No. 7, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 723 



ones, soap well all soiled places, pack iu the washer and leave until 

 morning, then add warm water and rub out. Rinse thoroughly, and 

 hang out. Have a good wire line in an airy part of yard. 



A way in which ice can be cheaply provided for use in a farm home: 

 If the place affords no natural body of water, a small stream may 

 be dammed. Only a rough building is required, using plenty of 

 sawdust. By filling clean barrels with pure water and then either 

 storing filled, or taking the ice out before storing. Let three or 

 four neighbors club together, build an ice pond on some convenient 

 stream and help each other fill an ice house on each farm, or have a 

 common ice house. 



If every farmer's wife could have water carried into the house by 

 means of pipes leading from spring or well she would have one of 

 the greatest conveniences possible in making her work easy. The 

 use of rubber hose to carry w^ater to kettles and tubs, and the im- 

 I>roved utensils that can be found in any hardware store, such as 

 asbestos stove mats, etc. A shelf near the kitchen stove to keep 

 crackers on that they may be always crisp. A shelf in the cellar- 

 way. A wood box under the tinware cupboard built in the wood- 

 shed and opening into the kitchen. Best of all a kind, willing, and 

 helpful husband. A man's work is from sun to sun. A woman's 

 work is never done. Housewives were never known to strike. 

 That's left for men, you know. 



Another convenience. Keep a scrap-book with headings of com- 

 mon diseases, or accidents likely to occur in a family of children, 

 and under each heading, such as croup, burns, stings, etc., paste or 

 write the best remedies you see or hear of, so you can turn to them 

 in a moment of need. A statement so common as to have almost 

 acquired the standing of an axiom runs like this: "Every properly 

 appointed kitchen should have as an adjunct a well planted and 

 thoroughly cared for garden. The kitchen garden belongs to the 

 domain of the housewife." Why should she plant it at all? Surely 

 she has work enough within doors. Does not the garden make a 

 home more home-like, though on occasions it has made the small 

 boy and even the farmer's wife wish it had never been created, be- 

 cause it had to be worked by hanrl. Even Mother Eve worked in the 

 field. At least she raised Cain. A good husband will give his wife 

 a certain sum for spending money, a regular allowance she can call 

 her own. If she is a good housekeeper she is entitled to it, for she 

 earns it. He will be handy about the house. When his wife asks 

 him to mend the sewing machine or put a new wire on the screen 

 door he will not pout and say "that was not down in the marriage 

 contract." 



After all, it won't matter a thousand years from now whether 

 you molded light biscuits, or wonderful patterns in clay and plaster. 

 I don't believe that God cares very much more perhaps not the least 

 bit more, for all the great works of art than He does for the simple, 

 homely tasks that so many of His children set themselves so pa- 

 tiently to perform. It's going to matter terribly, fearfully, whether 

 we were faithful and honest and simple-hearted in what we did do, 

 and that is all. "Faithful in little faithful in much." 



