160 
February 2, 1924 
Well, it is done, and done well in many schools, but. 
may I be allowed to say that we «b> not spend a 
whole 45-minute period teaching a class how to place 
the address and the stamp properly on an envelope, 
as I once saw done in a practice class, when I was 
observing work in a State normal school. Absolutely 
nothing else was taught in that 45 minutes to a 
class that appeared to be from 12 to 15 years of age. 
If we rural teachers couldn’t teach that amount of 
knowledge in 10 minutes to a class from eight to 10 
years of age. we would be considered pretty poor 
executives in the school room. 
REGARDING THE “RABBLE.”—As far as the 
rural population being a “disorganized rabble” is 
concerned. I think the term rabble would well apply 
to the large number of town population who do just 
one kind of work over and over until they deteriorate 
into breathing automatons, whose remaining mental 
ability consists of an inflated opinion of themselves. 
It takes one with the astuteness and insight of a 
business man, and possessed of a considerable exec¬ 
utive ability, to manage successfully a large farm; 
and there are many such throughout the rural com¬ 
munities of the State. Their wives also have the 
ability not only of conducting their households in 
good orderly manner, but of doing their own dress¬ 
making, laundry work, etc., and taking care of a 
flock of poultry and the family gawlen. Besides 
these lines of work, they organize and attend clubs 
and Home Bureau units, as well as the Grange and 
church functions. It "appears to me that a popula¬ 
tion of capable people like that ought to come pretty 
near knowing what type of school they want in 
their community. e. l. o. 
Maltose Sugar from Corn 
R EADERS have been sending us clippings from 
the daily papers in which rather sensational 
reports of an easy way of making sugar have been 
printed. To read these reports one would think that 
all they needed was a brass kettle and a hot fire in 
order to produce high-class sugar directly from 
corn. These clippings state that the Bureau of 
Chemistry in Washington is responsible for the new 
process, so we wrote the Bureau and have received 
a statement about it, and also a sample of the sugar. 
The new process was developed by Prof. II. I’. Gore, 
a chemist connected with the department. This form 
of sugar is known as maltose sugar, and can be made 
from cornstarch, hominy or other starch material. 
Chemists have known for many years that it is pos¬ 
sible to make crystalline maltose sugar from corn¬ 
starch. but up to within recent times the control of 
the process had never worked, so that it has not been 
possible to produce this, sugar economically. Prof. 
Gore has now developed a new method. While it will 
not yet be practical for a farmer to make the product 
for family use from his own corn, the method can be 
used on a large scale and will cheapen our supply of 
sweets. The method requires technical control sim¬ 
ilar to that found necessary in making sugar from 
beets or cane. We all remember how some years ago 
we were told by all the newspapers that every farmer 
can raise an acre of sugar beets and make his own 
sugar. All you had to do was to slice the beets and 
soak them in hot water and then boil this water 
down to a syrup. Thousands of farmers tried this 
and actually made the syrup, but very few of them 
finished the job by eating it. It evidently contained 
the sugar, but it also contained other substances 
which spoiled the taste, so that really edible sugar or 
syrup could not be obtained in this way. That is 
much the same with this new process of making 
maltose sugar. The plan is to mash either corn¬ 
starch or corn hominy with malt; this is kept wet in 
the form of a mash. The addition of the malt lique¬ 
fies the product, and in the course of seven to 40 days 
completely converts the starch into maltose sugar. 
The color is taken out by the use of carbon, and the 
syrup is evaporated to the proper density; then it is 
allowed to cool and inoculated with a small quantity 
of crystalline maltose, and allowed to stand several 
days, when it sets into a solid crystalline fondant. 
It does not make a granulated form of sugar like 
that from cane or beet. The sample we have here is 
in the form of a hard pasty mixture, white in color, 
and not quite as hard as a cake of maple sugar. 
