lonustk <£c0tt0mii. 
CONDUCTED BY MARY A. E. WAGER. 
THE HOUSEKEEPER’S TRAGEDY. 
ONE day, as I wandered, I beard a complaining. 
And saw a poor woman, the picture of gloom: 
She glared at the mud on her door-step ('twas rain¬ 
ing,) 
And tips was her wall as she wielded her broom : 
“ O! hie is it toil, and love is a trouble, 
And beauty will fade, and riches will flee. 
And pleasures they dwindle, and prices they double. 
And nothing is what I could wish it to be. 
•• There’s too much of worriinent goes to a bonnet; 
There's too much of Ironing goes to a shirt; 
There's nothing that pays for the time you waste on 
it: 
There’s nothing that lasts us but trouble and dirt. 
*• In March it is muddy: it's slush In December; 
The midsummer breesses are loaded with dust; 
In fall the leaves litter; in muggy September 
The wall paper rots and the candlesticks rust. 
“ Thore are worms In the cherries, and slugs in the 
rose9. 
And ante in the sugar, and mice In the pios. 
The rubbish of spiders no mortal supposes. 
And ravaging roaches and damaging flies. 
“ It’s sweeping at six, and Its dusting at seven ; 
Its victuals at eight, and It’s dishes at nine; 
It s pottlogand panning from ten to eleven; 
We scarce break our fast ore we plan how to dine. 
“ With grease and with grime, from corner to center. 
Forever at war and forever alert, 
No rest for the day, lest the enemy enter— 
I spend my whole lite in a struggle with dirt. 
“ I,aat night, lu my dream, I was stationed forever 
On a llttlii bare isle in the tnldst of the sea; 
My one chance of life was a ceaseless endeavor 
To sweep off the wave* cm they swept off poor me. 
" Alas! 'twas no dream—again I behold It! 
I yield, I am helpless my fate to avert." 
She rolled down her sleeves, her apron she folded. 
Then laid down and died, and was buried in dirt. 
[Selected. 
-- 
ABOUT CABBAGE. 
BY JULIA COLMAN. 
We are not H vegetarian ” enough to be 
willing to be made up of cabbage and tur¬ 
nips. Browsing on leaves does very well 
for cattle. They seem to he the natural food 
of several species of animals, the most of 
whom have an assortment of stomachs for 
the more complete digestion of that kind of 
fodder. Neither do we think it peculiarly 
becoming to the dignity of man to go root¬ 
ing in the earth for his nutrition, so long as 
there is so great a variety of more pleasing, 
refined, and nutritious food found growing 
above its surface. 
It will lie found, also, that these things 
are not so easy of digestion in the human 
stomach as fruits and grains. They require 
cabbage so that it may be thoroughly satu¬ 
rated with the acid, and serve warm, with 
the liquor. Borne may wish salt with this; 
others will prefer it without, as the salt coun¬ 
teracts the acid. 
A Irt Cranberry. 
The juice of steeped cranberries may be 
used in the same way, but in much larger 
proportion than of the lemon juice—say that 
from a pint of cranberries for a medium sized 
head of cabbage. If a little pains is taken, 
the quarters of cabbage can be very prettily 
tinted with this juice, (it maybe added when 
the cabbage is half done,) and then if you 
wish to make the most of the dish, have 
some also prepared in another dish with 
arm (fcc 0 tt 0 tm 
BAGASSE IN SUGAR BOILING. 
In a communication from the pen of Mr. 
A. N. Wallace, in Rural New-Yorker 
of July 80th, I notice an inaccuracy that 
ought to be corrected. I may here observe 
that an experience running through a period 
of thirty-live years, enables me to verity and 
endorse nearly everything said by the writer 
in regard to sugar culture. The Inaccuracy 
alluded to relates to tlie proportion bagasse 
bears to wood or fuel. He tells us “ the ba- 
lemon. And if the occasion be specially gasse from canes required to make a liogs- 
grand, the one who is serving the table may 
inquire of the guests if they will have cab¬ 
bage a la lemon, or a la cranberry ? 
But if I were getting up a grand dinner, I 
probably should not have cabbage at all. 
Perhaps in criticising this, you will say that 
if it takes so large a proportion of cranber¬ 
ries as that, you would prefer to have them 
stewed by themselves. If so, I should quite 
agree with you. 
8t«cped Cabbage. 
