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374 



THE II.Li:^roiS F^RMEK. 



Shiftlrss Tricks. 



To let the cattle fodder themselves at 

 the stticks; they pull out and trample 

 more than they eat They cat till the 

 ed;;e of appetite is gone, and then daint- 

 ily pick the choice parts; the residue, 

 being coarse and refuse, they will not 

 afterwards touch. f' 



To sell half a stack of hay and leave 

 the lower half open to rain and snow. 

 In feeding out, a hay knife should be 

 used on the stack; in selling, either dis- 

 pose of the whole, or remove that which 

 is left to a shed or barn. 



It is a shiftless trick to lie about 

 stores and groceries, arguing with men 

 that you have no titne, in a new coun- 

 try, for nice farming — for making good 

 fences; for smooth meadows without a 

 stump; for draining wet patches which 

 disfigure fine fields. 



To raise your own frogs in your own 

 yard; to permit, year after year, a dirty, 

 stinking, mantled puddle to stand be- 

 fore your fence in the street. 



To plant orchards, and allow your 

 cattle to eat the trees up. When gnaw- 

 ed down, to save your money, by trying 

 to nurse the stubs into good trees, in- 

 stead of getting fresh ones from the 

 nursery. 



To allow an orchard to have blank 

 spaces, where trees have died, and 

 when the living trees begin to bear, to 

 wake up and put young whips in the 

 vacant spots. 



It is very shiftless to build your 

 barnyard so that every rain will drain 



it; to build your privy and dig your 

 wtll close together; to build a privy of 

 more than seven feet square — some 

 shiftless folks have it of the size of the 

 whole yard; to set it in the most expos- 

 ed spot on the premises; to set it at the 

 very far end of the garden, for the 

 pleasure of traversing mud-puddles and 

 labyrinths of wet weeds in rainy days. 



It is a dirty trick to make bread with- 

 out washing one's hands after cleaning 

 fish or chickens; to use an apron for a 

 handkerchief; to use a veteran handker- 

 chief just from the wars for an apron; to 

 use milk-pans alternately for wash-bowls 

 and milk. To wash dishes and baby 

 linen in the same tub, either alternately 

 or altogether; to chew snuff while you 

 are cooking, for sometimes food will 

 chance to be too highly spiced. We 

 have a distinct but unutterable remem- 

 brance of a cud of tobacco in a dish of 

 hashed pork — but it was before we^were 

 niarried! 



A lady of our acquaintance, at a board- 

 ing house, excited some feara among her 

 friends, by foaming at the mouth of mad- 

 ness. In eating a hash (made, doubt- 

 less, of every scrap from the table, not 

 consumed the day before,) she found 

 herself blessed with a mouthful of hard 



soap, which only lathered t'^e more, the 

 more !?ho washed ftt it. 



It is filthy thing to comb one's hair in 

 a small kitchen in the intervals of cooking 

 the breakfast; to use the bread trough for 

 a cradle — a thing which we have undoubt- 

 edly seen; to put trunks, boxes, baskets, 

 with sundry other utensils, under the bed 

 where you keep the cake for company; 

 we have seen a dexterous housewife whip 

 the bed-spread aside, and bring forth not 

 what we feared, but a loaf-cake! 



It is a dirty trick to wash children's 

 eyes in the pudding dish; not that the 

 sore eyes, but subsequent puddings, 

 will not be benefitted; to wipe dishes 

 and spoons on a hand towel; to wrap 

 warm bread in a dirty table-cloth; to 

 make and mould bread on a table innocent 

 of washing for weeks; to use dirty table- 

 cloths for sheets, a practice of which we 

 have had experimental knowledge, once 

 at least in our lives. 



The standing,plea of all slatterns and 

 slovens is, that "ev''r3'body must eat a 

 peck of dirt before they die," A peck? 

 that would be a mercy, a mere mouthful, 

 in comparison of the cooked cart-loads 

 of dirt which are to be eaten in steam- 

 boats, canal-boats, taverns, mansions, 

 huts and hovels. 



It is a filthy trick to use tobacco at 

 all; and it puts an end to all our affect- 

 ed squeamishness at the Chinese taste, 

 in eating rats, cats, and bird's nests. 

