THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
of which is four feet in 40; the excavation is 
four feet at the front or deepest part. The 
displaced earth was put on the north side. 
The wall is drained with three-iuch tile, which 
connects with a live-inch drain at the south¬ 
west corner, where it receives the water from 
the roof. The stables accommodate five 
horses, seven cows and 50 to 60 she p. The 
cow stable, in the basement (Fig. 474), is 13 x 
26 feet; the horse stable, 16 x 34; the sheep 
stable, 18 x 34, and sick room, 10 x 15. The 
floor over this (Fig. 475) contains the thrash¬ 
ing floor, 12x 34 feet; the grain floor, 14x 34; 
Fig. 475. 
the bay-mow, 18 x 34; the granary, 16 x IS. 
and the tool room. 10 x IS. 
Over the hay-mow and grain floor there is 
no loft. The thrashing floor is 12 feet to the 
loft, and the granary and tool room are 7)4 
feet with a loft for hay or grain. There are 
two trap-doors. ODe 4x4 feet, for hay, and 
one 2x4 feet, for ground feed or grain. Fig. 
476 represents the front elevation. The barn 
Fig. 476. 
is 34x60 feet, with lS-foot posts. The base¬ 
ment is ni"e feet high. The cuts fully ex¬ 
plain the arrangement of the building. The 
cost was $825 —lumber aud tirnbei $320; shing 
les, $76 SO; wall, $70; painting and spouting, 
$70, and the balance, $290, was for nails, 
door-hangings and labor. 
tor Women, 
CONDUCTED BY MISl RAY CLARK. 
GUILTY OR NOT GUILTY? 
She stood at the bar of justice, 
A creature wan and wild, 
In form too small for a woman, 
lti features too old for a child: 
For a look so worn and pathetic 
Was stamped on her pale, .young face. 
It seemed long years or sutlerlng 
Must ha ve left that silent t race. 
‘•Your name," s:ild the Judge, ns he eyed her 
With kindly look j ot keen, 
"Is Mary McGuire. If you please, sir;” 
"And your age?"—"I am turned lifteen.” 
"Well. Mary." and then from a paper 
He slowly and gravely read, 
“You are charged here -I’m sorry to say It, 
With stealing three loaves of bread. 
“You look not like an offender, 
And I hope that, you can show 
The charge to be false Now, tell me 
Arc you gufitt of this, or no?" 
A passionate burst of weeping 
Was at first her sole reply. 
But she dried her eyes In a moment, 
And looked In the Judge's eye. 
“1 will tell you how It was, Ir, 
My father and mother arc dead. 
And my little urother and sisters 
Were hungry and asked me for bread. 
At II st I carne i It for them 
By working hard all day. 
But somehow iltnes were bad, Sir, 
And the work al fell away, 
“I could get no more employment; 
The weather was bit .er col l 
The young om-s cried aud shivered— 
(Little Johnny's but tour years’ old;; 
So, what was 1 to do, sir? — 
I am guUty, lint do not condemn; 
I took—Oh, was It uteiUinof— 
The bread to give to them ” 
Every man In the court-room— 
Gray beard and thoughtless youth— 
Knew, as he looked upou her. 
• hat me prisoner spoke the truth. 
Out from their pockets came handkerchiefs, 
Out from their eyes sprung tears, 
And out from the old faded wallets 
Treasures hoarded for years. 
The Judge’s face was a study— 
The strangest you ever taw, 
As he cleared his throat and murmured 
Something about the law. 
For one so learned in such matters, 
So wise In dealing with men. 
He seemed ou a simple question, 
Sorely' puzzled just then. 
But no one blamed him or wondered, 
When at last these words they heard: 
“The sentence of this you ns prisoner 
Is, for the present deterred.” 
And no one blamed him or wondered 
When he went to her and smiled. 
And tenderly le/t from the court-room. 
Himself, the “guilty ” child. 
—Selected. 
THE ENJOYMENT OF LIFE. 
