Mrs. Lincoln’s talks in the American 
Kitchen Magazine, are the best thing we 
have seen in the line of simplifying the 
science of the home. Primer science is 
needed everywhere, and as soon as 
teachers are ready to adapt their meth¬ 
ods to every-day workers, they will find 
an unlimited audience waiting for their 
words. 
* 
Is there a good microscope in your 
family ? There should be, for we are 
half-blind to Nature’s wonders without 
this aid. The use of a good microscope 
will give pleasure and profit to the 
farmer’s family. The study of insect life 
is almost a necessity to the practical 
farmer, and a knowledge of plant-growth 
and botany is also in line with his pro¬ 
fession. If you would be contented with 
your occupation, learn all that concerns 
it, for the knowledge will put you in 
sympathy with your work, and employ 
the mind while the hands are busy. 
* 
The Working Girls’ Aid Society has 
recently held a series of meetings to dis¬ 
cuss questions relating to the labor 
problem. Discussing “the unemployed,” 
Prof. Wyckoff, of Princeton College, said: 
“ The country has plenty of work for 
the unemployed. The cities are con¬ 
gested by them. A perfect means of 
transportation is going to solve the 
problem to a large extent. And the 
trolley — objectionable as it is — will 
enable farmers to accumulate in centers 
and go daily out to till the land.” This 
theory seems to point toward coopera¬ 
tion. When shall we be ready to adopt it ? 
* 
A writer in one of the fashion papers 
pleads for full-length mirrors in the 
home, as being a great aid to graceful 
manners and carriage. She disclaims 
the assertion that they develop vanity, 
and advocates a mirror for the baby who 
must amuse itself, and also for the older 
child who is without a playmate. There 
are often times when a mirror could do 
one a favor by acquainting him with 
facts so obvious to others. The uncon¬ 
scious offender would rather be told by 
the frank face of the mirror, that her 
hat is awry, or that there is a smudge 
on her face, than to try to guess it from 
faces that look too pleasant to offer 
criticism. Yes, we could, undoubtedly, 
make use of more mirrors. But it will be 
some time before we have full-length 
mirrors in every room. However, let us 
do this much : Banish the defective mir¬ 
rors wliich distort the face unpleasantly. 
THE HIRED MAN IN THE HOME. 
THE PRACTICAL SIDE OF IT. 
FTER reading “ The Hired Man in 
the Home,” in The It. N.-Y. of 
March 21,1 thought, “ That is theory ; I 
would like to know the views of the 
prospective Mrs. Eliot after five years of 
practice—or even one.” For about eight 
years, I boarded in families (four differ¬ 
ent ones) where hired men were boarded, 
and in every family, neither employer 
nor employee was pleased, although, 
apparently, each did as well by the other 
as he should. For eight years, I have 
been in my own home on a farm, and 
have had different experiences during 
that time, with from one to three, and 
occasionally more, hired men at a time, 
boarded in the home, and I am decidedly 
in favor of not boarding the man, both 
for comfort and economy. For some 
time past, we have not boarded any 
help, and find that we are much better 
suited. When we boarded the men, the 
work was very much harder, even with 
the help of a girl, than it has since been 
without one. 1 frequently had very se¬ 
vere attacks of nervous headache, which 
my physician told me were the result of 
overwork, and that he could only relieve; 
the only cure would be less work. I 
have not had them since the hurry and 
worry of so large a family ceased. 
The last year we boarded any help, we 
boarded only one man, and I was sur¬ 
prised to find how greatly the work and 
the amount of food used were reduced 
with his departure. The difference in 
wages paid to them, I am quite sure, 
would not more than pay for the food 
they eat. Some say that we can use the 
produce of the farm which would other¬ 
wise be wasted ; but I think that a small 
consideration compared with the extra 
length of the grocer’s and butcher’s 
bills. Without the men, we can sell far 
more of meat, lard, butter, eggs, etc., 
which is also a consideration. I have 
used 50 pounds of flour and five pounds 
of butter a week, a peck of potatoes a 
day, besides other vegetables in abund¬ 
ance, and dessert invariably for dinner 
and supper. Oh ! the baking and cook¬ 
ing, and dishwashing and sweeping and 
scrubbing it compels one to do ! It makes 
me tired now, just to think of it. 
In regard to economy, in boarding the 
men, there is to be considered the extra 
fire and lights, the wear on carpets, 
beds, bedding, towels, tablecloths, etc. 
In regard to eating with the hired man, 
I think that it is like putting one de¬ 
cayed peach among several good ones. 
The good do not purify the bad, but the 
bad corrupt the good ; although I have 
seen hired men whose table etiquette 
was superior to that of their employers, 
it is the exception, not the rule. 
