72 



POPULAR GARDENING. 



March, 



"^e Household 



About Washing Compounds. 



Washday comes ai'ouiid with gieat regular- 

 ity once a week, iu all good house-keepiug; a 

 day of hard labor. Much experimenting has 

 been done iu the past, with a view to the use 

 of preparations that shall act upon the dirt in 

 clothes, in a way that will separate this readily 

 from the fabrics, thus making less labor of rub- 

 bing and cleansing them. The trouble with 

 many of these is, that although they may have 

 the desired effect on the dirt, they also prove 

 injurious to the fibers of the cloth. The fear 

 of such results, in the minds of pnident house- 

 keepers, makes them often slow to adopt any 

 so-called washing preparations ; they prefer to 

 apply more labor at the task than run the risk 

 of injury to the clothes. 



We have the pleasure of introducing in this 

 place, directions for making a most reliable, 

 simple and safe compound for relieving the 

 burdens of washing da3\ It is Better, safer and 

 cheaper than pearline, and most other com- 

 pounds offered at the stores. Years of use has 

 shown that it will not rot the clothes or tuni 

 them yellow, and it does not harm the hands-. 



Into 8 quarts of soft water, put one-half 

 pound of lime and 1 pound of washing soda, 

 from the dealers in groceries. Place on the 

 stove and have come to a boil. Afterwards 

 let it settle, and pour off the clear liquid into 

 jugs or bottles, for future use. The prepara- 

 tion is chiefly used when boiling the clothes — 

 one teacupful in the first boiler, and after that 

 half a teacupful to each succeeding boilerful. 

 But iu soaking the clothes the night before 

 washing day, a half teacupful added to a tub of 

 clothes, will be very helpful. This compound is 

 unequaled for cleaning unpainted floors. 



Brieflets. 



Ammonia will soften hard water. 



A chain dish cloth for cleaning iron. 



Keep <-*old water from the children's ears. 



Salaratus is less used than formerly. Good. 



In cooking vegetables, start with boiling water. 



Have some plants iu every suitable sunny window. 



A bit of baking soda will restore milk that has 

 sli^'htly soured. 



Start early on the spring sewing. We'll warrant 

 you'll not regret it when June conies. 



For Grocers. Think twice before mixing chop- 

 ped hay with the tea. Honest tea is the best pohcy. 



The holder should have its place, and be kept in 

 place. This will save you a burned cake or pie some- 

 time. 



Try the meat saw for severing squashes. Even 

 tile ordinary hand saw would not be harmed by 

 such a use. 



To the Housekeeper ! Do your part towards 

 planning a good vegetable and fruit garden. And 

 don't forget earliness. 



When " tired to death " don't eat heartily ; start 

 in with a cup of tea and a cracker, or beat up an 

 egg in a half-pint of milk, sweeten and drink it. 



Coffee and tea both lose theii- flavor if not kept 

 in a e-lose can each by itself: the former will impart 

 its odor to other articles it comes near, if exposed. 



SatchetS of silk or satin, for holding gloves, hand- 

 kerchiefs, letters, watches, jewelry and endless 

 other things, were never more popular than now, 



A small shelf near the stove kept for an extra 

 pepper and salt dish, will save miles of weary walk- 

 ing, in time. Merely for exercise, far better walk 

 in the open aii*. 



The very fact that the Creator has provided so 

 great a variety of food in fruit, vegetation and flesh, 

 on the face of the earth, should lead us to see the 

 need of variety for our bodies, and to study to make 

 the best use of it. 



It's not always easy to start a fruit jar cover. 

 Instead of wrenching your hands and bringing on 

 blistei-s, simply invert the jar and place the top in 

 hot water for a minute. Then try it and you wjU 

 fi,nd it to turn quite easily. The law that " heat ex- 

 pands " accounts for this great difference. 



To those who have not tried the non-greasing, 

 perforated tin baking pans, which never "stick."' 

 we would say that they are excellent in every way. 

 Most tin-ware dealers now have them ; the cost is but 

 little, if any, above that of common ones. Our 

 housekeepers must give them a trial. 



