THE RUBAI. I4EW-Y0BKEB. 
DEffi 44 
looks at it that way. But it is the young 
girl who often feels this want of purpose. She 
may have regular duties, but possessing all the 
vague hopes of girlhood, she wants to do 
something or be something, out of the every¬ 
day rut. She becomes dissatisfied with com¬ 
monplace duties, and, if her fairy prince does 
not appear, she drifts into discontented old- 
maidism. What is the remedy .' This is hard 
to say, Perhaps the best tluug would be to 
give every girl an aim and purpose, apart 
from marriage, to teach her that wifehood 
is an honorable estate, but not to be eutered 
merely for want of ability to cure for herself. 
Self-respecting independence will not make us 
girls "strong-minded" in the common accept¬ 
ance of the term, nor need it make any 
womanly woman contemptuous of loving 
domesticity; it will simply give the ability to 
fight their own battles to those who ueed it. 
So find the work you are best fitted for, aud 
then, whatever your hand finds to do, do it, 
with all your might; it will not make life all 
sunshine, but it will prevent many a dark 
hour, and give something more to live for, 
in any case. patty garton. 
A PROTEST. 
. I want to say a word in behalf of the wash¬ 
women If "cleanliness is next to godliness," 
surely her station is a valuable one." 
Now 1 never went, out or took iu washing, 
but I have a neighlwr who comes and helps me 
over hard places, house-cleaning, washing, etc. 
I should no more think of offering her old 
carpets or surplus fruit, for pay than I would 
to a photographer for his pictures. 1 pay her 
cash, and give her the apples. 
If the laboring class are to be paid in second¬ 
hand articles, it is no wonder they revolt. 
To whom do you think it, will be said, "Well 
done, thou good and faithful servant"—the 
girl, with her soulless pictures, the faithful 
house-keeper, or the despised wash-womau ? 
M. s. HILL. 
TYPE-WRITING OR DISH-WASHING. 
If “Eleanor Kirk’s" excellent article in the 
Rural of November (1, lias not convinced 
“wife, mother, aud housekeeper" that a wo¬ 
man's whole duty is not bounded by wash-day 
on one hand and baking-day on the other, it is 
most unlikely that any humble words of mine, 
however earnest, will do so. That every wo¬ 
man who is married, or who contemplates 
matrimony, should be able to cook aud wisely 
conduct her household, 1 am sure no cue will 
deny, but it is quite as essential that she should 
also have some trade, profession, or vocation 
by which, in case of need, she can support her 
family. Husbands are mortal! “He left a 
wife aud four children iu destitute circum¬ 
stances," is a phrase that may be seen, with 
variations as to the number of children, in 
almost any and every daily paper. .Saddest 
of all, not every man who marries is able or 
willing to support a wife. In cither of the 
above-mentioned contingencies, what is a wo¬ 
man to do whose sole knowledge consists in 
making a good loaf of bread. She cannot 
turn this accomplishment, albeit a very desir¬ 
able one, to any pecuniary use, inasmuch as 
cooks with several children are not appreciat¬ 
ed in ordinary kitchens. 
I once knew a charming little lady, dainti¬ 
ly reared in a southern family of wealth, 
who had never been allowed to button her 
own shoes, or dress her own hair. She mar¬ 
ried, as many women do without the least ele¬ 
mentary knowledge of housekeeping, and 
went with her husband to a new settlement in 
southern California. Help was scarce, and 
when it could be obtained was rather a hind¬ 
rance than a help. Many a laugh that almost 
ended in tears, so closely did her tale border 
on the tragic, have I had over her recitals of 
her experience In those days. On one occa¬ 
sion coming home from church to find the 
cook iu a drunken stupor, and that the nurse 
and housemaid had talma French leave, she 
heroically assured hor husband that she would 
get him just such a dinner as he liked. 
Having settled upon a meat pie and hot 
biscuits as 1 he best that could be done under 
the circumstances, she hastened to the kitchen 
and proceeded to make the dough for the latter. 
Remembering to have heard that bread was 
the better for long kuoediug, she rashly con¬ 
cluded that the same rule would apply to bis¬ 
cuits, and patiently kneeded them for half an 
hour, molded and puttbem iu the oven; sliced 
her potatoes and onions iu a dish with layers 
of meat, filled the dish with water, covered it 
with a crust rolled from some of the biscuit 
dough, and triumphantly placed it in the oven 
to buke. When the biscuits were done she was 
somewhat dismayed by their leaden looks, but 
the tempting brown of the meat pie seemed 
to atone. To this day she declares that, when¬ 
ever she thinks of that pie with its unwarmed 
meat, aud ra w potatoes and onions, she experi¬ 
ences anew the mortificatiou of that dinner. 
