THE FALL O' THE YEAR. 
When the leaves er a-colorin’ and failin’ to the 
groun’, 
An’ the hiek’rynuts an’ walnuts er droppin’ all 
aroun’, 
When the mornings er frosty, an’a chill’s in the 
atmosphere, 
An’ the trees er gittin’ bare, an’ the fields brown 
an’ sear; 
It’s Nature’s way o’ doin’ in the fall o’ the year. 
When the corn’s in the shock, an' the wheat’s all 
sowed, 
An’ they’re pickin’ the winter apples by the 
wagon-load; 
When the wind’s blowin’ hard an’ the weather’s 
sort o’drear, 
An’ the old fireplace gives out a warm, invitin’ 
cheer, 
Nature’s carryin’ out her programme fer the 
fall o’ the year. 
When the cider’s on the dinner-table, an’ yer 
fcelin’ pretty dry, 
An’ yer swaller down the cider with a piece 
o’ pumpkin pie<; 
When they’re makin’ apple butter, an’ hog-killin’ 
time is near, 
An’ the weather gittin’ brisk’ tells yer winter’s 
nearly here, 
Then Nature’s in her glory, fer the fall o’ the 
year. 
When the cellar’s packed with fruit, an’ the barn’s 
filled with grain, 
An’ all the crops er under cover from the winter’s 
snow an’ rain; 
When they’re choppin’ the wood, ’nough fer the 
whole year, 
An’ yer feel that the winter’s cold won’t give yer 
any fear, 
Then Nature’s windin’ up her programme fer 
the fall o’ the year. a. p. h. 
When scouring knives, use a cork in¬ 
stead of a cloth to do the rubbing. It is 
much easier and polishes quicker. This 
is not a new idea, but, like all good 
advice, ought to be repeated. 
* 
Coot, weather will soon bestir us to 
take an inventory of winter dresses, and 
making over will be the order of the 
day. Pressing cloth properly is one of 
the necessary accomplishments if one 
would have a well-finished garment. 
Pear in mind that pressing is not iron¬ 
ing. The iron must be held on the cloth 
for a little to “ set” the smoothness, or 
after the cloth has cooled, the creases 
will appear again. The swift movement 
given in ironing will spoil some materi¬ 
als, as it gives a shiny look or makes 
shiny creases. 
* 
Why will they teach the children 
about the bogie man ? Why not teach 
them to fear to do evil instead of setting 
them to look for some indescribable ter¬ 
ror? The children are not benefited by the 
good intentions of the person who means 
to warn them against doing wrong by 
scaring them into doing right. They 
lose sight of that part of it, as, indeed, 
too often the parent does, and both are 
carried away in the endeavor to exert 
the imagination. 
A LITTLE AT A TIME. 
OR women who do everything on a 
large scale, and who have no time 
to “fuss” with small things, these sug¬ 
gestions will have no interest. Those 
who have to do things on a small scale, 
may be glad of them. Every one is glad 
to feel that she has something in the 
way of sweetmeats tucked safely away 
for winter consumption, and not all feel 
able to preserve or pickle on a large 
scale. It takes a good deal of money to 
purchase sugar, glasses and all necessary 
things for preserving fruit. One woman 
whose purse always seemed to have a 
“ hole at both ends” after the necessary 
things were bought, but who felt that 
she wanted a little jelly, and a few pre¬ 
serves on her storeroom shelves to bring 
out for extra occasions, manages this 
way : She preserves just a little at a 
time, or, perhaps, makes just two or three 
glasses of jelly at a time. In that way 
one does not feel the expense of the 
sugar, and can attend to it easily while 
doing the regular morning work, with¬ 
out being tired. You will be surprised 
to see your shelf at the end of the sea¬ 
son, witli its jars and glasses of different 
things. This woman had no scales to 
weigh, so she used a cup. If, for in¬ 
stance, she had made a pie of raspber¬ 
ries and had a cupful left, she would put 
them into a saucepan and make a cupful 
of jam, using, of course, a cupful of 
sugar. She did the same with currants, 
making either clear jelly, or jelly ex¬ 
cellent for meat, leaving the currants 
in. The extra strawberries are delicious 
that way. And the peach parings boiled 
in water enough to cover, till they are like 
pulp, make a delicate pink jelly. Strain, 
add as many cupfuls of sugar as there 
are of juice, and boil 20 minutes. Quince 
parings she boiled the same way, with 
the addition of the cores, and of them 
made a delicious jelly. 