 It 13 a filthy trick to let the exquisite 

 juice of tobacco trickle down the corn- 

 ers of one's mouth; or lie in splashes 

 on one's coat, or bosom; to squirt the 

 juice all over a clean fioor, or upon a 

 carpet, or baptismally to sprinkle a 

 proud pair of andirons, the refulgent 

 glory of the much-scouring housewife. 

 It is a vile economy to lay up for re- 

 mastication a half-chewed cud; to pocket 

 a half-smoked cigar; and finally to be- 

 drench one's self with tobacco juice, or 

 so be-smoke one's clothes that a man can 

 be scented as far off as a whale-ship can 

 be smelt at sea. 



It is a shiftless trick to snuff a candle 

 with your fingers, or your wife's best 

 scissors, to throw the snuff on the carpet 

 or on the polished floor, and then to ex- 

 tinguish it by treading on it! 



To borroAv a choice book; to read it 

 "with unwashed hands, that have been 

 used in the charcoal bin, and finally to 

 return it daubed on every leaf with nose- 

 blood spots, tobacco spatter, and dirty 

 finger-marks — this is a vile trick! 



It is not altogether cleanly to use one's 

 knife to scrape boots, to cut havness, to 

 skin cats, to cut tobacco, and then to 

 pare apples Avhich other people are to 

 eat. 



It is an unthrifty trick to bring in eggs 

 from the barn in one's coat pocket, and 

 then to sit down on them. 



It is a filthy trick to borrow of, or 



lend for others' use, a tooth-brush, or a 

 tooth -pick; to pick one's teeth at table 

 with a fork, or a jack-knife; to put your 

 hat upon the dinner table among the 

 dishe;^; to spit generously into the fire, 

 or at it, whil^the hearth is covered with 

 food set to warm; for sometimes a man 

 hits what he don't aim at. 



It is an unmannerly trick to neglect 

 the scraper outside the door, but to be 

 scrupulous in cleaning your feet after 

 you get inside, on the carpet, rug, or 

 andirons; to bring your drenched um- 

 brella into the entry, where a black pud- 

 dle may leave to the housewife melan- 

 choly evidence that you have been there. 



It is soul-trying for a neat dairy-wo- 

 man to see her "man" watering the 

 horse out of her milk- bucket; or filter- 

 ing horse-medicine through her milk- 

 strainer; or feeding his hogs with her 

 water-pail; or, after barn work, to set 

 the well-bucket outside the curb and 

 wash his hands out of it. — H. W. 

 Beeeher. 



Fall Plowing. 

 Two active workmen (we but repeat 

 the saying) may be secured by any 

 farmer for the winter at comparatively 

 small expense. Fermentation and frost, 

 if his fields are plowed in autumn, will 

 be busy with their culture through the 

 inclement months, preparing food for 

 plants and fitting the soil for their 

 growth. Decomposition and disintegra- 

 tion are more or less active from fall to 

 spring, and most soils, if properly plow- 

 ed in autumn, are benefitted by the 



agents thus set at work. Let us offer 

 some thoughts on the advantages and 

 disadvantages of autumn cultivation, 

 together with some directions for per- 

 forming the work. 



1. Low lands, such as are usually 

 most benefitted by fall plowing, are 

 generally in their best condition for the 

 operation at this season of the year. 

 Very often they are too Avet to plow in 

 spring until the season for seeding is far 

 advanced, and the product is lessened 

 by the delay, as Avell as the soil injured 

 by working when too wet — becoming 

 baked and lumpy, and requiring several 

 years' time to recover its usual state. 

 Heavy clays, especially, must be plowed 

 when just right as to moisture, or they 

 may almost as well remain without till- 

 age. Heavy loams are often in the best 

 condition for plowing in the fall, and 

 can be sown or planted more seasona- 

 bly, and with better results, if this oper- 

 ation is performed than if neglected. 



2. Teams are generally in better 

 condition for plowing in autumn; more 

 inured to labor, and in less pressing de- 

 mand for other employment on the farm. 

 In spring a veriety of work presses upon 

 the ."ittention of the farmer, which must 

 be done as rapidly as possible, and it is 



