184= 
AMERICAN AG-RICULTURIST. 
[Mat, 
the subject, each woman will do well to examine 
her own individual case, and see in what way she 
herself may lighten or dispense with some of her 
burdens. The woman who, with her little child, 
goes out on some errand, and lets the muddy and 
uneven walks, and the slow, dragging steps of her 
little one trouble her all the way, will find that her 
walk has been just so much extra labor added to 
her morning’s work. But she who starts just as 
weary with the morning cares, and forgetting the 
muchly and unpleasant walks, points her little one 
to the beautiful clouds with their ever varying 
lights and shades, and the glimpses of the pretty 
blue just dimmed by their filmy veil; who sees the 
little kitten, partly hidden by a bush, timidly peep¬ 
ing through the fence ; who, spying a little flower 
almost hid in the grass by the wayside, directs her 
little one’s attention to its beauty ; who has a kind 
word for the little boy who in his haste stumbled 
and hurt himself, will find that the morning walk 
has benefited her, and that its pleasures have in a 
great degree counteracted the weariness and trials 
of the morning. Just so in our everyday life, we 
ourselves will have to pick up the crumbs of com¬ 
fort and enjoyment along the way, or they will be 
lost, and none be the better, but we and our house¬ 
holds be far the worse for it. She who assigns her 
task for the day beyond her time and strength, may 
by constant hurry and labor accomplish it, but pa¬ 
tience and strength will be gone, so that there will 
be no pleasure in completing it. We all know how 
hard it is to be unable to carry out a plan when we 
have made up our minds to accomplish a given 
work within a given period. Our nerves are irrita¬ 
ted, and we have a kind of disrespect for ourselves. 
One way to avoid this is, never lay out before us 
more than our time and strength will allow; we 
will not say T ability, for frequently when an effort is 
made in the right direction, we find ourselves in 
possession of more than we thought. 
Let us look over at night the work of the past day, 
and see what we have failed to accomplish. True, 
some days it will seem as though we had utterly fail¬ 
ed, and the day lost. Unexpected company arrived. 
The “ only a minute ” call of your neighbor was a 
full hour. Little Charley was unusually fretful and 
worrisome, and on the whole, aside from the usual 
routine of breakfast, dinner, and supper, hardly 
one plan has been carried out. But never mind, 
only don’t let it worry you ; keep in mind the ad¬ 
vice of an eminent thinker of the age : “ Neither 
let mistakes nor wrong directions, of which every 
one falls into many, discourage you. Let us try 
faithfully, manfully, to be right, we will grow daily 
more right. It is at the bottom the condition on 
which all men have to cultivate themselves. Our 
very walk is an incessant falling—a falling and 
catching ourselves before we reach the pavement.” 
—Examine carefully the work for the following 
day; decide upon what must be done, and what 
may be left undone, and leave a wide margin for 
any emergency. But you are so weary when the 
work is all done, that you feel more like resting 
than forcing yourself to think. Well, leave the 
working of those last five button holes until some 
other time, and don’t put that trimming on Minnie’s 
apron to-night, but rest your tired hands awhile. 
Harder work. Yes, I know it is harder than to keep 
right on in the same line you have been traveling 
all day. But it will not be so hard to-morrow 
night, one week from to-night it will be still easier, 
aud in a month from now, if you keep up the plan, 
it will be a recreation and even pleasure. But to 
begin, whether there is help in the kitchen or not, 
some attention will have to be paid to the meals. 
If you have all the work to do, and any extra bak¬ 
ing, together with the other household duties, the 
five button holes and Minnie’s apron will be all, per¬ 
haps more than all, the sewing you ought to think 
of doing. But what is a great deal of work in one 
family, is not quite so much in another,and what one 
woman finds to be a difficult task, another woman, 
with her experience and conveniences, will fiud com¬ 
paratively easy. But the gist of what I want to say 
is this, don’t plan for your morrow’s work any more 
than it seems to-night you can easily accomplish. 
There was little Charley when he was so sick last 
spring, with the croup and spasms. The doctor 
explained to you the nature of his sickness; he 
said something about the contraction of the mus¬ 
cles, and of the trachea, larynx, and glottis ; the 
names, of course, were all familiar to you, and you, 
relying on your two school terms study of Physiol¬ 
ogy, thought yon understood all about the throat. 
