The RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
Boys and Girls 
By Edward M. Tuttle 
This is Our Page. Let us all join together 
and have a better page for the coming year. 
“ft snows! Yes . it snows! And the children are wild ” 
•\U thought of the fun in the snowdrifts up-piled ” 
Here we are in mid-winter! Out of 
doors the world is white and cold. Some¬ 
times it is very still, and we can bear 
little sounds a long way off. At other 
times the great wind is out, roaring 
through woods, across fields, around build¬ 
ings; blowing the snow in our faces, 
stinging our noses and our ears and our 
fingers. But boys and girls are not afraid 
of wind or snow or cold. 4 ou love the 
Winter. It makes your blood run faster. 
It brings color to your cheeks. It makes 
your eyes sparkle. 
The Winter brings many sports for us 
too. We skim over the smooth* ice on 
shining skates. We slide down a long 
bill—faster, faster, faster,, till we catch 
our breath for joy. We take sleigh rides 
to the tune of merry belle. We build 
snow houses and snow forts and funny¬ 
looking enow men. We have friendly 
battles, and only laugh when we get hit. 
even though it may sting a bit. The 
sting goes away in a minute and we join 
in again. 
The Winter makes us strong and well 
and happy if we use it rightly. But 
watch out for wet clothes indoors. That 
may make colds or worse trouble. Don’t 
get soaked when you know you will have 
to sit in school without a change of 
clothes. Wait till after school, then have 
your fun in the deep snow and afterwards 
go straight home and get dry. You may 
think sometimes that your father and 
mother and teacher nag you about not get¬ 
ting wet. It is not because they want to 
spoil your fun. It is because they know 
better than you do what may happen. You 
can have all the fun in the world and.still 
keep out of danger. Learn to take care, 
of yourselves. 
Winter time is a wonder time in the 
world of nature. All plant life sleeps 
and many animals. But some of the birds 
and animals may still be seen, and they 
are doubly welcome. As I write to jou 
now. a half dozen juncos are twittering 
about a feeding shelf not two feet from 
me. Only the window is between. They 
are happy to get the fine clicked corn 
scattered for them. In the bird box 
where chickadees raised two families last 
Summer, a downy woodpecker lives this 
Winter. Every day I see him. and he 
finds a piece of suet tied close by when 
he is hungry. Nuthatches, chickadees 
and other woodpeckers share the suet. 
On your walks to and from school or 
about the farm you see all kinds of 
tracks in the snow. Can you tell what 
made them? You can learn to do so. 
Above the snow many old weed stalks 
stand. Do you know their names? Can 
you find their seeds? Collect some of 
the seeds from each kind in little bottles 
and look at them under a magnifying 
glass. You could learn to know them su 
well that you could tell if you found 
them in your garden seeds where thc\ 
did not belong. Some morning break off 
a small twig of a tree that you know by 
name, take it to school and see how many 
of the others can name it. Take turns 
doing this until you can all name the 
common trees by their .Winter buds. 
Oh, there are lots of interesting things 
to do in Winter. I could tell you others, 
but I think it is your turn to tell me 
some, don’t you? Besides it is quite time 
that we opened 
The Letter Box 
It has been a very full letter box late¬ 
ly. I have been kept very busy reading 
your messages. I am interested in them 
all, and have hard work to choose those 
to print. But you know that I can only 
take a few out of the many, and I know 
that you will keep on writing whether 
you letters are printed or not, because 
every letter helps Our Page. Be sure of 
that. 
I am a boy six years old. I was in¬ 
terested in the Boys’ and Girls’ Page in 
The R. N.-Y., and am writing about my 
home. 1 live in a small town near Bos¬ 
ton. The population is 2,300. It is about 
five •minutes’ walk from the station. I 
have a good father and mother but no 
brothers or sisters. It is my first year 
in school but I -like it, and am in the 
second grade. 
Your little friend, 
Massachusetts. norman s. 
Norman is one of our youngest letter 
writers. I could tell that he wrote the 
letter himself, and his mother said, in a 
note, that he did it of his own free will 
and without help. We hope that he will 
be a friend to Our Page for many years. 
I live on a 100-acre larm and am in¬ 
terested in the The R. N.-Y. I like Our 
Page very much, and it seems a long 
time till the next copy arrives. 
Last year my brother and I raised 30 
pigs from a sow which we bought for $3, 
and now (October 8) slie has nine fine 
young ones which we. hope to sell before 
the first of November. 
I am 14 years old and go to high school. 
I hope to go to college some day. 
We have about 500 chickens and 20 
sheep, two horses, two calves, five cows 
now, but in Winter father usually keeps 
18 to 20 head. 
I have made a few bird houses, and 
one family has come back for three years. 
New Jersey. Leslie t. 
Leslie is a live wire. We hope he 
may have his wish about college, and 
that* he will get a lot out of it. There 
are some people who think that college 
spoils young folks. I think it depends 
mostly on the boys and girls themselves. 
I know many who have gone through 
college who are not “stuck up” over the 
fact, and who are not afraid to do the 
hard, honest, common work that is wait¬ 
ing for all who want to succeed in life. 
And then I know some of the other kind, 
but I won’t talk about them now. 
I live in sunny California, where 
the roses bloom nearly all the year. My 
father rents an orange ranch. _ The 
oranges are ripe and look like Christmas 
trees. 
We have two cows and one calf. My 
brother is in the pig club and his Duroc- 
Jersey pig won a blue ribbon at the 
county fair. We have a nice cat. I like 
the boys’ and girls’ letters. I am nine 
years old and in the fourth grade. 
California. grace k. 
We are glad to have word from Grace, 
and wish we could all see the orange 
“Christmas trees.” 
The bjoys and girls page for November 
had so many fine letters that I had to 
say something about them. 
