708 
June 15, 
Woman and the Home 
From Day to Day. 
THE DAISIES. 
Over the shoulder and slopes of the dune 
I saw the white daisies go down to the 
sea, 
A host in the sunshine, an army in June, 
The people Ood sends us to cot our hearts 
free. 
The bobolinks rallied them up from the dell, 
The orioles whistled them out of the 
wood; 
And all of their saying was, "Earth, it is 
well”; 
And all of their daneing was "Life, thou 
art good 1” 
—Bliss Carman. 
* 
Some of the most powerful literature 
of the great foreign authors gets right 
down to the soil, and points out the 
character that is hammered out by the 
elemental forces of nature, until it be¬ 
comes a great power in national life. 
The Illinois woman on page 679, strug¬ 
gling on a farm without a voter on it, 
presents a picture as moving as any¬ 
thing depicted by Rene Bazin or Tur¬ 
genev or Thomas Hardy, but do we 
ever find such a drama of rural life 
adequately represented in print? When 
the great American novel is written it 
will deal with the people of the soil, 
not with flippant amusement at so-called 
rural humor, nor with the superior at¬ 
titude of the professional “uplifter,” but 
as viewed by one who knows and loves 
the foundations of national life. 
* 
Here is .a recipe for canned baked 
quinces which comes all the way from 
South Africa. The Transvaal house¬ 
wife who gives the recipe says she likes 
the flavor much better than the boiled 
quince: Wipe the quinces; do not pare 
them. With a peach-corer scoop out 
the centre core, leaving the pips in. 
Cut into quarters or smaller. Put into 
an earthen jar, strewing an occasional 
layer of sugar, to which a taste of salt 
has been added, over the fruit. Add 
water to fill about a quarter of the jar. 
Cover the jar with its lid or a plate, 
and place in a moderate oven until the 
fruit is quite tender. Keep back some 
of the sugar, and in a preserving pan 
make a syrup as for canning. Now fill 
your canning jars with the fruit, adding 
some of the syrup out of the earthen 
jar to each, then fill up with the syrup 
you boiled. Screw down in the usual 
way. The proportions of fruit and 
sugar are the same as for canning. 
* 
The Woman’s Journal, measuring the 
distance we have traveled as regards 
our views on woman’s status, states 
that when Elizabeth Blackwell, Ameri¬ 
ca’s earliest woman physician, took her 
medical degree at Geneva, N. Y., in 
1849, her brother, Henry B. Blackwell, 
attended the commencement exercises. 
According to custom, the candidates 
for degrees marched from the college 
to the church where the ceremonies took 
place. The brother wrote home to his 
family in Cincinnati: 
“Dr. Webster was very anxious that 
Elizabeth should march in procession, 
and sent down two messages to that 
effect, but Elizabeth very properly re¬ 
fused. About half-past ten Elizabeth 
and I walked up to the church. As 
we ascended the college steps, Dr. 
Webster met Elizabeth and again urged 
the request, whereupon she told him 
peremptorily that ‘it wouldn’t be lady¬ 
like.’ ‘Wouldn’t it, indeed? Why, no, I 
forgot—I suppose it wouldn’t,’ said the 
little doctor.” Accordingly she waited 
decorously in the church with her 
brother, and did not join her class¬ 
mates till they entered the building. 
Nowadays even the most enthusiastic 
anti-suffragist will march in a college 
procession, or appear before a legis¬ 
lative committee in protest against 
further extension of women’s powers 
in the body politic. 
THE RURAL 
White dresses are the cleanest thing 
one can wear in Summer, but the laun¬ 
dry question makes many housekeepers 
look coldly upon them. As an actual 
fact they are washed with more satis¬ 
faction than the light-colored goods 
which must always be watched so care¬ 
fully to avoid fading. Cotton crape of 
a nice quality makes very pretty white 
dresses, and has the advantage of re¬ 
quiring little pressing, so this is really 
a great saving of work, just as the 
colored crinkled seersuckers, which are 
now revived, sometimes under the name 
of ripplette, make useful dresses and 
rompers for the children. Cotton 
poplin is another very useful mate¬ 
rial both in white and colors, and 
it has the great advantage of not creas¬ 
ing as linen does. The present styles 
of children’s clothes, the rompers and 
the little one-piece dresses with bloom¬ 
ers instead of petticoats, really do les¬ 
sen work, both at the sewing machine 
and laundry tub. If such dresses are 
made for play-time in the seersucker, 
there is a very great saving. When we 
remetnber the elaboration of frills and 
lace seen on children’s dresses 25 years 
ago, and contrast them with the sensi¬ 
ble styles now in vogue, we feel that 
the world really does move. 
