4888 
547 
Cmu. 
“Every Man is presumed to know the Law. 
Nine-tenths of all Litigation arises from Ig¬ 
norance of Law." 
The following recent decisions on questions 
of special interest to farmers, have been con. 
densed from reports in various papers, espe¬ 
cially in Bradstreet’s: 
LAW WITH REGARD TO RAILROAD 
COMMISSIONERS. 
An important decision bearing on the power 
of Railroad Commissioners to fix rates, has 
just been decided by Judge Brewer of the 
United States Circuit Court for the Eighth 
Circuit, in a suit brought by the Northwestern 
Railroad against the Iowa Railroad Commis¬ 
sioners. Some time ago the Commissioners 
fixed the passenger and freight rates on the 
road at figures considerably lower than those 
previously in force, and shortly afterwards 
the road applied for an injunction to restrain 
the Commissioners from enforcing the trans¬ 
portation rates which they had made under 
authority of the Legislature. Three legal 
questions were raised in the case, viz.: as to 
the legality of the suit against the Commis¬ 
sioners ; as to the right of the Legislature to 
delegate the power to fix the rates; and the 
right of the State to fix railroad tariffs. 
Judge Brewer holds that an action such as 
that brought against the Commissioners, is 
not strictly an action against the State such 
as cannot, under the constitution, be main¬ 
tained against it; that the State can lawfully 
delegate to the Railroad Commissioners the 
power to fix rates, and, finally, that the State 
has the right to fix railroad rates; but that it 
must make such rates reasonable. By “reason¬ 
able” rates the judge means rates high enough 
to maintain the road and pay fixed charges 
and return to the stockholders something, 
however small. Whether the rates imposed 
by the Commissioners are reasonable or not was 
not passed upon by the judge, but he granted a 
temporary injunction restraining the Commis¬ 
sioners from enforcing the rates until the 
question of their reasonableness can be passed 
upon. „ 
CIDER HELD TO BE INTOXICATING. 
In the case of the Eureka Vinegar Com¬ 
pany vs. The Gazette Printing Company, the 
U. S. Circuit Court for the Eastern District of 
Arkansas, lately held that cider was an intox¬ 
icating liquor, and that the sale of it in pro¬ 
hibition districts was in violation of the law 
against the sale of alcoholic, vinous, fermented 
or intoxicating liquors. The Court said : 
“All the acts include alcoholic, vinous and 
fermented liquor, and cider falls under all 
these heads. It is also an Intoxicating liquor, 
for it is common knowledge that a fermented 
beverage which contains five to 10 per cent, of 
alcohol which is freely drunk by the glassful, 
will produce intoxication. This is a fact of 
daily observation in communities where such 
beverages are sold.” 
Sale of Oleomargarine.— In a recent 
case (State vs. Newton), in New Jersey, the 
Supreme Court decided that under the State 
law which prohibits the sale of oleomargarine 
colored with annatto or other artificial col¬ 
oring matter, it is not necessary for the con 
viction of a person selling such oleomarga. 
rine that he should know that it is so colored. 
The court further held in the same case that 
the law was valid as applied to a sale made 
in New Jersey, by an agent of a manufac¬ 
turer in Indiana, though the package sold in 
New Jersey, was that which had been sent by 
the Indiana manufacturer to his New Jersey 
agent for sale. 
MARRIED WOMAN’S PROPERTY. 
In Pennsylvania a married woman has a 
right to loan money to her husband and take 
security therefor and to receive payment 
thereof by conveyance of his property. 
She stands precisely in the same position as 
any other creditor, and her husband has a 
right to prefer her claim as well as that of any 
other creditor. This has been just decided by 
the State Supreme Court in the case of Ben¬ 
son and others vs. Maxwell and others. 
landlord’s lien on crops. 
In Georgia the law makes it a misdemeanor 
for a tenant to sell property on which there is 
a lien for rent; but a bona fide purchaser, 
without notice, of a crop grown on rented 
premises will be protected against the lien, 
general or special, of the landlord for rent, 
according to a recent decision of the Supreme 
Court of the State, in the case of Thornton vs. 
Carver and others. The landlord’s remedy is 
against the tenant. This is good law for 
Georgia, but the law on the subject varies in 
other States. 
CONTRACT FOR FERTILIZERS. 
