THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
APRIL 2® 
2B2 
receiving inquiries about it. It may not be 
altogether a humbug; but the claims put 
forth in its circulars and advertisements are 
greatly exaggerated.... Again we have to re¬ 
peat our frequent caution against the Talla¬ 
poosa Land Enterprise of G-eorgia. A short time 
ago a “special commissioner” sent by the New 
York Herald to investigate the affair, spoke 
strongly against it in a two-column article. 
Dr. T. W. Graydon, Cincinnati, Ohio, and 
the Chicago Specialty Company, of Chicago, 
Illinois, are “not recommended” by Western 
papers. ..A. James & Co., offering incuba¬ 
tors for sale at Quincy, Illinois, are denounced 
by a resident of that town as a swindling 
mvth. No concern of the name exists there; 
nor is there any person of the name of A. 
James. Is it possible that “chicken sharp” 
Bain, of Ohio, has “gone West.” or is A. James 
& Co., an agent of his instead of being an 
alias?_Bronson & Co., of Chicaeo, who 
represent themselves to be commission men 
for broom-corn and broom-corn supplies, are 
reported to be humbugs. There is no such 
concern in the commission business in Chi¬ 
cago_The Lake Shore Lumber Co., of Chi¬ 
cago, has no existence at the address it gives, 
according to the Farm. Field and Stockman. 
....The Mississippi Valley Farmer is now 
denounced bv several farm journals, months 
after the Eye-Ooener showed it up-The 
Mutual Helper. Zanesville. Ohio, which prom¬ 
ises to give, free, to eaeh subscriber, a lot in 
Marquand. Madison County. Mo., is de¬ 
nounced as a fraud. Of course, all such free- 
lot schemes are of the same stripe ...The 
California and Southern Land Trust Co., 
of Cincinnati, is declared to be unreli¬ 
able by several papers... Be cautious about 
dealing with the Omaha World. 
Woman’s Work. 
CONDUCTED BY EMILY LOUISE TAPLIN. 
CHAT BY THE WAY. 
M arion Harland calls housewifery a 
profession, and a dignified one too. 
Certainly it requires as much education and 
intelligence to keep house properly as to man¬ 
age a great business successfully. And our 
oft-repeated quotation about makiug drud¬ 
gery divine will not make ironing day a bit 
easier, or enable us to get dinner without a 
certain amount of work, though it may make 
us think more highly of the dignity of house¬ 
keeping. 
# # * * 
There is one thing education ought to do 
for us, and that is to make our head save our 
heels, as a bright correspondent recently said. 
Simply for this reason, a clever and cultivat¬ 
ed woman ought to make a much better 
housekeeper than an ignorant one. Unfor¬ 
tunately this is not always the case, however, 
though a presumably educated woman who 
lets her house run all at loose ends is simply 
educated in the wrong direction. 
* * * 
A New York paper—the Weekly Press—has 
been collecting statistics from a lot of colleges 
as to the style of girl the collegians most ad¬ 
mire. Some of the responses are a little bit 
amusing—the budding Solons speak with such 
a calm. I-turn-the-crank-of-the-universe air— 
but the prevailing sentiment is in favor of 
modest, good sense and good temper. Some 
few demand “style,” money, or perfect beauty, 
but as a rule the three graces of good health, 
good sense, and good temper constitute the 
collegians’ ideal. The best trio in the world 
for everyday use, too. 
^ 
We would like to shake hands with Mrs. 
Jack on the question of out-door work 
for girls. As she says, heavy farm work is, 
of course, unsuitable for women, but assur- 
edly there is no reason why they should not 
familiarize themselves with light garden 
work. We cannot agree with the writer in 
the Garden, who declares that out-door life 
not only clears the complexion, but also pre¬ 
vents liability to freckles. Much experience 
shows that heat, wind, or sunlight will always 
produce this disfigurement on some skins, no 
matter how much the victim is out of doors. 
But it is a fact, that in many country dis¬ 
tricts the girls are not out of doors nearly as 
much as they ought to be. They are likely 
to be so busy, for one thing, that it seems a 
waste of time to take a walk without any 
object except that of exercise. If a little 
garden plot will make a girl take out-door 
exercise without feeling as if she were idling, 
why let us all begin our gardens at once, 
and try to grow health and strength as well 
as flowers and “garden sass.” 