There is nothing like getting out sometimes to an 

 interesting lecture or concert, and away from the 

 home cares, for inducing sweet and wholesome 

 sleep. In absence of these, drop a good share of 

 the evening work, read, converse and visit. Work 

 will turn off easier the next day for this course. 



A thoughtful woman sends in this item: "Paste 

 on the sewing machine this query: ' Is it necessary 

 or really beautiful '; Is it worth my time, strength 

 and thought y ' Measure the sewing by that rule, 

 and it will beat all how those torments of the 

 mother, who does her own keeping of clothes iu 

 order, namely: tucks and ruffles, will vanish." 



How to Cook Water. Few people know how to 

 cook water, Charles Delmonico used to afflrra. The 

 secret is putting good fresh water into a neat ket- 

 tle already quite warm, and setting the water to 

 boil quickly, and then taking it right off to use in 

 tea, coffee or other drinks before it is spoiled. To 

 let it steam and simmer and evaporate until the 

 good water is all in the atmosphere and the lime 

 and iron dregs only left in the kettle, bah: that is 

 what makes a great many people sick, and is worse 

 than no water at all. He says the Delmonicos were 

 the first to recommend the new hot water cure to 

 guests who complained of having no appetite. 

 "Take a cup of hot water and lemon and you will 

 feel better," was the formula adopted. The lemon 

 juice takes away the insipidity of hot water. 



poMltr/. 



Setting the Hens. 



Improve and pi'aise the patent incubators as 

 we may, still the hatching of hens eggs will 

 always be left, by the mass of the people, for 

 the hens to do. We urge early hat^^hing, say in 

 this month, to deferring it much into the future. 

 Even where eggs and not early chickens for 

 marketing, is the object, there is a great gain in 

 begimiing the hatching season early. If chick- 

 ens are hatched in March they will lay before 

 Christmas, if not hatched until June, the 

 chances are against perfect development by 

 winter, and with it poor wintering and poor 

 laj'ing the first season. 



In setting give no hen moi'e than thirteen 

 eggs. If the nest can be made on the ground 

 hatching will be more certain. A sod placed 

 in the bottom of an ordinary nest furnishes a 

 fair substitution. To have the hatching done 

 in a separate apartment, where other hens can- 

 not disturb the sitters, and lay eggs with her, 

 is an advantage. Otherwise the hen will try 

 to cover all added eggs, thus endangering those 

 first giveu by just so much. Marking then 

 also becomes necessary. Small hens should not 

 be used for sitting. The Brahmas are a pref- 

 erable breed for this business. As they never 

 get too much of sitting, it is well when the 

 broods of the same date are hatched, to give 

 them to one-half of the mothers to care for, re- 

 turning the other half to new nests of eggs. 



Never feed your sitting hens on the nest, it 

 is better for them as well as for the eggs that 

 they leave the nest occasionally— they will not 

 stay too long. The room where they are kept, 

 should be furnished with dusting boxes, drink- 

 ing vessels and well-supplied feeding troughs. 



CONDENSED POULTRY NOTES 



Large fowls: small layers. 



Ice cold water is bad for hens. 



Keep a record of dates, in hatching. 



A lime plastered hen-house has advantages. 



Clean the trough every time before giving water. 



Sprinkle the hatching nests with a little sulphur. 



One cock bird to twelve hens, is the safe rule 

 when hrttehing is the aim. 



Hens have been known to lay 2,000 eggs in a life 

 time. Useful lives indeed. 



Add a panful of fresh ashes to the dust bath oc- 

 casionally, say once a week. 



Five million dozen eggs from Canada last year! 

 The American hen must be put to work in earnest. 



Let every meddlesome pei-son tinker over your 

 incubator, and you may whistle for a successful 

 hatch. 



Chicken raising and gardening go well enough 

 together, provided only, that a six foot picket fence 

 separates the two. 



If possible set all the eggs that are to be set at 

 from one to three separate times only. Our reason: 

 you can attend to one hundred chickens, with hardly 

 any more trouble than half that number. 



