420 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
JUNE 23 
There are exceptional instances where ladies 
may, to my notion, kiss in public, but they 
are few. The majority of women who kiss 
rapturously in the street and in street cars, kiss 
the black noses of their pug dogs quite as vehe¬ 
mently. Half the kissing in the world be¬ 
tween women covers, and very badly too, a 
multitude of petty spites. I should raise a 
howl among my sex if I should state as strong¬ 
ly as I feel it, how much I regret many of our 
little ways among each other—the petty 
jealousies that creep into church and mission¬ 
ary societies where they are run solely by wo¬ 
men, the lightly spoken bit of gossip that has 
its rise at the weekly sewing circle, and that 
leaves a never-to be-effaced and unpleasant 
impression of the person of whom it was told. 
When I hear much talk about the emancipa¬ 
tion of women, it seems to me that there is 
much from which we must emancipate our¬ 
selves. To those who are disposed to “howl” 
at my criticism, let me say that only those 
of us whom the shoe fits need put it 
on. If we don’t gossip and harbor petty 
jealousies then all we have to do is to exercise 
patience and charity toward those who do, 
and instead of listening to their slandering, 
rebuke them for it. 
I once heard Dr. Deems preach from James 
IV., 11: “Speak not evil one of another, breth¬ 
ren,” and I came away with the eyes of my 
understanding opened regarding this matter 
of gossip, and a new' resolve to keep my tongue 
from speaking evil. The good doctor showed 
very clearly that it was not enough merely not 
to give utterance to an evil report, but that 
we should rebuke the person spreading it, and 
that the one who listened, in silence, it might 
be, to an evil story of his neighbor, was as 
bad as the one who carried it. I am sure if 
we will all read prayerfully the third chapter 
of James, we will recognize the beauty of 
that “good conversation” of which the apostle 
speaks. Perhaps there is no class among 
women whoso much need to cultivate and ex¬ 
ercise the beautiful virtue of patience as that 
long-suffering class, saleswomen. Even a con¬ 
siderate woman who “shops” cannot fail to be 
a trial to the clerk who waits on her. It is 
quite impossible always to know what is 
wanted until we see it, and this involves much 
lifting of heavy boxes, and taking out and 
putting away of goods. 1 always regard them 
as martyrs as well as saints, if, as often 
happens, they are lovely and cheerful under 
their hard lot. When I find one, as I rarely 
do, who is disobliging and impatient, I think 
of how her poor tired back and weary feet 
must ache, and I long to take her in my arms 
and confort her with loving sisterly words. 
“Bear ye one another’s burdens.” Let us think 
of that, sisters, when we are shopping. 
NUTS CRACKED FOR THE RURAL 
BOYS. 
BY ONE OF THEM. 
I wonder how many boys who read the 
Rural can tell me the origin of the dollar 
mark ($). Many think that it stands for TJ. 
S., the S written over the U, but the dollar, 
as well as its sign were in use before the 
United States existed. According to good au¬ 
thority, it comes from the design on the re¬ 
verse of the Spanish dollar—the Pillars of 
Hercules, with a scroll around each pillar, the 
latter probably representing the serpents 
strangled by the infant athlete while yet in 
his cradle. Another theory is that it came 
from the form of the figure 8, the old-lime 
dollar being a piece of eight reals. Washing¬ 
ton Irving, in his sketch of a “Creole Village,” 
written in 1837, first used the expression which 
Billy Florence has made so popular—“al¬ 
mighty dollar.” 
Mr. Grant S. Oliphaut explains the origin 
of “Uncle Sam,” as applied to the United 
States, thus: “Uncle Sam Wilson” was the 
government inspector of supplies at Troy in 
the war of 1812. Those edibles which he ap¬ 
proved were labeled “U. S.,” the new sign of 
the United States; the workmen supposed 
that these letters were the initials of “Uncle 
Sam,” and so the mistake became a joke and 
a lasting one. 
The national soubriquet of “Brother Jona¬ 
than” came from the fact that Washington, 
who thought very highly of the judgment of 
Jonathan Trumbull, Governor of Connecticut, 
was constantly remarking, “We must consult 
Brother Jonathan.” 