According to a recent decision of the Su¬ 
preme Court of Georgia, in the case of Fair- 
cloth vs. De Leon, no waiver or undertaking 
in a contract for the purchase of fertilizers or 
in a note given for the price, will bar or estop 
the buyer from pleading the want of legal in 
spection, when sued by the seller on such 
contract or note. The fertilizers must be 
legally inspected by the proper officials to 
entitle the seller to recover the price. 
USURIOUS INTEREST IN N. C. 
L. T., Raleigh , N. C. —A wants money and 
asks B to lend it to him. B has none to lend, 
but can get it at the usurious rate of interest 
of 10 per cent, and offers to get it for A at 
that rate, charging nothing to him for doing 
so. A thankfully agrees. B gets the money at 
10 per cent., giving his note therefor, and 
charges A only 10 per cent, for it. Is B 
chargeable with usury as between himself and 
A? Is he liable to the penalty of double in¬ 
terest under the statute of this State ? 
Ans. —In a similar case in North Carolina 
(see Dowell vs. Vannoy, 3 Dev. R. 43) it has 
been decided that, where an agreement was 
entered into whereby the borrower agreed to 
pay the lender the same rate of interest which 
the latter was bound to pay a third person 
and which exceeded the legal rate, the trans¬ 
action was usurious. The Court held that the 
contract was none the less usurious from the 
fact that the lender was himself borrowing at 
a usurious rate. 
CITIZENIZING ALIENS WHO LAND UNDER AGE. 
M. T. L., Brooklyn, N. Y. —I came to this 
country when I was 18 years old ; and I’ve 
been here four years ; am I an American 
citizen ? I’ve not “declared my intention,” or 
taken out any “ papers.” I am informed that 
having come here before I was 21, I became 
a citizen on attaining that age, without any 
formality. 
Ans. —Your information was quite wrong. 
No alien can become a citizen of the United 
States until he has lived here five years, no 
matter how young he may have been when he 
came. The only difference between one who 
who came before he was 18, and one who 
landed when older, is that the latter must wait 
two years after he has declared his intention, 
before he can take out his final papers ; while 
the former at the end of his five years’ resi¬ 
dence, may make his declaration, and take bis 
final papers on the same day. 
POWERS OF A GRANTEE TO CONVEY REAL 
ESTATE. 
W. H. L., Rochester, N. Y. —A devised his 
real estate in this State to his four children 
as tenants in common, and ordered and or¬ 
dained that no part of such property should 
be sold without the written consent of the four 
heirs. Can one of the four as a grantee of the 
four convey any part or the whole of the prop¬ 
erty without the written consent of the four t 
Ans. —If the grantee holds the fee his signa¬ 
ture will convey without the signatures of the 
others who will be taken to have given their 
consent to the alienation when they conveyed 
their interests in the property unconditionally 
to him. If the grantee holds any less estate 
than the fee simple (as, for instance, if it is a 
trust) his signature alone will not convey ; 
those of the three others will also be needed. 
NEED OF PROBATING A WILL. 
L. H. S., Owego, N. Y .—My father died 
about three years ago, leaving, in his will, 
everything to his wife (my mother). The 
property consisted of money in the savings 
bank, and a farm of 75 acres, clear of in¬ 
debtedness. As no one disputes mother’s 
right to the property, is it not necessary to 
have the bill probated ? 
Ans. It is quite important that the will 
should be probated, for unless this is done, 
the widow has no legal title to the fee of 
the real-estate or to more than one-third of 
the personal property. Application should 
be made to the Surrogate, who will issue the 
citations, and appoint a day for proving the 
document. One or both of the attesting wit. 
nesses should be on hand to prove the ex¬ 
ecution of the will. The whole expense may 
be kept inside of 10 dollars 
L. L. Georgetown, III .—From your state¬ 
ment of the case it is very unlikely indeed that 
the widow and other American heirs can get 
anything from the supposititous property in 
England. Even if such property ever existed, 
inquiry with regard to it should not have been 
deferred for 48 years. No doubt if it ever 
existed, it has been distributed among the 
English heirs long ago, and probably the 
Statute of Limitations would now bar any pro. 
ceedings for its recovery. It isn’t worth 
while bothering about it. 
G. A. G., Owasco Lake, N. Y.— Consult a 
good local lawyer to whom the case can be 
l ully explained. The question mainly depends 
upon the power over the property given by 
the .Court to A’s wife, while, A was unfit to 
manage it himself. 
Woman's XUorK. 
CONDUCTED BY EMILY LOUISE TAPLIN. 
