■Ghe RURAL N E W-Y O R K E R 
I WOMAN AND HOME 
Opportunity 
They do me "n’ronff to say I come no moi'e 
When once I knock and fail to find you 
in ; 
For every day I stand outside your dooi% 
And bid you wake and rise to fight to 
win. 
Wail not for precious chances passed 
away, 
AVeep not for golden ages on the wane; 
Each night I burn the records of the day, 
At sunrise every soul is born again. 
Ivaugh like a boy at splendors that have 
sped ; 
To vanished joys be blind, and deaf and 
dumb. 
My judgment seals the dead past with 
its dead : 
But never binds a moment yet to come. 
Though deep in mire, wring not your 
hands and weep. 
I lend my arm to all who say “I can.” 
No shame faced outcast ever sank so 
deep 
But might arise and be a man again. 
Dost thou behold thy lost youth all 
aghast? 
Dost reel from righteous retribution’s 
blow? 
Then turn from blotted archives of the 
past 
And find the future’s pages white as 
snow. 
Art thou a mourner? Then rouse thee 
from thy spell! 
Art thou a sinner? Sins may be for¬ 
given. 
Each morning gives thee wings to flee 
from hell— • 
Each night a star to guide thy feet to 
heaven. 
—Walter ^lalone. 
Many remarks, sarcastic and other¬ 
wise, have been made about the church 
supper and the oyster stew usually 
served at a church entertainment. Tn 
most cases, especially in the country, 
these meals are good, and visitors prove it 
by their actions. These suppers are 
served as a business proposition, usually 
to raise money for some definite purpose, 
and it is hardly the most appropriate 
place for some hearty eater to try to “get 
his money’s worth.” Yet there are some 
who do it. The following letter is from 
T]\c TAving Church, and is vouched for as 
genuine. Here is a man wdio is a true 
friend of the church supper. There would 
be more money in the treasury if there 
were more such men : 
“Dkar Madam : When T was at the 
supper your organization gave I saw two 
fellers what ate about two dollars worth 
and only paid seventy cents. I don’t 
want you to lose any money as I want 
you to be able to give some more sup¬ 
pers so I enclose fifty cents of my sav- 
ing.s. This is partly to pay for what them 
two fellers ate more than they paid for 
and I am well and doing well and hope 
these few lines will find you enjoying the 
same blessing.” 
* 
ATr. S. N. Leek, a photographer, tells . 
of his efforts to obtain pictures of fights 
among the elks in the Yellowstone Paidc. 
These elks stood upon tlieir hind legs and 
struck at each other with the fore feet— 
the object being to deliver a blow at the 
lower jaw. 
Elk cows fight the same as bulls, and 
cows will fight bulls and very often whip 
them. Once I saw a cow knock a buIT 
over backwards completely out; one of 
her hard fore feet reached his lower jaw. 
AV'e have no doubt that cow was grant¬ 
ed full herd rights and a full vote on all 
public matters! 
He 
The Block Island woman who tells us 
about fish dinners on page 990 writes: 
No doubt you think I am a real expe¬ 
rienced cook of about .50 tender years, 
who understands fish dinners “fore’n aft 
’n_no thanks tew nobuddy.” However de¬ 
ceived you may be, it is a woman’s privi- 
l(‘ge to conceal her age, and her royal 
duty to delight the appetites of her men, 
so here goes for a few aids, poor as they 
may be. 
It surely is not for us to try to figure 
out the age of our correspondents. Years 
count for little in preparing a good meal, 
and the description of some of these fish 
dinners will carry us back to Cape Cod. 
* 
Not long ago the editor of a local pa¬ 
per wrote that one of his farmer readers 
had a good lot of maple goods which he 
could not sell. We printed the note and 
advised the farmer to advertise in this 
local paper. Our readers at once began 
writing us, asking where the sugar and 
.syrup could be bought. There must have 
been orders for oO gallons in this way. 
The editor of this local paper writes: 
I don't know why it is. but I cannot 
convince the farmers ('f the great value 
in these little want advertisements that 
cost only a few cents. It is not worth 
the trouble to talk them into it. 
