GIRLS OF TO-DAY AND YESTERDAY. 
HE Girl of To-day is quite too serious a subject to 
be treated in one short paper. To defend her 
is unnecessary. She needs no champion, nor asks one. 
To analyze her would be the work of genius. To criti¬ 
cise her—who would dare ? 
This wonderful century, before making its exit from 
the stage of time, offers her opportunities which make 
her richer in being the American girl of to-day than 
to have been the most powerful queen that ever dwelt 
in ancient halls. The world of business as well as the 
world of art has flung wide the portals of her temples 
and bade her enter. Her generation is, up to date, the 
most favored that history has known. No shadow of 
national calamity has fallen across her pathway like 
that which darkened the youth of the generation be¬ 
fore her. The fates have stored their balmiest smiles 
for her, as if to make amends for the frowns they gave 
her mother. 
Progress has caught her in its tide, and si:e is han¬ 
dling her oars so well that man looks on in secret ad¬ 
miration and wonders where she learned the stroke. 
Oh, she is altogether lovely, this girl of '93, but she 
is dreadfully pervasive. You find her in everything, 
from an ice-cream parlor to an Arctic expedition. Take 
up your morning mail. She is as sure as politics to 
figure in the columns of the daily press. Open a re¬ 
ligious paper ; she is running a church fair or marry¬ 
ing a missionary. Turn to your agricultural weekly, 
and there she is with a page or two about fancy 
work ; to a mining journal, and she has just invented 
a machine for digging and hoisting ore. Fly to a funny 
paper for relief and you find her all over it. 
Hut she is doing so many nice things it is no wonder 
that the newspapers make a fad of her. And we are 
expecting great and good things of her in future, but 
now at her very best she is only a brilliant promise. 
We are so prone to worship the creation. The mas¬ 
terpiece is unveiled to the gaze of a heterogenous pub¬ 
lic. The majority exclaim at its beauty, but do not 
ask its author's name. A few remember the workman 
as well as his work. 
Almost three centuries ago the seed of American 
womanhood was sown in the rock-strewn soil of New 
England. History and romance, poetry and art have 
paid tribute to the planting. As long as painted can¬ 
vas or printed page exists to refresh the memory of 
man the Puritan maiden will stand in picturesque 
relief against the grim, gray back-ground of Plymouth 
Rock, her red cloak symbolic of the valor with which 
the women of her day met hardship ; her modest mien 
an index to the gentle dignity of their character. We 
are in no danger of forgetting her. 
To-day the women of America are the timber, 
straight and true and beautiful in its proportions. 
Hut during the “frightful interval” between the 
Puritan maiden and the girl of to-day, what a host of 
earnest women have been working in comparative 
obscurity ! 
Can any one measure the po ver for good that the 
women of the nineteenth century have been ? Can 
any one estimate the force of their organizations in 
lifting the race to a higher plane ? Timidly they 
ventured forth in quest of higher education, edging 
their way by slow degrees into the halls of learning 
hitherto held sacred to the use of men. 
The girl of to-day rides her bicycle up the broad 
road to our temple of liberal education. Many of its 
doors are wide open. She dismounts and flutters in at 
whatsoever door she chooses. She claims as her right. 
privileges undreamed of a generation ago, and thinks 
not that the pavement over which she has guided her 
shining wheel has been worn smooth by the plodding 
feet of men and women as earnest in their purpose as 
soldiers of the old crusades. Despite the proverb, it is 
a royal road to knowledge trod by the youth of to-day. 
The girl of to-day is a very sweet creature, but will 
she be all that the woman of to-day has been ? She 
knows that the day on which she receives the well 
earned laurels will be a proud and happy one in her 
mother’s life as well as in her own; but she does not 
know of a day long ago on which her mother’s school 
life ended. 
There was no diploma, no basket of flowers. Only 
a girl walking home with a few books under her arm, 
and in her heart the consciousness that she had done 
the best she could. She had just found out how much 
there was to be learned in the books and she wanted 
to “go away to school.” 
But the country was new and times were hard, and 
she knew at the door of that little district school 
house her school days had ended forever. 