“ Let the farmer forever more be honored 
in his calling, for they tvho labor in the earth 
are the chosen people of God."—Thomas 
Jefferson. 
— «♦< - 
CHAT BY THE WAY. 
How much should a woman spend on her 
dress? That American women of moderate 
means, spend more than the same class in 
England, may be seen, by the recent discus¬ 
sion in Longman’s Magazine. According to 
one case in point, an English-woman whose 
husband has an income of $7,500 a year, spends 
■ but $200 a year on her own dress. Few 
Americans of similar means would be con¬ 
tent with so small a sum, but we must remem¬ 
ber that all clothing is much cheaper in Eng¬ 
land than it is here, and doubtless this eco¬ 
nomical woman arranges all her purchases 
with care and forethought. As she says, 
there must be capital to begin with, 
in the way of a substantial wardrobe. 
When one has a good stock of under¬ 
garments, for example, it is easy 
enough to add a few articles to the stock 
every year, thus keeping the supply up. A 
girl of limited means cannot afford to buy 
a good and handsome gown and wrap every 
year, and she should arrange to buy the gown 
one season and the wrap the next. A coun¬ 
try girl will find a cloth coat, such as an ulster 
or raglan, infinitely more serviceable than a 
more elaborate-looking wrap. Similarly, 
though she will want to possess the one black 
silk gown which every woman wishes for, she 
will find more actual use in sensible, pretty, 
plain cloth frocks. The amount of wear one 
can obtain from a navy-blue tricot is astonish¬ 
ing ; it can be “made over” again and again, 
as long as it holds together, and always looks 
ladylike. 
* * * 
Winter is the hardest time for women of 
small purse; it is easy to dress becomingly in 
the summer when pretty wash fabrics cost so 
very little. That is, supposing the wearer can 
do her own dressmaking, as we hope all our 
Rural girls do. We think a girl is very im¬ 
perfectly educated, if she cannot make all her 
clothes, from her undergarments to her bon¬ 
net. But during the winter the material itself 
seems to cost so much, so it must be made to 
last as long as possible. The best “ Sunday- 
go-to-meeting” gown should not be worn in 
the house,until there is another ready to take its 
place. As soon as one comes in from church 
or visiting, or what not, it should be taken 
off, brushed and hung up. Do not turn a 
skirt inside out; a dress cover, in the form of 
a roomy bag, should be slipped over it, and 
this may be made out of an old cotton skirt. 
This preserves from dust, and prevents the 
creasing caused by laying away in folds. 
* * * 
As much as possible, one special dress 
should be kept for house wear. Of 
course it should be as pretty as one can make 
it. Nowadays we are making pretty wrap¬ 
pers, and calling them tea gowns, and they 
are the very things for home wear. Of 
course, a girl who has to prepare the family 
tea, would not make a trained gown, but it 
might be both useful and becoming in some 
handsome dark color, and it would make a 
decided saving in walking gowns. Our sensi¬ 
ble maiden would be well-bibbed and aproned 
during her household tasks ; one little house¬ 
keeper we know, slips a loose gabrielle wrap¬ 
per of calico right over her frock, if she has 
to do much housework when she is “dressed 
up,” and hers is a wise practice. 
* * * 
There are so many accessories to the ward¬ 
robe, which one really ought to have,but which 
do not come under the head of ordinary 
clothes. Water-proof, umbrella and heavy 
shawl are needfuls, and should be taken care 
of. We think a waterproof wears better if 
bung up in a closet, instead of being tightly 
rolled up in a bag. A well-made umbrella of 
mingled silk and linen lasts better than one of 
pure silk. 
It may be readily seen that care and neat¬ 
ness are the best aids to economy in dress. 
Clothes that are always kept clean and re¬ 
paired do not grow shabby very easily. A 
good supply of neat collars and white aprons 
—the latter we always look upon as an out¬ 
ward and visible sign of good housewifery- 
will make a well-kept house-dress look neat, 
even if it Is past its freshness. It is a harsh 
thing to say, but we see so many pretty house¬ 
hold slatterns that we are impelled to regard 
neatness as the first evidence. Of course we 
don’t believe that any of the Rural girls are 
so careless of appearances, but we are so often 
shocked by the sight of women going about 
the house injcur 1-papers. (To Jour mind it is>s 
bad as appearing at the breakfast table in 
one’s night-gown, and at best it is a slouchy 
habit, which should be strongly discouraged. 
TAKE LIFE EASY. 
MRS. C. F. WILDER. 
