1914. 
THE RUHAE NEW-YORKER 
859 
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WOMAN AND HOME 
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M RS. HAYS was busy with the Mon¬ 
day washing when there came a 
vigorous knock at the kitchen door. 
Opening it she faced a well-dressed man, 
who began talking before she could speak. 
“Madam, I’m introducing the great, 
new, roller-bearing pedal-rocking pat- 
A Well-dressed Man Who Began 
Talking. 
ented Royal churn. It works so easy 
that you don’t realize you’re working at 
all. Children quarrel for the fun of 
churning with it. It makes good butter 
with all the bother left out. It’s sure, 
absolutely sure—cannot fail; no guess¬ 
ing and no failures with it. Saves over 
an hour’s time every churning and that’s 
about three hours a week—a day every 
month and nearly two weeks in a year. 
One week of your valuable time, lady, 
will pay for the churn; the other week 
will be your sensible profit.” 
The man had talked himself out of 
breath, and Mrs. Hays was speechless 
through sheer surprise at his volubility. 
She slowly shook her head; as that form 
of answer meant more just then than 
any other she could think of. 
“No, no, madam; don’t shake your 
head. You cannot understand what this 
wonderful new churn means to you poor, 
tired, over-worked women.” 
Mrs. Hays tried to speak; held up 
her hand in distress but the agent talked 
smoothly on, edging slowly inside the 
door under cover of his gatling gun con¬ 
versation. The disorder of the room 
caught his eye, and he understood the 
disadvantages of trying to sell anything 
to a woman when her house is all torn 
up. Craftily he dropped the churn sub¬ 
ject, and turned his attention to the 
clothes-wringer, which he manipulated 
skillfully for half an hour. 
After he dropped the churn matter 
Mrs. Hays found him quite pleasant; 
occasionally he gave a hint about how 
hard ordinary things ran nowadays and 
compared them with the easy running 
Royal churn. While Mrs. Hays busied 
herself with getting dinner, the agent 
hung out the clothes, emptied the suds 
and put away the tubs. Meantime Mr. 
Hays came in from the field. He found 
the agent’s fund of witty stories quite 
refreshing—though many of them brought 
in the new churn and how folks were 
afraid to take hold of anything new. 
Near the end of dinner Mrs. Hays ad¬ 
mitted that she had the cream saved 
from Saturday to Monday, and that she 
had intended to churn it that evening 
after supper. 
Again the agent became useful. This 
time he was even more at home. With 
a dairy thermometer he tested the cream, 
added hot water to bring it up to the 
proper temperature for churning, worked 
deftly and kept up a running fire of talk 
about the wonderful churn at the same 
time. 
“See now; didn’t I tell you it was sim¬ 
ple? Just three minutes since you 
brought up the cream and I’m all ready 
to churn it. Do you mind if I look at 
this book a few minutes?” Mrs. Hays 
was surprised that he would stop talking 
long enough to look at anything, but she 
gladly gave her consent to his request. 
Settling himself in a comfortable pose 
the agent seemed lost in the book. With 
scarcely a glance at the churn he be¬ 
came absorbed in reading. With one 
foot he rocked the churn easily by 
means of the patent pedal arrangement. 
Through the little glass window at the 
top of the churn the butter grains 
showed clearly, and the glass cleared from 
... 
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The Patent Churn 
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[1 How the Agent Was Worked 
|| . By Enoch J. Mills— —- fl 
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milk white to a watery color. Mrs. 
Hays timidly called the agent’s attention 
to the butter. 
“What, so soon as all that?” he asked 
surprised. “Why I’d hardly got started 
reading. What time did you say it was 
when I began?” Mrs. Hays admitted 
that he had been but 11 minutes. At 
this the agent looked a bit disappointed. 
“Usually I churn in eight or nine,” he 
said. “But then I got interested in the 
book and forgot my business.” Through 
a patent, screened drain the agent drew 
off the buttermilk, leaving the butter col¬ 
lected in conspicuous grains, soft and 
yellow. 
Washing the butter was a simple pro¬ 
cess, duly explained, because the screen 
ered his voice and looked around, “I’m 
going to write the manager that you 
folks have been kind to me and ask him 
to ship you a churn freight paid; so that 
way it’ll cost you only eight forty-five 
instead of what the others pay. I’ll ask 
him to pick out the churn himself and 
you’ll be sure to get a good one—not but 
what they’re all good, but you know, 
sometimes, one’s a wee bit better than 
the rest.” 
“Will next week be time enough for 
delivery?” Mrs. Hays shook her head de¬ 
cisively. “Then I’ll wire the manager 
to ship yours right away by express, as 
a special favor to me.” 
“I guess we’ll wait until the factory 
isn’t so rushed,” said Mrs. Hays and she 
“OFF CAME THE CHURN LID. 
let the water out and kept the butter in. 
After the washing the butter was ladled 
into a big wooden bowl and left on 
the table for working down and salting. 
The agent carried the churn to the wait¬ 
ing spring wagon by the gate and re¬ 
turned with some papers in his hand. 
“Just sign here, Mrs. Hays, will you 
please.” It was more of a command than 
a request. His tone was full of confi¬ 
dence. Mrs. Hays wiped her hands 
carefully on her apron and took the 
paper. 
“Sign?” she asked. “What for?” 
The agent was hurt. He showed it 
by his look. 
