582 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
August 23 
| Woman and Home j 
H A A A A 4i A A ' -A A y 
From Day to Day 
COUNTRY LIFE. 
Not what we would, but what we must. 
Makes up the sum of living; 
Heaven Is both more and less than just 
In taking and in giving. 
Swords cleave to hands that sought the 
plow, 
And laurels miss the soldier’s brow. 
Me, whom the city holds, whose feet 
Have worn its stony highways, 
Familiar with its loneliest street— 
Its ways are never my ways. 
My cradle was beside the sea, 
And there, I hope, my grave will be. 
Old homestead! In that old, gray town, 
The vane is seaward blowing, 
Thy slip of garden stretches down 
To where the tide is flowing; 
Below they lie, their sails all furled, 
The ships that go about the world. 
Dearer that little country house, 
In land with pines beside it; 
Some peach trees, with unfruitful boughs, 
A well, with weeds to hide it; 
No flowers, or only such as rise 
Self-sown, poor things, which all despise. 
Dear country home! Can I forget 
The least of thy sweet trifles? 
The window vines which clamber yet, 
Whose blooms the bee still rifles? 
The roadside blackberries, growing ripe, 
And in the woods the Indian pipe? 
Happy the man who tills the field, 
Content with rustic labor; 
Earth does to him her fullness yield, 
Hap what may to his neighbor, 
Well days, sound night—oh, can there be 
A life more rational and free? 
Dear country life of child and man! 
For both the best and strongest, 
That with the earliest race began, 
And hast outlived the longest. 
Their cities perished long ago, 
Who the first farmers were we know. 
Perhaps our Babels, too, will fall, 
If so, no lamentations, 
For Mother Earth will shelter all, 
And feed the unborn nations; 
Yes, and the swords that menace now 
Will then be beaten to the plow. 
—Richard Henry Stoddard. 
* 
Try mixing some finely-chopped 
pickled cucumber in pot cheese just be¬ 
fore serving; it is very nice. This makes 
a good filling for sandwiches. 
• 
We once heard a mother remark, as 
her baby boy vindictively smashed a toy 
in a sudden gust of passion that Tommy 
had a violent temper naturally; when 
he got mad he always broke something. 
She did not endeavor to restrain him in 
any way, but accepted his baby temper 
as something inevitable—a natural in¬ 
heritance. She had no thought what¬ 
ever of the future, when the unrestrain¬ 
ed temper of the baby may develop into 
the murderous rage of the man. Few 
things cause more misery in family life 
than uncontrolled temper, and the time 
to cure it is in early life. 
* 
If the coarse salt and ice used to 
freeze ice cream are mixed together in a 
separate vessel, and the mixture then 
packed around the freezer can, the result 
will be much better than if put in layers 
without previous mixing. One-third salt 
is used to two-thirds ice, unless freezing 
a frappd or mousse, which is mushy 
rather than hard frozen. For this use 
ice and salt half and half. When the 
freezing compound is firmly packed 
down, without air spaces, there is much 
less waste than if it is put in carelessly. 
Another thing to avoid is too rapid turn¬ 
ing of the freezer. It is the even grind¬ 
stone movement, not the coffee-mill 
swing that is required. 
* 
Fiiuit red is one of the newest colors, 
which is likely to supersede green in 
the early Fall. It is a glowing straw¬ 
berry-raspberry tint, brighter than ger¬ 
anium, and softer than tomato red. It 
will be more becoming than the shades 
approaching scarlet. Mention of fruit 
red recalls the fruit trimmings that have 
been enjoying quite a vogue in millinery 
this season; strawberries, raspberries, 
currants, cherries and grapes. Some of 
them are pretty, but many of them are 
not, and we often feel in sympathy with 
a man whom we heard referring to such 
headgear disparagingly as “one o’ them 
garden-sass hats.” 
* 
We read recently of a small girl who 
is never still unless she is in mischief. 
The other day her mother became aware 
of the quiet which boded trouble. She 
was about to look for the child when, at 
that moment, Dorothea came in, her 
face rosy with happiness and her mouth 
covered with crumbs. 