She used grapes in much the same 
way, making some jelly, but the greater 
part were seeded the old-fashioned way ; 
they have a much better flavor, and it is 
not so tiresome as one would think to 
seed them. Do them in the afternoon, 
then cover them closely till morning ; 
they will not spoil. When doing the 
work, she puts them in a saucepan with 
just enough water to cover them, no 
sugar. Let them boil thoroughly, and 
can quickly ; they retain all their flavor 
and can be used all winter for pies or as 
sweetmeats by adding sugar to taste, 
boiling quickly and setting away to cool. 
This woman makes her pickles in this 
same small way—without fuss or fatigue. 
She cans all the pie plant she needs for 
winter pies, and it retains its flavor 
perfectly, by being cut in small pieces 
stewed quickly without a particle of 
sugar and canned ; putting in sugar be¬ 
fore cooking makes it flat and tasteless. 
When ready to make your pie, use a cup 
of sugar to each pie. saraii isham coit. 
WOMEN AS ECONOMISTS AND 
FINANCIERS. 
T had been market day. A number 
of small coins were spread out upon 
the table, and Bess and Tommie were 
busily engaged in piling them up, 
halves, quarters, dimes and pennies 
each by themselves. Mr. Fifield, clad in 
his gray business suit, had just closed 
the last account book and wiped his 
pen. 
“ I don’t suppose that there is another 
route in the city for which you would 
exchange yours, Horace,” remarked his 
wife. 
“There are plenty of cleaner streets 
than those through which I go,” he re¬ 
plied. “ My customers are all plain 
sort of folks, but they are honest and 
good pay. I never call twice where 
there is any cheating or disposition to 
do other than the right thing. I often 
give where there seems need, but I have 
little patience with lying and fraud. 
There must be more than a dozen fami¬ 
lies that I have supplied with my line of 
farm products ever since I was a boy, 
and first began peddling.” 
“You have a chance to know which 
women are the best managers, don’t 
you ?” remarked his sister, Sarah Fifield, 
who chanced to be on a visit to the 
farm. 
“ Yes, I do ; and I tell you, the women 
outdo the men in that line, nearly every 
time. According to my opinion, the 
average woman is a better economist 
than the average man. A woman will 
think how much she has in her purse, 
and what it must buy. She will select 
the things she most needs, and make her 
money spread over all it can be made to 
cover. She will get up a 50-cent or a 
five-dollar dinner, and have her money’s 
worth.” 
“Why, I did not know, Horace, that 
you thought women such good calculat¬ 
ors,” laughed Sarah Fifield. 
Taking the interruptions as an orator 
does applause from his audience, Mr. 
Fifield continued : “ Men might be di¬ 
vided into two classes; those who ‘pinch 
their pennies till they squeal,’ and those 
who don't pinch them half hard enough. 
A man will be either so open-handed 
that he is foolish, or so saving that he is 
stingy. Take a man who prides himself 
upon being liberal, and he will say, 
‘Now what’s the use of bothering Mr. 
Fifield for a peck of apples ? Let him 
bring in a bushel’; or, ‘What makes you 
ask for a half dozen eggs ? Take the 
whole basketful, and have some on 
hand.’ Likely as not, they are fall 
apples not likely to keep, and the woman 
knows just how many eggs she can 
manage with, and what she needs more 
than she does the eggs.” 
“ I should say,” and Mrs. Fifield broke 
off a fresh needleful of cotton with a 
snap, “ that it was a poor housekeeper 
who didn’t know what she needed, and 
as for her knowing how to scrimp, she 
generally has to practice that from the 
moment when the man she is marrying 
stands up and says that he endows her 
with all his worldly goods.” 
“That is so, Janet,” returned Mr. 
Fifield, with one of his sly winks. “ A 
woman would never discover half the 
virtues she is capable of developing 
without a husband to help her out.” 
“ Possibly, women are, as you say, 
good economists, but I confess to not 
having so much confidence in their busi¬ 
ness abilities that I would care to risk 
much money in an enterprise managed 
wholly by women.” Sarah Fifield spoke 
apologetically, conscious that she dis¬ 
trusted the sex it was the fashion to 
applaud. 
“ No, nor I,” quickly rejoined Mi’s. 
Fifield. “ Every little while, the news¬ 
papers make a fuss over some great 
thing women are going to do. Later, 
comes a small paragraph down in one 
corner, giving some polite reason why 
the thing slumped through. The last 
time-she was home, Mary was telling how 
the young woman whose charities and 
schemes the papers are always praising, 
is bankrupt after every concert she gets 
up, and goes about getting her friends 
to make up the deficit. I say that a 
woman’s place is in her home, and not 
splurging about seeking notoriety— 
Fame they call it! There is not room 
for more than 20 famous women in any 
nation at once. The rest get themselves 
talked about by clever advertising 
mostly, I reckon.” 