* 
A young man returning to New York 
after some time spent abroad was sur¬ 
prised by the number of young women 
he met—many of them mere girls—who 
were conspicuous for their striking 
clothes and artificial complexions. His 
first impression was that they were of 
the less reputable theatrical type, but 
after meeting some of them in carefully 
selected social circles, and seeing others 
in entirely respectable offices, he be¬ 
came aware that many young women 
of irreproachable character seem to 
think that they enhance their oppearance 
by using as much war paint as an Ara¬ 
pahoe brave. The old days when a girl 
put a surreptitious dab of powder on 
her nose and hoped no one would find 
it out, are long past, and the coat of 
red and white kalsomine, the reddened 
lips and penciled brows, are flaunted 
without the least embarrassment. We 
believe that it is woman’s inalienable 
right to make herself as attractive as 
possible, but we are still sufficiently old- 
fashioned to think that there is no par¬ 
ticular charm in an adornment that, to 
us, merely suggests the need of soap 
and water. There is always something 
attractive in the satiny skin of a young 
girl who is clean and healthy in mind 
and body, even if it does not possess 
the hard Brilliancy of these artificial 
lilies and roses; how sad it is to see 
its young bloom disguised in suffocating 
pigments! We do not know what argu¬ 
ments are put up in favor of this habit 
—except, perhaps, that it is “stylish;” 
but it certainly conveys, to many ob¬ 
servers, an impression of the girl’s 
standards that is most unflattering. One 
historian, writing of the social customs 
of the seventeenth and early eighteenth 
centuries—a period marked by mag¬ 
nificence of costume combined with 
neglect of personal cleanliness—asserts 
that there was real excuse for the ex¬ 
cessive use of paint by fashionable 
ladies of the period, since they bathed 
so rarely that the paint was needed to 
disguise resultant skin defects. Are 
we, in this well-washed and sterilized 
age of improved sanitation, returning 
in spirit to those dark ages when a 
daily bath was an unknown luxury to 
royalty itself? 
Removing Wall Paper. 
Will some good housekeeper tell me 
which is the best and the easy way to take 
wallpaper off an old wall, as I found it 
very hard to do? mrs. g. c. 
We use a putty-knife to aid in scrap¬ 
ing the paper off, but must admit that 
we do not find it an easy operation. 
NEW-YORKER 
The Rural Patterns. 
When ordering patterns always give 
number of patterns and measurements 
desired. 
The first group shows 7414, morning 
jacket with peplum, 34 to 44 bust, with 
short or long sleeves, round or square 
collar. For the medium size will be 
required 3 yards of material 36 inches 
wide H yard 27 for the banding and 54 
yard 27 inches wide for the piping. 
7391, girl’s apron, 4' to 8 years, with 
round or square neck and round or 
square corners. For the 6 year size 
will be required 1J4 yards of material 
36 inches wide, with l / 2 yard 27 inches 
wide for the trimming. 7421, waitress’ 
apron, one size. To make requires 3J4 
yards of material 36 inches wide. 7404, 
infant’s tucked dress, one size, with 
dress and sleeves in one. To make will 
be required 1?4 yards of material 36 
inches wide with 2 yards of insertion. 
7415, child’s one-piece beach or play 
suit, 2 to 6 years, with leg portions left 
loose or drawn up with elastics, with 
square or round neck. For the 4 year 
size will be required 354 yards of ma¬ 
terial 36 inches wide with 54 yards 27 
for the trimming. 