“Where have you been, Dorothea?” 
asked her mother. “What are you eat¬ 
ing?” 
“Cheese,” said the young lady, calmly. 
“Cheese? Where did you get it, dear?” 
“In the mouf-trap.” 
“In the mouse-trap!” exclaimed her 
mother, horrified. 
“Oh, yeth!” 
“But what will the mice do? They 
won’t have any cheese.” 
“Oh, dey don’t care, mamma! Dey 
was two moufies in de trap, and dey 
didn’t care a bit!” 
* 
We have always despised clingstone 
poaches, in spite of the delicious flavor 
possessed by many of these varieties, 
but they are troublesome to cut up, and 
embarrassingly awkward to eat out of 
hand. They are excellent, however, for 
baking, and this is the method: Wipe 
the fruit well with a soft cloth, so as to 
rub off the fuzz without bruising, and 
pack into a stone jar, filling about two- 
thirds full, and scattering a little sugar 
among them. Cover with cold water 
and place the jar in the oven, baking 
the peaches slowly until they are tender 
and transparent, but not broken. It will 
take from two to three hours, according 
to heat of oven and size of peaches. The 
flavor is retained in full. Pears, either 
peeled or unpeeled, are excellent baked 
in the same way; if a little cinnamon 
bark is added to the syrup, pears of the 
commoner grades acquire quite a su¬ 
perior flavor. The long cooking turns 
pears a pleasing deep red. 
An Indiana Woman Farmer 
ANOTHER FARM RUN BY DAUGHTER 
POWER. 
We have heard on several occasions of 
the farm work conducted by Miss Abbie J. 
Peffer, of St. Joseph Co., Ind., who forms 
an inspiring example for other women 
confronted by siniilar problems. Miss 
Peffer had the advantages of education, 
travel, and a varied experience of social 
life, but she finds her keenest pleasure In 
the simple and wholesome duties of her 
country home. Strawberries form one of 
her specialties, and she is devoting much 
attention to fruit, but she does general 
farming, and keeps some farm animals, 
nor is she ever too busy to give care and 
comfort to the widowed mother whose fail¬ 
ing health was one of the factors inducing 
her to assume charge of the farm. Miss 
Peffer gives us a little account of her work 
below: 
I was born near Carlisle, Pa. My 
father came to Indiana when I was but 
a very small child. He taught me how 
to do farm work, and Mother taught me 
to do all kinds of housework, for which 
1 feel very thankful. They managed to 
give me a good education; sent me to 
school near our 160-acre farm, and later 
to Northern Indiana College. After fin¬ 
ishing school I commenced teaching, 
which I continued for about eight terms, 
and as Father and Mother were both 
growing old, and I have always had a 
strong affection for my parents, I quit 
teaching and tried to do everything I 
could for their comfort and pleasure. 
My father broke himself down by work¬ 
ing hard to clear off the 160 acres of 
ground he first bought when he came 
to Indiana. Having sympathy for him 
I would undertake work that was en¬ 
tirely too much for me. He died in 1893, 
and my mother has been in poor health 
ever since. She was paralyzed in 1896, 
but is not perfectly helpless; is able to 
be up but not to do any kind of work. 
You asked whether I do all my own 
work on the farm without the assist¬ 
ance of man. I think about the story 
of George Washington when you ask 
that question; I cannot tell a lie. I do 
most of the work myself, I hire help 
occasionally. The farm I own now is a 
small fruit farm of but 17 acres, mostly 
covered with fruit of various kinds such 
as apples, pears, peaches, plums, grapes, 
cherries and strawberries, blackberries, 
raspberries, etc. I think fruit growers 
will agree with me in saying there is 
more labor to be performed on a 20-acre 
fiuit farm than on 100 acres of grain 
land. I am cultivating corn, about five 
acres, among the pear trees this season. 
I hired a man to help me plow it and 
get the corn planted; since then have 
been doing the cultivating myself. 
Planted three patches of early potatoes, 
two of Early Ohio, the other Six Weeks. 