The ways in which human beings eujoy 
themselves are as numerous as the individuals 
themselves. 
Mrs. Thrifty delights in the bustle of a large 
dairy; the splendid health which she enjoys 
makes the work attending the carrying on of 
a large farm, a source of pleasure. The music 
which suits her ear the best is the rattle of the 
tin pails and pans, and the sweetest praise is 
that wbieh pronounces her butter the best in 
the market;and her moral code embraces,first 
and foremost, the theory and practice of per¬ 
fect cleanliness. She keeps a sharp eye over 
the wardrobe of her children, and when they 
prepare for school, rutiled hair, or a soiled 
apron meets with ready reproof; while the 
little bad actions which often mar the moral 
life of a child, are entirely overlooked. 
Her nearest neighbor, Mrs. Dainty, who has 
fewer cares, gives her time, her thought, and 
her life to fancy, decorative work. 
In meeting and judging of different people, 
their sterling qualities are passed by. and their 
standing with her is given according to the 
number of patterns of embroidery they can 
execute, or the extra flounces on their chil¬ 
dren’s school dresses. Her kitchen is the last 
thing in which she takes pride, and all her 
movements are directed to getting housework 
out of the way, to get time to work a new 
tidy, or put a few more ornamental stitches 
on a crazy quilt. Her reading is confined to 
the magazin which afford a variety of 
needlework, 9 nd patterns of new or original 
designs. It a harmless hobby, but very 
tiresome to those who have not similar tastes. 
Mrs. Curiosity follows another and more 
annoyiug line of life. 
To find ou t w hat this or that unimportant 
move, on the part of her neighbors, means, is 
the serious conundrum that occupies her leis¬ 
ure time. A carriage standing before the door 
of the house across the street causes her to fret 
herself into a headache, because she does not 
know who arrived in it, or what their busi¬ 
ness meant. 
To find the latest bit of gossip about her 
dearest friend, in order to have something new 
to tell, and to ask the most impertinent ques¬ 
tions about her private affairs, with all the 
coolness imaginable, seems to give her the 
keenest enjoyment. To sum up her idea of 
life, would seem to be to make all your ac¬ 
quaintances feel as disagreeable as possible. 
Mrs. Prim enjoys most the forms and cere¬ 
monies of life. A good dinner would be 
spoiled for her if her napkin did not lay cor¬ 
rectly with the points of the compass, and any 
little form of politeness, accidentally omitted, 
is very distressing to her feelings. 
Very different from her is her neighbor, 
Mrs. Primrose, a quiet, undemonstrative little 
body, who finds herself happy, she scarcely 
knows why. 
She is in congenial company when she is 
plucking a handful of the most common flow¬ 
ers. Not a single lovely shade escapes ber 
eye. and she regards each flower in a 
different way, as she does her friends; they 
all seem to whisper of love and of 
the friends long passed away from earth. 
Every lovely flower seems but an echo of a 
pure thought in her mind. The first delicate 
flowers of ISpriug, the deeper-hued Summer 
and Autumn blossoms, from the early violet 
to the Cardinal flower, the field lily or the 
beautiful blue, fringed gentian, all seem to 
bear a message to her which she interprets 
with joy. The sombre, ungraceful hem¬ 
lock, the needle pine, or the Hr, all stir in her 
a different but lively sense of pleasure, and 
the happiness she gains by her communion 
with nature 6he unconsciously imparts to all 
who meet her. solitude sweetened. 
DOMESTIC HAPPINESS vs DOMESTIC 
UNHAPPINESS. 
If my articles on this important subject 
have accomplished nothing more than the ad¬ 
vice given in that finely written and, in the 
main, most excellent article, by "A Country 
Housekeeper," 1 am paid fully for expressing 
my views. 
