55o 
THE RURAL'NEW-YORKER. 
July 29 
[ Woman and Home \ 
From Day to Day. 
THE DREAMER AND THE TOILER. 
I am tired of planning and toiling 
In the crowded hives of men; 
Heart-weary of building and spoiling 
And spoiling and building again; 
And I long for the dear old river 
Where I dreamed my youth away— 
For a dreamer lives forever, 
And a toiler dies in a day. 
I am sick of the showy seeming 
Of a life that is half a lie. 
Of the faces lined with scheming 
In the throng that hurries by. 
From the sleepless thoughts’ endeavor 
1 would go where the children play— 
For a dreamer lives forever, 
And a thinker dies in a day. 
I can feel no pride, but pity 
For the burdens the rich endure; 
There is nothing sweet in the city 
But the patient lives of the poor. 
Oh, the little hands too skillful, 
And the child-mind choked with weeds, 
The daughter’s heart grown willful, 
And the father’s heart that bleeds. 
No, no; from the street’s rude bustle, 
From trophies from marl and stage, 
I would fly to the wood’s low rustle 
And the meadow’s kindly page. 
Let us dream as of yore by the river, 
And be loved for the dream alway— 
For the dreamer lives forever, 
lint the toiler dies in a day. 
—John Hoyle, O’Reilly. 
* 
Mrs. May Wright Sewalt,, of Indiana, 
president of the United States Council 
of the International Women’s Congress, 
has been elected to succeed the Countess 
of Aberdeen as president of the Con¬ 
gress, which will hold its next meeting 
in Berlin. July 7, Queen Victoria re¬ 
ceived 150 of the delegates at Windsor 
Castle, inviting them to afternoon tea. 
The Queen received her guests very cor¬ 
dially, and her hospitality was much 
appreciated, as it is rarely offered to 
similar gatherings. 
* 
A woman who believes implicitly in 
dreams, recently had a vision which 
foretold her death upon a certain date. 
She clothed herself in white robes, and 
invited a number of her friends to see 
her die. The fateful evening arrived, 
and so did the friends, but the dreamer 
didn’t die and, after waiting for the 
scheduled tragedy until about 10.30 p. 
m., the guests departed. The proprietor 
of the vision probably feels now, as one 
philosopher says, that it is safer to 
prophesy after the event. 
* 
The local school board at Conslio- 
hocken, Pa., has appointed a young wo¬ 
man as head of the manual training 
school. She received the preference 
over two men. Some wonder is ex¬ 
pressed 4 as to the ability o', a woman 
to teach the use of carpenters’ and ma¬ 
chinists’. tools, but the woman in ques¬ 
tion is a graduate of the Drexel School 
in Philadelphia, and is very highly 
recommended for ability. People w r ho 
make fun of feminine attempts to drive 
a nail, will think that this appoint¬ 
ment is a startling innovation. It 
is our* opinion that the average wo¬ 
man would handle tools as well as the 
average man, if she had been encour¬ 
aged in their use, but ordinarily, she is 
expected to busy herself with dolls, 
while her brother plays with his little 
tool-chest. We know one girl whose 
aptitude for tools would have made her 
a clever mechanic, had she only been 
a boy. Saw and hammer possessed a 
natural fascination for her, which on 
one occasion led her into a somewhat 
unusual prank. While quite a small 
girl, her father bought a lot of boards 
for some building purpose. The small 
girl saw the boards; saw, hammer and 
nails were convenient, and the tempta¬ 
tion was too strong to be resisted. 
When the owner of the lumber came 
home at night, he discovered that his 
daughter was busily engaged in build¬ 
ing a board sidewalk, as a pleasant sur¬ 
prise for him. She says that her father 
was not so much gratified as she expect¬ 
ed, and after that, she was obliged to 
confine her mechanical energies within 
certain limits. 
* 
An Illinois man recently brought suit 
against a woman for $90 and costs, be¬ 
ing the expense incurred in paying court 
to her, before she lacerated his feelings 
and blighted his existence by marrying 
another man. He received judgment for 
$75 and costs, some of the items being 
thrown out by the court. He made an 
itemized statement of disbursements, 
including glasses of soda water, car 
fares, etc. and demanded full payment 
for all. Regarding this case as a pre¬ 
cedent, a prudent young woman will 
now insist that any man who invites 
her to partake of soda water will pre¬ 
sent a legally-drawn deed of gift with 
each glass. 
