A PAGE OF FUGITIVE VERSE. GATHERED HERE AND THERE. WHO SHALL GO FIRST? Whose will it be in grief to stand Which shall bend over the wounded sod, Commending the precious soul to God, Which shall return to the desolate home, And list for a step that shall never come, Ah! then, perchance to that mourner there! Wrestling with anguish and deep despair, And then, methinks, on that boundary land, The mourned and the mourner together shall stand, Or walk by those rivers of shining sand, -Presbyterian. I SHALL BE SATISFIED. Not here! not here! not where the sparkling waters Fade into mocking sands as we draw near; Where in the wilderness each footstep faltersI shall be satisfied; but oh! not here! Not here--where every dream of bliss deceives us, Where the worn spirit never gains its goal, Where, haunted ever by the thoughts that grieve us, Across us floods of bitter memory roll. There is a land where every pulse is thrilling, With rapture earth's sojourners may not know, Where Heaven's repose the weary heart is stilling, And peacefully life's time-tossed currents flow. Far out of sight, while yet the flesh infolds us, Lies the fair country where our hearts abide, And of its bliss is nought more wondrous told us Than these few words," I shall be satisfied." Satisfied? Satisfied? The spirit's yearning For sweet companionship with kindred minds The silent love that here meets no returning The inspiration which no language findsShall they be satisfied? The soul's vague longings The aching void which nothing earthly fills? Oh! what desires upon my soul are thronging As I look upward to the heavenly hills. Thither my weak and weary steps are tending. Saviour and Lord! with thy frail child abide! Guide me toward home, where all my wanderings ending, I then shall see Thee, and be satisfied. -Hymns of the Age. "GOOD BYE." It came again to-night, that same sad feeling I catch an echo which will never die; A touch of hands, few hasty words, in partingI see and hear it all again to-night; A host of recollections now upstarting Brings the whole scene again before my sight. "Good bye!" The low sweet voice that spoke it faltered; There's no gossamer tint of tasseled corn, Nor flimsiest thread of the shy woodfern, Not even the cobweb spread over the flowers, Fine as the hair of this baby of ours. There is no fairy shell by the sounding sea, No wild rose that nods on the windy lea, No blush of the sun through summer showers Pink as the palms of this baby of ours. May the dear Lord spare her to us, we pray, For many a long and sunshiny day, Ere he takes to bloom in Paradise bowers, This wee bit darling-this baby of our. -Unidentified Exchange. MAKE CHILDHOOD SWEET. To make sweet the last sad hours; Oh, fill young lives with sweetness! To the rosy mouth we press, The eyes were dimmed that shone so bright Let never a worldly babble keep The memory of those words have never altered- "Good bye!" THIS BABY OF OURS. There is not a blossom of beautiful May, Silvery daisy or daffodil gay, Nor the rosy bloom of apple tree flowers Fair as the face of this baby of ours. You can never find on a bright June day A bit of fair sky so cheery and gay, Nor the haze on the hill in noonday hours Blue as the eyes of this baby of ours. There is not a murmur of wakening bird, The clearest, sweetest that ever was heard In the tender hush of the dawn's still hours Sweet as the voice of this baby of ours. Your heart from the joy each day should reap, Give thanks, each morn, for the sturdy boys, Would you rifle the earth for pearls? And fill young hearts with sweetness. Remember the homes where the light has fled, Where the rose has faded away; And make your home a garden of flowers, Where joy shall bloom through childhood's hours, And fill young hearts with sweetness. -Unidentified Exchange. PARTING. As we stand by the silent, shadowy shore, The music that floateth across the tide, And waves alight, Till, warm and clear, on the chilly way, And the sad adieu loses half its pain, -Unidentified Exchange. A FORTNIGHTLY JOURNAL. Conducted in the Interests of the Higher Life of the Household. Half the misery in the world comes of want of courage to speak and hear the be in which the relations are formed from character, after the truth plainly and in a spirit of love.