10 
AMERICAl^ AGEIOULTUEIST. 
[January, 
Marking Things—Home-made Stencils. 
The owner’s name put plainly on grain bags, 
hoes, rakes, spades, shovels, steelyards, etc., and 
on larger implements, is very convenient, and will 
very often save their wandering and loss. We have 
long kept a steel punch, a piece of iron one-half 
inch square, the corners rounded off a little, the 
lower end terminating in a flat piece of steel, three- 
sixteeuthS'inch thick and three-fourths-iuch wide. 
On the bottom edge of this the letters of the sur¬ 
name and initial of the given name are cut in relief. 
With this, and a hammer blow or two on its head, the 
name is cut into every implement, large and small. 
It is beaten into any soft iron, if there is any, oth¬ 
erwise into the wood, and has doubtless saved 
twenty times its cost (twenty-five cents a letter) in 
keeping a great variety of things from straying off, 
or remaining in possession of borrowers, who are 
thus precluded from saying of them*“ they did not 
know whose they were.” These punches, made 
to order, can be got by mail at moderate cost. 
Stet^cil PL.4.TES are very convenient, not only 
for marking boxes of merchandise, but also farm 
Implements, grain bags, barrels, etc. They are 
thin strips of tin or other metal, with the letters 
•cut through. The stencil is laid flat upon any ar¬ 
ticle, and a brush or cloth wad, smeared with a 
lamp-black mixture, is brushed over the letters, 
marking through the openings. It is important to 
keep the edges straight and even, so that they will 
lay flat and close upon the article to be marked, or 
the color will spread out under the plate, and the 
interior lines run together. Such jdates are made 
to order usually at five to ten cents per letter. 
“Iroquois,” of Jamestown, Ohio, sends us a 
method of easily making stencils at home, at no 
cost, if one has a simple bracket saw which will 
cut tin plate. Mark the desired letters on paper, 
being careful to have the pieces inside the letters 
supported by attachments to the outside. Paste 
this paper on any piece of tin, and saw out the 
parts to be removed. Old fruit cans serve well for 
the plates; the bottoms and tops are taken off by 
melting the soldering, and the side seams cut off 
with shears. With a mallet beat it out to a smooth, 
flat plate. Lamp-black mixed with coal oil, kero¬ 
sene, or spirits of turpentine, makes a blacking 
mixture. A coating of common varnish applied 
after they are dry enough, renders such letters 
permanent. The boj’s may well exercise their 
taste and skill, and find amusement, in getting up 
a variety of such plates, as a present to father, and 
for their own use. 
The Keifeb (ob Keiffeb) Hybrid Pear. —The 
discussion as to the value of this singular pear, has 
extended to the “ secular ” papers. Mr. 0. A. 
Hovey, having suggested in the “ Massachusetts 
Plowman,” that the pear is a “ humbug,” Mr. Jo- 
siah Hoopes, of Pennsylvania, writes in its defence 
in the “Philadelphia Press.” Having been the 
first to figure and describe this pear (see American 
Agriculturist, January, 1879), we take some interest 
in the controversy. We then said ; “ While it may 
not come up to the high gtandard of ‘ best,’ it is of 
sufficiently good quality to be acceptable to those 
who esteem the Bartlett.” Our aim has always 
been to induce our readers to grow fruit. We do 
not need to be told that the Concord is far from 
being a first class grape, that the Wilson is one of 
the poorest strawberries, but one who has a Con¬ 
cord vine, or a patch of the Wilson, is quite sure to 
have fruit in .abundance. Oui- object has been to 
have people begin with fruits from which they 
would be sure of results, believing that they would 
soon try better kinds. The Keifer Hybrid tree has 
proved in hcalthfulness and productiveness, all, 
and more than all, that was claimed for it. The 
fruit is large, strikingly handsoine, and sells rapidly 
at a paying price. It is not a Beurre Bose, or a 
Winter Nelis, but it is a pear, and the tree has thus 
far withstood “leaf,” “twig,” “insect,” “frozen 
sap,” and every other form or stripe of “ blight.” 
If it were only fit for baking or preserving, we 
should regard it as of great value. As one who 
has found out that he can grow Concord grapes, 
soon makes his way to better kinds, so those who 
are encouraged by their success with the Keifer, 
and pleased with its size and great beauty, will 
soon wish to go a step higher in the list of pears. 
The Chief Crop of the Country, 
BY E. r. BOB. 
What May is for grass, and July for corn, these 
winter months are for the invaluable growing crop 
of boys and girls ; and upon the care and atten¬ 
tion given to this crop the future of the country, 
the lights and shadows of our own coming years, 
and the success of the boys and girls them¬ 
selves, largely depend. The stock breeder looks 
carefully after the develoiiemeut and training of 
his animals, especially if thorough-breds. Should 
not we with more solicitude try to make thorough¬ 
breds of our children ? Which do you visit most 
frequently and examine with most diligent interest, 
the developing animals, the grain fields, the fruit 
trees or the olive plants in the school-room? Do 
you personally know the trainer there—his man¬ 
ner and methods ? What morning and evening 
attention do your children got, save to know that 
the chores are well attended to ? Do you father, 
and you mother, personally know where they are 
in the evening hours, who are their associates', 
what outside influences are molding their char¬ 
acters ? Do you know that they are developing as 
strongly, as symmetrically, as rapidly as they 
might ? 