Fannie, coming into the room with a 
handful of books and school exercises in 
time to hear her mother’s outburst, 
went over and patted her on the cheek, 
saying, “There, there, Momsie ! The 
world will move. Why not laugh at its 
follies, and try to like what is best so as 
to have the pleasure of sympathizing 
and feeling in touch with progress ?” 
“ Undoubtedly, there is an unlovely 
zest for notoriety noticeable among 
women nowadays,” admitted Sarah Fi¬ 
field. “But, of course, a good deal of 
successful business is conducted by 
women. I suspect that most such enter¬ 
prises have grown out of small begin¬ 
nings ; starting in a small way, women 
gradually acquire the necessary business 
education. How is it, Horace, ’ she 
broke off to inquire, “is Lizzie Mead 
going to make a success of farming ? I 
remember that you said, at the time you 
appraised her husband’s estate, that 
there were few men in the township 
who had better ideas of values and farm 
possibilities.” 
“She had a hard season for her first 
one.” Mr. Fifield pursed up his lips 
thoughtfully, and then added with con¬ 
viction, “ I’ll tell you, Sarah, nine times 
out of ten, where women make a busi¬ 
ness venture and fail, it is where they 
depend upon hiring men to do the 
work.” 
“It isn’t the women who are good 
managers who want to spell their sex 
with a capital W,” remarked Mrs. Fi¬ 
field, ignoring the question of Mrs. 
Mead’s success. “If a woman wants a 
man to help carry out her projects, she 
has the wrong sort of halter on the 
horse when she makes much of herself 
and little of him. He won’t be led, and 
he won’t follow half as well as he will 
be head horse. ‘Use the silken rein, the 
silken rein,’ our good old minister’s wife 
used to say.” 
“ I suspect that is so,” assented Mr. 
Fifield. “The best thing for a woman 
about to undertake farming would be to 
get herself a good, industrious husband. 
But I would as soon expect to see a widow 
running a farm at a profit as to see a 
widower making much headway, pro¬ 
vided he hadn’t daughters to look after 
things indoors. I could mention sev¬ 
eral instances where mortgages would, 
probably, never have been lifted but for 
the wife’s planning. A woman will look 
out for two cents here and five there, 
and merchants say that it is in the little 
retail trade, the five and ten-cent sales, 
that they realize largest profits. A 
bright woman will run a poultry house 
or a little store, and make a living, 
where a man would starve.” 
“ Undoubtedly, a woman is a better 
hand than a man to look after details, 
nodded the sister. “ And as to failures, 
they tell us that it is only a very small 
proportion of the ventures made by men 
that succeed. A good deal depends upon 
the wife’s management everywhere, but 
I suppose that nowhere else does the 
responsibility rest more equally upon 
both pair of shoulders, than on a farm.” 
“ Y 7 es, a man might about as well ex¬ 
pect to win a walking match by hopping 
on one foot, as at farming without a 
good wife ; and a woman is about as 
badly off on a farm without a man work¬ 
ing for love and his board and clothes. 
Janet, here, is running a farm at a fair 
profit ” 
As Mr. Fifield’s three companions 
looked smilingly up, he added, “ Yes, to 
run a business successfully, a woman 
needs a husband ; and when she has him, 
she wants to keep him just like that! ” 
and Horace Fifield placed his thumb 
squarely upon a gold piece which lay 
before him on the table, p. t. primkose. 
CURE FOR HICCOUGHS. 
N the last year, a number of cases of 
prolonged and frequently fatal hic¬ 
coughs have been reported in the news¬ 
papers. Frequently without warning 
persons in good health have started to 
hiccough, and have kept it up for weeks 
without cessation until the exhaustion 
proved fatal. The physicians in charge 
have tried many things as remedies, 
but as a rule, failed to accomplish any¬ 
thing toward controlling the disease, 
says the New York Journal. Professor 
Lepine, of Lyons, France, has, at last, 
discovered a cure. A young soldier had 
contracted the disease and was rapidly 
losing strength. The new remedy con¬ 
sisted in pulling the tongue several 
times a minute, keeping it outside the 
mouth, and then letting it slip back 
again. This faithfully kept up, pro¬ 
duced a cure inside of 20 minutes. 
Hiccough, when continued, is a seri¬ 
ous disease of the respiratory center in 
the brain. These rhythmical tractions 
on the tongue seem to affect the res¬ 
piratory center in a peculiar way. 
There is a bunch of nerves at the base 
