Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese"Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, A Coffee House Beloved by Samuel Johnson"
"Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, A Coffee House Beloved by Samuel Johnson"
Buszard's on Oxford Street is not as familiar to Americans, but it has an interest of its own, for it has made wedding cakes for royalty for many years, and the models displayed in theshow-room form an amusing exhibition to the American who has little idea of what a royal wedding cake should be. There they stand six or seven feet tall and in as many tiers, each ornamented with almond icing, inches thick, and sugar piping, with coats of arms and heraldic devices, and bearing on top a sugar temple surmounted by doves and other hymeneal emblems.
The account of a fashionable wedding in the English society papers usually closes with the line, "Cake by Buszard" or Bolland, for Buszard in London and Bolland in Chester make most of the wedding cakes that are served in England, and they send hundreds of them to the colonies, so that the English bride, even if she be far from home, can have "Cake by Buszard."
And most delectable cake it is, too, and if you wander into the heavily furnished, rather gloomy tea-room at the tea hour, you will find it well filled with city and country people and a sprinkling of foreigners who are partaking of the conventional afternoon refreshment where their grandparents or great grandparents, perhaps, were refreshed. Tea for two shillings allows you to eat all the cake you wish, but unfortunately physical limitations prevent you from trying half of the delicious confections in the tray beside you, the almond pound, Dundee, Maderia simnel, rich currant, muscatel, green ginger, cheese cakes and Scotch short bread, all made from ancient recipes. It is difficult to choose a favorite, although the Scotch short bread never tastes quite the same as it does in one of the popular tea rooms on Princes Street in Edinburgh.
Newhaven, just outside of Edinburgh, used to be more famous for its fish dinners than it is now and, perhaps, you will find no other party in the hotel coffee room where at least four kinds of fried fish, no one of which you can find on this side of the water, are served for a shilling, sixpence. Newhaven is visited for its picturesque fishwives; and the women look more as though they had just been brought from Holland than as descendants of Scandinavians who crossed in the time of James IV. They have been singularly conservative in their habits, and, owing to a strict custom of intermarriages, there are only a few names to be found in this colony of fisher folk, who have to resort to nicknames for identification.
From the Coffee-Room Window you cansee the Quaint Newhaven Fishwives
From the Coffee-Room Window you cansee the Quaint Newhaven Fishwives
If you are a tourist of the feminine gender, you will probably stop at the Globe Inn, in Dumfries, for a lemon squash, or a ginger ale, although you may be brave enough to ask the rosy-cheeked landlady for a small glass of what Robert Burns used to order; for the Globe Inn is the Burns' Howff, and down its narrow court the poet slipped nightly to the brightly-lighted room where his companions waited. The chair in which the poet lolled is still there, and a right stout affair it is,and with stout arms. It is kept securely locked behind wooden doors, and the landlady made a great ceremony of opening them and insisted on each of us trying the capacious seat.
"Perhaps you write poetry yourself?" she asked; but we had to confess that we felt no more gifted with rhymes in Burns' chair than in our own inglenook in America, and followed her up the stairs to the old-time room filled with relics.
"Americans come a long way to see these old pieces," she said, as she motioned majestically to a punch bowl, and then moved to the window on whose pane the poet had written the verses to "The Lovely Polly Stewart." "You seem to think a sight of Burns? There was one American gentleman who offered me a pot of money, if I would let him take the Howff to a fair in America, but I make a tidy living out of it here and God knows if we would ever live to cross the ocean. Burns lived and died here, and what would do for him will do for me," humbly.
There are many colleges in Oxford, but at no one of them is the tourist supposed to find refreshment in the dining halls, so that it was something of a triumph to be given a tart in one of the quaint old kitchens. The tart was really a tribute to an interest in the pantry shelves which were filled with pastry, and in the explanatory list that hung beside them. Tarts have been made in the same fashion at this Oxford college for several hundred years, in order, the cook explained, with a twinkle in his eye, that the students might get what they wanted, when they slipped down on a night tart raid. It is the nick in the edge that has told generations of students the contents of the tart; an apple has only one nick, a mince has two at each end, a gooseberry three, and so on until a student who has learned the rule can choose his favorite in the dark.