This noon it fell to my lot to prepare the 
potatoes for dinner, and as I took them in a 
pan and sat down in the cool breakfast-room, 
with closed door between the room and the 
cook-stove. I thought of a remark a dear New 
England aunt once made in regard to a 
house-keeper of her acquaintance : “ So shift¬ 
less ! Why, she even sits down to pare pota¬ 
toes !” 
A lady asked, a few days ago, how a certain 
woman could accomplish so much and yet 
seem to take life so easy. I think the fact 
that she did take life easy was the open secret 
of her success in doing so much. A woman 
who feels so fretted and hurried that she can 
not spend time to glance out to the rose-bush 
by her door; or up to the leaves of the tree 
above her window; who never hears the birds 
though they sing the most jubilant strains all 
around her home, or who turns her children 
coldly away when they bring some sweet lit¬ 
tle flower for her to admire, accomplishes but 
just one thing in life—she does a vast amount 
of drudgery. When she gets all through her life- 
work and comes up before the Master and He 
asks her what she has done; what is she going 
to say? That she trained aright the immortal 
souls of the little ones given to her care? She 
had not time to do that. That she made her 
neighbor glad that she lived near because she 
could so often give a helpful word, or a loving 
smile? Mercy! No, she never could say 
anything to her neighbor, only how hard she 
had to work. That the guest under her roof 
found a miniature heaven of rest whiletarrying 
there? “Rest!”—the guest felt, what with 
the cleaning, and scrubbing, and cooking, and 
churning, like Noah’s dove—not a place to 
rest the sole of his foot in quiet for a moment’s 
space of time. But there is left the church ser¬ 
vice where her intelligent face encouraged her 
pastor; the prayer-meeting where she aided 
in song or silent prayer; the Sunday School 
made better by her influence, or some literary 
club, or mission work pushed on with greater 
vigor, because her shoulder was to the wheel. 
No, alas, no! She had not time, she can only 
say, “The floors had to be scrubbed, the 
windows washed, the carpets, swept, the cakes 
and pies baked, jelly made and canning done. 
It is all eaten up now, Oh Lord, and the 
house is dirty too. I wish 1 had time to rest, 
and read, and think, and help others.” I do 
not believe that there is a woman on earth 
who really wants time to rest, and read, and 
think, and be helpful, who cannot get it some¬ 
how. Not every day, perhaps, but some¬ 
where, somehow, sometimes it can be obtained 
if a woman wills it. When I was preparing 
those potatoes I noticed how beautiful the 
world looked outside my window. The rain 
had made it seem like a newly-created world. 
Everything seemed alive and conscious. The 
birds in singing to each other seemed to sing 
to me in notes I could understand. The 
maple-leaves, from the tree in the yard, 
shook the pearly drops of rain down on the 
grass below, and as the tiny blade bent be¬ 
neath the weight, the maple-leaf laughed at 
the sight, and the dear little pansies looked 
up with their roguish faces as much as to say, 
“ Isn’t it fun ? ” The clouds were rolled back 
to the horizon like distant snow capped 
mountains, and as I looked I realized that it 
was the life within that gave me the rose- 
hued lenses through which I looked and saw 
what lay in its focus. I might have stood and 
prepared those potatoes for dinner in the hot 
kitchen, and thought, “ There’s the meat to 
cook ; I mustn’t forget to boil those beets for 
pickle, and I must order the berries for tea ; 
and—and—and—” all the while never dream¬ 
ing there were birds and pansies, and rain¬ 
drops and clouds all just outside, and on pur¬ 
pose to give me rest and comfort, and, oh, how 
they did rest me! I could meet“Admetus” with 
a smile when he came to dinner, though I’d 
been awake nearly all night on account of the 
storm, and it was Monday noon with all the 
“up setting ” trials of Monday morning and 
reaction of Sunday’s quiet. 
There are so many ways a house-mother can 
make life easy—an easy chair and a foot-rest ; 
a lounge ; a hammock swung under a shady 
piazza ; a glass of lemonade or a cup of milk 
with an egg beaten up and poured in, drank 
when weariness begins. Then there are so 
many things that one need not do when the 
mercury revels among the nineties. Less jelly 
and canned fruit and not so large a variety of 
pickles for next winter ; cake and pies abol¬ 
ished until cool weather comes, and blanc 
mange, lemonade, cracked wheat, oat-meal 
and fresh berries and fruit instead. ’Tisn’t 
living the .waysoma of us go through Ithe 
