1490 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
WOMAN AND HOME 
The Christmas Spirit 
Thou'rt neither frisky fay nor sportive 
sprite, 
Thou Christmas Spirit that December 
brings, 
Though in thy voice the merry sleigh bell 
rings, 
And in thy hair are holly berries bright. 
These cruder symbols fade in the holy- 
light, 
That Star-reflected glow which turns all 
things 
Before thine eyes to peace. Our wonder- 
ings 
Grow awed in thy sweet presence, calm 
and white. 
But we are blind, we do not recognize 
The fullness of thy depth. Our selfish 
joys 
Fill our small minds, and e’en the deeper 
heart 
Has but a corner left for thee. We prize 
Th.v gladness, but with loud and blust'ring 
noise 
That deafens ns to what thou really art! 
A. F. C. 
* 
Wiiat Dr. Foreman says on page 1493 
about the reading habit is gospel truth. 
To grow up to years and moderate com¬ 
petence without a love for reading is 
worse than most physical afflictions. To 
reacli years and poverty without this 
habit is a curse. It is the most wonder¬ 
ful resource to go to books and learn to 
know them, and the man or woman in 
the country has the best chance to know 
a book well. It is a sad thing to find a 
beautiful, comfortable home, built out of 
farm success, with everything except good 
books. By all means give the children 
the reading habit if you can give them 
nothing else. 
* 
We would like to make it a necessary 
part of every intelligent and responsible 
person’s education to see the play of 
“King Lear,” acted by high-class artists. 
In thi.3 play Shakespeare put the awful 
tragedy which is caused by the “thank¬ 
less child.” The picture of the old king 
turned out and rejected by his daughters 
is pathetic beyond description—yet not 
more so than dozens of cases we see in 
actual life. Our advice to people of mid¬ 
dle age or elderly people who have prop¬ 
erty is to keep it in their own hands. A 
great share of the world’s sorrow and 
trouble has been caused by parents giving 
up their property rights and depending 
upon promises of support. It is a great 
mistake. Do not be guilty of it, but keep 
your property for your own support. 
* 
On page 1483 is the brief story of a great 
wrong done a farm woman in the disposal 
of property. On the face of it this is 
about the hardest case which has come to 
our attention, though we have had many 
pitiful ones. In the palmiest days of 
slavery a woman could hardly have been 
treated worse in the disregard of her bus¬ 
iness rights, and the matter has been so 
long delayed that this unfortunate woman 
has probably lost her legal opportunity. 
We print it at least as a sad warning to 
other women who may have a little prop¬ 
erty which they have loaned or are asked 
to loan to relatives. We beg of them not 
to do it either as a personal loan or as an 
investment unless they can have full se¬ 
curity in good paper or collateral. Age 
and sickness come upon us all, when we 
must expect to become a burden unless we 
can hold our little property in our own 
right. 
* 
It seems that at the Kansas Agricul¬ 
tural College 45 per cent, of all the stu¬ 
dents are earning their way through col¬ 
lege fully or in part. Of these, 40 per cent, 
are entirely self-supporting. Of the men 
students 53 per cent, support themselves 
completely, while 17 per cent, do more or 
less of this. Of the women 24 per cent, 
are entirely self-supporting, and 9 per 
cent more or less so. As for the occu¬ 
pation of the fathers of these students, 
out of 2,260 there were 893 who said 
their fathers were farmers, 00 more called 
their fathers ranchmen, while 182 were 
retired farmers. There were 310 who did 
not state their parents’ occupation at all. 
Outside of farmers there were more mer¬ 
chants as parents of these young people 
than of any other class—91 in all. It is 
an encouraging thing to realize that there 
are still young men in the country who 
are willing to work hard for an educa¬ 
tion. We have begun to think that un¬ 
less a young person will do some of this 
work, his education will not be of any 
great benefit to him. 
* 
A Physiology lesson in the fourth 
grade drilled and redrilled the fact into 
four boys and girls that the body is made 
up of bones, skin, muscles, etc. Yes, one 
or two of the brightest acquired the 
satisfying habit of being able to repeat 
the all-important parts of the body, as 
designated by four or five general terms, 
in the course of a 15-minute recitation. 
Not one suggestion of the use or care of 
a single definite part of that wonderful 
and complex “House Beautiful” had 
been suggested. Bad teeth, bad eyes, bad 
air and stomach-ache kept constant com¬ 
pany with sore throats and coughs in 
that room, and in every one of the sur¬ 
rounding homes. * s. h. 