Winchester, the old royal city of England, has so many places of interest, the cathedral, the famous Winchester school, the castle, in which hangs King Arthur's round table as it has hung for several hundred years, that the traveler who is there but for a day may not have time to share the wayfarer's dole at St. Cross hospital which is distributed today just as Bishop Henry de Blois, a grandson of William the Conqueror, arranged almost eight hundred years ago. This wayfarer's dole consists of a horn of ale and piece of white bread, and anyone who knocks at the hatchway of the porter's gate is entitled to receive it. About thirty wayfarers are given it daily as well as many notable people and curious travelers who knock at the door for the novelty of sharing in a picturesque survival of a mediæval charity. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote of his experience, "Just before entering Winchester we stopped at the Church of St. Cross, and after looking through the quaint antiquity we demanded a piece of bread and a draught of ale, which the founder, Henry de Blois, in 1136, commanded should be given to everyone who should ask it at the gate. We had both from the old couple who take care of the church."
When you are in Paris you must not forget Rumpelmeyer, the "king of pastry makers." His shop is unpretentious, considering his vogue, and the room is all too small on a pleasant afternoon for the throng which would invade it. There are representatives from the far corners of the world. Americans are all about you; at the next table is a Russian grand duchess, perhaps, with her cavaliers; nearer the wall sits a woman from the Orient, whose soft silk draperies are in strange contrast to the modish Parisiennes; a group of children chatter of South Africa to their attendants and two natives from India have not doffed their spotless white turbans.
Sharing in a Picturesque Survival of a Mediæval Charity
Sharing in a Picturesque Survival of a Mediæval Charity
Rumpelmeyer's might be considered a glorified cafeteria, and the great moment of your visit to the café iswhen you have taken the fork and plate from the smiling maid, and stand hesitating beside the table laden with cakes. And such cakes! Fluffy balls rolled in chocolate and cocoanut, maple crescents, diamonds of paste enriched with French fruits, tiny tarts filled with glacéd cherries, half an apricot or a plum; cornets heaped with cream of pistachio or strawberries, pastry and sweetmeats in every appetizing form, until it is difficult to make a choice. At last with plate laden you find your way to the table where something new in ices, cool or hot drinks, is served. And as you go away, you cast a lingering glance at the patisserie table and plan to come, again and again, until you have tried every kind, not knowing that new confections are offered everyfew days to make such a plan almost an impossibility.
The Hospitable People of Volendam
The Hospitable People of Volendam
In strange contrast to the smart Parisian café is the Hotel Spaander in quaint Volendam, and if it is not the season you may be alone on the piazza which is swept by the bracing winds from the Zuyder Zee, and where the picturesque hospitable people give you a cordial greeting. And palatable as were the marvelous cakes of Paris, they were no better than the Dutch raisin bread, Edam cheese and mild beer that forms your luncheon. Volendam is but next door to Edam, the home of the popular cheeses, and the thin shavings seem to have been made to accompany the delicious raisin bread of Holland. The Spaander is a popular rendezvous for artists, and the big rooms have been adorned with paintings and sketches by the men and women who have enjoyed its hospitality. The bright-faced girl, who serves you, was taught to speak English, perhaps, by some artist who may be a member of the British Royal Academy now, and she loves to tell you of the notable people who have come and gone, and she fairly carries you away to see the homes of the fisher folk. She explains their marvelous clothes, and declares that the huge silver buttons worn by the men and boys were used as a mark of identification in case of drowning, for each district in Holland has its own design. She calls your attention to the old china, pewter and brass, and giggles approval when you pass the school and slip a copper into each of the wooden shoes at the door.