Sunshine is a very necessary element in our 
lives, and we would like to extend both hands 
to the Rural sister who gave us a little talk 
on this subject in a recent issue. It is a little 
hard to see it sometimes; life is a struggle to 
many of us, but there is no reason why we 
should make it into a battle-field. And we 
always tbiuk that poverty and its attendant 
ills are a thousand times harder to bear amid 
the cruel bricks and mortar of a city than out 
in the freedom of the country. Hardship is 
hardship, everywhere; as Thomas k Kempis 
says “there is no remedy for tribulation but 
patient endurance.” Add sunshiny cheerful¬ 
ness to the endurance, and we have the most 
effective armor in the world. 
EXERCISE AND EDUCATION. 
A. G. 
I F women are to use their brains, as men do 
theirs, although, perhaps, in less degree, 
they must nourish them somewhat as men do 
theirs. The usual sedentary life of a girl 
student is simply ridiculous, and can only end 
in ultimate failure. A young friend of mine 
is studying at the University of Berkley, in 
California, a college whose course of study is 
like that of Yale or Harvard, and in another 
year (if she does not die in the meantime) will 
take the degree of B. A. She has an hour’s 
ride in a horse-car each way daily from her 
home to the college, studies Greek on the way, 
and that and various other studies, until mid¬ 
night. She has no cricket, no football, no 
rowing, no croquet, eveD, to develop her mus¬ 
cle, and is losing all her fresh complexion and 
girlish spirits as her knowledge of Greek and 
conic sections increases. 
I do not go in for this sort of “higher edu¬ 
cation” of women. It is not giving the girls 
a fair show, and wheu they break down under 
what no boy is expected to endure, the cry 
will go up that we are not meant to develop 
our brain—that the chemistry of a loaf of 
bread, and the washing of children’s faces are 
all that nature intended us for. The London 
Spectator, in a review of Mrs. Pfeiffer’s book, 
says:. “Though we do not advocate any imi¬ 
tation by women of men’s education, we 
must protest that no boy or man was ever sup¬ 
posed to be capable of what is now forced 
upon some girls. The system of examina¬ 
tions run mad has been adopted wholesale 
from boy’s education by the educator of girls. 
But no boy, however crammed, was ever de¬ 
prived of exercise as girls are. No boy was 
ever allowed to sit up to work till 12 or one at 
night, as some girls are to the present writer’s 
own knowledge. Fortunately boys would not 
stand it, and the educators of girls should 
open their eyes to the fact that they are tak¬ 
ing what a boy would call a ‘mean advantage’ 
of the docility and eagerness of some of their 
pupils, and of the traditions of an unhealthy 
scheme of life, to further the end of gaining 
prizes and distinctions, to the ruin of their 
pupils’ health and the ultimate ruin of the 
cause they themselves have at heart.” 
Follow the advice in the “Chat By The Way” 
of a recent Rural, girls, and first look out for 
your physical health. After that we should 
say look out for thatof your family and future 
husband by learning how to cook, and then if 
you have any energy left, develop your mind, 
and you will, in most instances, find that there 
will be time for a little of all three. “These 
things ought ye to have done, and not to have 
left the others undone'” 
LIVING IN THE WEST. 
BY A GRAND-DAUGHTER. 
I N the issue of March 18, of the Rural 
New-Yorker I read an account of “Liv¬ 
ing in the West,” by a grandmother. The 
hardships she related in Western life are so 
different from anything of which I have 
heard or known, that I as a grand-daughter 
must give.a little of my experience which is a 
fair sample of many others. Grandmother 
advises the girls not to come West, and as I 
am one of these having been married only a 
short time, I will address my letter to them. 
I came to Dakota five years ago, having al¬ 
ways lived in a city. You would think that 
pioneer life as it has been represented to you 
would be very disagreeable to me, but not so; 
I never enjoyed the city as I do our beauti¬ 
ful prairie. We lived on a claim the first sum¬ 
mer and I enjoyed my first taste of Dakota 
life immensely. Our nearest neighbor had her 
house just across the road from us instead of 
one mile away, and this way of building is 
customary. 
