[i)ECEMBElt, 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
463 
OT1E MtD^EMLlIL 
W~ (For other Household Items, see "Basket" pages.) 
A Handy Boot-Rack. 
One of the greatest troubles of the neat house- 
wife in the country results from the muddy boots 
of those members of the family who have to work 
in the fields, the stables, and the barn-yard. The 
wet boots must be dried, and are generally left un- 
der the kitchen stove, where their presence is very 
disagreeable. Now, to have a neat kitchen, there 
should be a boot-rack placed behind the stove, iu 
which the damp boots may be placed to dry. Such 
a contrivance ars the one shown in the engraving 
garden. The steps are inside of the grounds, and 
a neat hand-rail should be made on each side of it. 
The engraving so clearly explains itself that no 
further description is needed. 
Home Topics. 
BY FAITH ROCHESTER. 
PLAN OP A BOOT-RACK. 
has been found a great convenience. It has three 
shelves about four feet long, ten inches wide, and 
placed a foot apart. At one end a boot-jack is 
fixed by binges, so that when not in use it is folded 
against one end of the rack and secured by a button. 
There is also a stand for cleaning boots at the 
front, which also folds up when not in use, and 
the blacking brushes are placed on the shelves be- 
hind the stand and are out of sight. The two feet 
of the stand are also hinged, and when it is folded 
they hang down out of the way. The rack should 
be made of dressed pine boards, and painted or 
stained of some dark, durable color. 
A Carriage Step. 
Few people ever think of the convenience of a 
carriage step. A man, of course, thinks such a 
convenience uncalled for, so far as he is concerned, 
at -' 
A CARRIAGE-STEP. 
and it is not considered part of a woman's business 
to see to the building of any such thing as a car- 
riage step. But she may suggest its utility and 
convenience for her, and by the help of the accom- 
panying engraving and description she may procure 
one to be made by laying the plans and making the 
request. Hence we give it a place in the Household 
Department. It should be built in a convenient 
place in the garden fence near to the entrance 
gate. It then remains a part of the fence, and no 
- -injurious arjimalcan_gam access by its means to the 
A Few Points in Cooking-Stoves. — A great 
deal might be' said about cooking-stoves which I 
shall nut undertake to say at the present writing. 
I had no sort of idea what I wanted for a kitchen 
stove when I began to keep house, and I have not 
fully made up my mind now. I am pretty sure, 
however, that I do not Uke to catch my dress or 
apron upon the hearth when I am flying past it, 
either pulling the hearth out 
upon the floor or tearing my 
clothing. I like better a 
stove hearth that lifts out 
when the ashes are to be 
taken from beneath it. 
Since it falls to my lot to sit 
down beside the cooking- 
stove sometimes on a cold 
day when I would warm my 
feet, and since it is not at all 
uncommon in winter for tho 
children to come bustling 
into the kitchen from their 
play with toes suffering from 
cold — I like a low hearth. 
The oven may be full of 
bread, and anyhow tho 
hearth is the best place for warming the feet. The 
high hearth may be more convenient for setting 
dishes to be kept warm ; but dishes on the hearth 
are usually in the way, especially if you have to 
draw it out when you would give the fire more 
air. Tou may be told that it is unnecessary to 
draw out the hearth, as there is a slide that may 
T>e opened or closed ; but possibly the slide will 
not work at all, and perhaps you must pull out 
the hearth very frequently to clear away the ashes 
from before the fire. 
I like the stoves with the long, high doors open- 
ing the whole front and exposing the cheerful 
blaze behind the grate. In warm weather these 
may he kept shut, but on a cold morning we would 
gladly have them open. Sometimes in the twilight 
such a stove is almost as good as a fire-place to 
knit before. I am sick of the stoves that have the 
lire shut away in the middle where you can not see 
it at all, nor feel it either until the fire has been 
kindled a long time. I want 
a stove with an oven that will 
heat up quickly, so that gems 
or potatoes may be baked 
sometimes for an early break- 
fast. Never condemn your 
stove as a had baker until you 
are sure that justice has beeu 
done it in length of pipe. Our 
6tove stood in a shed or sum- 
mer kitchen all summer, and 
I was sorely tried by its slow 
baking. The same stove was 
much improved in baking pow- 
er when another length of 
pipe was added above the roof. 