, ... * 
The New York State Supreme Court 
not long ago decided an interesting case. 
A man had been treated for tuberculosis 
and knew he had the disease. He was 
engaged to be married to a young wom¬ 
an, but concealed the fact of his disease, 
and said he was suffering from a cold. 
After marriage his wife discovered that 
he had tuberculosis, and brought suit to 
will dress, dine, motor, dance and per¬ 
haps do other things, they say. 
That is what the daily papers say of 
the visit of a “dancing club’’ from Dela¬ 
ware. Grown rich out of the profits from 
making explosives and other war mate¬ 
rials, these people were headed for New 
York in an effort to unload some of their 
money “in the pursuit of pleasure!” 
What a business for American women 
to be in—with all the trouble and suffer¬ 
ing in this world which their money 
might relieve. We can tell them how to 
“unload” some of their wealth so it will 
grow a crop worth harvesting! 
* 
A Pie-baking Contest. 
For some years we have urged the 
fruit growers or horticultural societies to 
give the girls a showing with their own 
natural weapons. There have been speak¬ 
ing contests in which girls have won 
prizes, and so-called cooking contests— 
usually won by some hotel cook—but 
thus far the societies have dodged the 
leal thing. 8o here we come once more 
patiently suggesting a pie-baking contest. 
Other fruit delicacies may come and go. 
but the good old apple pie remains the 
great family harmonizer and the ad¬ 
vance salesman for apples. Granted that 
mother and grandmother were artists in 
the apple pie line the next generation is 
more interested in our girls of to-day— 
and we must look to the next generation 
to keep our young orchards in business. 
Therefore give the girls a chance to show 
their skill. 
One suggestion runs about as follows. 
In some public place at the fruit meeting 
A Happy Christmas Day with Grandmother 
annul the marriage on the ground that 
there was fraud on the part of the man 
in concealing and misrepresenting the 
condition of his health. The court took 
that view and the marriage contract was 
annulled and the couple separated. This 
is probably the first time that such a 
case has been brought into court. The 
man made the mistake of attempting to 
conceal his Condition, when he must 
have known that it would sooner or later 
become clearly apparent. 
• * * 
We are glad to see that the Kansas 
Agricultural College has taken up this 
matter of choral singing in country 
neighborhoods. The professor of music 
will endeavor to organize the work. It 
is a fine thing. There are many beautiful 
voices to be found in the country. They 
ought to be trained and developed, and 
few things will do more to bring people 
together and tie them into an organiza¬ 
tion than good community singing. If 
you will go to history, you will find that 
the Danes owe much of their prosperity 
and progress to their singing clubs. 
These brought the people together and 
gave them a basis upon which they could 
build a strong and solid organization. 
There is no question about the fact that 
organized choral singing is a splendid 
thing for any farm community, and every 
school district ought to endeavor to de¬ 
velop this feature. 
* 
There has been an itching to unload a 
bit of the surplus wealth, so the joy trip 
was decided upon. The party will ar¬ 
rive in New York tonight and remain un¬ 
til Sunday. The entire third floor of the 
Astor Hotel is reserved for them. Thev 
have a number of stoves or ranges in op¬ 
eration, so as to provide hot ovens. Give 
each girl who enters her choice of apples. 
Then provide flour, butter, milk, salt, 
spice—whatever she calls for—give her 
knife, rolling pin, spoon and the other 
weapons with a suitable table—and then 
let her alone! These girls are to make 
one or more apple pies before the crowd 
and bake them in the ovens. If thought 
best let them bring their pie crust along 
with them. Let there be a set of judges to 
sample these pies and award prizes. We 
might suggest two good cooks, two far¬ 
mers and one scientist as judges. The 
scientist would possibly add character, 
and we never saw one yet who was not 
fond of pie. Give the girl who makes the 
best pie in this public manner $100, the 
second best $50 and third best $25. Do 
not put them off with ribbons or small 
prizes, but come up with a good slice of 
coin. The girls deserve it. 
Here is an original and novel contest. 
Make the offers early and call on the girls 
to enter the contest. It will be the most 
popular thing at the meeting. The com¬ 
ing fruit growers’ meeting at Poughkeep¬ 
sie in February seems to us the most 
likely place to put this contest through. 
In the Hudson Valley you may find fine 
fruit, fine girls, and good judges of pie. 
Who will help organize this contest? 