I do not remember much about sod shanties 
and dug-outs. Grandmother must be think¬ 
ing of the time when she was a girl. We all 
have wood houses here, excepting in the towns 
where they build chiefly of brick. 
We girls found many things to amuse us. 
Horseback riding was our favorite sport. 
There is fine opportunity for it here. Every¬ 
thing connected with the claim life bad a 
charm for us. The sunsets, moonlights and 
even the storms seemed grand. I have never 
seen a cyclone because they are more frequent 
in other States than here. The only bad bliz¬ 
zard I have seen was the one of Jan. 12, which 
was not so bad as represented. In our coun¬ 
ty there was no loss of life, and in the five 
surrounding counties only three perished. 
These six counties would be nearly the size of 
New York State, if not larger. 
It is here that I met my husband, a young 
Presbyterian minister. And by-the-way, girls, 
there are hundreds of noble bachelors here 
who are anxiously waiting for you girls of re¬ 
finement, in the East, to come out and 
make them comfortable homes; and as a rule 
our homes, though usually small, are comfort¬ 
able. We have as many luxuries according 
to our circumstances, as you in the East. 
The scarcity of doctors, and the sad death 
of the baby, with flowers growing over its 
grave was spoken of. There are grieving 
mothers everywhere. But here we have very 
few infants’ deaths. I have a hearty baby of 
three months, and I hope to keep her, as only 
two babies have died in our town during the 
four years of its existence. 
The truth is we don’t need many doctors 
out here. Our best physician is about to 
leave our town because he has so few patients, 
and one of our druggists has gone away, as 
he considers the climate too healthy for the 
drug business. 
Of course, we have our hardships and trials 
here, no person or country is free from them, 
but we are, as a rule a happy people, and 
greatly interested in our new country, so we 
do not mind the little inconveniences which 
necessarily come. 
Oh, I forgot the snake story. Don’t let 
that frighten you girls. I have never seen 
but two out here, and many of my friends 
have seen none. 
I will close for this time, hoping that in the 
future I may have the privilege of writing 
you again. Josephine m. brandt. 
GOLDEN GRAINS. 
A polite man is one who listens with inter¬ 
est to things he knows all about, when they 
are told by a person who knows nothing 
about them... 
Nothing but clear-cut principle is a safe 
guard in human action. The laws of nature 
are inexorable, why should not human law 
be? Nature is the best government we have 
ever seen, and that being true, does it not 
follow that the nearer we pattern our govern¬ 
ment after nature, the better the government 
will be?. 
The greatest thoughts of the greatest think¬ 
ers have all passed through fire. The greatest 
poets have “learned in suffering what they 
taught in song. ”. 
The mind, in order to b6 kept pure, must be 
employed in topics of thoughts which are 
themselves lovely, chastened, and elevating.. 
Wounds are not healed by the unbending of 
the bow that made them. 
A work prospers through endeavors, not 
through vows. 
“As we have opportunity” says a writer in 
the South and West “let us tread in His steps 
who went about doing good, whether the only 
service we can render be a look or tone of cor¬ 
diality to a fellow worshiper, a letter or visit to 
the sick, or comfort and peace brought to a 
fretful child, perchance one of our own house¬ 
hold.”.. 
A present good may be reasonably parted 
with upon a probable expectation of a future 
good which is more excellent. 
No theory of ministerial culture is either 
scriptural or philosopical, or sensible, which 
cannot bridge the gulf between the clergy and 
the masses. 
Pusey says: “What more passing than 
words? A breath! What very, very few 
words of ours rest with us? We forget them 
as soon as spoken; God does not forget them. 
They do God’s work or Satan’s work on others; 
they pass in act, they abide in effect.”. 
Human nature is not so depraved as to hin¬ 
der us from respecting goodness in others, 
though we ourselves want it. This is the rea¬ 
son why we are so charmed with the pretty 
prattle of children, and even the expressions 
of pleasure or uneasiness in some parts of the 
brute creation. They are without artifice or 
malice; and we love truth too well to re¬ 
sist the charm of sincerity.. 
