454 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
June 
From Day to Day. 
THE SOLDIER’S PRAYER. 
’Tls night on Luzon’s torrid plains, 
And poisonous insects ’round me creep; 
The winds are hushed, dread silence reigns— 
“ Now I lay me down to sleep.” 
While raven night with somber wings 
Is brooding o’er the mighty deep, 
And gloom enshrouds all earthly things, 
“ I pray the Lord my soul to keep ” 
And should my spirit wing its flight 
Before the light of morn shall break, 
Oh, guide me to the realms of light 
“ If I should die before I wake.” 
Hear Thou, O God, my earnest plea: 
If then the golden thread should break— 
This prayer my mother taught to me— 
“ I pray the Lord my soul to take.” 
— W. Dutton in Philadelphia Record. 
♦ 
As a proof of the antiquity of games 
of chance, one may see, in the B -itish 
Museum, the checker board and pieces 
which belonged to the Egyptian Qaeen 
Hatasu. The checkers are surmounted 
with lions’ heads, ten of light wood, 
and one of ivory. It is 3,600 years since 
Hatasu amused herself with those check¬ 
ers ; yet, every Winter, boys and girls 
and their elders, shut in by bad weather 
or bad roads, amuse themselves, in a 
thousand homes, with the same game. 
In games, as in many another matter, 
there is nothing new under the sun. 
A New York man has been undergo¬ 
ing treatment at Bellevue Hospital, to 
cure him from the evil effects of exces¬ 
sive tea-drinking. He was a stage car¬ 
penter, who was addicted to drinking 30 
cups of strong tea a day, without sugar 
or milk. Excessive tea-drinking has so 
long been regarded as a purely feminine 
weakness that we are inclined to call 
special notice to this case. This man 
certainly beats the record of the young 
woman in Pickwick, who scandalized 
the elder Mr. Weller by drinking UX 
breakfast cups at a sitting, and visibly 
swelling before the eyes of the audience. 
Some of the ribbon stocks now seen 
suggest that the gentle wearer is suffer¬ 
ing, like Boss Croker, from a serious at¬ 
tack of boils or carbuncles, the manifold 
silken wrappings suggesting a surgical 
bandage. When these wrappings are 
reenforced by buckram or a shield of 
celluloid, they are certainly as uncom¬ 
fortable as they look, upon a warm day. 
Many women declare that the stock is 
less heating than a stiff linen collar, but 
this is not the case when the wrappings 
of silk are simply an addition to a stiff 
collar. Many of them need only the 
addition of a muslin frill in the front 
to duplicate the neckcloth upon which 
the Father of his Country rested his 
determined chin. 
* 
Marie Rosalie Bonheur, better known 
as Rosa Bonheur, regarded by most ait 
authorities as the greatest animal painter 
of this century, died May 26, aged 78. 
She is known in this country chiefly as 
the painter of “ The Horse Fair”, which 
was bought, at the Stewart sale, by Cor¬ 
nelius Vanderbilt, for $55,500, and by him 
presented to the Metropolitan Museum 
of Art. Mile. Bonheur was born at Bor¬ 
deaux, France, and received her first in¬ 
struction from her father, an artist of 
considerable ability. She was only 22 
when she made her first great success 
with the picture entitled Plowing in the 
Nivernais. Mile. Bonheur acquired a 
wonderful knowledge of animals and 
their ways, tramping through the coun¬ 
try in masculine dress, among stable¬ 
men, butchers and graziers, studying 
both wild and domestic animals. For 
many years, she lived quietly in her 
home, Chateau de By, near the Forest of 
Fontainebleau, going into society very 
little. Her portraits show a strong, 
kindly, benevolent face, framed in waves 
of short iron gray hair. She may justly 
be considered one of the most remarkable 
women of this century, and it is reason¬ 
able to assume that the verdict of pos¬ 
terity will secure her a position among 
the greatest masters of art. 
A casual observer often fails to dis¬ 
criminate between the milk and cream 
served in the average restaurant; they 
bear a strong family resemblance. After 
repeatedly pouring the milk over our 
strawberries, and the cream into our tea, 
we have at last learned the difference. 
The milk is served in a tiny jug with a 
nandle, while the cream jug is handle¬ 
less. Instead of hopefully looking for a 
difference in color or consistency, which 
is rarely apparent, we now decide by the 
vessel containing the fluid. We must 
say, however, that restaurant milk is, as 
a rule, wonderfully improved in quality 
over that served a few years ago. 