If you think the girls of yesterday do not feel their 
early loss of mental training, go and ask some of them 
about it and be convinced, as I have, that it is not be¬ 
cause the people of this day are so studious that they 
are so well educated, but because the people of yester¬ 
day found out what they needed and put them in the 
way of getting it. 
A boy says, “ Yes, I know mother pinched like every¬ 
thing to get me through college,” but does he have 
any idea how she “pinched?” Does he see her rip¬ 
ping up the old carpet and putting the thin breadths 
at the edges ? Does he see her patching and dyeing 
old clothes, putting a new lining in the old carriage 
robe—aye, even painting the old buggy ? Anything 
to keep down the expenses until he had gained what 
she had wanted and missed so much ! 
[This unusual tribute to the “Girls of Yesterday,” 
the mothers of to-day, was read before a late farmers’ 
institute by a girl of to-day, Miss Mollie Caruthers. 
From it, as published in the Detroit Free Press House¬ 
hold, we have culled all that our space will permit,—En. 
TO KNIT, OR NOT TO KNIT. 
ITH pleasure did I read that piece about knit¬ 
ting, and I for one can say that it is a great 
gain to both read and knit at the same time. I am a 
lover of knitting, and this fall I have knit 38 pairs of 
large stockings and 6 pairs of mittens, and did read 
all the while when I was at work on them. Here in 
Utah are very few women and girls who know how to 
knit, and, if I ask them why they do not learn to knit, 
they shrug their shoulders and answer, “ We can 
buy our hose so cheap.” This is the truth, but how 
long do those hose wear ? No time at all, while here 
I can buy good yarn for the same price I would have 
to give for poor store hose, and then the pleasure of 
knitting is mine, and the hose do wear a good deal 
longer. 
You mothers may say, “Yes, but knitting does take a 
good deal of time and time we are short of.” Not so ; 
any housewife has many minutes in which she can sit 
down and pick up the knitting while it would not be 
worth while to take any sewing in hand. And why 
not teach the little girls to knit ? I was but a little 
lass of five years when my mother did teach me how to 
knit, and time and time again have I blessed her for 
that alone. Teach the girls to knit so many rounds 
each day before they can play. Let them knit their 
own stockings first; they will soon take pride as well 
as pleasure in their work, and in time you will have 
all your hose made at home. MRS. c. m. l. van dyk. 
[The above letter stands for more than the homely 
art it urges. In a postscript at its close, the writer 
states that she came from the Netherlands since her 
school days ; yet almost the only evidence the letter 
gives of this fact is in the pretty foreign use of the 
emphatic auxiliaries. This shows what can be done 
when the attention is given to any matter. How 
few of those who come to us after reaching maturity 
learn to speak our language well ; not to mention 
writing it. 
As to the knitting, doubtless there will always be 
two opinions. Our friend’s love of the work and her 
opinion are both a legacy of her childhood. But we 
th'nk there can hardly be a question as to the benefit 
of teaching the children this which may be either a 
useful art, or an accomplishment. They can then, 
when older, knit, or refrain from knitting, as circum¬ 
stances seem to dictate. 
A young mother once came to the Chief Cook in real 
distress. Her one rampant boy wore out long sale 
hose faster than her purse could furnish more. She 
had never learned to knit; her sister-in-law said she 
could never learn now, especially anything as com¬ 
plicated as stockings and mittens. Did the Chief 
Cook think so ? That authority assured her that any 
one could learn to knit if she willed to do so. Lessons 
were at once instituted. The first hose for this boy 
were fashioned without the difficult heel. As the lad 
grew, however, the mother's ambition kept pace. 
With personal instructions, combined with the same 
written out for her sole benefit, she learned to widen 
for a thumb in the laddie’s mittens, to “set the 
thumb,” to pick up the stitches and make the mitten 
complete ; but still she hesitated at the stocking heel 
with its purling and other intricacies. Still, the spur 
of necessity, and the encouragement and urging of 
her instructor finally overcame her hesitancy, and the 
dreaded task was accomplished. From that time for¬ 
ward this mother had the added respect for herself 
which every fresh acquirement gives. It was really 
worth while, even though it were but the hum-drum 
knitting. 
Yet to many an over-worked woman, the knitting 
which serves as pick-up work, is but slow suicide. 