The sample we have is not as sweet as beet sugar, 
and has a little different taste. It is sweet, however, 
and can evidently be used for many purposes, such 
as cooking and candy making. That seems to be the 
story of the matter. The newspapers are wrong in 
saying that this new process will enable any farmer 
to make his own sugar. It will not do anything of 
the sort. It would, however, permit a community of 
farmers to put up a laboratory or factory and use 
this process to make from their corn a sweet mass 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
which can be used for many cooking purposes. We 
think the method will be developed into a practical 
help for agriculture. 
Cure for a Leaking Cellar 
I built a greenhouse last Summer, 150x42 ft., hot- 
water heating system. I am having trouble now with 
my boiler room. Water is coming in through the walls 
near the floor. My boiler room is 16x16x9 ft. I can¬ 
not drain it because I am lower than the lowest place- 
around here. I have taken the boiler out of the cellar. 
The water comes to about 6 ft., and does not rise any 
higher. Can you advise me what to do, so I can get my 
boiler going? ' I cannot grow anything in the house now 
without heat. I am growing vegetables in the house. 
Hamden, Conn. E. k. 
CONDITION of this kind may be due to any¬ 
one or a combination of the following causes: 
I'orous concrete in the walls due to improper pro¬ 
portioning, mixing or placing; cracks in the wall, 
due to settlement, or poor workmanship in making 
joints between batches of concrete placed at different 
times where the construction is not continuous, and 
cracks caused by the water pressure heaving up the 
floor. 
Needless to say, this trouble can best be met when 
building the basement walls. The second best meth¬ 
od of correcting the trouble is thoroughly to clean the 
Here we have little Roger Hoffman, a Jersey boy, 
helping father paint the blinds. Nothing green about 
him, except the paint. Would you pay him $12 a day 
to stand around the home? 
outside of the wall, removing the earth about it, and 
plastering with one or more coats of cement mortar 
mixed in the proportion of one part cement to two 
parts clean, well-graded sand. Where it is impos¬ 
sible to get at the outsidg, the inside of the wall can 
be cleaned thoroughly and the plaster applied to this 
surface, first coating it with a mixture of cement and 
water mixed to the consistency of cream. This 
should be used within 30 minutes after mixing, and 
consequently should be mixed in small quantities, as 
there should not be. enough applied to the wall to be¬ 
come dry before the plaster is applied. I ut the 
plaster coat on about % in. thick and work it down 
with a wooden float, scratching it to give a good sur¬ 
face coat as soon as it has become sufficiently hard to 
do so without injury. The second coat is applied 
% in. thick, and both coats are given only sufficient 
water to make a stiff plaster when mixing.- 
Where cracks exist in the wall they must be 
cleaned out to a V shape with a chisel, and filled 
with a rich cement mortar. 1:1%, well rammed in 
before plastering is begun. If the work cannot be 
done in dry weather, weep holes should be left 
through the walls to relieve the water pressure back 
of them. Then can be plugged after the plaster has 
set thoroughly. The unrelieved water pressure back 
of the mortar might prevent a bond between the 
plaster and the wall. 
In ordinary cases the floor can be treated in much 
the same way. Where it has been cracked and 
heaved by water pressure, however, it should be 
cleaned and tar paper or burlap should be mopped 
onto it with hot tar. A second floor is then laid on 
this waterproof lining, either using sufficient thick¬ 
ness to resist heaving, or reinforcing it for the same 
purpose. A tar joint is made between the floor and 
the wall by laying in a wedge-shaped piece of well- 
oiled board, removing it and filling the groove which 
is next to the wall with tar or asphalt when the floor 
has hardened sufficiently. 
In connection with basement repairs, care should 
be taken to lead all surface and roof water away 
from the building by suitable drains and pipes. 
b. h. s. 
Plain Talk from Leading Dairymen 
Part III 
A Sound Suggestion 
I believe what is keeping the group of dairymen 
apart is that some dairymen want to sell all their 
milk as fluid milk, no matter what the price is, and 
make the other fellow take care of the surplus. 
