348 
AME LUG A N AGE ICU LT URIST. 
[September, 
leave small V shaped projections, which are after¬ 
wards smoothed with a chisel; fig. 2 may be read¬ 
ily made by those who can use a turning lathe. 
A Fruit-Dryer. —For drying fruit and vegeta¬ 
bles in considerable quantities, a regular dryer, or 
drying-house is necessary, hut those who have no 
regular apparatus can dry quite a large supply by 
using the heat from the stove when that is not oth¬ 
erwise occupied. An open oven, or the warm closet 
with which the better stoves are furnished, may be 
turned to good account, and by the use of the frame 
here illustrated in fig. 3, the drying capacity of a 
stove may be greatly increased. The size of the 
frame will be governed by that of the stove, per¬ 
haps about four feet square will meet most cases ; 
it should be of li inch stuff; the legs are four feet 
long, or sufficient to lift the Erame well above the 
stove, and so arranged that they may be folded up 
and put away when out of use. The frame may be 
covered by stretching common wool twine from 
side to side to make a net work to hold the fruit, 
but it is much better to cover the bottom of the 
frame with a piece of wire cloth, which may be had 
Fig. 3.—A FRUIT-DRYER FOR STOVE. 
at most hardware stores. The capacity of the dryer 
may be increased by suspending a second and 
smaller frame below the first, as shown in the en¬ 
graving. The fruit or other material to be dried 
should be so far above the stove, or the fire should 
be so low, that there is no danger of cooking or 
scorching. With a very slight fire the drying will 
go on with surprising rapidity. Fruit dried by arti¬ 
ficial heat is much better than when dried by the 
sun, as there is no risk of partial fermentation, and 
it is kept out of the way of flies and other insects. 
A Kitchen Press. —The ordinary method of ex¬ 
tracting juice from fruits, lard from scraps, and the 
like, is by placing the material in a strong cloth and 
wringing and twisting by the main strength of the 
hands and arms. Screw presses serve a much bet¬ 
ter purpose, but are more or less expensive. Much 
aid may be derived from the use of a simple lever 
press, made upon the principle of a lemon squeezer, 
shown in fig. 4. The halves are made of oak or 
other hard wood, two feet long, three inches wide, 
and three-fourths inch thick. These are shaped at 
one end into handles, and hinged at the other. It 
requires two persons to manage this ; one to hold 
the material in the bag or cloth, and the other to 
apply the pressure. Fig. 5 shows how the same 
press may be arranged to be worked by one person ; 
one of the halves of fig. 5 is hinged to a piece of 
board two feet long and fourteen inches wide, and 
set upon a table with one end elevated in the man¬ 
ner there represented. 
Home Topics. 
BY FAITH ROCHESTER. 
Helpim; a Husband. 
Isn’t there a universal groan going up because it 
is so haid to get a living ? People who are already 
rich—especially if they got their wealth by specula¬ 
tion or by public office—put on airs of-wisdom, and 
assure the poor that nobody need remain poor. 
Only let them live economically ; wages are good ; 
by saving a little every year any one can soon get 
rich. But the man with a growing family can’t al¬ 
ways see this. He wants books and papers, and 
music and pictures in his homeland he thinks his 
family has as much need of their refining influence 
as any other family. He loves to see his own wife 
dressed in good clothes on Sundays and holidays, 
and he knows that she is best pleased with him 
when he is well-dressed, and both of them wish to 
give their children the best opportunities for good 
health and a good education. His own wages are 
hardly sufficient to cover all these expenses. How 
can his wife help him ? 
In former times she did all of the work of the 
family, not only the cooking, and washing and 
ironing, and sewing, but also the spinning and 
weaving of cloth, and soap-making, and fruit-pre¬ 
serving, and candle-dipping. Some say that we 
must go back to that kind of life. Others tell us 
that such retrogression would not pay, even in 
dollars and cents, but they say that now women 
are relieved from so many of the old labors by the 
work of factories, they ought to engage in the 
mechanical, mercantile and professional kinds of 
business, so that they may not only support them¬ 
selves while single, but help to fill the family purse 
after marriage. It does seem best that every young 
woman should be prepared to earn her own living, 
as a part of her education ; and that she should 
support herself by her own labor if it falls to her 
lot, either through necessity, as in the cases of 
most working girls, or through natural adaptation 
and inclination, as in the case of Clara Louise 
Kellogg, Gail Hamilton, or many an obscure doer 
of good work. 
But it surely is not best, as a general rule, that 
wives should be expected to earn money by any 
regular business, especially if they are mothers. 