-Mrs. H. B. Stowe. F the first year of dual life twists or untwists the strands that form it the succeeding ten try their real strength. They who thought they knew one another before marriage know now they did not. Expectation and realization may be as unlike as midnight and noonday. In fact who, save the Oversoul of which it is an emanation, comprehends the workings of any human soul? Like spheres cut into multitudinous facets we touch one another only in points, and sometimes these points are wofully keen and sharp. But the grinding down process, though hard, is inevitable. Life is a continual process of refining and the most persistent polishing wheels are found in one's own family. "Better there were no marriage," comes in an undertone from many sources. And this not from the vicious who would revel in pandemonium but from those whose experiences have been like "the dance of captives on the ice, the song of the fettered in their chains." They forget that marriage between masculine and feminine forces runs through the universe just as truly as the attraction of cohesion or gravitation. There is only one kind of oil known with which to allay the friction of human machinery and that the oil of Love; but its application needs be under the direction of Wisdom. It is not so much love of self as of the other self that the world waits for and the lack of which wears and jars and grinds through every rank and race. In no relations of life do selfishness and neglect show such bitter results as in marriage. Children form new and closer relations but no other ties supersede this. Next to the lack of love as a cause of wretchedness come absence of justice, deception, harshness, ill-temper, frivolity, vice and want of adaptation. Through the development of character every one of these may be overcome and the last years of wedded life prove the happiest. Can plants grow and not human souls? Whatever is generous and beautiful, precious and devine, exists latent in one and all. Like seeds within the ground they wait the electric thrill and sunshine of love to call them forth, nor can all the bleakness of an immature world hinder their development. It is evident that marriage formed through affinity of taste and aspiration ought to give the greatest promise. But it is highest and not the lowest order; the house in which character marries. . . Then shall marriage be a covenant to secure to either party the sweetness and honor of being a calm, continuing inevitable benefactor to the other." And when that arrives wedded life becomes indeed "a thorough good understanding." If it be the husband's office to support a home, it is that of the wife to make it one. Frances Power Cobbe says: "The nest is constructed by the male bird but only the female lines it with moss and down." It may be added that man can mar it when once it is made,-or he can transform it into the dearest spot in all the world. It is evident that the woman who would do her whole duty will place affectional qualities higher than the faculties of being a good manager and a good cook. Men live more in the soul than in the senses if they truly live at all. Even a nature hard and cold as Alpine ice may be thawed in time; it could no more be moved through force than the rock on which it has congealed. Patience, tenderness and a sense of the divine ministrations of the true woman toward manhood will bring about a change in time, or lift their possessor into that realm of spiritual life in which external hurts will cease to be deeply felt. Most wretched she who has not entered into that inner realm of love and consolation boundless and exhaustless as the Infinite Heart itself. "Life is only bright when it proceedeth Where there is lack of principle on the part of the husband it is a more difficult matter. Few men marry women to reform them, and those are generally fools. Many women marry men for that purpose and sometimes find themselves in the same category. Yet not always; some of the noblest men have become so through their wives. An unprincipled man, tenderly loving the woman who is above him, may throw off his imperfections and yield to the beneficent influences of she who stands to him as an angel of healing and mercy. Here again it is only affection which unfolds the dormant seeds of goodness. "God uses us to help each other so," and woman's true nature is to uplift, comfort and inspire. Nothing gives her such happiness as to aid him she loves to find his better self and live in it, reflecting back on her that light which she has kindled; for the ideal of womanhood is to be the inspirer of morals. L The experiences of many observing persons have satisfied them that the chief sources of family friction are, on the part of the husband a domineering disposition; on the part of the wife frivolity, and of both together selfishness or want of consideration. All are the faults of undeveloped natures and not of marriage, though close association may intensify them. Sometimes these faults are reversed; it is the husband who lacks depth and character, and the wife who rules with a rod of iron. Strange that the ruling person never