73/>e RURAL NEW-YORKER 
1003 
WOMAN AND HOME 
Mother! To Thee 
“Stand and salute when you see our 
bright Flag!” 
You say to Mothers of Men. 
But they'made that flag and they love it 
best, 
For it means the most to them. 
Their life-blood is dyed in the flag’s bright 
red, 
The white is their purity. 
The blue is the heaven of the homes they 
make, 
And theirs are the stars we see. 
Bright stars that mean sons who have 
gone abroad 
To fight for our liberty ; 
.\nd they cry aloud to Fathers of Men, 
“Hats oft! Mother, to thee!" 
Stand and salute when you see a bright 
star 
Pinned on a brave mother’s breast, 
For hers is the honor, yet sacrifice. 
And she i.s the one we should bless. 
She gave up her son, the life of her life, 
And sent him across the sea. 
To fight for the Flag and hasten the day 
"When freedom for all shall be. 
Ah ! hers is a gift to all of mankind. 
With her love, for Liberty ; 
Then salute the Flag and the Service 
Star. 
Hats off! ^Mother, to thee! 
—A. S. Alexander. 
^ladison, Wis. 
Arx through the country districts you 
will hear such stories as are noted on 
page 009. People are made nervous and 
troubled by them, for they do not know 
how much truth there may be in them. 
The statement from the Food Adminis¬ 
tration which we print settles the matter 
for good, and we ask you all to help kill 
such stones as they come to you. There 
is no truth to them and they will do great 
injury if continued. 
« 
“Who is the greatest n'oman in Amer¬ 
ica?” 
That question was submitted to 150 
Arizona school teachers, and judges 
awarded the prize (rightly, as we think) 
to the following answer; 
“The leifc of a farmer of moderate 
means, n'ho docs her omn cooking, leash¬ 
ing, ironing, seu'ing, hrings np a fnmilg 
of hoys and girls to he useful memhers of 
society, and has time for intellectual im¬ 
provement.” 
* 
II.4S your town yet erected its “Honor 
Roll” tablet giving the names of men who 
have joined the army? Tf not. it .should 
do so at once. In our own small country 
town we h.ave such a tablet carrying the 
names of 13 young men. When it was 
dedicated nearly half the entire popula¬ 
tion of the town turned out for a simple 
and impres.sive ceremony which our chil¬ 
dren. at least, will never forget. The 
American people are making history this 
year. Let us all take part in it. 
=!■ 
Whatevek burden the war forces upon 
you, try to see that the children have a 
fair chance to play. You will feel little 
like playing as the fearful tragedy in 
Eui’ope is worked out, but play is a ne¬ 
cessity for the children. It is a necessary 
part of childhood, for without it the child 
cannot grow up into sweet and sane man¬ 
hood and womanhood. So give the kids 
a chance to play, and do not force the 
play. 
* 
A CT’Rious lawsuit has come up in this 
city over the death of a canary bird 
owned by a New York woman. A neigh¬ 
bor’s cat caught the canary and ate it. 
and the woman has brought suit against 
the cat’s owner for i5;25 damages. She is 
likely to win. Lu another city case a 
woman bought a small R. I. Red chick 
at a poultry show and kept it in her flat. 
The chick developed into a lusty rooster 
with lungs of brass. The neighbors com¬ 
plained and the woman was arrested for 
disturbing the peace. She had to give up 
the rooster! 
* 
The famous “scythe tree” near Water¬ 
loo, on the farm of Clarence F. Schaeffer, 
pictures of which have appeared in The 
R. N.-Y., has again come into prominence 
by the addition of another scythe in the 
tree, this time by the second son of Mr. 
Schaeffer, who recently enlisted for serv¬ 
ice abroad. The tree has long been mem¬ 
orable for the presence of the remains of 
a scythe placed there during the Civil 
War by one who upon enlisting said: 
“Leave the scythe in the tree until I re¬ 
turn.” He was killed in combat in North 
Carolina. 
* 
We are told that a Grange in Medina 
County, Ohio, has adopted the following 
resolution: 
Whereas, each and every housewife is 
commanded to conserve all foodstuffs: 
Ilesolved, that the matrons of said Grange 
refuse to prepare bread, cake, pickles, 
meat, sauce, chow chow and other kinds 
of chow for the consumption of patrons 
of the Grange during the months from 
.Tune to October, inclusive, unless such 
food' can be served at a time to take the 
place of a regular meal. 
This seems to be a drive against the 
old-time picnic dinner, which usually rep¬ 
resented a great waste of food, a “groan¬ 
ing table” and louder groaning children 
the following day. 