Everybody takes at least one ice at Florian's on St. Mark's Square in Venice for at Florian's you are sure to see the world and his wife, especially, if you are there on an evening when the band plays in the square. Florian's ices are world renowned, and its patrons are as cosmopolitan as Rumpelmeyer's, and, as you eat your way through the pink or chocolate cone of sweetness, you will find the price of it in the bottom of the dish. There is no room for argument over the charge, for in the bottom of every dish, in plain figures, is its cost, two francs or two francs, fifty. And after you have paid the reckoning, the waiter turns over the dish as a sign that your debt is canceled, and you are at liberty to sit and listen to the music and watch the people for as long as you wish.
Nearly every European city has a café or a restaurant that is of special interest, not because of its smart patronage or high prices, but for its quaint customs, old dishes or drinks, and it varies the routine of galleries and historic buildings to hunt them out. They add a spice, a zest, to what might become rather a dreary round of sight seeing, for no one appreciates the old customs more than the American. There are some travelers who make a point of stopping at the Three Tuns in Durham, no more to see Durham's beautiful cathedral, if the truth were told, than to have the trim maid bring them a tiny glass of cherry brandy to "drink to the health of the house," a custom that was young two hundred years or more ago, although it must be confessed that, while the custom has been retained, the glasses that hold the delicious cordial are considerably smaller than they were in the days when the request was first made.
By Mrs. Chas. Norman
The morning paper tells of a man and woman who got married after only a few hours' acquaintance. Unfortunately, this couple cannot claim to have done anything unique. Numerous persons have done likewise—at least the newspapers say so—though the statement is one which makes upon a sane mind an impression of confusion. I say confusion, not to mention other effects.
After reading the announcement, I looked into the dictionary to see if it could be true, and I judge it is possible. Marriage, according to Webster, is the act which unites the man and woman, and, while it seems impossible for a real union to take place in so brief a time, still there is probably no other way of telling in the English language what has occurred. It might well happen that the persons so hastily "joined" should become married in the course of time. Certain metals really mix and stick together even after the heat of welding has died out, but no mere ceremony can unite, though it be performed by the holiest of ministers or the most profound legal interpreter.
And, as it is impossible for any third person to "unite" man and woman, so it is out of the question for any third person to give any legitimate advice as to whether or not the man and woman should unite, unless by chance the third person discovers that the real union or disunion already exists.
An ambitious young lady stopped to see me on her way to New York. She was about to sail for Europe, and she told me, confidentially, that she was engaged to marry a clergyman of this country, and that she "might marry him," if she failed to get a certain position she hoped for in Paris.
I could not refrain from saying, "Do not marry," and she took it that I was either averse to matrimony or to the young man. Such supposition was incorrect. I simply disliked to see any man irrevokably tied to a woman who took him only because she could not get something else.
I explained this to the girl, but it did no good. She said I was "sentimental and not at all practical." I confessed to a little sentiment on the subject of wedlock, and refrained from adding that I should rather be truthful than practical, but I told her that, if she had accepted her lover, conditionally, her course was entirely honorable, and then, to relieve theheavinessof the conversation, I repeated these lines, which she laughed at very moderately indeed:
"I, Pegg Pudding, promise thee, William Crickett,That I will hold thee for mine own dear lily,Whilst I have a head in mine eye and a face on my nose,A mouth in my tongue and all that a woman should have,From the crown of my foot to the sole of my head."
"I, Pegg Pudding, promise thee, William Crickett,That I will hold thee for mine own dear lily,Whilst I have a head in mine eye and a face on my nose,A mouth in my tongue and all that a woman should have,From the crown of my foot to the sole of my head."
"I, Pegg Pudding, promise thee, William Crickett,
That I will hold thee for mine own dear lily,
Whilst I have a head in mine eye and a face on my nose,
A mouth in my tongue and all that a woman should have,
From the crown of my foot to the sole of my head."
The attention of my guest flagged a little and, when I completed the stanza, she confessed she was thinking of a Philadelphia girl whose resolution she much admired. During a sojourn in Europe, this girl had refused sixty-five offers of marriage—I hope I have the number exactly right—having determined to marry no one of lower rank than a prince.