We have never employed foreigners, 
but have had the best class of farm 
laborers to be had. They have always 
been respectful, cleanly and obliging 
and they value us as their friends. But 
the days for them to learn to sit grace¬ 
fully, speak grammatically and eat cor¬ 
rectly, passed with their childhood. 
They have neither the ability nor the 
desire to change their ways. If our 
children sit with them, they imitate 
them for two reasons ; first, because it 
seems so much easier to imitate the 
wrong than the right, and second, be¬ 
cause we are so busy pouring coffee and 
attending to the wants of the men, that 
we cannot give our children the atten¬ 
tion they need. 
Another objection to having the men 
at the table with the family, is that, in 
general, it is where the family meet and 
talk unreservedly about matters of no 
interest to any but themselves, and the 
men’s presence is an intrusion. I have 
known some men who were angry be¬ 
cause they were not invited to sit at the 
table when there was company present; 
they claimed that they were “ just as 
good as the company.” One man (not in 
my home), thought himself so badly 
used because he was not invited to drink 
tea with a party of afternoon visitors, 
that he afterwards ate breakfast and 
supper at home, and carried his dinner. 
Why should he, in his working clothes, 
wish to join visitors in visiting dress and 
unacquainted with him ? Truly it was 
lamentable ignorance, yet he had had 
the advantage of eating (in general) 
with some of the best families in the 
neighborhood for many years. 
As to the hired man himself, I think 
that he generally prefers to board in his 
own home. He has more money, spends 
more time with his family, has the priv¬ 
ilege of asking for his favorite dishes, 
and feels the same freedom at his table 
which his employer enjoys at his. If he 
is unmarried, the married man fre¬ 
quently is glad to board him, and he 
finds it more congenial than boarding in 
the farmer’s family, where his company 
is considered an intrusion in the sitting- 
room, even though he is one of the 
family in the diningroom. viola. 
THE COLLEGE TEA. 
C OLLEGE teas may be classed as two, 
in kind — the individual and the 
collective. The former is of weekly, or 
stated occurrence, on a day, and on an 
hour, when the student is free from lec¬ 
tures, and is altogether informal. Her 
fellow students drop in, in cap and 
gown, sip at a tiny cup of the amber 
beverage—always amber, when rightly 
brewed—and nibble at a cracker or 
cooky. Quickly, the room fills, and a 
dozen girls sit, or stand, while incessant 
chatter prevails. Now and then one de¬ 
clines tea, on the score of already having 
drunk a half dozen cups in the after¬ 
noon. The hostess has a new print on 
the wall—a photograph after Raphael, 
or of her “ dearest friend,” or a cherub’s 
head, home mounted on a strip of card¬ 
board covered with green crepe paper, 
or a vase of flowers—some new thing— 
for her guests to “ oh ! ” and “ ah ! ” and 
“perfectly lovely ! ” over. While it lasts, 
the pretty little interior is all life, wit, a 
little delicious college slang. Maybe a 
guitar is caught up and thrummed a bit 
—professors are criticised, and anathe¬ 
mas heaped high on what is hated, hair 
blond and brown has been tumbled and 
blown into charming disorder, and all is 
a sway and swish of talk, laughter, rustle 
of gowns ; then by twos and threes, they 
drop out, and the “ tea ” is over. 
The collective tea is much larger, less 
informal, because of the presence of 
laity, for not only have college, but non¬ 
college friends been invited. A half 
dozen juniors or seniors, as the case may 
be, engage a parlor of their hall of resi¬ 
dence, or a lecture room, which they 
decorate with their combined possessions 
of rugs, cushions, draperies, tea tables, 
chairs, etc., and if the day be fine, there 
is sure to be a crush, only standing 
room, much beautiful dress, and maybe 
a dozen or so of women who were 
graduated in the early days of Vassar, 
Wellesley, Cornell, Bryn Mawr or else¬ 
where. These veterans of bygone classic 
days, look about and wonder if ever their 
chums did so clatter, for every tea table 
is its own focus of talk. When they 
were in college, teas had not yet come 
in, and they sat down on the floor in 
some appointed room when a box of 
goodies had arrived from home, and 
munched and told stories, after the 
lights had been put out, and they were 
supposed to be in bed and asleep. Here, 
choice cakes and confections that have 
been sent from home, are served with 
many a racy comment, and there are 
coffee, cocoa, and possibly, bouillon, in 
honor of the occasion. The talk is more 
general, but it never approaches con¬ 
versation, the lingual hubbub being a 
composite of bits and scraps, laughter, 
explanations, greetings, presentations, 
and then the leave-takings : “ Such a 
sweet time ! ” “ So nice of you to re¬ 
member us.” “Quite a shame that 
gentlemen can’t come to your teas.” 