Carbolic acid is a most potent insectcide. A 

 small quantity of it in solution with a canful of 

 water, and this sprinkled with a fine rose over the 

 floor, walls and roosts of the hen-house, will keep 

 down insects very effectually. The liquid imparts 

 a wholesome smell at the same time. 



Young Chicks, after twelve or fifteen days old, 

 need some grass, for best results in their growth. 

 But if the chickens come before the grass does, a 

 httle may be raised artificiallj' for them. If no 

 better method presents itself for this, sow a box of 

 oats in a frame, or in the kitchen window or the 

 greenhouse. 



Do the thaws and spring rains make the floor 

 dampy Then you must not wonder if colds and 

 roup set in, unless you remedy the situation. The 

 floor, of course, needs to be raised. If this cannot 

 be done permanently so early in the season, then 

 take the next best step: put down some rails, and 

 on these some boards, and litter on top to keep the 

 poor cheerless fowls directly out of the wet. 



Wemust not forget now that the limy substance 

 from which shells are formed must first be con- 

 sumed by the hens. Burn all the old bones and 

 break them fine; getoysteror other shells and burn 

 them; take raw limestone and reduce as fine as 

 peas or finer, and have these convenient for the 

 fowls to reach at pleasure. It will be observed that 

 these substances will disappear and need replenish- 

 ing at times, and the egg shells will be strouger. 



How to Begin. Which is the best way to begin 

 the p'.'ultrj' business, to buj' eggs or fowls? is 

 a frequent question. Mr. \V. H. Johnson. Mineral 

 Ridge. Ohio, answers the question like this : If you 

 get the "hen fever'" in the fall, buy young stock; 

 if in the spring, buy eggs, as no breeder will then 

 part with good stock, excepting at a high price. 

 Three or four settings of eggs from the best yards 

 will not cost more than a good trio at that time; 

 from them you niay get a good start, including, 

 perchance, some prize birds. 



Eggs for feeding to newly hatched chicks should 

 be boiled half an hour, mashed or chopped fine and 

 mixed with bread crumbs. Sprinkle clean, coarse 

 sand on a board and drop the food on this, and let 

 the little fellows help themselves. As soon as they 

 begin to eat they need gravel, and this the coarse 

 sand supplies. Cracked corn, cracked wheat and 

 coarse oat meal fed dry, may form a part of the 

 diet of young chicks from the start, provided water 

 or milk be supplied. We think that at least two- 

 thirds of the food should be fed diy. and we are in 

 doubt about the other third. — Farm Joiirmil. 



Improved Breeds. A score of years ago one 

 could hear a good deal of opposition talk to 

 these. To-day they are the rule rather than the ex- 

 ception, where poultry interests receive anj" atten- 

 tion. Their coming in has almost revolutionized the 

 old system of poultry-keeping, for with being more 

 costly to get a start with, and requiring better care 

 on the whole, more thought and care has been he- 

 stowed upon the entire matter of management. So 

 we can see that the improved breeds, while often 

 over praised, are entitled to a good share of credit 

 for the present state i>f improved poultry raising. 



Sense and Nonsense about Laying Power. The 

 statement that a hen has a certain number of germs 

 or ovules in the ovary at birth, and that every one 

 of these, no more no less, must niatui'e into eggs at 

 certain periods of her life, is nonsense. At birth a 

 hen has no apparent ovules, and the ovary is not 

 fully formed. With age and size this grows and 

 matures, by much the same process by which the 

 bone, muscles and other parts of the system are 

 produced, that is, fi'om the blood which is made 

 from the food that is eaten. And all this accords 

 with good sense. If there is a lack of sufticient food 

 for all demands of the system on it, life is just sus- 

 tained and the reproductive functions must be 

 dwarfed. A hen will therefore not lay eggs unless 

 fairly fed, simply because the ovules that should 

 develop into eggs are wanting, because of the lack of 

 forming substances that must come from food. 

 The better the feeding, the greater will be the pro- 

 duct of eggs always, other things being equal. 