realizes the pall he or she casts over the household, but so it is. There can be no real happiness where there is no liberty. One of the two is driven to deception or prevarication through fear of the ill temper of the other. If there be not a cyclone it is a sour, gloomy sky or a sulky drizzle. There is no courage left "to speak the truth plainly" because the truth would cost too dearly, no matter with what a kindly spirit it may be uttered. For the want of self-discipline and culture of the feelings the peace of the family may be ruined. Not only so, the offending parties become unhappy wretches, since, to use the expressive words of Whipple, "self-will has a hard time of it when it comes into impotent conflict with the constitution of things." The public has heard enough of Carlyle whom someone calls "the high priest of naggers," yet no greater moral can be drawn from any pair of people than from them whose mutual irritability and affection have been blazoned to the world. To say they were sensitive and sickly is little excuse. By a supreme effort of the will others equally suffering have shown ineffable fortitude. Carlyle's best friends call him "imperious and selfish, with fits of snarling and caviling, rasping and biting." Once, stretched on a bed of suffering from a serious accident, Mrs. Carlyle lay with her mouth open from nerves and muscles injured by the fall. "Jane, you had better shut your mouth," said he. She tried to say she could not. "Ye'll find yourself in a more pious and compact frame of mind if ye'll shut your mouth. Ye ought to be thankful the accident was no worse; and the Chelsea giant stalked away. After this her journal recorded, "Oh, my mother! nobody sees when I am suffering now. From childhood to the present is a far and rough road to travel." Yet the man's repinings show that he loved his wife. "O my dear one, sad is my soul at loss of thee and will be to the end. Lonelier creature there is not henceforth in all this world. Oh my heroine, my too unacknowledged heroine If I could only see her five minutes to assure her that I have really cared for her through all," and then he throws himself upon the spot where her body lies at rest and kisses the turf resting upon the poor, weary heart. Again Carlyle writes: "Dost thou intend a kindness to thy beloved one? Do it straightway while thy fateful future is not here!" A truth expressed by Miss Preston in "What need the spurring pæan roll What worth is eulogy's grandest breath When whispered in ears that are hushed in death? Over-indulgence to children on the part of one parent is another discordant element in the family. When father and mother disagree in regard to management, it is generally the more foolish of the two who wins. The culture of the reasoning faculties and a spirit of mutual forbearance is the only cure. In the want of a proper understanding concerning pecuniary matters lies another source of friction. Where the management and labor of the wife count as nothing she is con scious of injustice and wrong. "My dear," said an eminent philanthropist to his wife one day as he suddenly burst into the sitting-room, "I have been counting the windows in our house and find there are forty. It just occurs to me that you have to keep these forty windows clean, or superintend the process. And that is not a beginning of your work. All these rooms have to be swept and garnished, the carpets made and cleansed, the house linen prepared and kept in order, beside the cooking, and I took it all as a matter of course. I just begin to see what woman's work is, even when she has help, as you are not always able to procure. You ought to receive a monthly stipend as a housekeeper would. Why have'nt you made me see it before? I have not been just to you while I have been generous to others." The wife who told this in after years to her husband's credit, sat down with him and for the first time since their marriage opened her heart freely upon the topic of woman's allowance. She confessed to having had many a sorrowful hour at her position as a beggar. At the head of a large household in a Western town where domestic service was both scant and incompetent, she had hardly been trusted with five dollars at a time during their united lives. "Robert and I talked it over," she said, "and decided that the woman who takes care of any household article, like a carpet for instance, from the time it is first made till it is worn out has expended upon it an amount of time and strength fully equal to the labor that made it, counting from the shearing the wool till it comes from the loom. It may be unskilled work but it is work all the same. And this is only one small item in her housekeeping