It must be observed, however, as in the 
case of many other vegetables, that much of 
the flavor is lost by cooking in a large pro¬ 
portion of water, which is commonly thrown 
away. Good, tender cabbage, (there is much 
difference in kinds,) will be found very deli¬ 
cate if steamed or cooked in as little water 
as possible until perfectly tender, requiring 
an hour or more, and then served quite by 
itself, or dressed with a meat gravy, or 
I white sauce. A very good dish is made by 
placing chopped cabbage in ft stewpan, fill¬ 
ing it (the cabbage) half full of water and 
steeping it very slowly until tender, say 
an hour. Have the water done out as 
nearly as possible, and then till it nearly 
full of milk or cream, give it one scald and 
serve. Some cook it in the milk, but to my 
taste it is not so good, and if it were, the 
tact that cooked milk is not so wholesome 
would induce to me to dispense with it. 
Milk and grease cooked into anything make 
very indigestible dishes, and partly for this 
reason I never boil cabbage with meats. 
Cabbage boiled with pork is one of the most 
indigestible dishes that ever came upon our 
tables. Habit, also, has made me consider 
it more delicate without. 
-++-+- 
CONTRIBUTED RECIPES. 
Bed Bun Exterminator* 
Use the following:—One-quarter ounce red 
precipitate; one-quarter ounce blue stone; 
head of sugar, is equivalent to half a cord ol 
wood, when used as fuel.” The fact is, the 
bagasse is equivalent to sixty-six anil two- 
thirds per cent, of the fuel necessary to boil 
the requisite amount of cane juice down to 
the sugar point. 
Tlie usual estimate for 1,200 pounds of su¬ 
gar, made in our old-fashioned kettles, is, and 
lias ever been, three cords of good wood. If 
three-fourths of a cord of wood will make a 
hogshead, tlie estimate of Mr. Wallace is 
correct; but not otherwise. I built bagasse 
sheds during the year 1845, and used them 
myself till 1350, and never failed to make 
two hogsheads of sugar with the bagasse from 
the three previous seasous. 
During the war, nearly all the shedarotted 
down, and none have been put up since; but 
there cannot be a shadow of a doubt as to 
the feasibility of making up every pound of 
sugar with the bagasse, by the introduction 
of machinery and apparatus economizing 
fuel at least fifty per cent., and which is now 
going up on all new places. 
I may as well add that In one Instance, not 
a mile from this town, a planter—and one of 
the most successful before the war, having 
made over $350,000 in thirteen years, with a 
Cash capital of only $8,000 to start with— 
when his sheds rotted down, resorted to 
stacking his bagasse, and conveyed it to the 
furnace in a sled drawn by a single horse or 
mule. The day is not remote when every 
hogshead of sugar will be made with the 
bagasse. Attakopak. 
New Iberia, La., Am?., 1870. 
-♦ * » — 
ECONOMICAL NOTES. 
very careful mastication, and it this is not. one pj n ^ turpentine. Thoroughly mix and 
performed, they are apt to induce acidity ot a pp|y with a brush or feather, 1 willwur- 
the stomach. They are, therefore, very im- nlnt that none will stay long where this is 
proper food for Invalids and young children. uaa [_ 0 3 j 
Bui, for adults with healthy stomachs and 
active habits, they may be allowed to form 
a part of one meal a day, without any ill re¬ 
sults accruing, so far as we know. And, as 
it, is desirable not to make confessedly poor 
articles of diet any more unwholesome by the 
manner of their preparation, we will take a 
look into that matter. 
L'abbage 
is said to he most easily digested raw. We 
confess to no distaste for it in that shape, if 
we may be permited to pick out the tender 
leaves near the center of a head of nice 
savoy, but we have never utilized them for 
the table in that way. And as to the matter 
of tanle, we have no dislike to pickled cab¬ 
bage ; but as we cannot defend the use of 
vinegar on the score of health, we conscien¬ 
tiously retrain from recommending it. And 
this is one difficulty in t he use of cabbage in 
any shape. Most people eat it With vinegar, 
don’t, care a fig for it without. Very well, 
be it remembered we do not urge them to 
eat it. There is an abundance of other good 
things to eat, and I dare say we should all 
survive the catastrophe if it were left out of 
our list of supplies altogether- But then 
there is no necessity for that. There are 
some natural fruit acids which are much 
pleasanter to my notion, and certainly far | 
more wholesome than acetic acid, the pro¬ 
duct of decay found in vinegar. 
A la Leman. 
A very appetising disli may be made by 
steeping about one quart of shred cabbage 
half filled with water until nearly tender, say 
three-fourths of an hour, then add the pulp 
and juice of one large lemon, two heaping 
spoonfuls of sugar, (more or less to suit the 
taste,) and one spoonful of wetted flour or 
wheat meal. If cinnamon is liked occasion¬ 
ally for variety a teasponful of the ground 
article, or a little more of the broken stick 
may be added. Cook five minutes and serve 
warm or cold. 