But somehow what the doctor said was a little con¬ 
fusing to your ideas, and you inwardly resolved 
that you would study up the matter, but there nev¬ 
er has seemed to be any time for carrying out your 
resolve. Well, put that down as part of your work 
for the morrow. The old school book may look 
dingy, but a half hour’s study will quite refresh 
your memory, and you will not forget it this time, 
for it has a practical bearing on your own experi¬ 
ence. In your studies you will probably find still 
something else that you ought to understand more 
thoroughly. If you have not time now, reserve 
that until some other day. Then there was Min¬ 
nie, only yesterday, looking at the plants in such an 
admiring manner, and had first noticed the differ¬ 
ence in some flowers. She asked you a question 
about the flowers which you could not answer. At 
the first opportunity Jet your school Botany be tak¬ 
en down from the shelf ; you will find that it can 
still kindle your enthusiasm, and your mind will be 
younger and fresher, not only from the old associa¬ 
tions indelibly impressed on every page, but from 
the actual knowledge you have obtained. And you 
yourself will not be the only one benefited thereby ; 
for the little ones will be inspired with a love for 
and interest in the world of beauty around them. 
So keep on for a week, and you will be surprised 
how much more you know at its close than you did 
at its beginning. It is astonishing how much we 
can learn within a week if we will but turn our at¬ 
tention in the right way, or how much we can lose 
by becoming indifferent to our opportunities. 
There is probably no woman who can not have at 
least one half hour a day for self-improvement if 
she will but make up her mind to take it. And 
she should talce it, as it is a duty that she owes to 
herself and to her family. 
One great general excuse that we are not better, 
that our lives do not amount to more than they do, 
is “ lack of time.” Yet we have all the time there 
is, and all the time we ought to need, The He¬ 
brew king anticipated the wants and excuses of 
mankind when he so particularly specified the time 
for so many different employments. To this we 
may supplement for ourselves the blessing given to 
one of a still earlier period, “ As thy days so shall 
thy strength be.” 
How to Make a Mud Mat. 
At this season of the year, mud is one of the 
house-wife’s troubles. Those who work in the 
fields or in the barn-yard, cannot help having mud 
upon their boots, and 
some means must be 
provided to prevent it 
from being carried in¬ 
doors. Have a few mud 
mats about the doors 
and yards, and this 
trouble will be avoided. 
They may be made very 
easily. Procure a few 
dozen of common one- 
inch-square fence pick¬ 
ets, three feet or more 
in length, and a few branches or stems of elder an 
inch thick. Bore holes through the pickets in 
four places—near each end and two between— 
large enough to admit No. 9 fence wire; saw the 
elder stems into pieces an inch long, and force out 
the pith ; then string the pickets aud pieces of elder 
together alternately, in the shape shown in the 
illustration. Place washers over the ends of the 
wires, and after cutting the ends the proper length, 
rivet them down upon the washers. These mats 
may be kept outside of the door-step, and if the 
boots are rubbed upon them, the soles will be freed 
from much of the coarser mud or earth adhering 
to them, and will not “muss up” the ordinary 
door mats nearly so much as without their use. 
A Flour and Bread Closet. 
The accompanying engraving shows the manner 
of making a very complete and compact flour chest 
with bread closet, bake board, and shelves ; it also 
has drawers for spice and other articles used in 
bread and pastry making. Economy of room in 
the kitchen and cleanliness in use are two most de¬ 
sirable features in this contrivance. It is made 
like an ordinary cupboard 5 feet high, 3 feet wide 
in front, and 2 feet deep. At the upper part is a 
flour-chest which will hold about a barrel of flour; 
this is made with sloping sides, and lias a slide at 
the bottom, which, when drawn out, allows the flour 
to fall into a pan placed under it. At the front of 
the closet is a falling door held, when closed, by a 
button, and when down is supported by the lower 
doors, which are half opened for this purpose. A 
round pin is fitted on to the top of each lower 
door, and this enters into a round hole in the fall¬ 
ing door as it rests upon the other doors ; this is to 
prevent them from moving away and releasing the 
falling door. The falling door is the bake-board 
or bread-board. A recess beneath the flour chest 
has a shelf around it, and serves to hold rolling 
pins, mixing pan, shapes, and other utensils. At 
each side of the flour chest in the angular space 
left by the sloping sides, there are drawers for 
spice, soda, cream of tartar, and other matters. 
The cupboard below contains the bread crocks or 
bread shelves, pies, and other baked food. The 
cupboard should be made of the best well seasoned 
clear pine; it may be stained to imitate walnut, 
and varnished or oiled with boiled linseed oil. The 
joints should be closely matched to exclude vermin 
of all kinds, and dust, and if well made and kept 
perfectly clean, will not only be useful and con¬ 
venient, but ornamental to a neatly kept kitchen. 
- - - - - - 
Pure Drinking- Water.—A Filter. 
Pure water is a most important thing, but that 
from wells is often contaminated by injurious mat¬ 
ters. The well is too 
frequently in too close 
proximity to a cess¬ 
pool, a drain, or the 
barn-yard, and in coun¬ 
try places, where one 
would suppose the wa¬ 
ter should be of the 
purest kind, is, from 
these causes, charged 
with the most deadly 
poison. Decaying ar.i- 
. mat matter in solu- water-filter. 
tion in water is as 
deadly a poison as arsenic or strychnine, and many 
persons die from disease which has been caused by 
A MUD MAT. 
