384, 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[October, 
bran, or fresh ground unbolted spring wheat. I 
am speaking of Minnesota gi-ain. 
Why use Graham Flour at all ? 
Because it adds a pleasing variety to our bill of 
fare. I should be very sorry to banish graham pud¬ 
ding (or mush), and graham gems and crackers 
from our table. Besides, I do not doubt that the 
best graham flour—that which has the bran finely 
cut to pieces and in small proportion to the rest of 
the flour—is better for the common use of many 
people who live mostly on concentrated food, or 
use much meat, cake, and pastry, than bread made 
of fine flour. Last year I lived close beside a large 
flouring mill for a few months. It was a mill using 
the modern “ new process ” machinery, and grind¬ 
ing the best of “ gilt-edged ” as well as “ family ” 
flour. When I wanted graham, I sent a sack to the 
mill, and received into it the pure unbolted wheat- 
meal before it had undergone any sifting process. 
I could not ask for better graham flour—made as it 
was from the best Minnesota spring wheat. This, 
however, was not like what I buy in the city label¬ 
led “ New Process Graham,” though I sometimes 
get the same labelled “ Fresh Ground.” I seldom 
use the highest priced “gilt-edged” fine flour. It- 
makes beautiful loaves, and it may be true, as 1 am 
told, that a sack of it goes much further “thau the 
common grade flour,” but it seems to empty the 
pocket-book faster, and a friendly miller, who 
makes both kinds, has assured me that the “grade” 
or “family” flour, is just as nutritious as ground 
wheat can be with the simple bran extracted. Cer¬ 
tainly the bran we get now-a-days for our cows, is 
quite different from what we used to get, years ago. 
It is so cleanly peeled from the wheat as to appear 
like very insufficient food for any animal unless 
mixed with corn-meal or shorts. The old-fashioned 
bran had clinging to the inside of the husk some of 
the most nourishing food material of the wheat, so 
that when this was bolted or sifted away from the 
white flour, the latter was left poor indeed, and de¬ 
served the outcry made against it. 
Good Gruel for the Sick. 
For the first time in my dozen years of mother¬ 
hood, I have had a child really sick in bed, and un¬ 
able to be dressed. All about that sickness I shall 
not tell here, but the patient and his mother have 
both learned important lessons. The sickness was 
partially the result of a degree of accidental poi¬ 
soning; but we shall hereafter be more careful about 
the times and seasons and temperatures of the 
swimming baths, that the body may be found in a 
better condition to resist disease. I believe, with 
a host of others, that little boys who get interested 
in swimming, are liable to do themselves great in¬ 
jury by too frequent and too long-continued visits 
to the water. There was poison in the system to 
be got rid of, and Nature tried to rid the stomach 
of its contents, as one of the first intimations of 
sickness. She did not succeed, and as there was no 
warm waier in the house to aid Nature’s efforts, 
and I had then no idea of the poisoning, I let the 
child crawl oil to bed with the bad stuff unreject¬ 
ed, and for a day or so, I still supposed that he 
would soon get about. But he would not eat, and 
after several days of fasting, I began to feel great 
anxiety about the return of his appetite. I feared 
that he would become so reduced in strength that 
we should have to bring him up on beef-tea and 
broths. But as the days passed it seemed less dan¬ 
gerous to wait patiently for the return of appetite. 
He lived on water, drinking it often and plentifully 
in obedience to his own iustinct, and I could see 
that it, in connection with daily sponge-baths, and 
enemas, was helping him. One morning he asked 
me with some eagerness if we couldn’t have fresh 
warm loaves of Boston brown bread brought home 
from the bakery sometimes next winter ! Then I 
knew that the appetite was coming. A few hours 
later he wanted to know what arrowroot looked 
like, and what could be made from it, and thought 
a little cooked thin with milk and sweetened a very 
little would taste good. How gladly I prepared it, 
and fed him the few spoonfuls that satisfied him. 
Now I believed in my heart, all of the time, that 
the best food he could have along at first, would be 
gruel made of sifted graham, and seasoned with 
creamy milk, such as seems very delicious to me 
when I am sick. But the last graham gruel he had 
tasted, had been made of “branny” unsifted gra¬ 
ham, and he “never wanted any more.” So I had 
equipped myself with arrowroot, sago, tapioca, and 
ground rice, having studied the recipes for the 
sick in Marion Harland’s book, and in a work on 
domestic medicine, which a neighbor lent me. 
But there was small demand for these after all. 
After one or two small meals of these prepared in 
the most simple manner, beef or chicken broth, 
with bread or crackers crumbled in, and a dessert 
of ripe fruit—at first grapes (the first thing he was 
willing to taste), or an orange, and soou a peach or 
a ripe apple—gave satisfaction, and as soon as he 
had tried a little graham gruel, made as I like it 
best, that alone became his favorite food. I have 
the water boiling vigorously, and turn into it slow¬ 
ly, stirring rapidly, a thiu paste of sifted graham 
flour and water, having previously salted the water 
to taste. For a pint of boiling water, I should use 
a small half teacup of sifted graham, making the 
gruel quite 'thick. Into this I pour good sweet 
milk until thin enough fora rather thick drink, let- 
ting this milk scald, but not boil, in the porridge. 