I sped my guest to New York and Europe, and after her departure no ghost needed to come from the grave to tell me why marriage is so often a failure. We hear this thing and that thing given as a reason. Responsibility enough is to be laid at the door of men, but let women confess a share in thedesecration of the sacred ordinance. Is it possible to think of a marriage resulting well that does not begin in truth, and continue in truth?
Let truth, at least, be counted an essential. After truth, let the candidate consider the necessity of sacrifice. Present-day girls cannot claim much more of that element than boys. If modern women have a hobby more general than another, it must be the development of their individuality. This is a fine thing, but let those who are over-zealous on this point remain single or remain rational, for it is scarcely fair to develop one's individuality to the extinction of another person's rights. To speak the truth, a proper individuality is never oblivious to others. Women would be learned and wise, but they fail to see that the very richest return of wisdom comes from putting forth their full strengthwhere it is due. God has provided that recompense for all dutiful activity, and it often happens that the circumstances that would seem to retard mental development are its greatest stimuli, and the saving of the much-cherished individuality is accomplished by self-forgetfulness.
Marriage is one of the apparent interruptions to intellectual progress—especially a woman's. We often hear of the fine career a certain person might have had, unmarried. Such talk signifies nothing.
In the first place, age does not always fulfill the promises of youth. Many a young man has started well in life and failed through no fault of his companion. A discerning man will not be apt to choose a frivolous woman, though we often hear the contrary. A bright girl, though she may remain single and devote herself to herself, is not sure of a successful career. Some womanly virtues are certainly fostered best in a home. Love is, to many women, what the tropics are to vegetation. On the other hand, there are women who seem to be created for public benefactions and isolated labors.
Concentration in any line of business is bound to bring definite results, but definite, tangible results may not be the best results. A man who assumes some domestic responsibility must abridge his public services, and, as it is only public services that make a show, his life seems less valuable.
"I like you better since you married," said a frank old lady to a young man, and he laughed and answered:
"I used to know a great many things, but they were all wrong, every one of them! It takes a sensible wife to straighten out a man's mental distortions." Doubtless his wife could have reversed the compliment.
The pictures of unhappy marriages are hung in every household which the American press can possibly reach: the good marriages attract no attention. Natural reverence prevents those who know anything about them from telling what they know. We do not talk glibly of God's love. The theme is sacred. Just as sacred, and very personal, is the other subject. No man of sense, who loves his wife, says much about it, even to his intimate friends. What adult, with reason, goes about seeking advice upon matrimony?
Marriage is for persons of mature minds, and it is absolutely an individual matter, each case deciding itself. Let those who doubt concerning matrimony stay out of it. Let those who are already in it, remember that it is a solemn compact between two persons and that any action is unbecoming and inconsistent which does not result to the advantage of both.
By Phœbe D. Roulon
Jack and I arrived at Podunk just in "strawberry time." Did you ever stop to consider what a mandatory phrase "strawberry time" is? Jack and I did to the fullest, for from one end of Podunk highway to the other, in every farmstead that was the happy possessor of a strawberry patch, the proclamation had gone forth that berries were ripe and must be "done up" at once. There is no such thing as procrastinating with Nature, especially in her fruit department. Infinite in patience, unsparing in pains from the first inception of the berry to its maturity, when once her creative work is accomplished, she lays the finished product at your feet and henceforth waives all responsibility. Put off until tomorrow what should have been "done up" today and Nature will seek vengeance upon you and show you your folly. Mrs. Simpkins might better save her breath than to enter the protest that she cannot possibly "can" today, for the minister and family are coming to dinner. Nature makes no exception for even the clergy. When Mrs. Hopewell declares she must take her butter and eggs to market today and so cannot do another stroke of work after one o'clock, Nature simply smiles complacently from the four corners of every ruddy berry basket and says, "Take me now in my perfection, for tomorrow it will have passed away."
In obedience to this inexorable law Podunk was making ready. Brass kettles were being scoured and granite ones were coming forth from their winter hiding places. With one accord Podunk was becoming a huge canning and preserving factory, with as many annexes as there were houses with berry patches.
Day after day the process went on, for day after day a fresh supply demanded attention.
