543 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



July 15. 



if such has been your habit, let me implore you 

 to pause and consider. May it not be that this 

 habit of swearing which you have gotten into 

 is one of the causes of these despondent spells 

 you are having? Suicides are on the increase, 

 so we are told. People are dissatisfied and un- 

 happy, even when they have the greatest cause 

 to be thankful. Has not the talk we indulge in, 

 especially when we are vexed, something to do 

 with it? The man or boy who takes God's 

 name in vain can not long be a man or boy who 

 enjoys life; and I believe Bro. Reed's keen, cut- 

 ting, earnest words are true — that "he who 

 takes the name of his Maker in vain is a lost 

 soul" unless he repents, in the language of our 

 text. 



Since my last I have done a deal of traveling. 

 One afternoon toward night I took a notion 

 that I must see T. B. Terry's Thoroughbred po- 

 tatoes. I got over the first 15 miles of my trip 

 very nicely; but when I neared the Cuyahoga 

 River I found I had a " picnic" ahead of me, as 

 the boys call it. There are some terrible hills 

 as you approach the river, and more of the 

 same kind to match as you go up on the oppo- 

 site side. With commendable thrift the people 

 had worked the roads and put the hills in very 

 much better order than ever before. It was 

 done just before our recent June freshets. 

 The soft new earth that had been brought up 

 on to the roadway had been washed and gul- 

 lied by the severe and repeated heavy rains un- 

 til wheeling was not only out of the question, 

 but it would have puzzled a team with a lumber 

 wagon to get along. Of course. I had to walk, 

 and carry my wheel. When I reached the val- 

 ley it was too muddy to ride, even then. The 

 soil had been washed in from the hillsides, so 

 the roads were wellnigh impassable. It was 

 lucky that my wheel weighed less than 30 lbs., 

 and that I had on my lightest summer clothing. 

 I had planned to reach friend Terry's before 

 dark; but it was dusk before I was out of the 

 valley. I had mounted and dismounted so 

 many times that I was nearly tired out; and an 

 unlucky slip of the foot threw me into a 

 ditch. After I had climbed the hill on the 

 other side, pushing my wheel, one of my first 

 experiences was to run over a thorn in the 

 darkness, puncturing my front tire. It was 

 too dark for repairs, so I finished my route by 

 pumping up my tire about every mile. As I 

 neared the beautiful home of friend Terry the 

 moon had risen, which had brought out the 

 closely shaven lawn around the barn and along 

 the roadside, making me think the place never 

 looked so handsome before. 



My many adventures had thrown me back 

 so that the family had gone to bed; but as I 

 had noticed a light in Robert's cottage (before 

 I reached the parental home) I thought I would 

 go back there and make inquiries. I meditated 

 going to the nearest hotel; but as that was 

 several miles away, and it was after bedtime, I 

 concluded the necessity of the case would have 

 to be my excuse for intruding at an untimely 

 hour. Before I reached the cottage, however, 

 the light there also was extinguished, and I 

 pushed farther back to a neighbor's where 

 people seemed to be up and stirring. They in- 

 formed me there had iust been a wedding in 

 that neighborhood. The Terry family were 



Erobably pretty well tired out by the event, and 

 ad gone to bed early. 



The next morning there was a good deal of 

 scolding because I had not waked the folks up, 

 and they proposed that I be taught the combi- 

 nation of the lock on the kitchen door, so the 

 next time I could walk in without any assist- 

 ance from anybody, and make myself at home. 

 Before I took my leave it was my pleasure to 

 have a pleasant chat with the charming young 

 bride (Robert's wife) in her own home at the 

 cottage. Friend Terry's latest hobby seems to 

 be home comforts. I wish our readers could 

 see the new porch or porches he has been put- 

 ting pretty nearly all around the home that 

 I pictured to you in our little book, the ABC 

 of Strawberry Culture, page 108. If we lived 

 more outdoors we should be a healthier people. 

 The colored folks down south never have con- 

 sumption; and I think one great reason for it is, 

 they live the greater part of the time entirely 

 out of doors. Many of their houses have no 

 windows, so their only means of lighting it up 

 is by having the door swung wide open; there- 

 fore they never suffer from living in clos*^ rooms 

 and their consequent impure air. Now, a 

 great part of the year, even here in Northern 

 Ohio, we can live outdoors if we take a little 

 pains to fix up for it. H. T. Gifford, Vero. Fla., 

 has large spacious porches, protected from in- 

 sects by wire-cloth screens, and the family take 

 their meals on this porch. Friend Terry spoke 

 about taking their meals on the porch, and 

 having his writing-table so he could sit and 

 write right outdoors. People who can not 

 stand a draft from open doors and windows 

 have no trouble at all when they are right out 

 in the open air. Do these things cost? Per- 

 haps not as much as doctors' bills after all. 



Friend Terry's other hobby, if that is the 

 right name for it. is making a convenient 

 kitchen so that his wife can do her own work 

 without help. You see, the children are now 

 all married, and in homes of their own. In the 

 first place, he has a refrigerator close by both 

 kitchen stove and pantry, that requires filling 

 with ice only once a week. The manufacturers 

 guaranteed it to keep every thing, when the 

 ice-chest is filled that often, and a man brings 

 the ice from town one day in each week. It 

 does the iDusiness perfectly, and he has so far 

 had ice to spare on every visit. I forget the 

 expense every week, but it was only trifling. 



The old Stewart stove that they have used 

 for so many years is to be exchanged for a 

 Stewart range. This interested me, because 

 Mrs. Root still holds fast to the Stewart stove 

 we used when we were first married. Water, 

 both hot and cold, as well as fuel, are arranged 

 right at hand as well as friend Terry's ingenu- 

 ity could do it. 



Close by is a very convenient and pretty bath- 

 room, so planned that one may go from any of 

 the bedrooms into the bathroom and back 

 again without dressing up. I hope friend T. 

 will give the world the result of his investiga- 

 tion and inquiries in regard to all real valuable 

 late inventions for saving woman's work in her 

 own home. In fact, he has partly described the 

 things I have mentioned already, in that excel- 

 lent home paper, the Philadelphia Practical 

 Farmer. 



Friend Terry's potatoes have hardly covered 

 the ground as much as my own; bat there are 

 three reasons for it. First, he did not plant as 

 early; second, my potatoes have not been flood- 

 ed with rains to the extent his have, and others 

 in his neighborhood. In many places his rich 

 fertile soil has been washed from the hillsides 

 into the ground, to the detriment of both hill 

 and valley; third, a good many of my potatoes, 