I quote a paragraph from tbp article, and 
must say that it cannot be too often read: 
‘•Yes, girls, be perfect wives and mothers, if 
that lot be given you. Bring your bright in¬ 
telligence to bear upou every wheel and spring 
of the domestic machinery: but keep'it in its 
proper, subservient place. Reduce to a science 
this “mere mechanism of life," so that its 
work may be smoothly and perfectly done, 
with the least possible expenditure of time 
and thought. Remember always that domes¬ 
tic duties, while necessary avocations, are not 
your vocation. There is something far above 
and beyond these ‘cares of bread.’ It is to 
give yonr husband not only' household com¬ 
fort, but intellectual inspiration; to be to your 
children not only the teuder housemother, but 
the companion, counsellor, aud friend. It is 
to teach them to embrace cheerfully whatever 
‘plain living’ is necessary to ‘high thinking,’ 
aud to prove to all who come within the influ¬ 
ence of your home that the life therein is 
more than meat.” 
There is nothing iu this which conflicts with 
my theories. In fact, the advice: “reduee to 
a science this ‘n ere mechanism of life,’ so that 
its work may be smoothly' and perfectly done, 
with the least possible expenditure of time and 
thought", is precisely the idea which 1 intend¬ 
ed at least to give in my former articles. I 
would elevate the housekeeper, and make the 
intelligent wife and mother feel that hers is a 
mission so far superior to any accomplish¬ 
ments as to be incomparable with them! 
“A. C H."says:“Whereonewomanfailsasa 
wife and mother, because she is insufficient as 
a housekeeper, one hundred fail because they 
are housekeepers only." Thisisnotso; women 
are usually housekeepers (?) outy because they 
are insufficient as homekeepers. If “A. C. H.” 
had said women fail as wives and mothers, be¬ 
cause they were as servo n t girls only —so far 
as technical training in household duties are 
concerned—she would have been right. The 
management of a family means far more than 
cooking, washing and ironing, or miniater- 
ing to the lower wants of the household. 
“Who cannot recall some sad example of a 
wife shut out from her husbaud’s mental 
world; of sons and daughters inevitably grow¬ 
ing away from the mother, who was mother 
for tbeir bodies only ?” What a familiar pic¬ 
ture this calls to our mind ! The mother who 
has long home the burdens of the household, 
whose own life has been sacrificed in one sense 
to her family; see her in middle age, when 
rest and recreation should be hors, iu the 
kitchen, with the servant—if she is fortunate 
enough to be able to keep one—while her 
daughters are in the parlor tbummiug away 
on the piano, or maybe reading the latest 
novel. In some cases the mother has been 
much to blame for such forgetfulness of duty 
on tbepartof their children, finding it easier, 
and taking much pride in doing the hard part 
of the work, thereby saving her daughters’ 
fine complexion or shapely hands from be¬ 
coming less attractive; while her daughters 
themselves are ignorant of the fact that the 
seeds which will bear the same kind of 
fruit are being sown, and as the wheels 
of Time roll on, and they in turn become 
mothers, the chances are that they will be 
found just where their mother now is. 
“Proper training for ordinary household 
duties should, if possible, be given every girl. 
But I do maintain that, two hours a day de¬ 
voted, for perhaps six years, to sewing and 
housekeeping, will makt\any girl proBcient in 
these duties. Let her, by all means, give the 
rest of ber time to the higher culture.” Ah ! 
how nice this sounds. But are two hours a 
day sufficient to perfect one in these duties ? 
In some cases the “higher culture” is at the 
expense of the “old man,” who wearily plods 
along bearing evidence of anxious care over 
“stocks and the markets,” or, perhaps, doiug 
without a new carpet for th*> sitting room that 
his “darter” could have an ‘ edification,’’ the 
thing he bad so keenly felt the need of all his 
life. It is too often a fact that at the very 
time when young ladiesshould be sharing the 
burden and the beat of the day with tbeir aged 
parents, who have sacrificed much for them— 
at this time, I say, when they are physically 
aud mentally competent to lay the founda ion 
of a successful life, they can be found workiug 
at Kensington embroideries, or, perhaps, try¬ 
ing to acquire a smattering of music. 