She began'at once,’like" the brave'little 
woman she was, to remedy the defects of her 
education, and became in time a most accom¬ 
plished cook, although she has assured me that 
she always disliked it extremely and found it 
the most terrible drudgery. A proof that all 
women are not born cooks. When a year or 
two later her husband lost all his money in an 
unfortunate speculation, and his health at the 
same time, this little woman, although she 
could not, make "boots and shoes," could and 
did by means of her pen. support her husband 
and two children, going to a large city to 
obtain work. Since her husband's death, she 
has gone bravely oil, sent her sou through the 
University of California (which is free except 
for board), aud educated her daughter, who, 
contrary to all laws of inheritance, is a natu¬ 
ral cook, and never so happy as when with 
her pretty arms bared, she is concocting some 
delightful dish. 
I know twenty women to-day who but for 
their knowledge of short-band and type-writ¬ 
ing would be iu indigent circumstances. I 
know another lady, who as editress of a well- 
known magazine makes three t imes the money 
that enables her to pay a good housekeeper to 
take from her hands the duties that are so irk¬ 
some aud for which she is so unfitted. 
Iris uot a question of "easier times,” it is 
one of doing with our might that for which 
we are most fitted, and 1 would say to “wife 
mother and housekeeper," beware how you 
check the tendencies of your daughter should 
she attempt to leave the old beaten track. Al¬ 
though she may not like to get up and build 
the fire on a cold winter morning, for a man 
selfish enough to let her do it, being the daugh¬ 
ter of so industrious a mother, she is not likely 
to be a drone in life. 
I am, dear readers of the Rural, one who 
has been a housekeeper, and is still, a 
WIFE AND MOTHER. 
TEACHING THE YOUNG IDEA. 
An exchange gives expression to the fear 
that when ladies are once generally admitted 
to the Boards of Education, they will, as far 
as their power goes,employ only female teach¬ 
ers. Whether this would be so or not, it cer¬ 
tainly would be better for the rising genera¬ 
tion that it should be so. Women have more 
power than men in forming character iu child¬ 
ren. The moral, intellectual and spiritual 
powers are better evolved aud developed by 
the coaxing influence of affection and sympa¬ 
thy possessed by women, than by the repel- 
laut severity c t' the average male teacher. 
As a general thing a man tills a post as 
teacher only as a stepping stone to something 
else, to work his way through college for iu- 
stauce. It is a woman’s life work. A very 
small per cent of lady teachers marry, and of 
those who do, many of them continue their 
teaching. 
There is cue crying shame that might be 
avoided if women could take a placeou Boards 
of Education. They would see that a female 
teacher who did her work in every way as well 
as a male teacher should receive the same 
salary. selma clare. 
GOLDEN GRAINS. 
Drydkn said: " Let grace and goodness be 
the principal loadstone of thy affections. Fol¬ 
io ve which hath ends will have an end, where¬ 
as that which is founded on true virtue will 
always continue.”. 
Professor Phelps says: " Take Christ 
out of the Old Testament and the 
student of astronomy may well scorn 
aud scout the whole story. Put back Christ 
into its pages, and they glow with a magnifi¬ 
cence which the Heaven of Heavens euunot 
contain. Pretty, Is it ' That very homeliness of 
details is the measure of God’s condescension. 
That he has come down to the slow and pa¬ 
tient training of a rude person in a ruder age. 
Is the prattle of the nursery degrading to the 
young mother who fondly studies its meaning f 
What else marks the love of a mother like ttf 
But. for just such pettiness what would the 
world have over known of Homer and Pluto? 
The Uld Testament is simply the story of the 
moral nursery of the race. Iu the ono fact 
lies the whole volume of reply to the carpiugs 
of infidelity."... 
Go ou In your journey to Heaven, mu) ho 
content with such fare by the way as Christ 
and Hts followers have had before you; for 
they had always the wind ou their faces; and 
the Lord hath not changed the wa> to us, for 
our case, but will have us follow our sweet 
guide... 
Ills useful where thou lives!, that they may 
Both want and wish thy living presences! Ill; 
Kindness, good paris, great places are the way 
To compass llils. Find out men’s wants and will, 
Ami meet them there. All worldly Joys go less 
To the one joy of doing kindnesses. 
—Geo. Herbert. 
P 0)31 f Stic C'COTlOimj 
CONDUCTED BY .MRS. AGNES F„ M. CARMAN. 