After it was moved into the 
kitchen, with more pipe and 
length of chimney, there was 
a very decided improvement. 
Sometimes the draft is bad because the pipe fits 
into the chimuey too loosely, allowing too much 
air to enter around the pipe. On the contrary, if 
the draft is too strong, as sometimes in the lower 
rooms of a high house, or where there is a long 
straight pipe and chimney, the difficulty may be 
remedied by making a hole in the pipe or en- 
trance to the chimney. 
Another point in reference to the hearth. It 
should extend under the* end or side-door where 
wood is put in. Even with some first-class stoves 
it is a source of almost hourly annoyance to have 
the ashes and coals dropping out upon the floor 
whenever the fire is replenished. Dread of this 
leads to opening the top of the stove for putting 
in wood, causing wood litter upon the 6tove and 
the escape of smoke into the room. Zinc under 
the stove may lessen the danger of burning up the 
house, but we do not like to have the zinc littered 
with coals and ashes. 
We must not expect that the smaller sizes of 
stoves will give equal satisfaction with larger ones. 
There will be more difficulty on account of too 
long wood ; the end door is necessarily smaller 
and the fire-box more easily crowded ; the top of 
the stove sometimes fails to accommodate the pots 
and kettles and leave room to wedge in a coffee- 
pot; the ashes clog up the draft too quickly and 
need lifting every morning. 
" Children's Work."— Who is going to answer 
" SusanMann's " question ? May I put in a word ? 
In the first place, I should say that no woman who 
has "been through the mill" seriously considers 
the work of small children as help iu the house- 
hold. Men sometimes labor long under that delu- 
sion. We teach the little ones to work, and we 
call it " helping mamma," for their own education 
and in the hope that when practice has made them 
somewhere near perfect in their tasks they will 
really be helpers. But if they are genuine chil- 
dren, with the life and buoyancy that belong right- 
fully to childhood, they do not put their minds 
upon their tasks long at a time, and it becomes 
very wearisome to keep reminding and hurrying 
them. Children are said to he "careless," but 
who have a better right, to he free from care ? 
Little by little we must teach them to carry respon- 
sibilities and cares, hut a child's face where care 
sits habitually is a pitiful sight. , 
A mother who was lately complimented because 
her boy of ten was "such a little man" about 
helping her, replied sadly : " He is a good boy, and 
I don't know what I could do without him, but I 
feel sad every day because he has to work so. I 
feel as though I am defrauding him of his child- 
hood. He never can be a child again, and it isn't 
fair to saddle him now with so many tasks." 
Do fanners expect any real work from their 
small colts and calves ? I think that children un- 
der eight years of age who do all of the table-set- 
ting and dish-washing and sweeping regularly are 
very remarkable children, and I do not see how 
one could reasonably require more. I think that a 
woman who trains her children to do this work 
while so young ought not to have much other care 
or labor, because the task of training children to 
work — the nerve or firmness to hold them straight 
to the task — is itself so arduous. 
Split Peas. — I see no recipes in the hooks for 
cooking split peas without meat. They are gener- 
ally used as thickening for soups, but they make a 
nutritious and palatable soup when cooked alone. 
Like beans, they must be cooked a long time. It is 
well to put them soaking in warm water at night. 
In the morning drain off the water and cover them 
with a good deal of fresh water, as they absorb a 
great quantity while swelling and cooking. Cook 
them slowly the whole forenoon ; and if the peas 
are good they will he entirely broken tip when the 
soup is clone. .Season it with salt, also with cream 
or milk and butter. I have had peas which it 
seemed impossible to cook, and peas that had a 
flavor of all sorts of barn fodder ; but good peas 
arc much liked in our family. The most common 
mistake in cooking them is not giving them time 
enough. If I cooked them with beef-soup I should 
give them much more time than the recipe-books 
say, for peas that, so to speak, have "dissolved" 
in cooking are far better than those mashed 
through a colander. 
Dried Peas. — Any good peas (minus insects) 
well cured are good for making soup. Wash them, 
soak them, and eook them the same as split peas. 
These, however, should be strained to free the 
soup from the skins. Split peas have had the 
6kins removed by machinery, which, ©f course, 
caused them to split. 