Overworked and tired housewives groaned in spirit and slept in meeting as a result. Everybody's nerves were a little on the bias until the strawberries were settled for the winter. To a casual observer it seemed as if Nature's lavishness had outrun Podunk's gratitude, and as if strawberries were becoming a nuisance.
As I said, Jack and I arrived just at this crisis in the farm life of Podunk. Indeed, within an hour after we landed, and amid the chaos of unpacking, a gentle maiden tapped at our kitchen door and importuned us to buy some preserving berries.
Jack has a sweet tooth and I saw at a glance that he had not missed the vision of rows of red jars on the swinging shelf in the cellar, and Sunday night teas of jam, long after the last strawberry had ripened and decayed. But he desisted and let her depart without buying a berry. This I call heroic and manly, and told him so on the spot.
Of course the well had not been pumped out, the water-pail had not been unpacked, the grocery supplies had not arrived. There had not been a fire in the stove for eight months, and there was no split wood in the wood shed, but men have been known to expect household routine to go on under conditions quite as hindering, therefore I repeat, that Jack, in the face of vanishing sweets, showed fortitude and consideration.
But it was plain that "strawberry time" had made an impression on his mind that took somewhat the form of a problem.
Now Jack is never happier thanwhen he has nuts to crack or problems to solve. He is that all-round type of man that can and does bring the same philosophic trend of mind to bear upon matters domestic as upon civic and national affairs.
We had come to Podunk to rest, but Jack always rests in motion, and in less than a week after our arrival I saw him go forth to canvass the community. For days and days he was as glum as an oyster, leaving me to guess what he was up to, but I have so long known the limitations to his capacity for holding in and carrying a secret, that I could wait in patience for the unbosoming. It came on one of those chilly, rainy nights in June,—the sort of night that Jack always expects and gets warm gingerbread for supper. Gingerbread always puts him in a talkative mood.
We had each taken a second cup of tea, when Jack looked up and said, "Do you realize, my dear, that this canning and jellying process is only just started for the season in Podunk? I find that our Fourth of July not only proclaims American independence but also the proper time for making currant jelly, and so, unless Nature plays us false, the same ordeal must be repeated, with only the difference that 'currant' will be written on the label instead of 'strawberry.' And still another repetition, when raspberries are ripe and blackberries grow sweet and luscious. Again when the huckleberry bushes give up their treasures, shadowing forth a winter supply for pies. Then come the peaches, pears and plums, followed by apples, grapes and quinces. Between times, lest the hand forgets its cunning, there are peas, corn, beets and tomatoes to be rescued for future use. And the season ends with a pickling tournament.
"It hardly seems creditable, but from here to Podunk Hollow, a distance of less than two miles, and only sparsely settled, I find by actual count that there are thousands of cans of fruit and hundreds of glasses of jelly prepared every season. From 'strawberry time'—indeed some ambitious housekeepers start in with rhubarb in April—until the last luckless green tomato is snatched from Jack Frost, there is a mad rush on the part of the farmer's wife to keep apace with Nature and to take care of her bounties with a thrifty hand."
By this time Jack was ready for a second helping of gingerbread and proceeded. "Don't you see, my dear, that this is an awful waste of muscular energy and stove fuel. Don't you see that consolidation and coöperation at just this point would emancipate these women quite as much as the telephone and the rural delivery?
"Furthermore, I believe there is fruit enough that goes to waste every year, which, if rescued, would not only pay for the running of a community kitchen, but also give a handsome bonus for civic beautifying. It is my firm faith that Podunk can earn the foundations of a fine library, within the next three years, by simply saving the waste of fruit and vegetables within her own borders. She has a market already established at the summer colony of Bide-a-wee."
The third piece of gingerbread gave Jack the courage to make a clean breast of everything, and to confess that he had called a meeting and made all the necessary arrangements to start a community kitchen for canning and preserving, to be ready this season for the currant crop.