labor. Does she not deserve some payment beside her board and clothing? "Robert saw woman's work in a new light. From that time till to-day he has placed a generous share of his income in my hands not as a gift but a right. And he knows that I will no more fritter it away than he will. If I choose to deny myself something I need and bestow its cost in charity or buy some books I crave, he no more thinks of chiding me than I think of chiding him for spending his money as he likes." There are other Roberts who have yet to learn this lesson of justice and they are found in every walk of life. I have known rich men who were ready to buy silks, velvets and diamonds for their wives, sometimes far beyond what were desired, yet who grudgingly doled out five dollars at a time when appealed to for a little money. The reason given is that it may be spent foolishly. If anything will prolong babyhood into maturity it is such treatment. Against it a woman's nature rises in rebellious indignation. Thoughts of bitterness rankle in the wounded heart and there are flighty, mocking, flippant creatures made so by just this want of trust on the part of their husbands. The gravest and most elusive faults are always found among dependent classes. The way in which housework is looked upon is illustrated by a conversation between the son of a thrifty mechanic who owned the cottage he lived in and had money in the bank, and a neighbor who told the story. "What wages does your father earn, Tommy?" seldom any opportunity to see the blue sky or the pleasant Original in GOOD Housekeeping. landscape around except from the windows of the kitchen. It is shown by statistics that the largest class of patients in our insane asylums are the wives of farmers. The sad monotony of existence might often be broken up if a "farmeress" (why may not such a term be coined?) only had a little income from her poultry, butter or canned or preserved fruit, something that is her very own. I have known a thrifty wife and mother who did far more toward supporting the family by her management and forethought than her husband who was obliged to conceal a couple of pounds of butter in the cellar at a time, or a dozen eggs, till she had enough to smuggle into town to buy a fresh cambric dress to wear to "meeting" on Sunday. That woman's life had been all famine till her eyes had the dumb, pathetic look of a patient animal. There was not enough life left for friction in that family. Yet the husband was a good man and kind as far as he knew how to be. He owned the farm and the cows and chickens and everything that was produced as his father did before him. The wife and children had enough to eat and clothing sufficient to keep warm, what more could be wanted? He never dreamed that the soul needs food as well as the body, aye, more than the body. If one must starve let it be the least important. They can live and be happy on simple nutriment at whose board sit cheerfulness and love, mutual thoughtfulness and personal independence. In this respect we may thankfully believe the world is growing better. In the year 585 a council of the Church convening in Macon, France, spent some time in solemnly arguing the question "whether a woman ought or ought not to be considered a human creature." An independent existence could not he asserted of a being who could give no satisfactory proof that she was human. One way of preventing friction between parents and children is by giving the latter an allowance even though it be small. If daughters were taught how to keep accounts and make investments there would be a more practical sense of affairs after they became wives and mothers, the want of which often brings discord. A woman taught to estimate things at their real value and who has an income to herself, no matter how small, will not be likely to counsel extravagance. After all, a fluent nature, a sense of otherhood as well as selfhood, true sympathy and the power of looking at life from all sides enable their possessor to obviate friction in domestic matters. And what joy is there like pouring oil upon the troubled waters of family life. If there be failure then, in the words of Amiel, "The beautiful souls of the world have an art of saintly alchemy by which bitterness is converted into kindness, the gall of experience into gentleness, gratitude into benefits, and insults into pardon." No wretchedness can hinder the fact that the bitter salt within life's cup may be the very ingredient needed. "Then be content, poor soul! BISCUITS AND BREAKFASTS. [This series of papers is Original in GOOD HOUSEKEEPING and is not printed elsewhere. It is the only series which Miss Parloa prepares for publication