Pleasant evenings in the sitting-room of 
the farm house. How can me secure them ? 
Music , vocal nr instrumental, or both, will 
help. A game or so, a story or lively conver¬ 
sation will also help. But underlying these 
we must have contentment. 
HOUSEKEEPING IN NEW ENGLAND. 
I. 
MARY WAGER-FISHER. 
We had an "outing” of six weeks last 
August and September on the Massachusetts 
coast, beginning with Boston, jaunting leisure 
ly southward as fancy led us, and seeing a 
good deal of Yankee life iu a variety of 
places—very superficially, it is true, but per¬ 
haps more interesting than a deeper acquaint¬ 
ance would have proved to be. Most of the 
housekeeping was in hotels. In one, where the 
rates were four dollars j»er day. the tablecloth 
was soiled, aud in auotber, where the charge 
was two dollars a day, aud the best hotel in 
the place, all the tables were covered with 
white oil-cloth kept spotlessly clean, aud I 
liked that much better. 
On Sunday mornings we invariably had for 
breakfast baked beaus, Boston brown bread 
and codfish balls! In one very quiet and 
bou.e-like hotel where, we stopped for three 
weeks, and where we had fresh bed liuen twice 
a week and stacks of clean towels (the woman 
who did the washing and ironing was Scotch; 
she had the sweetest voice and smile of any 
woman I have seen in six months, and her de¬ 
meanor was that of a bred lady), the brown 
bread was so exceptionally good, that I asked 
the landlady how it was made, and she said: 
"Rye flour three cups, corn meal three 
cups; imt m mixing pan. Add one-half cup 
of molasses, one teaspoon of soda, put in one 
quartof cold water, one teaspoon of salt. Mix 
and steam three hours. If you have no brown 
bread pan you can put it iu a lard pail of suit¬ 
able size.” 
The baker iu this house was a superior 
workman in every branch of bread and pastry 
making. He was a German and had learned 
to make bread in Germany, but lie had learned 
to make pies iu Yankecland, as Germany is 
not the home of the pio, His pastry was ex¬ 
cellent, and although I don’t approve of pie 
and consider it a sort of culinary abomina¬ 
tion, still, when the dining-room girl would 
come to our little table daily with “What will 
you have for dessert? Mince, apple, blueberry, 
custard, Washington -and squash pio and ice 
cream," I was often inveigled into ordering 
pie! Aud everywhere wo went pie abounded, 
and One mature waitress said that she had all 
her life lived in New England and she had 
never been anywhere they didn’t have pie— 
they didn’t generally tlnnk fruit was good for 
much except it was turned into pic! 
One day I went in to see the German baker 
at work—clad all iu white like a Chinese 
house servant, aud with u white turban on his 
head. He worked like a flash. He was 
moulding bread—putting the loaves iu a long 
pan, with a wide space between each loaf; 
with a wide camels-hair brush such as artists 
call a "blender” he gave each one a coating of 
egg well heaten, then covered them—each 
separately —with a long narrow bake tin. 
Under these hoods the bread rose for the last 
time, and was baked—the covers being removed 
only when the bread was nearly done, so 
that a fine crisp crust would be formed en¬ 
tirely over each loaf. He used the Vienna 
yeast because he said that he hadn’t time to 
tuuke his own,—he used half milk and half 
water iu mixing the dough. Every day a 
“shore dinner” was served for such as pre¬ 
ferred it to a “roast.” It consisted of clam 
chowder, blue ILsh boiled or baked, clam frit¬ 
ters, vegetables, etc. Fish was always abund¬ 
ant. It was no uncommon thing to see half a 
hundred boats at, anchor fishing for mackerel 
aud many others out with a trap for catching 
lobsters—a cage like arrangement called a 
lobster pot into which the lobsters are be¬ 
guiled by bait, aud although slipping easily in 
cannot get oat—much on the plan of some 
mouse traps. 
One day we went in it whaler across Massa¬ 
chusetts Bay to the tipend of ('ape Cod, where 
we ate fresh codfish, and saw fishermen un¬ 
loading cod from the boats just in from the 
"Great Banks” of Newfoundland. The fish 
are caught with a hook and line, cut open, 
washed and salted In the hold of the vessels, 
the hold packed full of them. In unloading 
and preparing them for market, they were 
pitched out with a pitchfork and washed oil’ 
iu a large canoe tilled with fresh water, then 
packed in casks, and the work was done iu a 
cleanly manner. The livers of the cod are 
thrown iu casks where the oil exudes spontane¬ 
ously—the meaty part of the liver and other 
impurities rising to the top, leaving the oil 
“crystal pure.” Oue of the men lifted the lid 
of a liver cask, and the smell was too vile for a 
moment's emliirauce—quite equalling the taste, 
which is the worst of anything I ever tasted, 
and I once swallowed iu the course of time a 
gallon, more or less! 
