Women Make the 
Homes. 
Woman And The Home 
Homes Make the 
Nation. 
HINTS FOR HOME STUDY. 
Saving Money and Saving Time. 
J. W. NEWTON. 
M ANY hours are thoughtlessly wasted by young people, 
precious opportunities which, once lost, can never 
be recalled. How can the spare hours and minutes be 
saved ? One way is by spending them in study ; not alone 
in the study of books, but in the study of Nature, of God’s 
wonderful works. So many of us go through the world 
with our eyes shut and our ears closed to the wonders and 
beauties around us. There are the animals with their 
varieties of structure and habit, the plants with their 
many forms and uses, the stones, rocks and soils, the 
heavenly bodies and their mysterious motions—all these 
are before us to study and admire. Then there are the 
wide fields of physics and chemistry yielding profit as well 
as pleasure to him who searches therein. Many young 
people who do not have opportunities for these studies in 
school can learn much at home, and it is to aid and en¬ 
courage such that I write. Books are necessary, especially 
where there are no teachers, but to study books of science 
without studying Nature is to do one’s-self a great injury. 
The study of animals and plants naturally divides into 
three parts; first, their structure; second, their habits and 
uses, and third, their classification. The latter is espe¬ 
cially important in studying plants. It is best to first take 
a general view of the field of science, and among the best 
books for this purpose are the works of Paul Bert, Primer 
of Scientific Knowledge, and First Steps in Scientific 
Knowledge. The second work is larger and more com¬ 
plete than the first, and is to be preferred. I wish all of 
the young people who read The Rukal New-Yorkeb 
could get this inexpensive little book ; it might save them 
many hours of time and lead to other studies in science. 
An excellent help in studying animals is Morse’s First 
Book of Zoology. Used with Steele’s Popular Zoology one 
can get a vast amount of information about animals, but 
this should lead to observation. Books should lead to the 
study of Nature herself. To read or study books about 
animals is not enough, but books are a great help. Birds 
Through an Opera Glass is one of the best books I have 
found to lead to the study of Nature. It belongs to the 
Riverside Library for Young People, a series with which 
the young people who read The Rural should get ac¬ 
quainted. Johonnot’s Glimpses of the Animate World 
is an excellent work to read in connection with the study 
of animals. 
Gray’s How Plants Grow is the standard botany for 
young people. The Fairyland of Flowers is another good 
primary work. For older students, Gray’s Lessons and 
Manual are, of course, the standard works. Dana’s The 
Geological Story Briefly Told is one of the best of its 
kind. Shaler’s First Book in Geology is helpful, if one 
makes due allowance for the Darwinism in it. Steele’s 
Fourteen Weeks in Geology, is now superseded by Steele’s 
Popular Geology which is very useful. Dana’s Manual, 
is the standard in geology. Steele’s New Astronomy and 
Young’s Elements of Astronomy are among the best for 
home or school study. The latter carries the study farther 
than the former and is more difficult. 
All these sciences require observation; the student 
must learn from Nature, must use his eyes. In chemistry 
and physics the student must not only use his powers of 
observation, but in order to succeed he must make experi¬ 
ments. Books are more necessary in the study of chemis¬ 
try and physics wnere one has not teachers, than in that 
of the other sciences. One of the best elementary works 
on physics is Cooley’s Elements of Natural Philosophy. 
Steele’s Popular Physics is one of the best books on the 
subject to read, and is excellent to study. It has taken 
the place of Fourteen Weeks in Physics, and should be 
substituted for that work wherever that is used. Gage’s 
Elements of Physics is, on the whole, the best for home 
study and for schools that lack apparatus, as it describes 
experiments which can be performed with simple and 
often home-made apparatus, besides being an able work in 
other respects. It must not be confounded with Gage’s 
Introduction to Physical Science. The latter is especially 
valuable on account of its fullness in topics connected 
with electricity. Boys intending to become electricians 
or interested in this branch of science, should obtain and 
study this treatise. Cooley’s Easy Experiments in Phys¬ 
ical Science contains directions for performing a large 
number of simple experiments In natural philosophy and 
chemistry. Cooley’s Guide to Elementary Chemistry for 
Beginners is valuable for home study. Steele’s Popular 
Chemistry is one of the best for general use. Williams’s 
Introduction to Chemical Science is another text-book of 
special value. The Young Chemist, by Appleton, is a 
brief and concise work, while Quantitative Analysis, by 
the same author, is excellent *for home study and for 
schools with little apparatus. 