Then I cool it, thinning again so that it can be 
drank, with milk—and call it good. So does my 
patient, and it gratifies me to see how eagerly he 
takes it. The milk is excellent nourishment, and 
so is the flour used, and though it would hardly 
support the strength of a laboring man as a steady 
diet, it is a useful dish where something light and 
nourishing is needed, especially for children. 
Other Food for Invalids. 
Oatmeal gruel made in the same way as that of 
graham flour, is excellent, only it should be cooked 
longer and with a less proportion of meal to the 
same amount of water, as oatmeal swells very much 
in cooking. Corn-meal gruel is not so useful, be¬ 
cause it is more heating and less'nourishing. Corn- 
meal needs a very thorough cooking. Gruel made 
of fine meal should boil at least half an hour, and 
it is best when one-third white flour is used with 
the meal, mixed with cold water before putting 
into the boiling water. Most of the recipes for the 
sick which I have found in my late search, seem to 
me very objectionable, on account of the seasoning. 
Nearly all of these gruels are sweetened with sugar 
(wholly unnecessary if you have fresh sweet grain, 
and much more likely to become sour in the 
stomach), and it seems to be supposed that to be 
palatable, food for the sick must be spiced with 
nutmeg or cinnamon, with the addition of lemon 
juice or wine, or both, while the old-fashioned 
dread of milk seems to prevail. Modern physicians 
are advising milk for weakened invalids. I recent¬ 
ly read this testimony from Prof. Gairdner, of Glas¬ 
gow University. He says : “ To give wine, whiskey, 
and beef tea, while withholding milk, is simply, in 
my opinion, to destroy your patient. And the 
more wine and whiskey you give, the more sure 
you will be to destroy your patient soon, because 
you are thereby poisoning the blood. I believe 
that infinite mischief has been done in typhus 
fever, and in all fevers, by giving wine instead of 
milk. It is a fatal delusion.”—As for the spices, 
they are often the hardest and last thing that a 
weak stomach can digest, remaining at the last to 
heat and worry the stomach that needs rest. 
Common Weeds made Ornamental. 
Under the above title, we last month described 
the manner of making large downy balls from the 
common thistle. After it was too late to make a 
correction, the lady who kindly gave us the infor¬ 
mation discovered that in describing the matter 
from memory, she had made an error as to how 
much of the prickly green cup, or involucre, should 
be removed from the thistle head. Instead of 
leaving as much as shown last month, (fig. 2, p. 313), 
all of the involucre is to be removed, that can be 
readily cut away, as none of it is needed. A section 
of the prepared thistle head, with the involucre 
removed, and the flowers pulled out, is here given 
in fig. 1. It was stated that the downy ball consists 
of the hairs or bristles of the “receptacle ” or the 
bottom of the cup on which the little flowers stand ; 
this receptacle is really the enlarged, flattened end 
of the flower stalk, and is indicated by a, in the 
figure; as the hairs are attached to this, all of the 
green and prickly involucre, may be removed with¬ 
out causing them to fall out. We usually test such 
matters before giving them to our readers, but in 
Fig. 1. —THISTLE. 
DOWN. 
-b 
,-C 
I! 
this case we had not time. The best thistle for 
this use, is the common large flowered species ; 
the tall late thistle found in 6wampy places, has 
very short hairs, and will not answer. Another 
lady has shown us how to convert the 
Seed Pod of Milkweed 
into a most beautiful ornament. There are a num¬ 
ber of species of Milkweed ( Asclepias ), some quite 
parly, and others, especially those growing later 
in wet places; the pods differ much in size, but 
they have essentially the same structure, and any 
of these will answer the purpose. The pods break 
open when ripe by a slit along the curved side to 
allow the seeds to escape. Nearly all have noticed 
the beautiful silky down attached to 
the seeds, each of which has, as iu 
figure 2, a tuft of the finest hairs to 
allow it to sail off on the air to some 
distant resting place. The pods are 
to be gathered when nearly mature, 
but before they open, as soon as the 
seeds are full-grown, even before 
they begin to brown they will answer. 
If a seed be examined, it will be 
found that the hairs are not attached 
to it singly, but if the tuft be sepa¬ 
rated it will leave the seed all in one 
piece, the numerous hairs being 
stuck together at the end. The pod 
is to be carefully opened; if it will 
not split otherwise, a knife may be 
used to merely cut a slit through it. 
Within will be found a body like that 
shown in figure 3, which is slightly 
united to the pod by each end, and 
is to be detached. It will be worth 
while to examine this in order to 
know what we are working with. A 
botanist would describe it as the 
placenta , with the attached seeds. 
The placenta, or seed-bearer, is seen 
at the lower end, a, and at the 
upper end, b, but all the rest is closely covered 
with the flat seeds and their down, save a narrow- 
line, c, extending the whole length. The seeds are 
laid on with beautiful regularity, and overlap one 
another like the scales of a fish, while the hairs of 
the down lie close together to form a sort of flat¬ 
tened thread. In order to succeed, the most care¬ 
ful and delicate handling is required; as soon as 
the seed-bearer is taken from the pod, the lower 
end, a, is to be tied ; a bit of soft cord may be used, 
or what is better, a very narrow ribbon ; this is to 
'-"--"A 
—cl 
Fig 3. 
Fig. 4.— MANNER OF MOUNTING. 
be tied quite firmly, as the part will shrink in dry¬ 
ing. The projecting portion (6, fig. 3) at the other 