Wouldn’t you like to know Russell l - . 
and Vernon' II.? Their letters sound 
so genuine, so full of ambition and youth, 
it makes one feel n little bit ashamed 
when one thinks of his- own aspirations. 
I think Russell would make a fine orator, 
and I hope Vernon will succeed, too. 
America looks to boys like these to uphold 
her standard of manhood. I have a friend 
Fun with the Wheelbarrow 
of sixteen in his senior year of high school, 
who though he has his choice between 
ease and a life of work, is studying law. 
Everybody loves and respects that boy ; 
it isn’t hard to explain why. 
My interests are divided between teach¬ 
ing, writing and nature, but. I disapprove 
of a woman or girl giving up her natural. 
God-given work—that of mother and 
home-maker—entirely to any other occu¬ 
pation. I like to write about nature. 
The longest period of time I ever spent 
away from the country was one month 
the longest, month of my life. Each morn¬ 
ing I woke to the noisy chatter of spar¬ 
rows and the hateful noise of wagons and 
autos on the paved street. Everything 
seemed to be so overcrowded and so grat¬ 
ing to one’s nerves. I love to watch the 
trees when the wind is gently blowing; 
and little streams in the woods. 
The R. N.-Y. is fast becoming a fixed 
thing in my life. Two years ago I thought 
it the driest, most uninteresting paper 1 
had ever seen. My father didn t take it 
then, however. I saw it at an uncle s. 
Now I think of it as a fine paper—a 
paper “of the people, by the people and 
for tlie people”. 
I am fifteen, and if I had gone to school 
this year would have been in the second 
year of high school. I must wait now 
until my lungs grow stronger before I 
can finish my education I want so much. 
I hope eveiy boy and girl will go to 
school as long as he or she can. The 
more education one gets, <t generally 
makes one want to press on, to learn 
January 22, 1921 
more and more, and thus become of 
some use in later life. 
I suspect, Mr. Tuttle, that you think 
I’m going to ramble on forever, but you’ve 
a surprise in store if you really think 
that 
West Virginia. ELSIE J. 
When I receive a letter like Elsie’s it 
makes me glad that we have Our Page 
together. She feels we should be proud 
of such boys as Russell and Vernon. I 
agree, but. I feel, too, that we should be 
proud of girls like Elsie who are true 
and sweet and happy and helpful. We 
look to them to keep up America’s stand¬ 
ard of womanhood, the l’eal womanhood— 
deep, earnest, warm-hearted. It is not 
Donald and Lady Dora Klondike De Kol 
whcie you live, or what you have that 
counts. It is what you are. It is char¬ 
acter. and our characters we build our¬ 
selves day by day. Think it over. 
1 have been going to write to Our Page 
for a long time, but have beeu putting 
it efir. I just finished reading the Decern 
ber page and certainly enjoyed it very 
much, rs I do every month. This letter 
may never be printed, but I thought I 
would write and let you know I am an 
interested reader. 
I was very sorry to hear Mike was 
taken sick, as I have a cat that looked 
nearly like him. I enjoyed the pictures 
of Phyllis and her flock of geese; also 
her ]>et gander. The story of the meteor¬ 
ite was very interesting to me, for I had 
never heard about it before. 
I had a very enjoyable time Christmas 
this year, and I got quite a few presents. 
I am thirteen years old and am in the 
eighth grade at school. I enjoy going to 
school very much, for there are so many 
interesting things to learn. FRANCES T. 
Pennsylvania. 
Tf others of you have beeen going to 
write to Our Page for a long time, don’t 
put it off any longer. Think what we 
may miss. 
I am sending you a picture of myself 
and ray purebred Holstein cow, I.ady 
Dora Klondike De Kol. who won the blue 
ribbon at our recent cattle show'. Also 
a picture of my two sisters and myself. 
T enjoy the letters and pictures in Our 
Page. With best wishes for its success. 
Maine. donalds. 
You will all see the pictures on this 
page. Thank you, Donald. We are glad 
you have such a fine cow. 
I am very interested in reading the 
Boys’ and Girls’ Page. I am a girl of 
nine years. I was born and raised on a 
farm, and I like to live there very much. 
For two Summers I had a little garden. 
I raised lettuce, beets, radishes, carrots, 
sunflowers, sweet corn and cranberry 
beans. But last Summer I could not have 
a garden because my big brother, w'ho is 
ten and a half years old, joined a garden 
club and papa gave him my piece of land 
to make a bigger garden. I had instead 
a flock of 11 ducks. I raised them with¬ 
out a mother. When they were babies 
I fed them on bread and milk. Then 
when they grew older. I fed them on 
soft mash. They grew wonderfully. They 
were very tame. Whenever I would walk 
around they would follow me. I expect 
them to lay eggs soon, and expect to have 
a bigger flock of ducks the coming Spring. 
SYLVIA R. 
Sylvia is a good little farmer. I like 
the spirit she showed in taking up another 
piece of work when her brother needed 
more land for his garden. We shall 
want to hear later how the ducks get 
along. 
Warm School Lunches 
At the school which I attend nearly 
every pupil brings his or her lunch. It 
seems very hard to us to sit down on a 
cold Winter’s day to eat a cold lunch 
and think of the nice things on the table 
at home. 
When our school first began in the Fall 
a year ago. our teacher received a letter 
in which we were asked to take up cook¬ 
ing or sewing. We decided to take up 
cooking. To do this of course we must 
have a stove. We did not know how to 
get the money to purchase a stove, but 
finally we held a box social in the school. 
The box social was planned by our two 
teachers. As you know, a box social 
means for every girl to bring a box of 
lunch, and they are auctioned off. The 
highest bidder gets the box. No box was 
sold under $1. Some boxes sold as high 
as $5 and $6. Each girl had her name 