It is sad to think how many young people grow up in 
the country with no knowledge of Nature. Having eyes 
they see not the wonders and beauties with which they 
are surrounded. A little money spent for books and ap¬ 
paratus, a little spare time spent in study, would open up 
the treasure house of Nature, and be a source of dally de¬ 
light. An hour or more a day spent in study, taking 
astronomy, physics and chemistry in the winter, and 
zoology, botany and geology in the summer, would accom¬ 
plish a great deal. And how easy it would be for most 
young people to spend an hour a day, or an evening, in 
study. Cannot you do it ? 
COUNTRY SCHOOLS. 
S OME writer has said “Wherever there is failure, there 
is some step omitted, which Nature never pardons.” 
That the district school in the country fails in much which 
it might accomplish is very evident. Probably a fair pro¬ 
portion of the readers of The Rural New-Yorker re¬ 
ceived their early education there, and many of them no 
doubt look back with regret upon the “ chaos twice con¬ 
fused” which presided. There was a total lack of system 
and the teacher’s work was thus made ineffective and the 
pupil was proportionately careless and discouraged. Each 
pupil selected his own studies and when one of them be¬ 
came distasteful, it was dropped, without a thought of his 
proficiency in it. Such “ elective courses” could have but 
one result. Pupils were not thorough in anything and if 
a study was, by chance, mastered, it was either by accident 
or on account of a superior power of application on the 
part of the pupil. Grammar and geography could not be 
completed in one term and the new term brought a new 
teacher, often a new text book and the class began again 
at the beginning, toiled over the well-beaten path again 
and seldom reached the end. Do you remember how we 
were taught (?) grammar? You, surely, have not forgotten 
how we would parso long sentences, in which there were 
all sorts of “ quips and quirks.” We could decline nouns 
and pronouns and conjugate verbs as glibly as the young¬ 
sters of to-day can talk baseball; but we rarely realized 
that Nominative I, Possessive my or mine, Objective me 
was anything more than a mere formula, and you might 
easily hear one young grammarian say to another, “ Are 
you going home at noon John? I be.” We lacked the oral 
instruction, the criticism and example which alone teach 
language. 
Arithmetic is not often neglected in our country 
schools. We look well to the “mighty dollar” and we 
must have arithmetic to assist us in gaining It and taking 
care of it when gained. 
Reading is taught with but little care; in most Instances, 
indeed, it is a rare thing to find a really good reader. 
Writing is frequently left to teach itself without any aid 
except the copy books. Regular and thorough examina¬ 
tions are held in the graded schools in our towns, which 
teach pupils to measure their attainments by a correct 
standard, doing away with foolish conceit on one hand 
and equally foolish self-depreciation on the other. There 
are feeble attempts, sometimes, to hold examinations in 
our country schools, but they are nearly always failures. 
Our country schools need as thorough and regular courses 
of study in the lower branches as our colleges have in the 
higher, and a pupil should not be allowed to pass from 
one study to another until he has passed a satisfactory 
examination and received a certificate showing his stand¬ 
ing. The course of study should be arranged with direct 
reference to the calling which it is expected he will pursue 
or the course which he expects to take up in some higher 
institution of learning. True, many never go higher than 
the country school, but if any pupil wishes to do so he 
will not find the first year of his course hampered and 
embarrassed by any “conditions” which will injuriously 
extend their influence over time which should be given 
to the regular work of his course. While text books are 
necessary in nearly all studies, the teacher should be so 
well versed in everything which he is required to teach, 
that he can give a fair amount of oral instruction, in each 
branch, from sources not easily consulted by the pupil. 
This is more especially valuable in the case of young 
children. A story bearing upon the lesson, or an apt 
illustration from some familiar object, will impress the 
child with a remembrance of the fact about which he is 
learning more thoroughly than would pages of text book 
lore. Physiology and hygiene are frequently taught en¬ 
tirely by oral lessons and it is wonderful how quickly the 
little tots of five or six years will catch the principal facts 
and retain them. 
“ To help the young soul, add energy, inspire hope and 
blow the coals into a useful flame—to redeem defeat by 
new thought, by firm action” is the work of the true 
teacher and there is none which is nobler. 
Emerson says : “ The true test of civilization is, not 
the census, not the size of the cities, not the crops—no, but 
the kind of men which the country turns out.” And 
though much depends upon natural talent, birth and 
blood, even more depends upon how that talent is nur¬ 
tured and cultivated from its earliest existence. 
Seneca Co., N. Y. _ ' s. A. little. 
NOTES ON “THE PROBLEM OF THE AGE.” 