* 
Years ago, frugal housewives used 
brown sugar very largely as a substitute 
for granulated. The brown cost very 
much less, and it seemed sweeter. One 
man, however, who used to keep a la¬ 
borers’ boarding house, declares that 
even when brown sugar cost only half 
as much as white, it was no cheaper, 
because it packs so closely and piles up 
on the spoon, whereas the granulated 
runs over if the spoon is more than level 
full. Now that granulated sugar is re¬ 
duced in price, there is no object in 
using brown sugar, except where a 
recipe calls for it or as a matter of 
taste. It has changed greatly in quality, 
too, and no longer has the molasses 
sweetness of the old-fashioned article. 
* 
According to an old idea in Eng¬ 
land, it was formerly believed that, if 
a wife, at her wedding, was clothed only 
in a sheet or a single linen garment, 
her husband was not in any w r ay liable 
for debts previously contracted by her. 
We may read in the parish register of 
Chiltern All Saints’, Wiltshire, that 
“John Bridmore and Anne Sehvood 
were married October 17, 1714; the 
aforesaid Anne Selwood w r as married in 
her smock, without any clothes or liead- 
gier on.” Several other similar cases are 
recorded in various registers, and more 
cases are supplied by local tradition. 
As a rule, these brides appear to have 
been widows, who thus relieved the sec¬ 
ond husband of debts contracted during 
widowhood. Such a case is reported 
from Lincolnshire as recently as 1842. 
Local tradition states that this bride 
was clad only in a sheet, stitched about 
her, with holes cut for the passage of 
her bare arms. 
* 
A medieval custom still observed at 
Salency, France, is that of annually 
crowning with roses the most virtuous 
girl in the village. This festival, which 
occurs June 8, is attributed to St. Med- 
ard, Bishop of Noyon, who died nearly 
1,400 years ago. It is said that he 
charged his family estate with a sum 
of money, to be given annually, with 
a crown of roses, to the girl selected, 
who must not only be irreproachable 
herself, but whose parents must, also, be 
virtuous. After religious services in the 
village church, a procession escorts the 
girl to the chapel of St. Medard, where 
the priest takes a wreath of roses from 
the altar, blesses it, and crowns the can¬ 
didate. The “Rosiere,” as she is called, 
receives 300 francs (about $G0) half oi 
which is presented by the municipal 
council. It is said that the custom has a 
powerful influence over the conduct of 
the village girls. 
* 
Recently a Pennsylvania farmer w r as 
approached by an agreeable man of 
clerical appearance, who drove to his 
farm at sunset, and asked if he could 
be accommodated for the night. He 
made a favorable impression, and was 
given permission to stay. A little later, 
a man and woman stopped at the farm, 
inquiring the way to the nearest min¬ 
ister, as they wished to be married. 
The other stranger volunteered his ser¬ 
vices, and the marriage was performed, 
the farmer signing his name as a wit¬ 
ness. Later the farmer’s signature 
turned up attached to a promissory note, 
which was presented for payment. The 
three strangers were swindlers operat¬ 
ing together. We cannot wonder at any 
man falling into such a trap as this; 
The R. N.-Y. can only reiterate the ad¬ 
vice, offered hundreds of times, during 
its 50 years’ service—never sign any 
document, of any nature whatever, at 
the demand of strangers. 
* 
Western women show us many ex¬ 
amples of energy, pluck and industry, 
taking hold of all lines of work, and giv¬ 
ing the impression that, if woman is the 
clinging vine, as generally pictured by 
the poets, she is a vine which can sup¬ 
port herself w’ithout a masculine trellis. 
We heard recently of a Pennsylvania 
woman who, with her husband, settled 
on a wheat and Alfalfa farm in Arizona. 
The husband found speculating in cat¬ 
tle and sheep, in a small way, more to 
his liking than farm work, so he travels 
about the Territory, while his wife runs 
the farm. She has done all the plow¬ 
ing herself, unaided. When a young 
baby was added to her cares, the neigh¬ 
bors were rather astonished to see how 
she managed her plowing. A small box 
v'as fastened to the plow handles, and 
there the baby lay, while its mother 
tramped along the furrows. We ad¬ 
mire the inventiveness here displayed, 
but fail to extend that admiration to 
the husband. 
Woman’s Work in Syria. 
Housework is woman’s work in Syria, 
says the Chicago Record. She washes, 
bakes, cooks and carries water from the 
fountain. On w r ash day, the woman 
of the house gets up early, builds a fire 
outdoors, when the weather permits, in 
a movable fireplace called "moukeda.” 
This is built about square; three stones 
shut three sides and one side is left open 
for the fuel. The boiler is placed on 
top of the moukeda, which is only about 
nine inches high. The washing is done 
in a large, round, earthen basin, about 
2G inches in diameter. The woman sits 
at this basin sometimes for six hours, 
and washes and wrings tne clothes by 
hand in a very energetic manner. Iron¬ 
ing is generally an unknown thing to 
the Syrian woman. The clothes are 
smoothed a little by hand after they are 
dried, then they are folded and made 
up in bundles, and put away. 
