838 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
December 15 
vvvwvvvvvvvvvv 
l Woman and Home 
From Day to Day. 
If I were King of Fairyland 
And had the right to say 
How blessings should be passed around 
Down here, from day to day— 
If I might give to each and all 
Whatever gifts I chose— 
What should I give, my little boy, 
To you, do you suppose? 
Not heaps of gold nor mighty ships 
To sail the ocean blue, 
Not wealth to make of other boys 
The hired slaves of you— 
But ruddy cheeks and sparkling eyes, 
A laugh that had the ring 
Of honest pleasure in it, and 
A heart for anything! 
If I were King of Fairyland, 
With none to say me nay, 
O, little girl, what think you I 
Should bring to you to-day? 
Nay, I should bring across the sea 
From some knight-ridden strand 
No mincing little “nobleman" 
To ask you for your hand! 
I would not raise up castle walls 
Where you should be the Queen, 
But I would let you play with dolls. 
Still artless and serene, 
And I would put within your heart 
The everlasting grace 
That lifts a woman out and leaves 
An angel in her place. 
—Chicago Times-Herald. 
* 
A pretty little penwiper is finished 
off with a doll’s head. A full ruffle of 
silk, with pinked edge, is first fastened 
securely around the doll’s neck, so that 
it does not slip, and this is sewn firmly 
to an ordinary round penwiper, made of 
several pieces of different sizes, pinked 
around the edges. 
• 
It is several months since women be¬ 
gan to decorate themselves with spikes 
of gold or silver, and the enormous pop¬ 
ularity of metallic trimmings this Win¬ 
ter keeps the spikes in vogue. At first 
they were modest little slides much like 
the tags on shoe laces, used to finish 
the ends of narrow neck ribbons, but 
they have increased in size, and some of 
them are about three inches long, chased 
or embossed. The end of the ribbon is 
gathered and drawn into the spike. Belts 
and neckties are especially finished with 
the spikes; also the ends of ribbon bows, 
and collarettes. The popular gilt rib¬ 
bons used for neck and waist are usual¬ 
ly finished in this way. 
* 
The silversmiths are constantly devel¬ 
oping new ideas in tableware, and many 
unfamiliar and, indeed, hardly necessary 
spoons and forks are among them. 
Horseradish spoons have a long slender 
handle decorated -with the stem and fo¬ 
liage of the plant. Chocolate and sher¬ 
bet spoons both have perfectly round 
bowls. A toast lifter has a broad flat 
blade, divided into three wide fork-like 
prongs, and a favorite decoration for it 
is a design of wheat ears and stalks. 
Lemon tongs, which were made to pick 
up the bits of lemon used with fish or 
iced tea, proved very inconvenient for 
the slippery slices of fruit, and a small 
fork is now made for the purpose. 
* 
f 
A Chicago justice of the peace re¬ 
cently handed down a decision that may 
be very important to sentimental 
youth. He has decided that a young 
woman who returns a man’s love—de¬ 
clined with thanks—must also return 
any presents made by the unlucky suit¬ 
or. The case involved was one brought 
by a young man to recover certain gifts 
made to a hard-hearted maiden whom 
he desired to marry. According to pop¬ 
ular ideals, a man who has been jilted 
ought to be too deeply hurt to think of 
anything so sordid as his expenditure 
in gifts, but the Chicago man in question 
did not take this view, and he sued to 
recover his presents. According to latest 
advices, the young woman looked upon 
the legal order with scorn, and it may 
be that the tributes of affection will be 
replevined by a prosaic constable with 
a writ. The legal decision was made 
upon the argument that the presents 
were noi merely gifts, but were part of 
an unwritten agreement involving a cer¬ 
tain reciprocity. In other words, when 
a man makes gifts to a girl under the 
impression that he is thereby cultivating 
an affection for the donor, he has a 
right to demand the return of said gifts 
if the anticipated affection does not ma¬ 
terialize. His offerings of disinterested 
3662 Double Breasted Jacket > 
32 to 40 in. bust. 
affection have a string attached. This 
appears to be a cruel blow aimed at wo¬ 
man’s one undisputed privilege—that of 
changing her mind. 