A LTHOUGH those who profess to known are fond of 
saying that there is nothing new in the cooperative 
schemes set forth in Bellamy’s most popular work, the 
idea of cooperative housekeeping as a practicable thing 
seems, through its influence, to have taken a firmer grip 
upon the popular mind than ever before. Countless 
minds are turning strongly towards this idea as a possible 
solution of the problem of housekeeping, and those who 
have been afraid to make the venture themselves are 
watching with eager eyes to see the outcome of the bold 
initial essayists of the scheme. 
Criticism, meanwhile, flourishes in a congenial atmos¬ 
phere—that of doubt. One critic asserts that Utopian 
hash must be a failure; another goes further, and gives 
reasons why this failure is a foregone conclusion by as¬ 
serting that it is impossible to prepare food to be delicate 
or even palatable, in very large quantities. She insists that 
there can be no perfection in the fine art of cookery unless 
“ brains, and imagination, and deftness of touch,” go into 
the work, which would make a mental bankrupt of the 
cooperative cook. 
It is greatly to be regretted that the apparent failure of 
the Evanston combination has lessened the confidence of 
the advocates of cooperation, while it has given great 
boldness to the adverse critics. A more successful attempt 
along this line has been reported in the daily papers since 
the Evanston fiasco. It was on a much smaller scale than 
the other. The Evanston club included 50 families, and 
meals were delivered by means of “Norwegian kitchens” 
(tin or zinc) to the various private dining-rooms. The 
later combination (which was, we think really earlier, 
although not made public) at Utica, N. Y., consisted of 
five families only at first. These formed themselves into 
a club, leased and furnished a club-house, and arranged 
for real cooperative housekeeping, as far as dining-room 
and kitchen were concerned. Members of the club took 
turns in buying the supplies, the motto being : “ The best 
of everything, but no extravagance,” and the expense, as 
reported, was $3.00 per week each. A good point was the 
contract entered into at the outset, which bound all mem¬ 
bers to give the plan at least three months’ trial. The 
three months were up about the middle of January, and 
it was reported that all were so well satisfied that no one 
would withdraw; no complaints had been made, and the 
number of members had increased to 50, and no more 
could be taken, although new applications were received 
daily. At this point, our advices cease, but we shall 
watch with interest for further reports. 
This club comprised only families well known to one an¬ 
other, and no one was admitted who was not likely to 
prove congenial—a necessary limitation, if harmony were 
to be insured. 
If we may judge by results, as they appear in the maga¬ 
zine, Marion Harland and Jenny June hold sharply op¬ 
posite views as to the proper working out of the thought 
represented by the name of the Home-maker. Under the 
supervision of the former, rather light stories, house¬ 
keeping matter, recipes, hints on home decoration—in¬ 
deed, whatever might be thought most likely to attract, 
and to afford enjoyment to the average woman who is a 
home-keeper—made up the several issues. Mrs. Croly has 
changed all this. In the words of one of her admirers: 
“ She holds that woman-kind shall not live by trivialities 
and frippery alone; but by uncommon sense, applied to 
daily service. She is making an obvious success of the 
Home-maker.” 
The matter now given relates more to the world at large 
and to abstruse topics; much of it is descriptive, and a 
goodly space is given to the reports of the various women’s 
clubs, which are discussing “ Ethical Culture,” “ Political 
Science,” “Literature,” etc. A masculine critic asked— 
we think in the last number issued under the former 
editorship—whether the magazine could not be made 
“more virile.” Perhaps this word best expresses just 
what it now is. Whether it will suit as well the needs of 
the home-maker as it does those of the club-maker, re¬ 
mains to be seen. 
The fashion of having a single idea carried out in enter¬ 
tainments has attacked even weddidgs. Harper’s Bazar 
gives an account of a “Rose Wedding,” which it charac¬ 
terizes as “one of the prettiest weddings seen in Grace 
Church for many a season.” The church was decorated 
with rose-bushes and great bunches of La France Roses. 
The bridesmaids wore Louis Quinze coats of rose brocade, 
veils of pink chiffon, and pink satin slippers. They also 
carried bouquets of pink flowers, as did also the maids of 
honor. The youthful looking mother of the bride wore 
white brocade, with folds of rose velvet about the neck. 
Many of the guests at the above wedding wore cloth 
dresses in the palest tints. The windows of the city stores 
are full of such cloths, which have been used all the sea¬ 
son for evening wear. They will be a favorite for spring 
wear, the newer ones being described by the “ Paris cor¬ 
respondent” as of light weight and color, and almost as 
glossy as satin. 
It is said that the Princess of Wales has given orders 
that nothing need be submitted for her inspection, or 
that of her daughters, in which birds are used as trim¬ 
ming. Long live Alexandra! 
In writing to advertisers, please mention The R. N.-Y. 
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cutaneous Oh arm 
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THE PACKER MFG. CO., 100 Fulton St., N. Y. 