Sell each dealer all the milk he needs for his trade 
at as high a price as the market will warrant. All 
surplus to be manufactured by the Association. All 
milk, except for butter and cheese, to be of P> grade. 
Milk for butter and cheese subject to a equitable 
differential. All cities and towns to have same board 
of health requirements for Grade B milk. 
s. s. COMFORT. 
Build Up a Pool Market 
As a reader of The R. N.-Y. and a pool producer, 
I want to endorse the article on page 19 signed “An 
Average Pooler.” Will some of the other groups of 
milk producers, the Sheffields, the Eastern States, 
and the Non-poolers inform us how they propose 
to handle the. milk problem if we would all join 
with them? Do they intend to dump all the milk 
in the fluid market and thereby cause all milk to 
be forced in the lowest classes? Let’s hear from 
you; what is you plan? You know how the Co¬ 
operative Association proposes to keep up the price 
of fluid milk, by withholding the surplus and manu¬ 
facturing it into other products. Our directors are 
being urged by the poolers from all quarters to pro¬ 
tect and build up our organization. The other group 
of milk producers lias been cutting the price in the 
fluid market ever since the pool started. At the 
present time the pool fluid price is $2.80, the other 
groups’ price is $2.55, a cut of 25 cents. All other 
business would meet this competition at once by 
reducing the fluid price to that of their competitors. 
Our directors are being convinced that the poolers 
want the Co-operative Association to cease to pro¬ 
tect the other fellows’ market, but build up our 
own. L. J. HAPPICH. 
True Co-operation Needed 
To my mind the thing that has kept dairymeh 
apart has been the pool contract and a press more 
or less influenced by clever propaganda. The plan 
that will bring and keep them all together is yet 
to be devised, but true co-operation economically 
practiced will go a long way toward doing it. By 
“true” co-operation I mean the kind that does not 
require one branch of the industry to suffer at the 
expense of the other; that is broad enough to em¬ 
brace producer, conveyor, distributor and consumer; 
that fairly deputes to each group the portion of re¬ 
compense merited by their several vested interests 
as partakers. This kind of co-operation among 
dairymen has yet to be tested to the full in this ter¬ 
ritory; and should it be given a test, there is no 
power on God’s green footstool sufficient to check 
its wonder-working efficacy as a boon to the indus¬ 
try if efficiently administered. w. t. s. 
High Taxes and Low Prices 
What is your opinion on last week’s 47-cent milk 
drop by the pool? Certainly the farmers are crushed 
to the earth by such a drop right in the Winter 
with feed up and taxes sky-high, and due this 
month. The taxes on our farm have *one up since 
1917, both school tax and land tax. Both taxes 
never exceeded $175 together, but today we are pay¬ 
ing $173 school tax and $350 land and road tax. No 
wonder our farmers are leaving the farms. As you 
know the income from the dairy is all we have to 
look forward to. When that fails the farmer is 
down and out. It looks to me that any milk organi¬ 
zation that cannot run same for 1 cent per 100 lbs. 
and is taking more out, is robbing the farmer. I 
hope and pray that some day, in the near future, 
the milk situation may be cleared up. 
New York. a stjftsrer. 
Revive the Old League 
I have been thinking for some time about some 
plan by which the milk situation could be put be¬ 
fore all the milk producers. I appreciate your plan; 
first locate the trouble, then find a remedy. 
Tim dairymen are kept fighting by false and un¬ 
reasonable propaganda, spread principally by the 
poQl. In this as in all other wars the leaders are to 
blame. Then rank and file is forced ahead no mat¬ 
ter who misdirected the movements, or the suffering 
and sacrifice of the fighters. There has been and is 
at present propaganda spread that makes it appear 
that the poolers are carrying the entire burden of 
the milk industry, when in fact every producer is 
oppressed beyond toleration, and the entire industry 
is suffering. 
I wish to offer two plans as a remedy: First, by 
each recognized group selecting one man to meet 