The second group includes 7011, 
combination corset cover and five-gored 
petticoat, 34 to 42 bust. For the medium 
size will be required 3J4 yards of ma¬ 
terial 36 inches wide; 3 T 4 yards of em¬ 
broidery for frill; 2j4 yards of band- 
739© s- 73 i 
ing, 3J4 yards of edging, 3% yards of 
beading. 6949, plain princess slip for 
misses and small women, 14, 16 and 18 
years, with high, V-shaped, round or 
square neck; long, elbow or short 
sleeves. For the 16 year size will be 
required 454 yards of material 36 inches 
wide. 7064. semi-princess slip, empire 
style, 34' to 42 bust, perforated for 
round or squarq neck. For the medium 
size will be required 4J4 yards of ma¬ 
terial 36 inches wide, with 254 yards of 
embroidery 14 inches wide, or 54$ yard 
of material 36 inches wide for flounce; 
3J4 yards of edging, 3j4 yards of bead¬ 
ing. 7398, open dart-fitted drawers 24 
to 34 waist with straight lower edges. 
For the medium size will be required 
154 yards of material 36 inches wide, 
with 2J4 yards of edging 4 inches wide, 
and \y 2 yards of insertion or 1^4 yards 
of flouncing 27 inches deep. 7315, circular 
closed drawers for misses and small 
women, 14, 16 and 18 years. For the 
16 year size will be required 2J4 yards 
of material 36 inches wide, 6 yards of 
insertion, 3 yards of edging. Price of 
each pattern 10 cents. 
Drying Currants. 
Will you kindly advise me how to dry 
currants in the way that they are used for 
fruit cake, etc. ? Out here in Washington 
our currants will soon be ripe. H. b. N. 
The “currant,” so called, used in fruit 
cake is not a currant (Ribes) at all, but 
is a small seedless grape native to 
Greece and the Levant generally. The 
name currant is supposed to be a cor¬ 
ruption of Corinth, as these dried 
fruits, coming by way of that city, were 
formerly called Corinth raisins. They 
grow in small bunches, almost as close 
as kernels of corn, the fruit, varying 
in color in different varieties from white 
or amber to purple, is very sweet, rich 
and aromatic in flavor. The currants 
are dried on earthen platforms in the 
open air, turned with rakes, and win¬ 
nowed when dry to remove stalks and 
trash. Pliny mentions these Corinth 
raisins A. D. 75, and they appear to 
have been inported into England since 
the early thirteenth century. They 
form a leading crop in parts of the 
Greek mainland and also in Zante, 
Chios, and other adjacent islands. Some 
efforts are made to grow them in Cali¬ 
fornia. 
We have had no experience in drying 
garden currants, either red or black. 
If any of our readers can aid this in¬ 
quirer we should like to hear from 
them. The currants are so useful and 
delicious preserved in other ways that 
we doubt the value of drying them. 
Destroying Black Ants. 
My storeroom is overrun with blaek ants 
one-half inch to one inch long. Can you 
suggest any way of getting rid of them? 
A. E. s. 
The only sure way is to locate their 
nest, which may be inside or outside of 
the house. Notice where the ants come 
from; you will probably find them 
entering through some crack or crevice, 
or above a baseboard. With a syringe 
inject bisulphide of carbon into the 
crevice, and close it with a cloth, to 
hold the fumes, which will extend for 
some distance. Always remember, in 
using bisulphide of carbon, that it is 
highly inflammable and explosive; it 
must not be used near a light or fire. 
When these black ants get into the shell 
of a house, it is often very difficult to 
eradicate them, as the nest may be 
some distance from where they enter a 
pantry. Many may be trapped, how¬ 
ever, by using a sponge saturated with 
weak syrup of sugar and water, remov¬ 
ing it and dropping into scalding water 
when it becomes full of ants, and re¬ 
peating this operation as they continue 
to enter. The marauding ants are the 
workers, and their killing will in time 
weaken the colony so that there are'no 
care-takers for the larvae. Persistent 
work will surely get rid of them. It is 
well to look for the nests outside too, 
as they sometimes enter the house from 
outside. Such nests should be destroyed 
by the bisulphide; punch several holes 
about a foot deep in the ground, pour 
an ounce of bisulphide of carbon in each 
hole, and close up with earth. The 
fumes pass all through the workings of 
the nest. 
Discouraging Ants. —Tell D. B„ Pen- 
field, N. Y., to sprinkle sulphur or put 
in cloth bags where ants run, and they 
will trouble her no more. mrs. g. h. 