Mr. South wick, in “Quizzism,” gives us some 
curious information aboutthe term “Yaukee,” 
w hich doubtless most of you think came from 
the Indians’ pronunciation of the word 
English. Mr. Southwick tells us that in a 
curious book of the “Round Towers of Ire¬ 
land,” the origin of the term “Yankee Doodle” 
was traced to the Persian phrase Yanki- 
dooniah, or inhabitants of the New World. 
Layard, in his book on Nineveh and its Re¬ 
mains, gives Yanghiduuia as the Persian name 
of America. 
Mr. Southwick tells us that the song “Yan¬ 
kee Doodle” is as old as Cromwell’s time; that 
it was the Protector himself who “stuck a 
feather in his hat,” when going to Oxford, 
and that the bunch of ribbons which held the 
feathers was a macaroni. A writer in the 
Cornhill Magazine says he does not see how 
round towers, the Persian language, and 
Cromwell came to be so intimately connected. 
The following are some of the ingenious or¬ 
igins given by Mr. Olipbant for the various 
names of his Satanic Majesty. Old Harry, 
he suggests, may be a corruption of the Scan¬ 
dinavian Harl, one of the names of Odm, or 
another form of Old Hairy. Butler, the au¬ 
thor of Hudibras, says Old Nick comes from 
Niccolo Macliiavelli, while Mr. Oliphant 
thinks it is derived from the river god Nick 
or Neck. Old Scratch is taken to be derived 
from Scrat, a house or wood demon of the 
ancient North. 
It is interesting to know that the mode of 
dividing time on the dial plates of watches 
and clocks dates from Hipparchus, who lived 
in the second century before Christ. This 
astronomer accepted the Babylonian sexages¬ 
imal system of reckoning time. The Babylo¬ 
nians although acquainted with the decimal 
system for practical purposes, counted by sos- 
si and savi; the former representing sixty, 
and the latter sixty times sixty. This mode 
of reckoning found its w T ay into the works of 
Ptolemy, and eventually to the dial plates of 
clocks and watches. 
GOLDEN GRAINS. 
Mr. Beecher said that one Sunday after¬ 
noon with his Aunt Esther did him more 
good than 40 Sundays in church w r ith his fath¬ 
er. “He thundered over my head, and she 
sweetly instructed me down in my heart.”_ 
Rev. Dr. Twining truly says, put the 
Bible on its natural ground, relieve it from 
the strain of unnatural and unbiblical theories 
of its origin, of its nature and of its authority, 
and it will vindicate itself. The process which 
has been going on through the century has a 
lesson in it. Never was criticism so free. The 
tendency has been everywhere to freedom. But 
the result is a quickened Church, a more bibli¬ 
cal Christianity, and an interest in the Bible 
such as the world has never seen. 
Spurgeon says that some one has said that 
when there is a shadow there must be light 
somewhere, and so there is. Death stands by 
the side of the highway in which we have to 
travel, and the light of heaven shining upon 
him, throws a shadow across our path; let us 
then rejoice that there is light beyond. Nobody 
is afraid of a shadow, for a shadow cannot 
stop a man’s pathway even for a moment. 
The shadow of a dog cannot bite; the shadow 
of a sword cannot kill; the shadow of death 
cannot destroy us. Let us not, therefore, be 
afraid. 
Be kind to all—speak kindly to all—to men¬ 
ials and dependents. Never slight or neglect 
the humblest individual. Remember he is of 
as much importance to himself as you are to 
yourself, or as is the greatest man in the 
world. You have no right to hurt the feel¬ 
ings of any person. 
Rev. Bam’l Scoville in the course of a re¬ 
cent sermon in Plymouth Church, said there 
must also be confidence and, w’ithin limits, 
independence. It is mostly true that uncrit¬ 
icising, unquestioning acceptance of Christ is 
the highest example of Christianity; but 
friendship expects a frank statement of all a 
friend’s difficulties. How long could you talk 
to a friend with no opinions, who says “Yes” to 
everything? Multitui es of men who shrink 
from doing their own thinking have put 
themselves under some strong ecclesiastical 
power for the sake of getting rid of this glor¬ 
ious, ennobling responsibility.. .... 
In London, lately, a school examiner asked 
the class before him the meaning of “eternity.” 
Straightway the smallest of the pupils held 
up a little white hand, and exclaimed: “Please, 
sir, God’s life.”. 