regularly.] III. FOR BREAKFAST. Raspberries. Wheat Germ Mush. Cold Roast Lamb. Savory Omelet. Baked Potatoes. Milk Toast. Allegheny Muffins. In the last two articles only such breakfast breads and cakes as can be made with yeast have been treated. Those which call for the union of an acid and alkali require much different treatment. They can be made quickly and therefore are used more than those made by the slow process of raising with yeast. As a rule, the alkali used is soda. The acid may be cream-of-tartar, sour milk or sour cream. Bakingpowder is a composition of an acid and alkali. The proportions are so nicely adjusted that one ingredient neutralizes the other. One of the great objections to baking-powder is, that the cook is apt to use too much of it, making the biscuit or muffin very light but destroying all the fine flavor of the grain. In using sour milk or cream more judgment is required than when baking-powder or soda and cream-of-tartar are employed; for the acidity of the fluids varies. A pint of sour milk that would at one stage need a scant teaspoonful of soda, would, if kept a few days longer, become so sour that almost twice as much soda would be needed with it. Milk fin or cake, because there will be so little soda required that or cream that is only slightly acid will not make a light mufenough carbonic acid will not be produced to make the cakes light. If one use more soda than is required for sweetening the milk the cakes will taste of it. Again, if the milk be very sour, and there be not enough soda used to neutralize it, the cakes will taste sour and will not be light. A good rule for the use of soda with sour milk is this: For each pint of the milk dissolve a generous teaspoonful of soda in two tablespoonfuls of cold water. Gradually stir this into the sour milk. When the milk foams considerably you may be sure you have added enough soda. Stir the foaming milk into the flour or meal. The quicker the batter is mixed and put in the oven the better, as the gas escapes if the mixture be allowed to stand. Success in making any cakes or muffins with an acid and alkali depends largely upon the quickness with which their batter is mixed and they are placed in a hot oven. Baking-Powder Biscuit. The materials are: One quart of flour, measured before sifting, almost a pint of milk, three heaping teaspoonfuls of baking-powder, one teaspoonful of salt, one generous tablespoonful of butter, one tablespoonful of lard, and a scant teaspoonful of sugar. Put the flour, sugar, salt and baking-power in a sieve. Mix thoroughly, and then rub through the sieve. Rub the butter and lard into this mixture. Have the oven very hot, the pans buttered, the board, cutter and rolling pin ready. Now add the milk to the mixture, stirring quickly and vigorously with a strong spoon. -Hester M. Poole. Sprinkle the board with flour and turn the dough on it. Roll down God's plans like lilies pure and white, unfold; FROM every piercing sorrow In infinite delight.-Joseph Cottle. to the thickness of about half an inch and cut with a small cutter. Bake in a quick oven. Do not crowd the biscuit in the pan. If they be cut small, and the oven be very hot, they will bake in ten or twelve minutes. They should not stand in the oven after they are done. It is impossible to give in this recipe the exact quantity of milk to use-flour varies so much; but the dough should be mixed as soft as it is possible to handle. Cream-of-Tartar Muffins. For these use one pint of flour, measured before it is sifted, three scant gills of milk, one teaspoonful of cream-of-tartar, half a teaspoonful of soda, half a teaspoonful of salt, one teaspoonful of sugar, half a tablespoonful of butter and half a tablespoonful of lard. Mix all the dry ingredients and rub them through a sieve and into a bowl. Add the milk and then the butter and lard, melted. Beat quickly, and put into heated and buttered iron gem pans. Bake for fifteen minutes in a quick oven. If more convenient, two scant teaspoonfuls of baking-powder may be substituted for the soda and cream-of-tartar. Allegheny Muffins. For a dozen muffins allow one cupful and a half of sifted flour, one generous cupful of milk, one tablespoonful of butter, one teaspoonful of lard, two teaspoonfuls of baking-powder, half a teaspoonful of salt, and one egg. Mix all the dry ingredients and rub them through a sieve and into a bowl. Melt the butter and lard in a cup. After beating the egg till it is light, add the milk to it. Pour this mixture on the dry ingredients. Add the melted butter and lard, and after beating quickly and vigorously, put in buttered muffin pans and bake for a quarter of an hour in a quick oven. Rice Muffins. To make two dozen