* 
The Pittsburg Dispatch tells this little 
story of a small girl whose idea of dis¬ 
tinction is rather unusual: 
Netta was a little girl who lived in a 
foundling asylum, a place where homeless 
children without relatives are cared for. 
A visitor who often came to the foundling 
had taken a great fancy to Netta. It 
was the birthday of Muriel, the lady’s little 
girl, and permission was asked for Netta 
to take tea with Muriel. 
As it was Muriel’s birthday Netta wished 
to be very nice to her. At the same time 
Netta felt she had an advantage over Mu¬ 
riel, for it was not everyone who lived in 
a foundling hospital. 
“You were born, Muriel?” she asked. 
Muriel nodded and smiled. 
Up went Netta's head a little higher. 
"It is so common to be born,” she said. 
"I was founded!” 
* 
Some pretty neck dressings recently 
noted consist of a stock collar of white 
satin, having hanging in front, like a 
jabot, a box pleat of satin or silk-faced 
cashmere, edged with lace. The collar 
was trimmed with narrow black velvet. 
The Empire bow with long ends, which 
was worn with so many Summer gowns, 
is still in vogue, but now, instead of ap¬ 
pearing at one side of the center, on the 
edge of the yoke, it is right in the mid¬ 
dle, and the ends extend almost to the 
bottom of the dress. The bow is a regu¬ 
lar windmill shape, and is not flattened 
at all, but allowed to stand out at its 
own sweet will. It is often made of 
chiffon or thin Liberty silk, but some¬ 
times the bow itself is lined with differ¬ 
ent color. 
Plunge down into the darkest cor¬ 
ners, not only among sins of the tongue 
am. the hand, of society and business, 
of the house and the street, of the mar¬ 
ket and the church, out among sins of 
forbidden desires, of subtle indulgence 
of the temper and imagination—sins 
that allay themselves, if they can, with 
noble impulses and warm affections, 
with the intellect and with honor.—F. 
D. Huntington. 
The Rural Patterns. 
A useful Winter coat is here illus¬ 
trated, having a fitted back and half 
loose fronts. Favorite materials are 
beaver cloth and heavy cheviot in black, 
dark blue and Oxford gray and the dark¬ 
er shades of covert cloth. When addi¬ 
tional warmth is required the revers can 
be faced with fur, which, beside mean¬ 
ing comfort, adds to the style, but as il¬ 
lustrated tne jacket is of heavy black 
cheviot, with revers and collar faced 
with peau de soie machine stitched. The 
fronts are fitted with single darts. The 
back includes a center seam and side 
backs, and is joined to the fronts oy 
under-arm gores. When the revers are 
rolled back to the waist line, the jacket 
is closed invisibly with large hooks and 
eyes. When the shorter revers are used 
it is lapped over in double-breasted 
style, and closed with buttons and but¬ 
tonholes. The high flaring collar is cut 
in sections, and fits the throat snugly. 
The sleeves are two-seamed and flare 
over the hands, where they are stitched 
to simulate cuffs. Pockets, with laps, 
are inserted back of each dart, the laps 
being machine stitched round three 
sides. To make this jacket tor a woman 
of medium size 4% yards of material 20 
inches wide, two yards 44 inches wide, 
or 1% yard 50 inches wide, with % yard 
of silk for collar and revers, will be re¬ 
quired. The pattern No. 3662 is cut in 
sizes for a 32, 34, 36, 38 and 40-inch bust 
measure. Price 10 cents from this office. 
A five-gored skirt cuts 10 better ad¬ 
vantage than other shapes in materials 
of moderate width. In addition, it is 
generally becoming and hangs so satis¬ 
factorily as to be chosen by many tailors 
and dressmakers for cloth as well as for 
narrow goods. The model given in¬ 
cludes all the latest features, fits snugly 
at the upper portion and flares freely at 
the feet, where single inverted pleats 
are underlaid at front and side seams. 