There may be circumstances of sickness or debt, 
or poverty, which make it seem necessary for a 
mother to do this, but the home care of her hus¬ 
band and children is business enough for the mother 
of two or more children, and if the actual labors of 
house-keeping are added to thi3 home-making 
business, and if both are done well, there is cer¬ 
tainly not strength to spare for any other regular 
occupation. A man who wants to have a good 
natured wife, ready every day to give him that 
smiling welcome—which is the old recipe for keep¬ 
ing him from making a drunken brute of himself— 
had better see that his wife has some leisure and 
some rest. These remarks apply not only to the 
woman who leaves her children in the care of 
strangers, while she goes about the country de¬ 
livering lectures, or rides by day or night to visit 
sick patients, but quite as much to the farmer’s 
wife who has the care of a butter-making business 
imposed upon her by her husband, or who, sick or 
well, has to work with might and main through all 
the hottest season, to take care of the various 
kinds of fruit which her husband has planted, in 
the cool expectation that the women-folks will do 
the main part of the fruit-picking and preserving, 
or marketing. If a wife has time and strength to 
devote to it, the butter-making or fruit-drying busi¬ 
ness is a good one, but I wish the “ conservative ” 
brethren to see that a wife and mother, who has to 
neglect her real home work, her loving care and 
genial companionship as mother and wife, to help 
along in what he calls his business, is just as much 
out of her proper sphere as the mother who teaches 
school or delivers lectures. He had better consider, 
too, how far this applies to the business of taking 
boarders. 
Why need we try to get rich ? Why not begin to 
be rich instead ? Instead of bending soul and body 
to the task of getting a living, why not begin to 
live ?—for there is considerable difference between 
living and getting a living. Dwellers in the coun¬ 
try have no pressing need of costly paintings, if 
they make the most of their sunrise and sunset 
views, and there is a deal of the best of music to be 
had gratis. Let us rest from our digging and 
delving a little while every day and look about us 
for something beautiful, and listen for something 
musical, and ere long we shall find it in our own 
children’s bright and loving glances, and in their 
happy voices. Let us have something to read, and 
little family treats of one kind or another in the 
way of innocent diversion, whether any money goes 
into the bank or not. I see less reason, now-a-days, 
for us to worry about laying up money to send the 
children to college, since free schools of every 
grade are becoming more and more common, and 
since the best libraries are open to the public. The 
main point is to make comfortable homes for our 
little ones, until they are old enough to look out 
for themselves; to keep as sweet and wholesome 
as we can the little corner where our work is set, 
and to do our daily tasks as faithfully and cheer¬ 
fully as we are able, with faith in that Infinite 
Goodness which overrules all. 
The Baby-Jumper. 
At last I have my baby’s jumper in use again. It 
is such a simple contrivance, it seems a shame that 
baby should have been obliged to live two months 
without it, just because, after our removal and in 
papa’s absence, we never were quite able to get the 
jumper in jumping order. 
I hear of various baby-jumpers, 6ome of which 
must be very nice and convenient, but they are all 
more or less expensive, while our baby-jumper did 
not cost a penny’s outlay. 1 have never seen 
another like it, but I had the description and the 
jacket-pattern from a neighbor, who had given two 
or more of her children the benefit of such a jumper. 
It is a benefit to both mother and child. Indeed 
it is a benefit to all beholders, to laugh with baby 
when he dances about and bubbles over with the 
delight his own antics give him. My neighbor tells 
me that her little one, scarcely nine months old, 
sometimes stays contentedly in his jumper for an 
hour at a time, taking his exercise or resting at 
ease, while her hands are free to do the work of 
the family. Even after a child has learned to walk, 
it likes its jumper, and dances about, picking up 
its playthings from the floor, or leaning over to 
play. The exercise seems very wholesome and 
strengthening to every limb. When you have but¬ 
toned the jacket on the child, it is already in its 
seat, and this is buttoned to the straps of the 
jumper by four strong buttons at the shoulders. 
My baby’s jacket is made of strong double linen. 
It may be as ornamental as you choose, and the 
straps and hoop may be as gay as you like. I took 
a barrel hoop, and wound it first with black and 
then with a narrow strip of scarlet flannel put on 
so as to give the hoop a striped appearance. The 
hoop serves to hold the supporting straps apart, so 
that baby’s seat in the jacket is comfortable. The 
clothing should be smoothly arranged, protecting 
the legs properly, before the jacket seat is button¬ 
ed. The spring-pole, to which the jumper is at¬ 
tached, is usually of hickory. It must be fastened 
to the ceiling in two places, at least a yard apart, 
by strong staples, or screws if possible. My neigh¬ 
bor’s, being in a room with convenient beams over¬ 
head, is fastened up with two crotched sticks nail¬ 
ed to the beams. I thought I could make an elastic 
strap do instead of a spring-pole, and I sent for 
such a strap and a strong hook—and “ thereby 
hangs a tale.” 
When Mr. Rochester came home for Christmas, 
loaded with the Christmas gifts which we had been 
talking about in our letters, he handed me, among 
