1908 



(H^EANINGS IN HEE CULTURE 



1017 



were about tour inches wide — possibly five. 

 They were plaued on the edges; and before lay- 

 ing the floor we stood the boards all up edgewise 

 and painted the edges ; and after they were laid, 

 the tops were given a good coat of paint. The 

 great trouble with a floor made of matched floor- 

 ing is the shrinking and swelling whenever the 

 rain beats in and stands for some time on the 

 floor. Another advantage of a porch with open- 

 ings between the boards is that, in sweeping or 

 scrubbing, the dust or the water goes right down 

 through, and it is very soon all dried off. I am 

 sure such a porch floor will last much longer 

 than where we have a tight floor of matched lum- 

 ber. Of course, there should be a little slant 

 outward, although this is not so important with 

 a floor with a slight opening between the boards. 

 Since dictating the above, Mrs. Root objects 

 to having the opening between the boards large 

 enough to let small articles fall through ; and I 

 notice that T. B. Terry, while recommending 

 a similar porch, says we should push the boards 

 up tight together. When they come to shrink 

 this will leave a crack large enough to let the air 

 in and dry out the floor. He says that, where 

 we use matched flooring, the water is sure to get 

 in and rot out the floor much sooner than where 

 there is a crack between each two boards. 



OUR ROBINSON CRUSOE ISLAND ANOTHER 



GLIMPSE OF IT. 



We clip the following from the Southern Ru- 

 ralist. As it was written by one of my particu- 

 lar friends (a schoolma'am), it may be of interest 

 to our readers: 



Five years ago last monlh we landed in Manatee Co.. F'lorida, 

 where it is perpetual summer. We settled on a little island two 

 hundred yards wide and eight miles long — the Gulf of Mexico 

 on the west and Sarasota Bay on the east. The gulf is about 

 1000 miles wide; the bay, one. 



There was no one living on the island when we came, and 

 only two other families now, so you see our peaceful slumbers 

 are never disturbed by the hurry and noise of the busy city. 



The growth on the island is oak, with leaves green all the 

 year; cedar, cabbage palmetto, sea-grape, rubber, and a great 

 variety of grapes and other vines and bushes. We grow our 

 vegetables in the winter months mostly. There was an abun- 

 dance of coons, foxes, and wild cats when we first came, and we 

 had to fight our way to save our poultry, and coons are bad yet. 



There are six of us children — four girls and two boys. We 

 girls went to school in a little row-boat. We never had any 

 mishap, although the waves toss us about pretty roughly at limes. 



.Vly oldest sister is lately married, and lives near. I am 

 teaching school, and the two youngest, 12 and 14 years, have to 

 paddle their own canoe. 



Father is keeping bees, and raising queens for The A. I. Root 

 Co. and others. He sends his queens by mail in little cages. 

 Our main source of honey is saw-palmetto and cabbage-palmetto. 

 We have extracted over 5000 pounds so far from saw-palmetto. 

 Cabbage is not in bloom yet. 



My two brothers and brother-in-law fish. They each have a 

 sail-boat and carry a net 200 or 300 yards long on each boat. 

 When they find a school of mullet they surround them with their 

 nets, pushing their boats with long poles, then they pound on 

 their boats and on the water to frighten the fish, when they will 

 rush into the nets and gill themselves. Then the boys pull the 

 nets back into the boat and take the fish out, when they will be 

 ready for another strike. 



Sometimes they come home loaded down — 2000 to 2500 lbs. to 

 the boat. Then sometimes they fish all night and do not catch 

 enough for breakfast. 



This is a delightful place to live in. The thermometer sel- 

 dom goes above 94 degrees nor below 40. 



We have two Jersey cows and a nice flock of hens. We do 

 not have to build houses for either. 



Sea-turtles are crawling now. 1 hey come out and dig a hole 

 in the sand and lay from 100 to 150 eggs as large as hens' eggs. 



