THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
MARCH 25 
thoughts of the injustice so often done to the 
hard-working girls who make the home of the 
farmer so comfortable and pleasant. Speaking 
of books and of magazines, a look of despair 
crossed her face, and she exclaimed with in¬ 
dignation. 
“ But I cannot get money to buy one maga¬ 
zine, or paper. It is not hard times; father 
is saving money that he will never spend; but 
he will not allow a cent to go out in pleasures 
as we go along. What is the use of life to me f 
To do the housework, wait on the hired help, 
and get my board, and shabby clothing 1 No 
wonder farmers’ daughters want to get away 
from home, to the factory, or into stores 
anywhere that gives them opportunity to earn 
money of their own. If it was not for mother 
I-” But I broke in on this. 
“Is there no way in which you could earn 
as much spare money at home as you would 
have left after your board was paid if you 
worked away from home ?” 
“Plenty of ways,” she replied, “but I should 
not be allowed to keep the money if it was 
earned. It would be r Jeanie, give me the 
money to pay the hired men,’ and that would 
be the last of it. Oh, I’ve tried it, worked in 
the garden, planted corn, raised fruits, and 
poultry; but it’s of no use, I cannot even get 
money to buy postage stamps without asking 
for it, and undergoing a fire of questions.” 
I felt that what this young girl said was in 
many instances too true. And why is it? Are 
daughters not so much valued as sons in a 
farmer’s home ? Is it true that their work, 
often times drudgery, is estimated so low as to 
be taken for granted ! And if a good daughter 
stays at home to cheer the declining days of 
mother and father, should she not be paid in 
a regular and stated way and have something 
her very own ? The butter, the poultry, a 
certain portion of the fruit crop, or buy her a 
dozen hives of bees, and let ber have the pro¬ 
duct, that costs nothing from your barn or 
granary. What sacrifices she has made—her 
youth, her hopes of mental improvement, 
society and an independent living; and let not 
her pocket-money be doled out grudgingly, 
but as her share in part of the profits of the 
home she helps to keep so thrifty and cheerful. 
Every woman, married or single, has a feeling 
of this kind, and I know many cases of wives 
who would rather do without things needed, 
than a°k for the means of purchase. This is 
the reason why store bills are run up, and why 
women often have to resort to subterfuges to 
get what is really their own. If fathers could 
once be brought to see this, and give their 
daughters what they can afford of the mutual 
earnings, then the new era would dawn. 
Brothers would see their sisters so treated and 
there would be some hope for the next gener¬ 
ation of wives. 
CONDUCTED BY EMILY MAPLE. 
OUR READING CLUB, 
It has no high-sounding title, no officers, no 
constitution or by-laws, and is not, even 
among ourselves, recognized as a society, yet 
it is doing more genuine work than many a 
Literary Circle that has been organized with 
every possible formality. We never have a 
meeting, for we live miles apart, and many of 
the members do not see each other once a 
year; others do not meet once in five years, 
yet we always understand each other, for our 
common motto is: “When you have any¬ 
thing good to read, pass it around.” 
That we may always be sure of something 
new, one friend takes the Century, another 
the Eclectic, another Harper’s and another 
Popular Science Monthly, and we all ex¬ 
change, not only the magazines, but whatever 
books that may happen to come to us, Some 
of the books are of but transient interest or 
worth, and we let them go, indifferent as to 
their return; but they are sometimes standard 
works of permanent value that will be useful 
for future reference, and for such the pass¬ 
word “ Take good care of this,” always insures 
its safe return. 
Thus you see that although we have “ re¬ 
tired to a farm in pursuit of health and hap¬ 
piness.” we still have our connections with the 
outside world and may yet make our own the 
best thoughts of the best minds. Of course, 
we do not expect to read them all; that per¬ 
haps would not be best, even if possible, for 
too much reading is often as injurious as too 
little can be, but the most of U9 have leisure 
to take at least the cream from each number, 
while with some of the monthlies, merely to 
look over the artistic work is equal to a “feast 
of reason and a flow of souL” For myself, I 
can imagine no greater pleasure than (with an 
appreciative companion) finding fresh beau¬ 
ties on each newly-cut pictured i>age of a 
Harper’s Monthly. 