Henry Ward Beecher says the impulse 
to the wrong use of the tongue is so great that 
if a man has the power to control that, there 
is nothing else so strong that he cannot con¬ 
trol it, and in that sense he is a perfect man 
that can command his tongue. 
Goethe says the useful encourages itself, for 
the multitude produce it and no one can dis¬ 
pense with it; but the beautiful must be en¬ 
couraged, for few can set it forth and many 
need it.. . 
Dr. Hammond says of cigarettes: If a boy 
begins to smoke a great deal early in life you 
may be sure he will never become an intellec¬ 
tual Saul, as the effects on his body by affinity 
reach his mind; he will lose energy and steadi¬ 
ness of purpose, and will become a vacilla¬ 
ting, weak man, unfitted for the struggle of life. 
Cigarette smoking is like whisky drinking; 
the appetite for it increases just in proportion 
as the body becomes unable to bear it. 
Extracts from the pen of the Rev. Mark 
Guy Pearse, taken from Mister Horn and His 
Friends: “If you want to keep money from 
hurting you, you must think as much about 
givin’. as gettin’.”..“Folks often excuse 
themselves saying they can’t afford to give; 
but if they saw things in a truer light they’d 
say that they couldn’t afford to keep.”. 
Just as soon as any conviction of truth be¬ 
comes central and vital there comes the de¬ 
sire to utter it. Sacrifice is gladness, service 
is joy, when such an idea becomes a com¬ 
manding power. 
The Christian spirit loves with aid to go; 
Will not be sought, waits not for want to plead, 
But seeks the duty—nay, prevents the need. 
Sprague says our salvation does not depend 
upon our having right notions about the 
devil, but right notions about God. And if 
we hate evil and love that which is good, we 
need[not trouble about'the 'personality of the 
Evil One. 
CONDUCTED BY MRS. AGNES E. M. CARMAN. 
HOW TO ENLARGE A LEAF TABLE. 
In the Rural for November 19, 1887, page 
775, there is illustrated a method for extend¬ 
ing a common table for which I would suggest 
an improvement, especially as to the corners. 
Why make square corners when it would seem 
that there are corners enough in the world 
without making more. Cut four holes, one 
inch by one and one-fourth inch, through the 
cross-bar at the end of the table, as shown in 
diagram, Fig. 114, and thus make the supports 
Fig. 114. 
for the extension longer and consequently bet¬ 
ter than represented by “Picket” on the above 
page. JETHRO TULL. 
KITCHEN TALKS. 
ANNIE L. JACK. 
The April days are lengthening and once 
more we are busy with spring work and re¬ 
joicing in renewed sunshine. Easter came 
early and filled us with desire to begin house¬ 
cleaning ; but the changeable weather warned 
us to desist. Now with softer winds and 
brighter days we feel that we can open all the 
windows of the soul and of the body too, 
“Wide open to the sun.” 
The kitchen aspect is varied and to me it 
seems the most unfavorable time of the year 
as far as appearances go. Mud tracks will 
gather on the floor; cobwebs will gather in 
spite of brooms, everything grows so fast. 
But soap and water, borax and ammonia are 
sure cleansers, nor need we add to our cares 
by haste and worry. How lovely these spring 
mornings that bring us the return of the birds 
and the first spring flowers. The season in 
this northern latitude is always late, and then 
with a sudden surprise the annual miracle 
comes. The mountains and hills, the streams 
and brooks break forth into singing and the 
wonder of spring-time is repeated. There is 
something very beautiful in all this and in the 
faith we renew with each season as we plant 
and sow, trusting that we shall reap the re¬ 
ward of our labors—a trust that is never be¬ 
trayed. In our circle there has been illness, 
and at one time we feared for our invalid. 
But youth and a naturally good constitution 
triumphed, and surrounded by loving care 
once more the kitchen circle is complete. It 
was partly a case of “tired hands” and of over 
care, and of fruitless efforts to solve the prob¬ 
lem of life—an over-tasked body and a mind 
too alert with a spirit of self-sacrifice that 
would become a martyr for those near and 
dear, with or without cause. And thus with 
When Baoy was sick, we gave her Castoria, 
When she was a Child, she cried for Castoria, 
When she became Miss, she clung to Castoria, 
When she had Children, she gave them Castoria, 
