ilOO 
you put into your tractor is motor insurance. 
And the “premiums” are insignificant com¬ 
pared with the protection received. 
♦ 
Without oil your tractor is worthless. With 
an ordinary oil of low heat resistance, it 
is only a little better. To get full power, 
profitable operation, only minor repair bills 
and longer life—your tractor needs an oil 
especially prepared for tractor requirements. 
♦ 
That’s what Socony Motor Oil for Tractors 
is—carefully refined, with a high heat resis¬ 
tance and tough body that ‘ ‘ stands the gaft” 
in the hottest days of August. 
♦ 
Everyone carries fire insurance on his house. 
Every farmer should insure his tractor motor 
by using Socony Motor Oil. There’s a type 
especially recommended for yours. Consult 
the Socony chart at your dealer’s. Delivery 
in 30 or 50 gallon metal drums, with 
faucet, probably will suit you best, and it 
costs no more. 
Call or write our nearest station . 
STANDARD OIL CO. OF NEW YORK 
26 Broadway 
SDCDNY 
MOTOR OIL 
Jor Tractor Lubrication 
FARM WAGONS 
High or low wheels— 
steel or wood—wide 
or narrow tires. 
Wagonparts of all 
kinds. Wheels to fit 
any running gear. 
_log illustrated id colors fre© 
Electric Wheel Co., 2 Elm St., Quincy, III. 
TIMOTHY S MB 
Few dealers can equal Metcalf’s Kecleaned Timothy, 
99.70% pure. S4.70 per bushel of 45 lbs. Metcalf’s 
Timothy and Alsike Mixed at S5.25 per bu. of 45 lbs. 
Cotton bags free and freight paid in 5 bu. lots. 
B. F. METCALF & SON, Inc. 
206-208 W. Genesee St. - - Syracuse, N. Y. 
Tonic In The Salad Bowl 
An A. A. Radio Talk Broadcast From WEAF 
N OW, Johnnie, By GABRIELLE ELLIOT you'll give me—that J 
drink this right Household Editor of pastes good. But I ' 
ciown and do stop mak- American Agriculturist don t know why, J 
ing those terrible faces!” just don’t like the 
Many unfortunate small boys of the taste of oil—and after all, there are plenty 
previous generation knew what it meant of other things! I don’t like to drink 
when the spring tonic bottle appeared on water either—it’s too much bother. So 
the kitchen shelf. In most orthodox long as I take plenty of gasoline and lots 
American households all hands then sub¬ 
mitted to being dosed by the conscientious 
mother of the family, who assured any 
who dared protest that a spring tonic was 
absolutely necessary to pull them through 
the dangerous days. The worse the con¬ 
coction looked and smelled, the more 
efficacious it was supposed to be, and 
sticky doses by the gallon were obediently 
swallowed down. Sulphur and molasses 
was a favorite mixture and so were 
“bitters” of a hundred different flavors, 
all violently unpleasant. 
* * * 
Yet all the time our grandmothers had 
at their very doors the best tonics in the 
world—and they didn’t come in bottles 
either. Sulphur and the other minerals 
which most decidedly are spring necessi¬ 
ties come in lettuce, celery, spinach, 
apples, carrots, radishes and greens of all 
sorts. For the average hungry citizen, 
there is more real spring tonic in a well- 
filled salad bowl than in any fearsome 
blue glass bottle. Salads may be mixed 
with a hundred different flavors—and 
every single one of them is good! 
Just talking about them makes me feel 
like the w r eary upstate farmer, pro¬ 
visioned all winter on salt pork and pota¬ 
toes, who declared that if he “could just 
live through to dandelion greens” vhe’d 
be all right. 
The human system craves green things 
all year round—and is much better for 
them. Spring is the time when salads 
are especially good for city or country 
dweller and you can’t include too many 
in your diet right now. 
Every now and then a home-maker 
complains to me, “but my family 
doesn’t like salads,” or “John never eats 
green vegetables and the children are 
just like him.” With the immense in¬ 
crease in the variety of available foods, 
eating has come to be regarded as a matter 
of emotion, not of necessity. Primitive 
man, like the animals, didn’t say he 
“liked” this food, or “couldn’t bear” 
that. He ate what was good for him and 
chose it largely by instinct. Conse¬ 
quently, he ate right. 