In baking, the dough is mixed in a 
large earthen basin like the one men¬ 
tioned, and sometimes 30 pounds of 
flour are mixed at once. After raising, 
the dough is cut into loaves and turned 
by hand into round lumps, each about 
the size of a biscuit, and placed on 
large straw trays. The public oven is 
built at some central point in town, and 
is operated usually by two men. The 
woman carries to that place, on her 
head, the straw tray on which the mold¬ 
ed dough is placed—one hundred loaves 
are usually put on one tray—and there 
awaits her turn, 'i he baker “spreads 
the dough” and bakes it, taking for his 
compensation from eight to ten per cent 
of the loaves. At the public oven, all 
the women meet, and much of the town 
gossip has its origin here. 
The women have, also, to carry the 
water from the public fountain for the 
supply of the home. The earthen jar 
in which the ■water is carried weighs, 
when full, about 30 pounds; it is usually 
carried on the right shoulder, and held 
steady with the right hand. In the 
south and southeast, the jar is carried 
on the head. 
Perhaps the highest industrial achieve¬ 
ment of the Syrian w r omen is that most 
exquisite embroidery which some of 
them produce. 
One of the queer practices that obtain 
in the Holy Land is the tying of the 
hands of a babe to its body, and the 
body to the wooden cradle, whenever 
the child is put to sleep, lest its hands 
grow crooked. Immediately after birth, 
the child is wrapped in “swaddling 
clothes”—a square piece of stout cloth, 
to one corner of which a long string is 
sewed, and this string is wound around 
the babe’s body from the ankles to the 
shoulders to keep the little hands 
straight by the sides, and also to keep 
the feet stretched as straight as they 
ought to be. This “straightening” 
treatment is kept up until the child is 
about a year old. Then the limbs are 
supposed to keep growing as they were 
trained. 
Mothers are extremely careful not to 
let “evil-eyed” folk see their children. 
They believe that some persons, having 
been born on a certain evil day of the 
lunar month, or, as they express it, “on 
a bad day in the moon,” kill people by 
simply looking at and admiring them. 
When a mother supposes that her child 
is “strucK ’ with the evil eye, she sends 
to the raky for the power of healing. 
The raky is often a woman. She takes 
from the four corners of a straw mat 
four big straws, and prays while the 
straws are in her hand. Then she sat¬ 
urates them with olive oil, and sends 
them to be burned in me presence of the 
afflicted. 
A Comment on Vegetarianism, 
A new candidate for fame has publish¬ 
ed a book entitled. The Golden Age 
Cook Book, devoted to the advocacy of 
what its author calls pure vegetarian¬ 
ism, says the Chicago Inter-Ocean. We 
notice, however, that the recipes given 
call for abundant supplies of butter and 
eggs, and frequently demand “hot fat,” 
in most inconsistent manner. Whence 
we are led to note afresh a fact fre¬ 
quently observed before, that wnat is 
called vegetarianism is actually a delu¬ 
sion and a snare, the “boast of mere 
pretenders to the name.” In fact, the 
claim of most of those who call them¬ 
selves vegetarians, that they wholly ab¬ 
stain from flesh food, is false. In the 
use of milk, butter, and cheese, they in¬ 
dulge in highly-concentrated proteid- 
containing food of animal origin, to say 
nothing of eggs, which contain all the 
material of the developed chicken. 
There are very few so-called vegetarians 
who confine their uiet absolutely to pro¬ 
ductions of the vegetable kingdom. The 
practice being thus imperfect, what be¬ 
comes of the theory on which it has 
been mistakenly supposed to be found¬ 
ed? 
Sir Henry Thompson, a famous Eng¬ 
lish physician, writing on this subject, 
pertinently inquires why an animal 
w'hich is solely dependent for its exist¬ 
ence during the toothless stage upon a 
purely animal food—milk—should be 
expected to adopt a vegetable diet later. 
The fact is, no form of vegetable nour¬ 
ishment has ever been found on which 
it is possible to rear an infant, milk 
being excluded. Further, though the 
vegetable regimen may be often resort¬ 
ed to in illness, when the body is at rest 
and little waste of tissue occurs, yet in 
a state of health, when labor is ex¬ 
hausting tissue hourly, the demand for 
animal food to rebuild it is instinctive. 
The vegetarians claim that the original 
and only natural food of man was fur¬ 
nished by the products of the earth. 