As shown, it is of cheviot with the 
seams turned forward and stitched flat 
from the waist to the upper edge of the 
pleats, a style that is much liked by 
leading tailors, but can be simply seam¬ 
ed if preferred. To cut this skirt for a 
3670 Five-Gored Flare Skirt 
22 to 32 in. waist. 
woman of medium size 7 yards of ma¬ 
terial 24 inches wide, 6 y 2 yards 27 inches 
wide, 5V 2 yards 44 inches wide, or 5 
yards 50 inches wide, will be required. 
The pattern No. 3670 is cut in sizes for 
a 22, 24, 26, 28, 30 and 32-inch waist 
measure; price 10 cents from this office. 
Begin with a generous heart. Think 
how you can serve others. Then you 
shall find resources grow.—Frothing- 
A Housekeeper’s Wisdom. 
If you had asked the Spectator re¬ 
cently if it could ever be moral to delib¬ 
erately sweep crumbs under a hearth¬ 
rug, he would have promptly and em¬ 
phatically answered “No!” To-day he 
would make no such reply. His con¬ 
version was in this wise. Within this 
last 24 hours the Spectator was calling 
at the house of a friend whose morality 
he has always considered above ques¬ 
tion, and whose reputation for super¬ 
lative house-keeping rests like a halo 
above her head; and yet it was in her 
drawing-room that the Spectator re¬ 
ceived his lesson anent crumbs and 
hearth-rugs. Afternoon tea was being 
served to the Spectator, and a young 
daughter of the house, in passing a plate 
of brittle little cakes, dropped all those 
cakes to the floor, where they broke, 
scattering a shower of crumbs. The 
daughter at once moved to the bell, 
and had laid her hand upon it, evi¬ 
dently intending to ring for the maid. 
‘‘No, no, my dear,” said her mother, 
‘‘don’t ring for Susan. Just take the 
hearth-brush there and sweep the 
crumbs under the hearth-rug.” “Mam¬ 
ma!” exclaimed this well-brought-up 
daughter. But her mother sat placidly 
confident and unabashed, merely re¬ 
marking: “Susan really ought to be in 
bed this afternoon. She’s keeping up 
simply because it’s my reception day. 
The crumbs can wait perfectly well un¬ 
til to-morrow. ‘Be tidy. Be not too 
tidy.’ ” 
The Spectator sat amazed in his 
chair, and, it must be confessed, he was 
at that moment disloyally wondering if 
there were many other such skeletons 
concealed under other hearth-rugs in 
this house. A little later he plucked 
up sufficient courage to make to his 
hostess a laughing confession of the 
shock he had suffered at her hands. “I 
am sure you are right,” he said, “but 
won’t you explain to me why you are 
right?” To the Spectator’s amazement, 
this notable house-mother with some 
warmth recorded her disapproval of 
those who could never bring themselves 
to thus sweep crumbs under rugs.- “I 
have seen housekeepers,” she averred, 
“who not only lived and died to be 
clean, but who killed for it. There 
have been times,” went on this blend¬ 
ed Mary and Martha, “when I have seen 
my floors very dirty indeed, and known 
it was my plain duty to continue to see 
them dirty—and keep calm. I have 
had to make it a matter of prayer to be 
able to sweep crumbs under rugs and to 
believe that cleanliness isn’t the first 
thing in the world at all times, in sea¬ 
son and out. But you can’t be expected 
to understand such things.” 
The Spectator, though but a man, 
flattered himself that he did understand 
his friend’s position and approved it, 
yet at thb same time he had an awe¬ 
struck kind of feeling, as if the ashes 
of his grandmother were being strewed 
to the winds of heaven.—The Outlook. 
If we know of a kind act which we 
might but do not intend to perform, if 
we be aware that our moral health re¬ 
quires the abandonment of some plea¬ 
sure which yet we do not intend to aban¬ 
don, here is cause enough for the loss 
of all spiritual power.—Frances Power 
Cobbe. 