I have sold about 40 bushels of Early 
Ohio, getting from 60 to 75 cents per 
bushel for them. I dare say they were 
the nicest potatoes that went to market. 
I have not dug any of the Six Weeks 
potatoes yet. The corn I have growing 
Miss ABBIE J. PEFFEttt. Fie. 23-4. 
is called the best-looking corn in the 
neighborhood. 
My principal business for the past 12 
years has been strawberry growing, and 
I made a success at it, but as weeds got 
the start of me I was obliged to change 
crops. Many times I -wonder how I can 
er dure so much and keep my mind and 
health, to try to keep a beautiful home 
so near a city, and above all to take 
good care of my afflicted mother and 
keep pets such as two horses, two cows, 
150 chickens, 30 turkeys, six canary 
birds and a nice pug dog. Very often I 
hitch up the quiet horse to the buggy 
(no matter how tired I am) and take my 
dear old mother over the place to see 
how I am managing things, and to give 
her pleasure while she is on this earth. 
She is in her eighty-fifth year of age. It 
takes material to feed all these pets I 
have, and expenses in a good many ways 
are to be met. I take the best of care 
of all my stock; feed them three times 
a day. My horses are the Messenger 
breed, a white one named Prince, which 
was Father’s pet, a horse fit for all pur¬ 
poses, and my buggy horse, yellow or 
cream, named Queen. My cows are Jer¬ 
sey and Guernsey, my chickens Light 
Brahma, Buff Cochin and Partridge 
Cochin. I keep Bronze turkeys. Moth¬ 
er takes much comfort with such things 
to look at while I am out at work, es¬ 
pecially the canary birds and pug dog. 
I never get started out to my outdoor 
work before eight o’clock in the morn¬ 
ing after all chores are done around the 
house, and very often come in to see 
whether Mother is getting along all 
right. Former accounts of my work 
have it that I am out all day. It is a 
mistake; I could not treat my mother 
that way. I do not deserve credit alone 
for farm work. I have taken first prem¬ 
ium at our county fair for bread, cake, 
needlework and displays of fruit, riding 
horseback, etc. I wish all the women 
interested in farming could see what I 
have done. 
The Household Congress. 
Buckwheat Gems. —Two cupfuls of 
wheat flour; two cupfuls of buckwheat 
flour; one-third cupful molasses; four 
tablespoonfuls thick cream; one scant 
tablespoonful soda, a pinch of salt. But¬ 
termilk sufficient to make a very stiff 
batter. Bake in hot greased gem pans 
in a quick oven. sweet keen. 
Freezing Ice Cream Without Turn¬ 
ing. — I read the request in The R. N.-Y. 
asking about the results of making ice 
cream in the freezers which do not re¬ 
quire turning. We have used both kinds. 
That which does not require turning 
makes excellent cream, and it is a very 
easy method. But it has not the flaki¬ 
ness and lightness of color of that made 
in the freezer that has to be turned. We 
always freeze our cream in the other 
freezer. The other cream is more solid, 
and if for anything special, it is much 
nicer, as it will remain stiff longer. 
Delaware. Barbara a. engel. 
Windmill Washing Power. —In The 
R. N.-Y. of June 21 Aunt Rachel sug¬ 
gests that all washing machines need 
man power to run them. On our farm 
here in Iowa the wind furnishes the 
power, and we think it far ahead of man 
power, for if we want it to run longer 
than common it never grumbles, or ob¬ 
jects, and there are very few days that 
the wind does not blow enough to run 
the machine. The wind pumps the well 
water into the house, as well as the 
barn. We have hard wp,ter at one end 
of the sink and soft at the other. We 
think it is just as necessary to have 
things handy indoors as out. s. e. t. 
< 7 / er 
a 
Once 
a day our Gov¬ 
ernment Observers tick 
the correct time to thousands 
over the wires. 
ELGIN WATCHES 
tick it continually to millions. 
Every Elgin watch has the word "Elgin” 
engraved on the works. Send for 
free booklet about watches. 
ELGIN NATIONAL 
WATCH CO. 
Elgin, Illinois. 