Vhen ou the island of Nantucket we ate 
sword-fish which Anaximander thought capi¬ 
tally good—considering it was not Delaware 
shin), which to his palate is the finest fish iu 
the world. Tt is only recently that, sword-fish 
has been considered good for the table and the 
tremendous weapon it, carries projecting 
straight out from its head would seem to con¬ 
stitute it a veritable monster. The laddie paid 
half a dollar for a sword in Its natural con¬ 
dition as taken off the fish’s head. The surface 
is hard and rough like a grindstone and much 
the same iu color—the length 38^ inches and 
the circumference at the big end ten inches. 
One of the sailors ou board the whaler showed 
us the gun they used in shooting whales—a 
short, very heavy iron gun with an inch bore 
—the load a shell about a foot long which ex¬ 
plodes inside the whale and serves to make him 
feel sick. This shell is bought already pre¬ 
pared aud costs s:j. After the whale has ex¬ 
perienced the astonishing sensation of this in¬ 
ternal explosion, he is harpooned, a rope is 
tied to the harpoon, an anchor tied to the rope 
and a buoy to the anchor: in three days the 
whale will float and may be then towed into 
port. The whale is one of the most fortunate 
of creatures for he lives to lie a thousand years 
old and nobody knows how much longer. In 
that length of time ho accumulates an im¬ 
mense quantity of oil which at one epoch went 
a long way in enlightening the world But the 
discovery of petroleum practically put au eud 
to whale oil for illuminating purposes and was 
almost the death blow to New Euglaud whale 
fishery. It is no longer considered profitable 
and whalers in large numbers have turned to 
other sources of industry. 
To have stiff shirts aud collars add pow¬ 
dered borax to the boiled starch—half a tea¬ 
spoonful to a quart. 
ONE WINTER. 
ANNE THRIFTY. 
One evening in early December, as the twi¬ 
light deepened. I was sitting in the big rocking 
chair, with Samiuie and Bertie both on my lap. 
The glow that shown through the mica doors 
of the stove was our only light, and surround¬ 
ed by dusty shadows we were building a 
story about a wonderful little boy, who, after 
boding a very ordinary life until ho was nine 
years old (our heroes always had to be about 
the same ago as the twins), suddenly iu re- 
spouse to an uttered wish found himself 
changed into India-rubber. As I wove the 
story, the boys contributed to it, by interrupt¬ 
ing me at, every breath with suggestive ques¬ 
tions such as; “Could he reach a mile with 
his rubber arms?" “Could he mt a whole bush¬ 
el of eundyf" with great emphasis on a whole 
bushel. “Could he stretch his eyes very big?” 
“Could he hear better when his ears were 
stretched?” To all these questions I must re¬ 
ply with some wonderful experiences our 
hero had gone through. As we sat thero 
laughing over our story, with t he faint light 
from the lire around us, l wondered whether 
any one would think of us a-s poor if he could 
look in through t he window. 
Aunt Helen with little means at her com¬ 
mand had made her house so home-like that 
it seemed beautiful to me. 
The house was new, and although built to 
rent, it had been nicely finished inside, aud 
the windows were large aud low with only 
two large panes of glass in each sash. Aunt 
Helen had selected the paper for the wall in 
the sitting-room to harmonize with the carpet 
which was green and black. The extension- 
tublc closed, uud covered with a red tablecloth, 
stood in the center of the room holding books 
and papers; pictures, drawn iu colored cruyou 
by Auntie when a school-girl, hung on the 
walls in both sitting-room and kitchen. 
Everything had been cared for and kept at 
Its best as long as possible, and whenever I 
swept, dusted and arranged they were an ob¬ 
ject, lesson to me in housewifely art. 
I found it hard to realize that Aunt Helen 
would never come back to her little home, and 
whenever I attempted any task that was new 
to me, 1 found myself involuntarily looking 
down the street, whence Aunt Helen had so 
often coma from shopping or other errands 
expecting to see her and consult Iter about 
my work. 
What, an empty, licurt-breaking void is al¬ 
ways left when the mother never comes back. 
When the boys felt lonely how helpless I used 
t<> feel to supply to them the mother love they 
had lost, and when Uncle John looked care¬ 
worn and sad, the desolation that death 
makes would fill the house aud sadden us all, 
I 
