for Billy: cold muffins, two hard-boiled eggs, rice, milk; for Dick and me: cold muffins, rice and milk. Dinner: boiled potatoes, pork scraps, hot biscuits, milk. Wednesday. Breakfast: oatmeal, fried potatoes, warmed over biscuits. Luncheon: for Billy: cold biscuits, two hard-boiled eggs, bread pudding; for Dick and me: baked potatoes, cold biscuits, bread pudding.