Lemon juice may also be applied in other 
j forms. It may be squeezed directly on the 
t boiled cabbage, instead of vinegar; but a 
^ better plan, to mv notion, is to quarter the 
heads, steep them slowly in a closely covered 
5 porcelain kettle until quite tender, in as little 
fdv water as may be, and keep it from burning; 
r then add lemon juice to the taste, say two 
k lemons to a cabbage, large or small, respcc- 
lively; steep ten minutes longer, turning the 
8<iuuhIi Fritters. 
A pint of squash, or less, from the dinner 1 
table, one egg, two spoonfuls of flour. Fry 
in a spider or on the griddle for breakfast. 
Fried S<jun*li. 
Slice thin, dip in egg, then in Hour, and 
fry in butter. Both of these squash prepa¬ 
rations are excellent.—D ork Hamilton. 
To Preserve Ureeu Corn iu Brine. 
Tell Laura to gather her green corn, as 
much as she wants to pickle, husk and take 
off the silk nicely and put it iu a boiler of boil¬ 
ing water, cook till thoroughly done, take it 
out and let it cool. While letting it cool 
make a strong brine that will swim an egg; 
then cut the corn off of the cob, carefully 
[tut it in a well glazed stone jar to prevent, it 
from soaking through, then pour your brine 
over the corn till covered, and cover, and 
you have corn that will keep for years,—A 
Western Housekeeper. 
Preserved lilncklierrien and Knupberries. 
I have just been lasting soipe very deli¬ 
cate preserves made of these two fruits mixed, 
about three-fourths blackberries and one- 
fourth red raspberries. They were made up 
by the usual rule, pound for pound, (of sugar 
and fruit,) the sugar heated with barely wa¬ 
ter enough to melt it, then boiled and skim¬ 
med, and the fruit put in and stewed till 
tender. Then the fruit was skimmed out, 
the sirup steeped slowly for half an hour, 
and poured over the fruit. Blackberries 
treated iu this way are not likely to be so 
hard and seedy as when steeped longer hi 
the sirup. But I like canned fruit the best— 
think it the most wholesome, and another 
year I shall mingle some blackberries and 
raspberries in the cans. The latter fruit im¬ 
parts a delicacy of flavor that Is very desira¬ 
ble. I think the mixture a little better than 
either fruit by itself.— Anna B. 
- 
Domestic Inquiries.—M. A. Arkrbauf.ii asks 
some one to tell her how to cook summer 
squashes—how to make pies, custards, &e., from 
them.—'O. J.C.asks for “u recipe for putting up 
corn injurs;” has tried three years and failed. 
Also wants a recipe for making a good baking 
powder that will contain but a small quantity of 
soda.—Another subscriber asks tlie best, way to 
can tomatoes.—A Farmer’s Daughter wants to 
know tho best way to put up Siboriun crab 
apples. 
Carpenter’s Automatic l< uper mid Hinder. 
Allusion has beer .... e in theaecolutmis 
to this machine. O B., Fond du Lac, Wis., 
writes the Rural New-Yorker that, lie has 
seen it perform in a field of green rye, suc¬ 
cessfully ; that the inventor was confident it 
could not be bettered, it doing the work to 
his satisfaction. Some of I lie parts of the 
machine require strengthening. It reaps, 
rakes, binds and deposits the bundles in a 
rack which holds twelve, whence they are 
tipped"out to the right of the driver by a 
lever operated by him, all clear from the 
track of tho horses. The machine is of light 
draft, aud binds with annealed wire. Our 
correspondent adds:—•“ Mr. Carpenter has 
studied for years, and spout fortunes, to per¬ 
fect his machine. It has told heavy on liis 
mind; he has grown gray very fast” 
noway to get rid of charlock except to pre¬ 
vent its seeding. And wc know of no 
grain crop that, can be grown where it grows 
that will mature before charlock, with equal - 
chance. Defoliation when the plant is in 
bloom is tlie surest way we know of destroy¬ 
ing it _ 
Scttiusi Fence mid Gate PoMtn. 
Alonzo Bradt of Skaneateles, N. Y., 
writes:—“ In this vicinity, for several years, 3 
the manner of setting has been with hydrau¬ 
lic or water lime and coarse, clean sand or 
fine gra vel, the proportion, one of the former 1 
to four or live of the latter, it should be ! 
mixed thoroughly, rather thin, and the hole ' 
filled to the surface. There may be small 1 
stones thrown in as the hole is being filled, ' 
which should uot be less than three feet 
deep.” 