“ Nothing quite like your college gather¬ 
ings, so sparkling, etc., etc., goodbye. ' 
MARY WAGER-FISHER. 
SCOLDING THE CHILDREN. 
I DO not believe that scolding ever ac¬ 
complished any good, especially with 
children ; it only hardens and spoils 
their tempers. Children need only to be 
trained in the way one wishes them to 
go ; and if the mother will only begin 
soon enough, she will have no trouble 
in their training ; but she must begin 
in the cradle. The tx-aining must begin 
as soon as the child begins its journey 
in this life ! It must be started on the 
right x’oad, as it is not hard to keep a 
child in the right track once it is started 
there. It will not require any scolding 
to keep it in the right paths with its 
mother’s watchful care. But the mother 
must watch herself as well as her babe, 
for it is watching her ; even the muscles 
of her face it soon learns to read, and a 
smile or a frown often tells the babe all 
it needs to know. There is where the 
mother’s influence and her controling 
power first begin ! Where will it end, 
and bow ? 
A scolding mother never yet made a 
bright, sweet-mannered boy. When I 
see a courteous, gentle-mannered boy, I 
say that that boy’s mother is a lady 
whose ways are gentle, soft, loving and 
kind, and in her quiet, gentle manner, 
will reprove him when he requires it by, 
“ My son,” and not in that loud, boister¬ 
ous manner, scolding and calling him 
namessuchas “ You little scamp,” “ You 
torment of my life,” “ I’ll whip the life 
out of you some of these times.” 
MRS. A. H. WING. 
Stand close to a high fence 
and try to leap over. You 
fail. Walk back a few steps, 
get a good start. The fence 
is easily cleared. Neglect 
your cough, never mind your 
loss in weight, and when con¬ 
sumption faces you, your 
strength may not be sufficient 
to carry you over the danger¬ 
line. If you could only go 
back a few weeks and make 
a good start, you might win. 
of Cod-liver Oil, with Hypo- 
phosphites, is for you even if 
you are only a little thin. 
SCOTT’S EflULSlON has been en¬ 
dorsed by the medical profession for 
twenty years. (Ask your doctor.) This 
is because it is always palatable —always 
uniform —always contains the purest Nor¬ 
wegian Cod-liver Oil and Hypophosphiles. 
Put up in 50 cent and$ 1.00 sizes. The 
small size may be enough to cure your 
cough or help your baby. 
10 CENTS A YEAR ! 
Evenings at Home. 
A Clean, Bright. Valuable. Family Paper. Every¬ 
thing to Elevate. Nothing to Degrade. 
Published Every Two Weeks. 
Send five 2-cent stamps to 
Evenings at Home, 157 Main St , Burlington, Vt. 
We make a specialty of 
printing for farmers, fruit 
growers and stock raisers. 
Letter-heads, Envelopes, 
Cards, Tags, Circulars, etc. New type, good 
work, reasonable prices. 
POULTRY MONTHLY, Albany, N. Y. 
UiANTCH t0 en K a Fe a working practical Celery 
W1 AH I CU Grower to take full charge of crop; 
labor assistance provided. House for married mac. 
Address A. E. CARSWELL, Montague N. J. 
F OR SALE.—First-class farm, about ZOO acres, with¬ 
in Smiles of Poughkeepsie, cheap or on easy terms, 
or will trade for New York City property. Full in¬ 
formation, John Dunphy, 29 Ferry St., New York, or 
Wilkinson & Cossum, Attorneys, Poughkeepsie, N. Y. 
For Sale.—Two Peach Farms. 
One with 150 acres; good buildings. 3.000 peach 
trees in bearing, with fine prospect of good crop this 
year. Good truck land. Plenty of grass on the farm. 
A great bargain. Good Apple Orchaid. 
No. 2 has 125 acres, with good, large, roomy house 
and good outbuildings. About 1,003 peach trees; 500 
in bearing. This is a No. 1 Truck and Fruit Farm 
Good Apple Orchard in bearing. Running water ou 
both farms; good for stock raising. These farms will 
pay any one who can look after them. Address 
FARMER, P. O. Box 391, Dover, Kent Co.. Del. 
may be changed—made beautiful atsmall cost. 
NEW WALL PAPERS 
—all grades—50% less than common prices. 
Samples and guide to papering, FREE. Describe ropms and 
state prioe you want to pay. Paper hanger’s outfit complete, $1. 
CHAS. M. N. KILLEN. 1233 Filbert St.. Phlla., Pa. 