The Independent says it has noticed the re¬ 
markable fact that old folks are generally 
more interested in a sermon addressed to 
children than in one addressed to themselves 
and will remember it better. This fact has a 
moral for ministers rather than for their peo¬ 
ple. . 
Talmage says that if parents knew more of 
Christ, and practiced more of His religion, 
there would not be so many little feet already 
starting on the wrong road, and all around us 
voices of riot and blasphemy would not come 
up with such ecstacy of infernal triumph. 
Tears shed upon a coffin will not blot out 
the stains that may have been cast in life upon 
the stilled heart within it. 
CONDUCTED BY MRS. AGNES E. M. CARMAN. 
THE DINING-ROOM. 
ALICE BROWN. 
An attractive room in which to eat is a 
luxury to some and a necessity to others. But 
the man who would eat with equal pleasure in 
a dark, ill-smelling, disorderly room or in a 
bright, cheery room must be either very hun¬ 
gry or quite lost to a sense of his surround¬ 
ings. Some dining-rooms have a flavor of 
home-life prevading them, and a warm per¬ 
sonality about their appointments, that is felt 
at once even by a stranger. This sense of 
comfort comes through the addition of a few 
fit things of beauty. They may be very sim¬ 
ple, inexpensive things, but they lift the room 
to a little higher place in the household econ¬ 
omy, giving it elements that minister to mind 
and heart. 
The accompanying illustration shows a part 
of the dining-room, in the house of Mr. W. S. 
Lyon. The room is medium in size and is 
well lighted by a double window looking to 
the west and a low window on the north open¬ 
ing upon a piazza. The room is finished and 
furnished in light-wood color. The floor was 
at first carpeted, but carpets wear out fast in 
a room that is constantly used, and some time 
ago Mr. and Mrs. Lyon decided to replace the 
carpets with an inlaid floor, as cheaper in the 
end and much more satisfactory. The floor¬ 
ing is made of blocks nearly two inches square 
cut across the graiu of ash wood; this gives a 
very pleasing variety as the blocks taken from 
the heart wood are darker than those from 
the outer growth and many, of the blocks are 
in themselves bi-colored. These blocks are 
three quarters of an inch thick, and as the 
wear all comes on the end of the grain it seems 
probable that a lifetime of wear would not 
destroy this flooring. Around the room, about 
three inches from the wall, is a border of ma¬ 
hogany blocks in a double row, broken by a 
figure in the mahogany, in each cornor. The 
whole floor is highly polished. 
These two colors—ash color and mohogany 
red—run through all the furnishing of the 
room. They are repeated in the large, heavy 
rug, on which the dining-table stands, and in 
the table-cover that takes the place of a white 
one between meal times. The windows are 
curtained in a creamy wash material with a 
thread of red running through it at intervals. 
The table, chairs, and side-board are of ash, 
the chairs cushioned in leather. Ash-color is 
the predominating tint of the neat figured 
wall paper, and the picture frames are of ham¬ 
mered metal or of the light-colored natural 
woods now so much used in framing pictures. 
The mantel, which is shown in the illustration, 
is the chief beauty of this room. Here the 
brightness centers and when the open fire is 
burning the room represents the essence of all 
that is home like. 
A sister of Mrs. Lyon painted the happy 
chimney swallows that are seen over the man¬ 
tel. Those in the fore ground are life size, in 
their natural color, and shown against a blue 
sky softened by a few fleecy white clouds. 
The effect is charming and its suggestions of 
chimney homes occupied by nesting birds, is 
a happy thought for a mantel decoration. At 
the left of the mantel the swallows are repre¬ 
sented in the distance and the colors of sky 
and cloud are shaded a little more soberly. 
Above the picture is a band of dark red felt, 
held in place by a gilded molding. Picturing 
the room as a whole, it shows the polished floor 
in shaded ash, windows flooding the room 
with light, and afternoon sunshine, a tall side¬ 
board with mirror, and shelves filled with 
dainty china, dark red repeated unobtrusive¬ 
ly in floor, rug, table cover, curtains, and in 
the felt over the bright mantel picture. 
Cordial hospitality is not lacking to complete 
all that the room suggests. There are many 
When Baoy was sick, we gave her Castorla, 
When she was a Child, she cried for Castorla, 
When she became Miss, she clung to Castorla, 
When she had Children, she gave them Castorla. 
THE DINING ROOM. Fig. 220. 