* 
Mrs. Woodrow AYilsox has given the 
following letter for publication. The 
mothers of France are very close to the 
mothers of America in these trying days: 
Madame Woodrow Wilson, 
Washington. D. C. 
Madame—It is from the mothers and 
women of France that I send you these 
words to prove our gratitude for the com¬ 
forting and brotherly support that these 
leaving their families, their country, and 
their hopes to come to our rescue. Alas! 
I myself have given my beloved son to my 
unhappy and cruelly tried country, and I 
can undci-stand the pain of those who see 
their sons go so far, so very far away. 
Tell them, those mothers, those women 
with the sublime hearts, how near we are 
to them in thought, and how moved we 
arc at their sacrifice. They are our sis¬ 
ters through suffering and agonizing wor¬ 
ries and we are brought together through 
the same sorrow. That we will never for¬ 
get. It would make me happy, Madame, 
to correspond with some of these mothers, 
if they will send me a few lines. 
Very respectfully. Madame, I .salute 
you. M.\1)AME M. BARRON. 
No. 1, Rue du 14th Juillet, Ban, Basscs- 
I’yreuees, France. 
Tiroi'.SANDS of our readers have taken 
children into their families and tried to 
“raise” them as they would their own. 
Such people know tln-t however they may 
try to prevent it, there will always be 
some difference between such adopted lit¬ 
tle ones and their own flesh and blood. 
Many who take such children are not 
really fitted for the task, and somehow 
they never quite seem to gain the full 
confidence of their wards. We know men 
and women who feel In their hearts that 
they have failed with their children. The 
little ones grow up and go out into the 
world to find homes of their own without 
telling the older people just what they 
feel. They cannot give expression to 
their feelings, and the old folks come to 
think that their years of care and labor 
are not appreciated. We know of a case 
whei'e «uch a child grew up in a farm 
family—taking the care and love lavished 
upon him as a matter of course, with no 
showing of appreciation. He simply lacked 
the power of expression needed to show 
his feeling. Finally there fell into his 
hands a new book, .aud located in»a lonely 
place he read it carefully. It made a 
deep impression upon him, and he wrote 
the “old folks” about it. He told them 
how the hero of that book, an orphan boy 
— brought ui) by his uncle and aunt in a 
strict “old-fashioned” way, fully expressed 
his sentiments. He could not express it 
himself, but if the “old folks” wanted to 
know how he felt about them they should 
read that book and understand how that 
boy came to regard “ITncle Peabody” aud 
“Aunt Deel.” That was the .strongest 
and most beautiful endorsement that could 
be given for any book, and we wish every 
man aud woman who has ever tried to 
bring up a child or even thought about 
doing it could read the story. It is “The 
Light in the Clearing,” by Irving Batch- 
ellor—a farm story dealing with the life 
and times of Silas Wright. We consider 
that it ranks with “Nathan Burke” as 
the great American story. 
Eat Beans or Lose Them 
There are 120,000 bushels of last year’s 
beans in the New York market which 
are in danger of going to waste unless 
they are consumed before the 1018 crop 
comes in. In the hope of saving them 
the Federal Food Board issued a call 
recently for a “bean drive” to begin at 
once. 
“.lust as the consuming public came 
to the rescue during the Spring and 
early Summer to save the surplus pota¬ 
toes,” the board said, “.so a similar pa¬ 
triotic use of beans is requested. Patri¬ 
otic housewives are urged to have a bean 
dinner or bean supper at least one day a 
week as a means of using up the present 
surplus. One reason for the existing sur¬ 
plus is a falling off in the consumption 
of beans during the past few months. 
The above is taken from the New York 
Bun of August 3. If they want us to 
eat beans they should allow us to buy 
them as substitute cereals. At the pres¬ 
ent time the market is full of perishable 
fresh vegetables which must be consumed, 
or they will be a total loss. The reason 
bean consumption fell off last Winter was 
because of high retail prices. We paid 
22 cents per pound. I don’t see why the 
Federal Food Board should order us to 
eat beans so that Ave may pay high prices 
to possible profiteers. The Food lloard 
says beaus are now 15 cents per pound, 
and are equal in value as protein food 
to beef at 38 cents. This is no doubt 
true, but the comparison is not just, be¬ 
cause, in using meat, the housekeeper ex¬ 
tends the meat flavor to foods low in 
protein, but giving succulence, mineral 
salts, yitamines, etc., all of Avhich are a 
necessity in a well-rounded diet. Beans 
are A’aluable and nourishing, but they 
must have fat added, and they must be 
cooked long and carefully to be digestibh*. 