I credit every reader of the American Agricultur¬ 
ist with understanding well that mind is the true 
stature of the man or woman. Are you content 
with providing shelter, clothing and food, and to 
see them add inch by inch to stature? One hundred 
and forty pounds of flesh and bone may not 
make a man ; they may constitute an ill-natured, 
ignorant cad or boor. One hundred and fif¬ 
teen pounds of feminine symmetry do not make 
a woman, even though expensively clad. They 
may present a parody, a caricature, a false sham 
that will bring bitterness and disappointment to 
more than one heart. 
It is not essential that young men and women be 
positively bad or obtrusively disagreeable, to fall 
short of what they should or might be. If we 
plant a tree or vine of the best variety, and allow it 
to grow without special attention and training, we 
know well what we shall find after a lapse of years. 
It may overspread a wide area of soil, with a 
useless mass of wood and foliage, yielding a few 
defective apples or ragged clusters of grapes, that 
are not poisonous, but such fruit is not in demand 
in the world’s market, nor desirable for the home 
table. So the boy or girl merely left to grow, de¬ 
velops much as the neglected vine. They may 
never become vicious, and may even be spoken 
of as good at heart, like the half-barren apple tree, 
but are scarcely worth the room they take up in 
the world. 
Are Ihe daughters, when receiving their bent in 
in early age, actually learning how to fill their 
future positions well—how to be wives, how to 
keep the house orderly and make it inviting; to 
help economize for rainy days ahead, to provide, 
perclianee with limited means, a daily variety of 
inexpensive yet delicious, wcll-cooked hejilthful 
food. Much of the dyspesia and ill-health now 
prevailing is chargeable to lack of early training in 
the home circle. 
If a girl is learning to play upon the" piano, is 
the acquisition of a few showy pieces her aim, oris 
she studying music ? There is as rhuch dillcrence 
in the two efforts, as between pinning material to¬ 
gether to look like a dress, and the power to cut 
and make a graceful costume. Washing dishes 
steadily a thousand years, will not teach a girl, the 
high art of thrifty housekeeping ; she should not be 
merely taught to do housework, but to keep bouse. 
Boys may work on a farm until grown up and then 
be less able to take charge of it than a hired hand. 
Childish helplessness, combined with physical 
maturity, is so often seen because children receive 
knowledge too much as potatoes are placed in a 
bin—both in a crude state. The one makes 
blood and muscle, the other mental expertness 
and power, but both need proper preparation 
and assimilation. Boys taught to farm as well 
as to work on the farm, are far leas anxious to 
leave home for town or city. Instead of mere 
treadmill drudgery day after day, enlist interest in 
the sciences related to farming with its endless 
variety. Show a boy that some of the finest minds 
and most eminent men in the world have been de¬ 
voted to this calling. Interest him in a pair of blood¬ 
ed fowls or pigs, if not in larger animals,and let him 
have a pecuniary interest in their increase, how¬ 
ever small, also in some crop that he aids in cul¬ 
tivating. Above all, incite him to learn how skill 
can make “ two blades of grass grow where there 
was but one before.” 
Now, the long evenings supply just the oppor¬ 
tunity for fathers, and mothers as well, to give per¬ 
sonal and special attention to the most important 
product of the farm, the growing crop of boys 
and girls. The boy at yonder table is studying 
his lessons; doing “sums” perhaps. Is he 
merely tumbling diy rules and disjointed facts into 
his mind to be repeated parrot-like ? Suppose you 
come out of your doze and talk with him. See that 
he knows why he adds and multiplies. Teach him 
to apply his knowledge to cvery-day affairs. Give 
him the purchase and sale of j'our farm pro¬ 
ducts, the expense of fields and crops, imple¬ 
ments, etc., and have him ajaply the knowledge he 
is gaining. Teach him to use it as tlie soldier 
uses his weapons, and the mechanic his tools. 
Your interest in what he is doing will add to his 
interest, will make him more ambitious, more 
thorough and more practical. If he is studying 
geography, show him that the towns and cities he 
is hunting on the atlas, are not mere dots on the 
map, but places full of live men who will certainly 
get ahead of him unless he use his knowledge 
aright. 
And the same is true of the daughters. The re¬ 
sults of half hours thus spent will be a surprise to 
both yourself and the children. If your ovvn early 
education was faulty and they teach you in some 
things, it will be all the more interesting to them. 
Now is the time to enlist your sons’ enthusiasm 
in your calling, perhaps to rekindle your own also. 
Go over the Agricultural Journals with them and 
let them see and know what live men are doing and 
thinking, and awaken emulation. Let a book or two 
about some part of your business, or the whole of 
it, be read to you by the boys. Draw out their 
comments and make your own. Remember the 
story of the industrious man, who was ever repeat¬ 
ing, “he worked only for his children.” Indeed 
he worked so hard that he never had time to form 
their acquaintance, much less to help them to be¬ 
come men and women. As a result they soon 
scattered what he had gathered for them. 
You want your children to sympathize with your 
life and work. Sympathize with their life and pleas¬ 
ures—the life and fun that you enjoyed at their age. 
A holiday with them now and then, will not be 
lost time, it will be more than made up by increased 
efficiency on other days. Y’'ou can thus renew your 
youth and give joy to theirs. Roc.all your owm 
thoughts and feelings when at their age. A few 
holiday gifts w’ithin your means, will bring unal¬ 
loyed pleasure now, and for many days to come. 
Make a child happy and he can scarcely fail 
to be good. At the same time let him be initiated 
into the secret that those are most happy who 
add most to the happiness of others. Is your 
home notahappy one? Ask yourself what you .are 
doing to make it happy. Be not like the publican, 
always sitting at the receipt of custom, taxing 
others.—Subject yoursidf to a little examination. 