The fact is that farmers ought to be 
the best advertising patrons of these local 
papers. They could .sell many good.s 
right within a few miles of the farm 
if they would only use a little printer’s 
ink. Not only that but the local paper 
•would feel that it must do more to 
champion the rights of farmers. Any 
paper will stand first of all for those who 
support it and when farmers both sub¬ 
scribe and advertise they can control the 
paper. 
* 
The little story on page 993 gives a 
good idea of the way many farm women 
regard the “advice” so freely'doled out 
to them. One “authority” tells the wom¬ 
en to utilize the table scraps, and the next 
one tells her to feed such scraps to the 
pigs! It is quite enough to start a 
“scrap.” Some of the men see the fool 
side of all this, too. 
AA^hen the average man gets to telling 
the average woman how to run a house 
he shows just how big a fool he is, and if 
she pays any attention to him, she is a 
bigger fool; if you listen to him he will 
turn your home into a mining camp with 
none of the redeeming features. 
That is about right. And yet some of 
these advisers ought to know something 
that will help. They fall down in deliv¬ 
ering their message for the reason that 
they do not understand the thought and 
the language of the plain people. For 
that reason such wisdom as they pos.ses 3 
is crippled and comes lame and halting 
like one who fears for his reception. 
* 
Entries, which are open to all comers, 
close on .Inly 11 for comi)etitions for 
women-folk in milking, poultry, hoeing 
roots, harnessing, driving a harrow, ma¬ 
nure, hedge trimming, driving competi¬ 
tion. Three prizes will be offered in 
each competition, and a silver cup will 
go to the girl securing the most wins. 
That is taken from an English farm 
paper. Such competitions are quite com¬ 
mon, and women are becoming very pro¬ 
ficient in the lighter work of farming. 
Of course every woman ought to know 
how to harness a hor.se and milk, al¬ 
though but a very small proportion of 
modern girls can do either. A recent 
report shows that over 4,000,000 women 
and girls are at work in Great Britain. 
I.ast October 9.3.3,000 women were di¬ 
rectly replacing males—20,000 being so 
reported in agriculture. Most of these 
women are employed in commercial or 
manufacturing enterprises, but they are 
entering many trades which were former¬ 
ly reserved for men exclusively. The 
work is being done, but the grave ques¬ 
tion ari.se.s as to what will happen when 
after the war, the men return and de¬ 
mand their old jobs? During our Civil 
AA'ar many women, both at the South 
and in New England, did more than a 
man’s work. AA’hat happened in these 
sections when the war ended? 
* 
Sir Horace Plunkett is to be chair¬ 
man of the new Irish convention—prob¬ 
ably as fair a choice as could be made. 
Sir Horace is well known in this country, 
where some of our readers have no doubt 
heard him try to make a speech on the 
co-operative work in Ireland. He is a 
very poor speaker, and has never been 
married, but he has the true Iri.sh wit. 
A writer in the Sun tells this story: 
It is told of him that after one ''f his 
attempts at a public address he received a 
letter from an old friend, an Irish lady 
of somewhat sharp tongue, in which he 
was told that he lacked two things, “les¬ 
sons in elocution and a wife.” “My dear 
lady,” replied Sir Horace, "permit me to 
say that the two are one.” 
Scolding Farm Women 
AA"ho is responsible for all this scolding 
of farmers’ wives and daughters for 
wasting food? 
The advice to housewives to save the 
crusts and half slices of bread is good 
and to the point. But a little advice to 
the manager of the farm to save and 
apply the tons of fertilizing materials an¬ 
nually going to waste on our farms 
seems to me more i)ractical as well as 
profitable. The crusts and crumbs gen¬ 
erally find their way to the henyard, or 
in feeding the cats that we are obliged to 
keep around the barns as rat and mice 
exterminators. In both instances there 
is no waste. In the other case there is 
not only waste but damage also. ii. E. c. 
* 
Slacker Marriages 
The New York papers are full of par¬ 
ticulars about the doings of young men 
who try to evade the army draft by get¬ 
ting married. There were 527 to get 
licenses in one day. In some way these 
men seemed to think that marriage would 
surely put them into the exempt class and 
they were quite taken aback when the 
following notice was put up: 
“The AA"ar Department announces that 
989 
all men married since the outbreak of 
war will be considered ui)on the same 
basis as unmarried men, in so far as their 
military obligations are concerned.” 