“I repeat emphatically that it Is possible 
for a woman to be a perfect housewife and a 
cultured student,"says “A C. II.” I will go 
further and say that it is imuossible for a 
woman to be a perfect housewife unless she is 
a cultured student. Cultured, nut in music 
or art or literature, except in so far as they re¬ 
late to housekeeping, but in chemistry, physi¬ 
ology, medicine, surgery, botany, and hygien , 
besides a geueral knowledge of poultry, the 
dairy and other things, which come naturally 
and properly under tho supervision of the 
house-keeper. 1 said in a former article that, 
“The sooner young ladies learn that they can¬ 
not step from the piano, George Eliot’s works, 
or crazy patchwork, into the position of the 
mistress of a household, and into s-uecessful 
domestic life, the better.” “A. C. H.” says, 
“A young man devotes three years to the 
study of his profession, and at the end of that 
time is prepared to practice law, medicine, or 
theology, as the case may be.” Is housekeep¬ 
ing then an art that can be acquired at once? 
Can a man step from the piano, George Eliot’s 
works, or base ball, into law, medicine, or 
theology ? I claim that housekeeping is as 
much of a science as any business or profes¬ 
sion and requires as much special education. 
My ideal is not merely a “perfect domestic 
machine,” but rather “a companion for man’s 
highest moods and deepest thoughts.” But 
if extravagance and waste; improper and in¬ 
sufficient food; fault-finding and a continual 
striving after the unattainable; are the chief 
characteristics of a man’s home—no matter 
how aesthetic the wife—there will be neither 
time or disposition for deep thoughts or high 
aspirations. 
The fact is “A. C. H.” pre supposes that 
eveiybody has a source of income aside from 
the result of their daily labor. We may not 
devote our life and our reason to merely phys¬ 
ical ends, but if we do not the chances are 
some one has already or will have to do it for 
us. Raskin's statement that, “Things that 
only help us to exist are, in a secondary and 
mean sense, useful; or rather, if they be 
looked for alone, they are useless and worse: 
for it would be better that we should uot ex¬ 
ist, than that we should guiltily disappoint 
the purposes of existence," is cold, harsh, un- 
christianlike. If we have more time than we 
require for our physical wants, there is enough 
to do to lighten the burdens of others. 
“A. C. H.” says: “The great lack in mar¬ 
riages appears to be the lack of that education 
of mind aud heart, which alone produces real 
congeniality, which alone sanctifies the tie, 
elevating it from a degrading bondage into a 
veritable sacrament. If statistics could be 
collected on the subject, ‘J. H. G.’ would find 
that in nine cases out of ten, divorce is the 
result, not of heavy bread and undarned 
socks, but of ill regulated minds and char¬ 
acters.” I say, possibly true. But the illy 
regulated minds and characters which lead to 
divorce are inseparably connected with, and 
produce heavy bread and undarned socks. A 
serious discussion bas recently been held as to 
what and how vocal artists should eat, and it 
is perhaps true that “National mediocrity (in 
housekeeping) will destroy the possibility of a 
national compauy of literati and artists.” 
Seriously the statement that the German 
composers leads the musical world, corrobo¬ 
rates my statement that no one person can 
excel iu more than one or two avocations. 
In Germany one thing is learned thoroughly; 
in America many things are learned imper¬ 
fectly with the exceptions noted above. I 
fj&tettUanfottiS 
To produce instan¬ 
taneously, in either 
hot or cold, hard or 
soft water, a profuse, 
creamy, and delight¬ 
ful lather, use the 
Ivory Soap, which, 
owing to its purity, 
will not cause redness 
or irritation of the 
skin. 
Free of charge. A full size cake of Ivory Soap 
will bo scut to any one who can not got it of their 
grocer, if six two-eent stamps, to pay postage, are 
sent to Procter & Gamble, Ub' r "' , nuU. Please 
mention ‘his paper. 