“Most folks,” he explained, “are will¬ 
ing to put their names down when they 
want anything.” 
“But we don’t want anything,” she 
protested, and there was a twinkle in 
her eyes. 
“But madam—the churn, it is a great 
privilege I’m offering you. Not every¬ 
one will have the opportunity of getting 
one; the factory is nearly a year behind 
in its orders now. Only yesterday I got 
a letter from the manager saying that 
after this week we’d take no more orders 
for six months or so.” He searched in 
vain for this letter. When he looked up 
Mrs. Hays was smiling understandingly. 
“Now, Mrs. Hays, I don’t want you 
behind times and have your neighbors 
talking about you. Just to show you 
that I’m sincere in the matter—” he low¬ 
entered the kitchen, quickly closing the 
door behind her. 
For a moment the agent looked disap¬ 
pointedly at the closed door. Then he 
glanced at his watch as though suddenly 
remembering something of importance, 
and drove hastily down the road. 
Late Tuesday evening, just as Mrs. 
Hays was serving some invited neighbors 
supper on the lawn, the agent stopped 
at the gate. “I beg a thousand pardons, 
ladies and gentlemen, for interrupting, 
but my horse has gone lame and give 
clear out. I haven’t the heart to drive 
him into town tonight. Thought maybe 
you folks would keep me’ overnight.” 
The agent’s horse was truly lame; 
Mrs. Hays had noticed that the day be¬ 
fore. Besides they were accommodating 
neighbors, and rarely refused anything 
reasonable to anyone. 
Mr. Hays rose from the table. “Drive 
around to the barn,” he called, “and I'll 
help put up your horse.” Meekly the 
agent bowed and turned his tired horse 
in at the gate. Two of the neighbor men 
followed to the barn. From them the 
agent learned that it was the Hays’ fif¬ 
teenth wedding anniversary that was be¬ 
ing celebrated by the supper. Further he 
learned that the neighbors had presented 
Mr. and Mrs. Hays a set of water glasses 
and a pitcher to match. 
The agent was visibly disappointed. 
“What,” said he, “give such fine folks a 
small thing like that?” The neighbors 
had not thought of it in that way and 
really felt a bit queer. “Why not all of 
us chip in and get them something hand¬ 
some?” He was confidential now. Mr. 
Hays was just inside the barn and might 
hear. Cleverly he manipulated the con¬ 
versation so that each neighbor was 
afraid to offer an objection for fear of 
being placed in the light of being op¬ 
posed to giving his neighbors a decent 
present. “I’ll throw off my profit on 
it—” Here one of the men interrupted to 
ask what it was they were to give. The 
agent told them in low tones. From the 
back kitchen window Mrs. Hays had 
watched the agent talking to her neigh¬ 
bors, and from their actions she sus¬ 
pected what was being said. 
The agent was delighted. On the way 
to the house he suggested that he would 
show off the churn to the company. Then, 
when the proper climax came, one of the 
neighbors was to rise and present the 
churn. The agent planned it all. The 
two neighbors were ominously silent. 
The company seated themselves at the 
table out in the yard, the agent modest¬ 
ly refusing to sit down with them. Said 
he had something he wanted to show 
them. 
Mrs. Hays had gone into the kitchen 
for the last of the hot things for the 
table before sitting down herself. At 
the door the agent met her and said 
something in an undertone. Mrs. Hays 
listened and when he had finished, she 
nodded. 
The churn was placed where it would 
show to advantage a few feet from the 
table, and the agent carried the big jar 
from the cellar with a flourish. To any¬ 
one who would listen he explained the 
workings of the churn as he prepared the 
cream. Making sure of the temperature 
and testing the lid to see that it was 
down tight, he drew out of his pocket a 
worn paper, hitched forward an aband¬ 
oned rocking chair and settled himself 
in a very unconcerned pose. He looked 
as much at ease as though churning was 
the most delightful thing in all the 
world. 
Mrs. Hays whispered something to the 
neighbor who sat next her at the table. 
The man smothered a laugh and glanced 
quickly toward the agent, who sat calm¬ 
ly rocking and reading, and pedaling 
steadily away. Ten, 15, 20 minutes 
passed. A half hour. Still the agent 
was apparently absorbed in his paper. 
Frequently he cast furtive glances at the 
churn but never once lowered the paper. 
“Say, Mr. Churn man,” drawled the 
neighbor who sat next Mrs. Hays, “how 
long does it take that new fangled churn 
to do business, anyhow?” The agent 
looked up surprised. 
Glancing at his w T atch the agent 
laughed outright. “You’re right,” he 
laughed, “I got interested in the paper 
and forgot all about the temperature.” 
Wiping off the thermometer he looked 
at it critically: “Just what I thought,” 
he announced. “Temperature’s gone way 
up while I been reading.” 
Cold water brought down the tempera¬ 
ture and the agent again started churn¬ 
ing. The company was near finishing the 
He Urged The Horse To A Faster 
Pace. 
meal so the agent left off reading and 
devoted himself to the churn. Ten min¬ 
utes, and he glanced appealingly toward 
Mrs. Hays, but she was busily talking. 
Another five minutes passed and the 
company arose. 
“Come see my flower bed,” invited Mrs. 
Hays and the company filed out of sight 
around the corner of the house; much 
(Concluded on page 867.) 
