sponse; "here you have a crank; there, a few iron wheels; inside, the dasher. The price is moderate; one that would do the work of a dairy would be only fifty dollars. That amount could be saved in a summer."

"I should like to inquire farther," I hastily answered; and, hurrying down stairs, in spite of remarks about acids and oxygen, nitrogen, caseine, and a dozen other scientific compounds, I escaped from the store. There is always a dreadful feeling of shame connected with not purchasing when one enters a store and asks for an article. It seems as though you were getting credit and making a display on false pretenses. The manner of the attendant suggests a doubt of your honesty, and any little compliments he may have paid you are manifestly taken back at once, and contempt usurps the place of esteem.

After pausing to recover my breath and my courage, I entered the nearest place of a similar character and made the same inquiry.

"Yes, sir; we have a churn of a most approved and successful description. There," he continued, as the clerk brought me face to face with a still stranger-looking machine, more like the walking-beam of a steam-engine than my early recollections of a

churn, "there you have simplicity itself. In it you back to first principles. You wind up a spring—” "A spring!" I exclaimed.

go

"Undoubtedly. No one thinks of using manual power in these times. The dashers are secured to each end of this bar, and as one rises while the other falls, there is no loss from the attraction of gravitation. We call this the Hippo-opticon."

"The Hippo-opticon, did you say?" I inquired, wonderingly.

"Yes; the name is derived from two Greek words, hippo, a horse, and opticon, sight; because it has the strength of a horse and the eye of intelligence. It works without care or superintendence. When once started it runs of itself. The cream

"The cream!" I muttered to myself, having supposed that I had just discovered that milk was churned.

"The cream is placed in these two receptacles; the dashers fall regularly and slowly."

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Slowly!" I exclaimed, still more surprised, remembering the praises I had heard of excessive speed.

"Churning must be done slowly; that is the best established law. There must be deliberation and regularity."

"What is your opinion,” I inquired," of the Patent Duplex Elliptic Milk Converter ?”

“Then you have seen that worthless contrivance! It could not have deceived an experienced farmer like yourself. Why, that whirligig is the most utterly useless affair conceivable. It is forever out of order; the flanges bend, the cogs break. Whatever you do, don't buy that. In ours you have primitive simplicity and perfect security."

At this point a brilliant idea entered my mind, and, taking my departure without even waiting to ask the price of this wonderful invention, I hurried back to the first store. Thrusting my head in at the door, and not daring to advance farther lest I should be overwhelmed by a second avalanche of learned terms, I inquired of the smiling clerk, who evidently saw the certainty of a customer in my return, what he thought of the Hippo-opticon.

"The Hippo-opticon!" he laughed; "that old fogy concern that winds up with a spring? My opinion simply is that it will never make butter at all. It never has yet, and it never will. They could not humbug a gentleman of your discernment with that attempt to return to the antiquated days of our forefathers. The Patent Duplex-

"Thank you!" I shouted, as I slammed to the

door, and fled without waiting to hear farther. The selection of a churn was evidently an intricate matter. It was a practical affair, in which intellectual research would not help me, and recourse must be had to Weeville. As soon as I returned to the country I sent for him, and inquired which was the proper churn to use, and what was the proper thing to put in it.

"Well," he said, deliberately, "the art of making butter is yet in its infancy; the principles that control it are not fully understood. Great cleanliness is a prime requisite; the dairy must be well ventilated; electricity is very injurious. In Switzerland they do not allow women to take part in any of the operations, even in milking the cows, on account of their possessing more electricity than men."

“Oh!” I broke forth in despair, "I give it up; it is altogether too complicated a matter-"

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"Nonsense," said Weeville, suddenly recovering himself; “the old-fashioned ordinary churn is the best; I will send you one. You must use cream, and there is no difficulty so long as proper regard is paid to cleanliness."

With that he left me. His suggestions about electricity were alarming. I had often felt the electrical power of the female sex. I had received many

dangerous shocks from them; the touch even of their hands had often produced palpitations and electrical phenomena of the strangest kind. There could be no anticipating what might be the result if the cream was affected by their presence. While I was hesitating what to do, I suddenly thought of Patrick. There was nothing electrical about him. He might be dirty—his hands and face usually were -but there was no other danger. He was called at once, and told to milk the cow himself in future, and be sure to wash his hands and face first; to which directions he gave a surprised assent, wondering, no doubt, at the sudden interest his master evinced in his personal appearance. I took charge of the dairy myself, to exclude all possibility of electrical phenomena, and skimmed the cream carefully. Cushy had been falling off lately for some incomprehensible reason, having done so well for eighteen months; and when, at the end of a week, the churn arrived, it seemed ludicrously large for the small bowlful of cream that had been collected not much more than a pint in all. Patrick, when I called upon him to wash his hands and set to work, burst forth with the astonished inquiry,

"Sure yer honor does not want me to churn that little speck ov crame in this big tub. It would get lost intirely."