One of our best New York journalists lately 
wrote: “ For a child to have St. Nicholas and 
later on Harper’s Monthly through his child¬ 
hood and youth, would give him a liberal ed¬ 
ucation,” and although we have tor our chil¬ 
dren wider avenues to knowledge than these 
alone would give, all must acknowledge their 
value as accompaniments to a student’s life in 
cultivating taste for pure and wholesome lit¬ 
erature. There are so many excellent juven¬ 
ile publications that it is hard to choose be¬ 
tween them; but my own little daughter, al¬ 
though her years barely number more than one 
decade, alreadj* considers her St. Nicholas as 
necessary a part of her daily existence as is 
her daily bread; while for my humble self, I 
surely need not be ashamed to acknowledge 
the keen enjoyment I find within its pages, 
when a foreign sovereign (the Empress of 
Austria) confesses that she “ finds the St. 
Nicholas most entertaining reading.” 
When we first set up our “ household gods ” 
we each year had our magazines bound; but 
long ago gave up that practice, for whit is the 
use of filling our book shelves with monstrous 
rows of similar volumes that must inevitably 
be crowded out of the way by newcomers. In 
our grandparents’ time, when books were rare 
and one acquired but few in a lifetime, it was 
well enough to be carefully saving of them; 
but those “good old times” are gone now, and 
even with our books as with ourselves, is it 
not “better to wear out than to rust out?” 
Last year among the city guests who “ flit 
to us in summer time ” came the wife of a 
member of a publishing firm in New York 
City, and she gave me some new ideas on book¬ 
lending. “ It is wrong,” she said, “ for you to 
lend your books as you do. You are doiugan 
injustice to book-dealers. Each family should 
buy its own reading matter." This was put¬ 
ting the matter in a new light to me, for 1 had 
always felt that book-lending was a kind of 
a rare charity, an humble way of doing good 
—for although some of our society can buy 
whatever books they choose, others (and per¬ 
haps the greater number) must practice some 
self-denial in other matters to be able to own 
even a small library. 
I suppose book-dealers have their rights as 
well as other people; but I am afraid I have 
too long wandered in this by-path-of wrong¬ 
doing to be easily converted from the error of 
my ways, and as soon as I have absorbed its 
contents, even my last acquired treasure—my 
dainty little volume of Longfellow’s Birth¬ 
day Poems—shall go the rounds, for I can al¬ 
ready think of several friends with whom I 
am longing to share its beautiful thoughts. 
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THE TRUTH ABOUT FARM WORK 
AND MILKING. 
Being a constant reader of the Rural, I am 
sometimes amused as well as instructed by the 
hints and advice to farmers and their wives. 
Now, I am a farmer’s wife and was a farmer’s 
daughter, and have spent all of my life on a 
farm, and know that farm work is a healthy 
and respectable employment; and it' a farmer 
owns his farm he can live in independence 
and almost in luxury^ yet there is more labor 
than poetry r in farming. I think if May Maple 
would milk from four to six cows every morn¬ 
ing all Summer, in the wet grass—and every 
milkmaid knows the cow’s breath is anything 
but fragrant—she would change her mind as 
to the pleasures of it as a business. Farmers 
and their wives have to labor early and late, 
with but few holidays in the Summer. Help 
for the farmer’s wife is scarce and not very 
reliable as a general thing. If there is any 
merry-making, the help is off, not as much as 
saying “By your leave,’’while the milking must 
be done, rain or shine. Almost every farmer’s 
wife of my acquaintance is a good butter 
maker—not a maker of the cheesy, streaky 
stuff described in the Rural. And as to 
cooking, no one can beat a practical farmer’s 
wife: one who oversees hqjj own cooking and 
does most of it herself. Farmers and their 
families are not the ignorant, awkward people 
that city-bred folks ofttimes imagine. If the 
person who invented the word farmerine will 
never use the word again (I think it a con¬ 
temptible word and ft slur on womankind) he 
or she will receive the thanks of one 
Farmer’s Wife. 
PROFESSOR 
SECOND TO NONE! 
jjUOSPHAT/c 
Yearly Sales 50,000 Tons, 
This Fertilizer, which 
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their works especially to 
supply the Northern de¬ 
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Made from Professor Horsford’a Acid 
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Recommended by leading physicians. 
Makes lighter biscuit, cakes, etc., and 
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In cans. Sold at a reasonable price. 
The Horsford Almanac and Cock Kook 
sent free. 
Ruinford Chemical Works, Providence, R. I. 
position to till orders 
promptly. Pamphlets 
-containing testimonials 
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ife-f, furnished by our local 
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General Selling Agents of Pacific 
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TEN DOLLARS PER TON SAVED 
BY USING 
Coffee. If Dr. Hoskins’s “ Brieflet” (p. 129) 
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If he is correct in theory, then a large propor¬ 
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I say, good i. e., well-made coffee, is not so 
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miXjADBXiI'lkxA, r*A. 
ANNIE L. JACK. 
I have just had a visit from a farmer’s 
daughter, that has filled my mind with 