. A Louisiana correspondent says, in that 
State the planters have always been in the 
habit of using the heart of cypress trees for 
fence posts. They split them from nine to 
ten feet long, having holes In which to place 
the rails near the center, leaving a sufficient 
length on either end to put iu the ground. 
By this means, when the ends are rotted off, 
the posts can be inverted and the rails again 
put iu place, It. was repeatedly noticed that 
some of the posts would last more than twice 
as long as others of like size split from the 
same tree. On examination, it was found iu 
every instance that, the posts which were tho 
most enduring were placed with the reverse 
end down. 
Effects of UnderdYalill liar. 
We have often heard of the great benefits 
resulting from underdraining, but have never 
seen them more strikingly illustrated than 
recently, on viewing a piece of land on 
which cabbage grew last season. We un¬ 
derstood the proprietor to say that he had 
sold from Ills piece of land, containing three- 
fourths of an acre, 4,000 heads—varying In 
weight from twenty to forty-seven pounds 
each, averaging at least thirty pounds—at 
tlie rate of $18.75 per hundred head. 'Phis, 
if we compute right, gives a net product of 
more than $900 to the acre. When we take 
into view that the culture of cabbage re- 
1 quires no extraordinary skill, and but a J 
moderate application of labor, vve think this 
product equal to to any we have seen. We 
know not to what to attribute it, except 
to the fact that the entire piece has re- 
, cently been imderdrnined to the depth of 
} about three feet. It is fiat land, has been 
well fertilized for many years by the liberal 
, application of sea manure, and lias generally 
. yielded from two to three tons of hay to tho 
[ acre, besides a fair cutting for second crop. 
, If iinderdraiiiing can produce such effects, 
j there are hundreds of acres along the shores 
of Old Essex (Mass.) that can be equally 
t benefited by this process. — A Constant 
r> Reader. 
be JJouItriHJarb. 
POULTRY NOTES. 
Sebright Fowls. 
1 saw an article in tbe Rural New- 
Yorker about Sebright fowls. I think that 
your correspondent has the right name for 
his fowls. They have been in these parts 
for over two years, aiul have no other name 
than the Sebright. They are a large, heavy- 
set fowl, very broad over the back and dark 
color—neither black nor brown- with speck¬ 
led neck and breast. They have a tuft of 
feathers running down the outside of tbe 
leg on tho toe. I have five young chicks, 
and they are splendid birds. Tlie gentle¬ 
man I got them of says they are the best 
fowls lie ever saw; limy keep easy, and can 
he kept in a yard with fence two feel high. 
He says they are, placable on the farm or in 
the garden, and the best layers he ever saw. 
—P. EL F., Schoham Co., iv, F 
AA A 
ric.2 
re x. zo j 
yic.s 
isil' 
WWA 
WiMmfa 
How to tttault Straw, 
The above illustration shows how straw w 'j 1 
can be stacked so that it will be preserved ,0 T 
from spoiling, aud at the same time answer Wlle f 
for a shelter to protect stock from the storms. am , 
Tho pen should be two or three logs high, P‘ ;rl ‘ :( 
(or higher if your logs arc small,) and large I’h'fi-*: 
enough to correspond with the quantity of Av,u 
straw. Then set fence rails or poles all a ' ,ove 
around inside of the pen as represented. It ‘ 
can be built at the tail end of the threshing P 10 * 0 ' 
machine so that the straw can fall in it. It 
will require less hands to stack. This is a tln | ei 
good deal better way of doing than to haul tlni 
the straw out and burn it. —M. II. Richards. 
__ made 
IIow to Got Kiel of Charlock. stock 
loot | 
R. Etbil writes:—“ I have a farm which w j,, e 
has been badly managed. Plenty of cluvr- ordin 
lock and thistle seed on the ground and in feet n 
the manure. I want to know how to crop 
it to get rid of the weeds, charlock purlieu 
larly, and to kill the seed in the manure. t j L , 3 
Will buckwheat mature before the charlock 
a sufficient length of time to prevent its go- e C o 
ing to seed?” This correspondent should 
have received earlier attention. We know marl. 
To Make Wire Fence. 