muffins one must take a pint of milk, a pint and a half of flour, half a pint of cooked rice, three teaspoonfuls of baking-powder, one teaspoonful of salt, two teaspoonfuls of sugar, one tablespoonful of butter, and two eggs. Mix the dry ingredients and rub them through a sieve and into a large bowl. Melt the butter and beat it into the rice. Beat the eggs till they are light, and add the milk to them. Put this mixture with the dry ingredients in the bowl. Now add the rice, and beat quickly and well. Pour into buttered muffin pans and bake for twenty-five minutes in a moderately quick oven. Graham Muffins. Take for a dozen muffins half a pint of graham, a scant half pint of sifted flour, half a pint of milk, one teaspoonful and a half of baking-powder, half a teaspoonful of salt, two tablespoonfuls of sugar, and one egg. Sift the graham into a bowl, and then turn in the bran that is left in the sieve. Now put the flour and other dry ingredients into the sieve. Mix well, and rub through the sieve, letting the mixture fall on the graham in the bowl. Mix all these materials thoroughly. Beat the egg till it is light, and add the milk to it. Pour this mixture on the dry ingredients. Beat quickly, and pour into buttered muffin pans. Bake for half an hour in a moderately hot oven. White Corn Meal Muffins. You will need for a dozen muffins half a pint of flour, half a pint of white corn meal, a generous half pint of milk, one egg, half a teaspoonful of salt, a teaspoonful and a half of baking-powder, two tablespoonfuls of sugar, two tablespoonfuls of butter, melted, and four tablespoonfuls of boiling water. Put the butter in a hot cup and pour the boiling water over it. Set on the back part of the stove. Mix all the dry ingredients and rub through a sieve and into a bowl. Beat the egg till light, and add the milk to it. Stir this mixture into the dry ingredients. Add the melted butter and water. Pour into buttered muffin pans and bake for half an hour in a moderate oven. Yellow Corn Meal Muffins. These are the ingredients needed for a dozen and a half of muffins: A generous half pint of yellow granulated corn meal, three gills of sifted flour, a scant pint of milk; two tablespoonfuls of butter, melted, two tablespoonfuls of sugar, half a teaspoonful of salt, a teaspoonful and a half of baking-powder, and two eggs. Mix all the dry ingredients and rub them through a sieve and into a bowl. Melt the butter in a hot cup. Beat the eggs till light. Add the milk to them and turn this mixture into the bowl containing the dry ingredients. Add the melted butter, and beat quickly and vigorously. Pour into buttered muffin pans and bake for half an hour in a moderate oven. Should a larger proportion of meal be liked, half a pint of flour and three gills of meal may be used. Corn Bread. To make two sheets of good size use a pint of granulated yellow meal, one pint of sifted flour, four tablespoonfuls of sugar, three teaspoonfuls of baking-powder, one teaspoonful of salt, three tablespoonfuls of butter, and three eggs. Mix the dry ingredients and rub them through a sieve and into a bowl. Melt the butter. Beat the eggs-yolks and whites separately. Put the milk with the yolks and add to the dry ingredients. Now add the melted butter. Beat well, and then stir in the whites of the eggs. Pour the batter into two well buttered pans, and bake for thirty minutes in a moderately hot oven. Or, the batter may be baked in four deep tin plates. In this case the round cakes may be sent to the table uncut. This is desirable, in order to retain both their heat and moisture. -Maria Parloa. [Copyright. All rights reserved.] Original in GoOD HOUSEKEEPING. THE ZULU BASKET. Nothing is more useful in a home than a Zulu basket transformed into a work-basket. When lined with silk, satin and plush they are particularly ornamental, but cretonne is a good material for this purpose. The illustration shows one decorated with a pretty, bright cretonne, with the edge trimmed with a kilting, rather closely folded, of the material. One side is bent down while the other stands up; and the whole is arranged so as to hang on the wall. These fancy work-bags and baskets grow in favor constantly. People are quite as fond of making them as others are of using them; and, indeed, if we do much fancy work we are all glad of some convenient receptacle in which to put it away; so a present of one in a novel form is always useful. flower or fern pot holders, the inside lining being for this The Zulu baskets may also be turned to good account as purpose omitted, and the decorations confined to moss-green plush ribbons, by which to suspend the basket, and possibly a silk scarf of the same color. -S. E. Archer. |