* 
The Danger of Unclean Magazines 
In a country school district there was 
a spirited and bitter controversy over 
head vermin in a district school! It even 
went as far as an appeal to the State Ed¬ 
ucational Department. While this dis¬ 
December 18, 1915. 
gusting controversy was going on one of 
our readers wrote to the local paper as 
follows: 
Lice on the outside of children’s heads 
are loathsome, but ideas such as are 
found in “The Ledger” put on the inside 
of children’s heads are still more loath¬ 
some. Is there not some moral health 
agency, in this town that will safeguard 
the inside of children’s heads? 
The paper referred to is the Chicago 
Ledger. It is said to distribute 1,250.000 
copies each week, and makes a special ef¬ 
fort to reach school children and their pa¬ 
rents. It is a thoroughly disgusting sheet, 
particularly in its advertising—in this re¬ 
spect one of the most contemptible papers 
we know of. It seems to carry every fake 
and nasty advertisement that the law will 
allow. The meanest of all are the so-called 
“personal” or “want ads.” Here are a 
few showing what we mean, omitting the 
addiesses: 
HAVE sweethearts everywhere. Receive 
letters from every place. Membership 
10c. 
LITTLE MISS MABLE in two nature 
poses, 10c. 
MY LADY BEAUTIFUL at Bath, two 
nature poses, 10c. 
\_ 
MARRY—Free photos beautiful ladies; 
descriptions and directory; pay when 
married. 
MARRY RICH—Big list of descriptions 
and photos of congenial people with 
means FREE. Sealed. Either sex. 
LOVERS, send only 25 cents, for $1.75 
packages. Patented Lovine Sachet. 
Real thing. 
LOVER’S SACHET, wins sweethearts. 
Used personally, or secretly in corre¬ 
spondence. 
WIIAT Happened to Estelle. Real life. 
Naked truth. Can’t tell about it here. 
Sent sealed. 
Is it possible that any man or woman 
who has regard for the character or purity 
of their children would permit such a 
paper to come into their house? It should 
be burned up instantly before the children 
get a chance to see it. It is disgusting to 
talk about head vermin or to have such a 
nuisance in the school, but our friend is 
right in saying that such hateful papers 
are infinitely worse in the damage they 
do to the inside of the head ! 
* 
Farmer’s Epitaphs 
The business man feels it his duty to 
take, at least, one annual vacation, and it 
is a wise move for the busy soil tiller to 
follow his example. A constant atten¬ 
tion to strenuous farm duties gets monot¬ 
onous. The farm gets to own him, but 
when he leaves it and sees how others 
live, especially if he can learn how others 
farm, he comes back and takes hold with 
renewed vigor. The writer is past three 
score, and it is still a joy to engage in 
all the multitude of farm endeavor, but 
when fatigue, which formerly was a 
stranger, asserts itself, off he and his 
helpmeet go. We have lately traveled 
over hill and through valley, in buggy, 
auto, “steam cars” and by boat in East¬ 
ern Ohio and down the “Beautiful River, ’ 
reading the lives of men, living and dead, 
as they are written on the farms. The 
monuments of many have been built and 
the epitaphs written by the owners before 
they died, but the present ones are now 
engaged on theirs. One stated that “John 
Doe formerly lived here and strove to 
make this old earth better. He made it 
increase and multiply, added to its beauty 
and worth and then moved away to a bet¬ 
ter location.” 
Another said: “Richard Roe’s earthly 
stay on this farm was a drudgery. He 
saw no joy in toil, no beauty in nature 
and no pleasure in association with happy 
animals. He inherited his place when it 
was improved and fertile and moved 
away, leaving it in this impoverished and 
distressed condition,” and all along our 
route we watched present owners in the 
progressive work of building their own 
monuments and writing their epitaphs. 
The epitaph figure had its inception 
from the sight of occasional nicely clipped 
patches of the darkest green, showing in 
contrast with the face of seedy looking 
nature at this season of the year. They 
showed on the realty of the men who are 
writing pleasing epitaphs, or who had 
just started in that work, men who had 
learned the “Gospel of Alfalfa” by pre¬ 
cept or example. It was surprising how 
numerous these examples of pleasing pen¬ 
manship were. There were specimens in 
patches, in fields large and small, along 
runs and rivers, on hill slopes and on 
what were formerly bold hill tops on both 
sides of the Ohio River. These were in¬ 
dividual writings of the realty holders, 
but how about all of them collectively? 
What an epitaph they would make if they 
were not too voluminous to compile and 
edit, and then it would only be the agri¬ 
cultural part of our friend Joseph E. 
Wing. w. W. REYNOLDS. 
Ohio. 