* 
At the commencement exercises of a 
young women’s academy in Illinois re¬ 
cently, Mrs. William J. Bryan, herself a 
graduate of the school, gave an address 
on The American Woman, in which she 
said: 
While we hear a great deal these days about 
equality, the real permanent advancement of 
woman depends on her own individual develop¬ 
ment. When man flnd3 in woman a thorough 
appreciation of his work and aims; when the 
mind of woman becomes the perfect supplement 
and complement of the mind of man, which the 
Creator intended it to be, then will all the dis¬ 
cussions as to their rights and privileges cease. 
Woman has long been a recognized power in 
the spiritual world, and when one looks into a 
church in any part of our land, and sees how 
much of the work is done by woman, it seems al¬ 
most superfluous to say that the ideal of Ameri¬ 
can womanhood is attained under a threefold 
development of the physical, the mental, and the 
spiritual. 
The ideas embodied in the first para¬ 
graph, sound and logical as they are, 
often appear to be overlooked by those 
engaged in women’s work. 
Florence Nightingale, who may be 
called the Clara Barton of the Crimean 
War, celebrated her eightieth birthday a 
few days before that of Queen Victoria. 
She is very feeble, and lives so quietly 
that many people are unaware that she is 
still living. Miss Nightingale may be re¬ 
garded as the pioneer of women’s sanitary 
work among soldiers. Public opinion as to 
woman’s place and duties was very differ¬ 
ent, in 1854, from what it now is, and 
this quiet woman was taking an un¬ 
heard-of responsibility when she organ¬ 
ized her nursing corps for Scutari and 
Varna. Since then women nurses have 
become an official factor in the British 
army, and the Queen has founded a 
special medal, the Order of Victoria and 
Albert, for the decoration of women who 
display uncommon heroism in caring for 
sick and wounded. This medal is to the 
nurse what the Victoria Cross is to the 
soldier. 
* 
As a study in complicated relation¬ 
ships, we may recommend the case of a 
western man named Miller, who mar¬ 
ried a widow with a grown up daugh¬ 
ter His father fell in love with the step¬ 
daughter. The father became the son’s 
son-in-law, and the stepdaughter be¬ 
came his mother. Recently the son’s 
wife had a child. The child was Miller’s 
father’s brother-in law and Miller’s own 
uncle, for he was a brother of his step¬ 
daughter. Miller’s father’s wife—his 
stepdaughter—also had a son, who was, 
of course, Miller’s brother, and inci¬ 
dentally Miller’s grandchild, for he was 
the son of Miller’s daughter. Thus Mil¬ 
ler’s own wife was his mother’s mother, 
and Miller became his wife’s grandchild 
at the same time. And then, to top the 
whole thing off, as the husband of his 
grandmother, he was his own grand¬ 
father. 
* 
John H. Thiby, of Long Island City, 
N Y., is the originator of the school 
savings bank system in this country. The 
system is in practice in 351 schools, lo¬ 
cated in 89 cities. There have been de¬ 
posited m banks during the past year 
$659,247 01. There have been withdrawn 
$441,825 83, leaving a balance to the 
credit of the school children of $207 - 
421 18 This is considered a remarkable 
showing, as the savings represent stray 
pennies that the pupils take with them, 
usually for spending money. 
Feather-bed swindlers have been 
operating in West Virginia lately. There 
were three of them, anl they traveled 
with horses and big wagons. They were 
smooth talkers, and said they were em¬ 
ployed by a large feather-renovating 
works that for 25 cents per 100 pounds, 
would make feathers as good as new, 
and take pay in cash or feathers. The 
process would make the feathers so 
fluffy, they said, that the bulk would be 
increased 100 per cent, and the house¬ 
wives, glad to make two feathers grow 
where only one grew before, fell easy 
victims. At nearly every farmhouse they 
came to, the men secured a bedtick or 
two full of goose feathers, which they 
loaded on their wagons, giving the 
women a written receipt for the ticks, 
and promising to return them in three 
weeks. Of course, the feathers were 
never returned. This is a particularly 
mean form of swindling. Similar frauds 
may be heard of in other districts, so 
it will be well to look coldly upon any 
traveling agent who mentions the sub¬ 
ject of feather-renovating. 