The largest turtles weigh about 400 lbs., but dress only about 

 >M lbs. of clean meat, which is about as good as F'lorida beef. 

 They can hardly crawl on land, and are no trouble to catch; 

 and, once turned on their backs, they can never get over again 



Bathing in the gulf is superb — no undertow, and lots of beauti- 

 ful shells on the beach. We can sit on out porch and see the 

 launches and sail-boats flitting about on the bay, and large ves- 

 sels on the gulf. 



There is an abimdance of fish and oysters to be had for the 

 taking, and plenty of shark, stingiree, and mosquitoes to make 

 it interesting.- Before coming to Florida we had considerable 

 sickness, but not enough since to need a doctor. 



Florence Shumakd. 



LET US QUIT BEING HYPOCRITES. 



We clip the following from the Christian Eli- 

 de a-f or World ioY ]wnQ 11: 



WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN. 



The San Francisco Star has the following sensible comments 

 on the recent visit of the fleet: 



" The $180,000,000 invested in the war-ships now in San 

 Francisco harbor would irrigate 6,000,000 acres of arid land, and 

 provide homes for 120,000 families, giving to each family fifty 

 acres of land. That amount of money would build a railroad 

 from the Atlantic to the Pacific; and such a road owned by the 

 people and for the benefit of the people would squeeze every 

 drop of water out of the railroads of the country. 



" That amount of money would build and equip a national tel- 

 egraph and telephone system, which, conducted for the people, 

 would squeeze every drop of water out of the privately owned 

 telegraph and telephone systems. 



" That amount of money, properly spent, would go far toward 

 relieving the people of the tremendous monopofy burden now 

 resting on their backs. 



" That amount of money would build from sixty to one hun- 

 dred great electric-power plants for the people, and free them 

 from the monopoly that is now skinning them. 



" Instead of building more war-ships, isn't it time to call a 

 halt .' With tens of thousands of our citizens begging for an op- 

 portunity to earn a living, isn't it time to call a halt on this 

 wicked waste of money and energy .' If we are going more and 

 more into the war-ship business, let us be honest and pull down 

 our churches. If we are to glorify war, let us quit glorifying the 

 Prince of peace. Let us quit being hypocrites." 



We are very glad indeed to see that the World 

 gave place to the above; but what I would like 

 to say would be a hearty amen to the above. 

 And, by the way, it would rejoice my heart to 

 hear a hearty amen to the same from every relig- 

 ious paper in our land. Is it not true that we al- 

 ready have too many million-dollar war-ships as 

 well as too many re-vol-i'ers '(' Let us quit being- 

 hypocrites, as the San Francisco Star has it, and 

 come out in the open, and demand that this war- 

 ship business be stopped in exactly the same way 

 that we as a people not only demanded but suc- 

 ceeded in getting, the motto back on our coins, 

 "In God we Trust." And (/We trust in God 

 we certainly do not need to invest 180 millions 

 of dollars in one fleet of war-ships. 



OUR ,$180,000,000 FLEET OF WAR-SHIPS. 



The above was prepared for Gleanings sever- 

 al weeks ago, and would have been printed with- 

 out further comment; but I presented the matter 

 in our Thursday-evening prayer-meeting, and 

 our good pastor, Rev. J. Edward Kirbye, put 

 the matter in such a different light that the item 

 was held over. He said that our good Presi- 

 dent's plan was to make this fleet of war-ships a 

 great messenger of peace. His design was, in 

 fact, to have it do missionary work. The Unit- 

 ed States has already put a stop to superstition 

 and cruelty in Cuba; but we could do this only 

 by means of our war-ships and brave men. In a 

 like manner the United States, with the assist- 

 ance of other nations, has just recently begun to 

 demand the cessation of such outrages as they 

 had in China, and the Armenian massacres in 

 Russian territory. It would be a sad thing for 

 us to undertake to lestore order and have some 

 heathen nation beat us in our efltort to protect the 