It seems that many of the girls who 
were willing to marry these slackers are 
now at work and expect to keep right on 
working. As one of them put it: 
“For why must me and Abie wait? I 
gotta go back by my work—didn’t I tell 
Louis Schifenheimer, the boss, I would 
only^ be gone three hours. But gee, Abie 
won t hafta go to no war; he’s gotta go 
by an examination to-morrow and he can 
tell em he went an’ married.” 
One young woman came to obtain a 
duplicate of her marriage certificate 
—given a month before: 
I married Louie Greenburg only a 
month ago bccau.se he did not want to go 
to the war. Two weeks ago he left me 
Hng and the marriage cer¬ 
tificate with him, and yesterday I got a 
card from him in which he said that I am 
free and that he has gone into the army 
under another name. He said, H married 
you to keep out of the army, but now 
I m going into the army so I can keep 
away from you.’ I’d like one of them 
duplicates, mister.” 
Out of 50 of the.se .slackers only eight 
were born in America, AVhat contempt 
the patriotic men and women who are 
honestly trying to serve their country 
must have for such' poor creatures. 
* 
The Child’s Food Habits 
“Many people complain that they can¬ 
not get their'children to eat cornmeal. In 
old times it was a custom to serve corn- 
meal before the meat and give a prize of 
a second help to meat to the child who 
ate the most cornmeal!” 
Apropos of above clipping from your 
paper, that many people cannot make 
their children eat cornmeal, I know a 
.sensible woman with three children. If a 
child refuses to eat anything placed be- 
foro him, the offending dish is simply re- 
moved, and he is allowed to eat nothing 
further at that particular meal. If the 
child has refu.sed because of slight indi¬ 
gestion the tre.atment is very beneficial. 
If he refu.sed simply becau.se of a whim, 
good honest hunger will overcome that 
whim by the time the next meal comes 
around. The fact that the best part of 
the meal, dessert, comes at the end helps 
the .system remarkably. p. r 
The writer was brought up that way, 
and the system worked well. It requires 
firmness not only with the child but 
with grandmother and “Aunt Mary.” 
Each of these worthy women may spoil 
the_ treatment of their favorite child by 
giving _ too much sympathy—and food. 
AA’hat is the antidote for the misapplied 
affection of the doting Aunty? 
* 
“The A/oice of the People” 
In times like the present we think the 
following from The Christum Work i.s 
very appropriate. It should be studied 
and committed to memory by all who 
undertake to teach or advise country 
people. One tendency of scientific study 
may be to cause our teachers to think 
there is less need of consulting the wish¬ 
es of the common people. No greater 
mistake could be made: 
It has long been acknowledged that 
“the voice of the people is the voice of 
God.” ’Phe undiscerning may lu'.-ir in 
the people’s voice only a great roar of 
discontent, or the mutterings of the mis¬ 
guided mass. But he who has under¬ 
standing will hear the “still, small voice,” 
which speaks the will of God. 
No class of men have a broader ex¬ 
perience than the “common people”—no 
class knows quite so well what it means 
to toil and to suffer and to sacrifice. 
None have higher aspirations and none 
exhibit deeper consecration. It is be¬ 
cause of this that God speaks through 
them. 
Sometimes the people’s expression of 
God’s will is crude. Sometimes it comes 
as a shock to men who have become ac¬ 
customed to things as they are, who, 
quite satisfied with present conditions, 
are unwilling to be made uncomfortable 
by a change which may mean a readjust¬ 
ment in their method of living and in 
their ,way of doing business. But to 
stand in the way of progress is futile. 
It may be that it is necessary to oppose 
certain features—man-made and man-in¬ 
spired—which have crept into the plans 
which the people present, but back of 
them all and beneath them all will be 
found the hand of God. 
This has been proved in history. As 
Gladstone once said, “In the beginning 
of every great fight for the right and 
for progress, the leisured classes, the so- 
called upper classes, have been on the 
wrong side of the battlefield.” The com¬ 
mon people—the men of uncommon sen.se 
—to these the world owes a debt of gra¬ 
titude. 
If you would hear the voice of God, 
keep close to the people. 