* 
The daily papers have recorded lately 
several deaths due to so-called “head¬ 
ache powders,” taken without the advice 
of a physician. The Medical Record re¬ 
fers to a case in Pittsburgh, where a 
woman died within 20 minutes after 
swallowing a powder for the relief of 
headache; this was the fifth death in 
that city alone, recently, laid to this 
cause. It is urged that the ingredients 
of all nostrums sold in the drug store 
should appear upon the package, for the 
protection of both druggist and pur¬ 
chaser. Unfortunately, however, knowl¬ 
edge of the ingredients will not save 
people from the effects of dangerous dos¬ 
ing. A few years ago, antipyrine was 
the favorite dose with many for head¬ 
ache, feverish cold, etc ; it was taken 
freely, whenever the patient felt the in¬ 
clination, in spite of oeiug a dangerous 
drug in inexperienced hands. When we 
think of the many serious ailments— 
often deep-seated organic diseases—of 
which headache may be an outward in¬ 
dex, we may realize the unwisdom of an 
unknown “headache powder”, which 
might be an actual danger to the unsus¬ 
pected cause of the symptom Better 
leave all headache medicines severely 
alone. A person who suffers repeatedly 
from severe headaches is a subject for a 
capable physician. It is no cure to 
deaden the pain temporarily with drugs. 
A Philadelphia grocer relates 
slightly embarrassing incident which 
occurred in his retail trade. One of his 
regular customers ordered a barrel of 
flour of a certain brand. The grocer 
was out of this particular brand, so he 
sent another, which was, of course, “ just 
as good.” A week later the customer 
insisted on returning the flour, after 
having two bakings out of the barrel, 
because she did not like it, and she 
wanted the brand she ordered in its 
place. As the grocer was still out of 
the flour wanted, he filled up the old 
barrel, put a new head in it, and sent it 
back. A few weeks later, the woman 
returned, very mad, accusing the grocer 
of the fraud committed. He denied it 
with lofty indignation, of course. Said 
he : 
“ Oars is too honorable a house to cheat its 
customers or to ask them to accept a substitute 
for something they liked !” 
Then the woman grinned at me. 
“ Huh 1” she retorted, “ that’s all very fine. 
But I had two bakin’s out of the first barrel be¬ 
fore I sent It back.” 
“ Yes,” I assented, “ and you got a full barrel 
in return. Doesn’t that prove ”- 
“ Prove nothing,” she interrupted. “ The first 
two bakin’s out of the barrel I got the second 
time were all right. But I want you to know 
that I always take my flour out of the barrel 
with a saucer. When I got down to the third 
bakin’ out of the second barrel I”- 
“ Yes,” I interposed, “ what did you do ? ” 
“ I found my saucer,” was the answer. Then 
she went out; and it was well she did, for I came 
near falling in a faint. It was month3 before 
that woman would condescend to trade with us 
again. 
Suggestions for Canning Time 
So many people advocate cooking fruit 
in the cans, and no doubt it does look 
finer ; but the work and the time it takes! 
Then it needs two persons to lift off the 
boiler, and one is all I have at my com¬ 
mand. When getting dinner, I often 
can a quart or two of fruit, the same 
number or more at supper, and some¬ 
times put the fruit on while preparing 
breakfast; this will be ready to can by 
the time we are leaving the table. E?ery 
scheme is worked to keep from having a 
fire all day, or a bit longer than neces¬ 
sary. One should learn to use chips, 
cots, and quick-burning wood ; no need 
of a good solid baking or ironing fire. 
One may take advantage of the ironing 
fire to bake and can several jars of easily- 
prepared fruit. 
It is such a satisfaction to have the 
fruit labeled. For instance, one lot of 
strawberries were some of the last pick¬ 
ing, and were rather small; so they were 
marked “small strawberries” and were 
set on one particular shelf, while the fine 
ones were marked “ fine ” and placed on 
the company shelf, with the “fine” 
pears, peaches, etc. Of course, we often 
open some of the company-shelf fruit 
when there is no company, but I save 
myself from being provoked to find that 
I have opened some of my smallest fruit 
when Cousin Sarah visits me, who always 
has the finest of everything. 
I find it a good plan to keep an account 
of how much fruit of each kind I have, 
also of how much used. Then one can 
use it up evenly, and not be surprised to 
find that “the cherries are all gone 
already.” I think: sugar helps to keep 
the color and flavor of most fruits, but 
do not use much or want it to cook into 
the fruit too much ; so I add it usually 
when the fruit comes to a boil. I know 
several who have very nice canned fruit, 
who do not use sugar, and so my way is 
not the on y way. We like half-gallon 
cans for the plentiful fruit, quarts for 
the rarer, and pints for preserves and 
butter. bay. 
WALTHAM WATCHES 
The best and most reliable timekeepers 
made in this country or in any other. 
The “ Riverside (trade-mark) movement is jeweled 
throughout with rubies and sapphires. 
For sale by all jewelers. 