The strain upon tired eyes, and the cramping of the 
arms against the thorax and viscera are incalculable. 
Especially should women who are dyspeptic, or those 
who suffer from uterine weakness, avoid knitting or 
crocheting. A physician prominent in the profession 
asserts with vigor that the nervous force expended in 
these trivial occupations is greater than would be 
needed to chop wood or to perform equally heavy 
work.—E d.] 
SOME FACTS ABOUT CAGE BIRDS. 
LIVE THORNE MILLER, the bird lover whose 
articles are so eagerly sought by high-class 
publications, has written a unique “ Bird Lore ” series 
for Harper’s Bazar. It will be remembered, perhaps, 
that Mrs. Miller is the lady who sent out a year or so 
ago, so many thousand postal card protests against 
the use of dead birds for millinery purposes. So far, 
however, from agreeing with the popular idea that 
confinement is cruelty to living birds, and that it 
would be an act of kindness to free them all, she in¬ 
sists that a captive bird property cavght and properly 
cherished need not be unhappy; and that it is rank 
cruelty rather than kindness to set free a bird wonted 
to captivity. “ To rescue one or more from the miser- 
erable conditions of a bird store, and make them happy 
in our own homes is a deed of charity.” She insists, 
however, that they must be well attended, and made 
happy by loving care, and that to leave them, as so 
many do, to die the victims of neglect, is “an outrage,” 
bitterly cruel, and even wicked. 
For singers, canaries and mocking-birds are espe¬ 
cially recommended ; for a delightful companion, one 
of our own native birds, wood-thrush, robin or blue¬ 
bird ; for the king of singers and one of the most in¬ 
telligent birds in the whole list, a Mexican bird. ( ‘Hut 
he will not siDg unless he loves his captor.”) 
Paroquets, cockatoos and macaws, Mrs. Miller char¬ 
acterizes as noisy and often unbearable ; yet affection¬ 
ate, ingenious in mischief, exceedingly entertaining 
as pets, easily kept happy and healthy, and long- 
lived. Of the mock'ng-bird she says: “No bird of 
my acquaintance will think of so many droll things to 
do, and be so certain to do them, as this one.’> 
Nearest like him is the cat-bird, which is guaranteed 
to be a sure panacea for lack of entertainment, or 
ennui, if allowed the liberty of the house. 
The Baltimore oriole is exceedingly decorative, in- 
qu sitive, interesting; and if kept alone, becomes 
very tame and friendly. 
The Virginia cardinal is considered by some a finer 
singer than the nightingale, but he does not become 
friendly. 
The beautiful scarlet tanager does not become recon¬ 
ciled to captivity, and is quite sure to mope and die ; 
will eat nothing but flies. 
The blue jay is more than usually fascinating. 
The Brazilian cardinal is a beauty in soft dove-color 
with scarlet head, bright and merry, and a tireless 
and rather loud singer ; also easily kept in health. 
The English goldfinch is described as “ a pleasant 
little fellow ” and a sweet singer, not fretting in con¬ 
finement. _ 
Sour-milk Biscuits.— Once upon a time I could not 
make them fit to eat, but afterwards I could, and 
this is the way to do it: Mash the soda fine with a 
case-knife on a flat surface, then measure it, mix it 
with the flour and salt, and sift all together twice. 
Then, after stirring in the sour milk, roll and cut 
out the biscuits and get them into a hot oven as quickly 
as possible. The milk should be clabbered, else it is 
not sour enough, and it should have been kept, from 
its youth up, in a pure atmosphere. The proportion 
of soda should be one even teaspoonful to a pint of 
sour milk. If there is much cream in the milk less 
soda should be used, for there is but little acid in sour 
cream compared with that in sour milk. A little cream 
supplies shortening enough. Flour varies so that 
exact rules cannot be given as regards quantity, but 
a scant quart of unsifted flour to a pint of sour milk 
is nearly the right proportion. One or two trials will 
generally show just how much of a particular brand 
is necessary, and after that the exact amount can be 
measured out before beginning operations, l. robbins. 
YVhen Baby was sick, we gave her Castorla, 
When she was a Child, she cried for Castorla, 
When she became Miss, she clung to Castorla, 
When she had Children, she gave them Castorla 