D. A. J., Vicksburg, Miss., asks:—“ Will 
you please give ibe way of making wire 
fence and tbe usual cost of the same?” The 
best wire fence we ever saw — and vve made 
it ourselves — was made in this way. Good 
young larch or rod cedar posts were, set 
eight feet apart, as for board fences. (They 
were set three feet deep.) Holes were bored 
(with a hull-inch hit) through the posts, six, 
eight, and twelve inches apart, the lower 
wire being one foot from tlie ground, the 
two wires above six Inches apart, another 
eight inches above, and one twelve inches 
above that. (Of course these distances may 
be varied according to circumstances.) The 
end posts were large and firmly set. One 
Slid of each wire was put through the hole 
in I lie post at one end, wound around the 
post once and twisted to fasten. Then the 
wire was passed through each post to the 
other end post, where it was wound twice 
or thrice around a horizontal capstan, con¬ 
sisting of a round block of hard wood three 
inches in diameter, through each end of 
which was inserted a short lever with which 
to turn it This capstan was laid against 
the side of tbe end post under the wire, 
which is wound two or three times about it, 
to get purchase. One man takes hold of the 
wire and another of the lever of t be capstan 
and the entire line is thus tightened until 
perfectly taut. Pine or cedar half-inch 
plugs, previously whittled and soaked in oil, 
were then driven in the holes beside wild 
above each wire on each side of'each post, 
thus dividing the strain among tbe posts and 
protecting the wires from water where they 
enter tbe same. After these plugs were 
driven, the wire was taken from tlie capstan 
and wound about and fastened to tbe end 
post. The wires were then painted. Bo 
made, a wire fence proves effective against 
shock, (sheep, cattle and horses,) and will 
last twenty years without repair. No. 9 
wire was used, and posts of the usual size for 
ordinary board fence. Borne find twelve 
feet apart near enough to set the posts. We 
should prefer eight feet for a pasture fence. 
The cost must depend upon I be cost of wire 
per pound and the cost of posts in the locali¬ 
ties were it is to be used. 
A Clienp nml Convenient Houncry. 
Having built a hennery last full, after a 
model of my own, and as it has so well 
pleased me and proved convenient, I send 
you a description of it, accompanied with 
rude drawings, thinking per' ups some of the 
many readers of the Rur it, New-Yorker 
might be suited with t'.j plan, if about build¬ 
ing a hennery. 
Tlie drawing of tlie building shows the 
north and west sides. Tlie building is six¬ 
teen by twenty feet, sixteen feet high to root 
peak. 
Fig. 2 represents the Inside of the building 
as follows:—C, roosting and general room; 
B, egg room, feed room, &c.; A, A, A, are 
nests. In the recess there are three rows ol 
nests, one above the other; 5, door opening 
from outside building; 6, door opening from 
feed room to recess nest boxes and roosting 
room. 
Fig. 3, nest boxes, thirteen by twenty 
inches. These boxes are all movable, so that 
I arrange them to suit circumstances. By 
raising a board, hinged, one can readily ex¬ 
amine the nests from the feed or egg room. 
Should a lien wish to sit, take out one of the 
nest boxes, turn it end for end, thereby plac¬ 
ing the end that is closed up in the roosting 
room, which prevents the other liens from 
bothering or annoying her, l have it so ar¬ 
ranged that the sitting hen can go out in a 
little yard, scratch and dust without any in¬ 
convenience or annoyance from tlie others. 
The egg or feed room lias shelves in it, and 
a loft, (which is reached by a ladder made 
fast up the side,) where the feed is kept. 
Fig. 4, represents the roosts, two feet apart, 
of sassafras. 
Fig. 5, represents a flooring of hoards, 
with the same slant as the roosts, but placed 
two feet away from the roost. The drop¬ 
pings falling on these boards, roll down into 
a trough at the lower end, as shown. 
In the cast side of the house, 1 have one 
large sliding window, and in the south side 
two, with wire lenders or screens, over all 
three. A building of this size and kind can 
accommodate 200 to 250 chickens with am¬ 
ple room.—G. O. Brown, BrooklandviUe,Md, 
Economical Inquiries. A Maryland corres¬ 
pondent asks those who have had experience to 
tell to what crops and when it is best to apply 
DiscnacU and Dying Chicken*. 
Is there any cure for chickens that have 
been fed salt. I have had about three hun¬ 
dred nice spring chickens, but lately they 
have commenced to die off rapidly. As 
they are nice ones and I have been to con¬ 
siderable expense in building a poultry house, 
I do not like to lose them all. I think they 
must have been fed salt, or something else 
to kill them, ns they die soon after being 
taken sick. 1 have known them to die in an 
hour from tlie time 1 discovered there was 
something wrong with them. 
The kind that I have lost are Black 
Spanish and Leghorns. When first taken 
sick the bird droops and cramps as if in 
great pain; comb turns to a dark purple 
color, and they soon die. I thought at first 
they might have diarrhea. 1 tried W right’s 
receipt lor a cure, and many others, but to 
no good.—C. F. Moseley. 
Our correspondent “ L.” will please reply 
at bis earliest convenience. It may be that 
others can give remedies. 