A city AAmman Avho cooks Avith gas can 
only afford to cook dry beans Avith a fire¬ 
less cooker. At this season it seems to 
me Ave ought to be eating the perishable 
truck crops. If we lessen the consump¬ 
tion of green crops to eat dry ones aa'c 
are penalizing truckers who.se crops can¬ 
not be stored largely. hoitsekekber. 
What of Home Economics Organization ? 
Will some of the real farm leomcn, no 
rural uplifters, please, from the counties 
Avhere they have a permanent home eco¬ 
nomics organization, tell us through TTik 
R. N.-Y. the benefits to be h.ad from 
such an organization? Wayne aud !\Ion- 
roe counties are trying to establish an 
organization for the women to correspond 
to the farm bureau for the men, and I, 
for one, AA’ould like to know' how we are 
to be benefited, or how' Ave can help 
others through this new demand upon 
our time aud i)urscs. It is d(‘signed to 
aid in food conservation, and the idea is 
sDonsored by the Food Admini.stration. 
Please let us hear from the Avomen avIio 
belong to such an organization. Does it 
help conseiwe the food, the clothing, the 
time and money of that advice-surfeited 
class, the farm Avomen ? mrs. t. r. 
Wayne Co., N. Y. 
7’hero are jAlenty of real farm leomen 
among The R. N.-Y. readers, and Ave 
Avant to hear from them. No “rural up¬ 
lifters” need apply in this case. ’Phe di.s- 
cussion Avill give us a good chance to find 
otit Avhat a real faiun Avoman is. It is 
true that there has been an overload of 
advice. 
Married Woman’s Separate Property 
Tf a married Avoman has money or prop¬ 
erty left to her, hoAV should she keep it; 
in her married or maiden name, and if 
in married name, Avith or Avithout the 
“Mrs.” annexed? I Avant to be able to 
handle my money or property independ¬ 
ently of my husband, and to protect my 
interest in a lot or property from any 
debt husband might incur. In case AA'e 
decide to buy a lot and build a house on 
it, using my money for either the lot or 
to build the house. c(uild avc buy together 
and my portion be protected? 
Ncav York. .AfRS. m. a. steavart. 
Under the Iuaa’s of the State of New’ 
York a married Avoman’s property is en¬ 
tirely her OAvn and in no Avay subject to 
the control of her husband. In keeping 
your bank account, it should be kept 
Avithout the Mrs., and in the name of 
your Christian name, your oavu family 
name and the name of your husband. 
That is, if your first name is Mary, your 
father’s name Avas Smith, and your hus¬ 
band’s name .Tones, it should be kept in 
the name of Mary Smith .Tones. Any 
property standing in your name, and only 
your name, is entirely free from the debts 
of your husband, or any indebtedness your 
husband may have. In case your husband 
uses your money for improvements on real 
property, the simplest Avay to do Avould 
be for him to give you a mortgage for 
the amount .adA'anced by you. We haA’e 
giA’en above the Iuaa's of New' York State, 
and the same are true, generally .speaking, 
for all of the States in the Union, except 
possibly some of the Southern States. 
Dower Right 
Mv husband sold 35 acres of the farm 
at .$100 per acre. I reeived $.300 and 
signed the deed, .signing my doAver right 
away in that parcel of land. I am told 
now’ I had no doAver right in that parcel 
of land sold, and I must pay back to my 
husband the $.300 paid me at the time he 
sold parcel of land. Will you advi.se me 
Avhat Avould have been my doAver right in 
the aboA’e deal? My husband says I have 
no right to any of it, after 30 years of 
^VOrk. SUBSCRIBER. 
Ohio. 
A Avife or husband in your State is en- 
doAved of an e.state for life in one-third of 
all the real property oAvned by the other 
at any time during the marriage, and 
from your statement there appears to be 
absolutely no reason w’hy you should giA’e 
this money up. The value of your doAver 
interest cannot be given Avithout knowing 
your age. but it does not look as if you 
received any too much. For a Avoman of 
(iO it Avould be nearer five or six hundred 
dollars, and more if she is younger. If 
you are further pressed to return this 
'money you Avould better consult a good 
local attorney AV’hom you can trust. 
M. D. 
hard and hot problem of life upon them 
too early. They should do their share of 
Avork, but they must have a chance to 
yuong Americans bring us Avith such 
noble enthusiasm, Avho are not afraid of 
Grandmother's Drive for Xext Winter’s Food 