* * * 
Explorers returned from the wilds of 
Mongolia tell us that the hardy plains¬ 
men live on an extremely bare and 
limited diet consisting of only four items 
of food, but that these four contain all 
necessary elements and so constitute a 
perfectly balanced diet. The explorers 
seem surprised that such uncivilized 
men have enough sense to choose such a 
perfect diet, but I feel that no credit is 
due them. It is all they can get. Expose 
them to the temptations of a modern 
hotel menu, and see what happens! 
In other words, more and more variety 
has been laid before our eyes, and we see 
fruits, vegetables, cereals, meats piled up 
in dazzling array to choose from. We 
have lost the instinctive angle on food and 
think of it as wholly a matter of taste. 
Taste is all right and very valuable up 
to a certain point. If your palate re¬ 
sponds to one vegetable of a definite food 
content and rejects another with prac¬ 
tically the same value, by all means take 
the one you like. 
But honestly now, doesn’t it sound silly, 
when you think about it, to say, as some 
people do rather proudly, “I never eat’’ 
this, that or the other thing? They seem 
to think it reflects some credit on them, 
instead of just the reverse. Your trust¬ 
worthy flivver never rises up on its hind 
wheels and shouts “Take away the oil! 
I don’t like it! I’ll drink all the gasoline 
of good fresh air in my tires, why bother 
about oil or water? This talk of a bal¬ 
anced diet is just foolishness.” 
Yet for some reason human beings are 
supposed to have more sense than even 
the smartest machines. They don’t 
always show it! 
To come back to salads. 
* * * 
Someone will tell me that, after all, 
salads are a decidedly modern develop, 
ment and that they couldn’t have been 
included in the menus of primitive man. 
Perhaps not, but salads were well known 
in Biblical days. Long before salad forks 
were invented, the broad leaves of the 
hyssop plant, not unlike our modern 
plaintain, were bruised by crushing with 
stones, and then served with an oil. Other 
greens were favored by different nations, 
the Greeks especially having discovered 
the sleep-producing value of lettuce, 
which they served at the end of a repast. 
Salads have three essential parts, the 
garnish, which may be lettuce, water 
cress, celery tops or other greens, the 
body, of fruit, vegetables, cheese, meat 
or fish, and the dressing, which varies 
from the simplest oil and vinegar mixture 
to more elaborate sauces, such as mayon¬ 
naise, ravigote, Russian and vinaigrette. 
Although salads are ideal for using up 
odds and ends of left-overs, don’t take 
the rag-bag attitude towards them. 
Blending a good salad takes every bit of 
one’s ingenuity and the finished product 
is well worth thought and care. 
* * * 
Your materials must be of the best. 
Fruits and vegetables should be fresh, 
well cleaned and crisp. Wash each 
lettuce leaf carefully, dry the leaves in a 
clean towel and keep them cold till 
served. Break lettuce or celery; never 
cut them. 
When it comes to the body of the salad, 
take an inventory of what you have on 
hand. Combine suitable things and be 
sure the dressing blends well with the 
salad. Don’t use mayonnaise on fruit 
or vegetables; they require French dress¬ 
ing. Mayonnaise is suitable for meat, 
chicken, fish or tomato salad. Remember 
that the salad oil aids digestion and don’t 
skimp it. Vinegar stimulates the taste, 
and salt and pepper add seasoning. If 
you use onion, either in the salad itself 
or in the dressing, be sure not to overdo it, 
and the same holds true of garlic, a 
dangerous spice in the hands of the 
inexperienced. 
Eggs are often used as a garnish, but 
here again be governed by appropriate¬ 
ness. They go especially well with fowl 
or fish but not with every vegetable nor 
with fruit. 
* * * 
In preparing vegetables, be sure to cut 
them into small pieces so that they look 
appetizing. Peel cucumbers in advance 
and put them in a pan of cold water to 
crisp. Add salt in the proportion of a 
teaspoon to each cup of water and you 
will find the cucumbers more digestible. 
Here are just a few of the vegetables 
which, cooked or raw, alone or in com¬ 
bination, make delicious salads. Spinach, 
cabbage, carrots, tomatoes, turnips, po¬ 
tatoes, cauliflower, kohlrabi, beets, pep¬ 
pers, eggplant, radishes, brussels sprouts, 
asparagus, beans and peas. In addition 
you have several sorts of cheese, including 
the always dependable cream and cottage 
cheese, fruits such as pineapple, orange, 
grapefruit, prunes, apple, bananas, grapes 
and pears; and nuts such as walnuts, 
{Continued on page 283) 