Jack always persists that my impulsive opposition is his most helpful ally, so I never feel hindered in giving it. But I said "You have surely never looked at this problem from the psychological standpoint. You have never calculated the personal pride of every housewife in her own handiwork, done in her own way, the way tradition has made sacred to her. Eliminate thepersonal touch from half the preserve closets of Podunk and you rob them of their glory and half of their flavor. There are some things that cannot be consolidated and coöperated and this is one of them. Why! Mrs. Patterson would be inconsolably wretched, if she thought a jar of peaches would ever stand in her cellar that did not adhere to the formula of one and three-quarters pints of sugar to three pints of water. Now Mrs. Smith is equally loyal to one and one-half parts sugar to three parts water."
"And as for jelly making, it has a hedge about it as conservative and invulnerable as a Chinese wall. Instance, our beloved Mrs. Thornton. That splendid spirit of housewifely excellence that we have always admired in her would be wholly inundated and wrecked, if she ever had to set before us, on her own tea-table, a glass of jelly that had been made by heating the currants before they were crushed, and straining the juice through cheesecloth instead of flannel. To Mrs. Thornton there is but one right way, the cold and flannel process.
"Even I, Jack, dear, must own up to feeling an unpleasant sensation down my spinal column, and a vexatious agitation in my mind, whenever I see jelly boil more than five minutes after the sugar is added. Nay, my Worthy Wisdom, let me entreat you to carefully consider ere you intrude upon the sacred precincts of jelly-making with any ruthless tread.
"As for pickling, it is an established fact that every housewife pickles to suit the taste of her family and her rule lies in the palate of said family. You know that the Joneses are always strong on the onion flavor, while the Millers emphasize cinnamon and allspice! Fancy consolidating these flavors into a blend and expect either family to be contented and happy.
"Worthy as your Community Kitchen idea is in its inception, I fear it is doomed to failure. It uproots too many of the 'eternals' of housekeeping."
Jack received my volley of opposing arguments, not only with fortitude but with apparent satisfaction, and simply said, "Have you finished?" As I had, he again took the floor.
"Now, I am sure that my foundation is secure and my psychological attitude all right, for all the objections you mention were brought up, in one form or another, at the meeting we held, and I was able to meet every one of them. No, my dear, I do not mean to uproot the 'eternals' and the Joneses shall stand for onion flavor to the end of time. The personal equation will always be considered. Each farmer will simply send his consignment of berries or fruit with explicit instructions as to recipes to be followed, just as our great-grandfathers sent their grist to the mill to be ground and ordered middlings left in or middlings left out, according as to whether it was for pancakes or bread. Those worthies took it on faith that they brought back the same grain they carried and there need be no question now. Farmer Dunn's marrowfats need never get mixed with Deacon White's telephone peas, and Mrs. Thornton can always send her flannel jelly bag.
"It is my opinion that the good wives will have gained enough leisure time to come to the Kitchen and inspect the process while their batch of fruit is being handled."
So closely are faith and works related in Jack's philosophy of life that in an incredibly short time Podunk awoke one morning to find the abandoned Haskell house turned into a "Community Kitchen," in charge of a New England man and his wife, of thrift and learning. They began on the currant crop.
Of course, since Jack was behind the innovation, I had to show my faith by sending the first lot, with instructions that the jelly should be boiledonly one minute after the sugar was added. The twenty glasses of tender crystalline jelly that stood on my pantry shelf the next day needed no argument and so encouraged my nearest neighbor that she sent half of her picking to the Kitchen. I saw that it caused a wrench, but she supported herself on the consciousness that she was only risking half. But the jelly that came back adhered so closely in color, taste and texture to the "traditional" that the other half was sent without a qualm. This made a beginning and by the time the raspberries were ripe a dozen families were converted.
When the fall fruits came on, it had grown into such a fashion to send the preserving out that the capacity of the Kitchen was somewhat taxed. An evaporating outfit was added, that saved hundreds of bushels of apples from absolute waste. A simple device for making unfermented grape juice brought profit enough the first year to paint the town hall, build over the stage and buy a curtain that never failed to work.
The second year a "Sunshine" Laundry was added to the Kitchen, which proved a great boon. Podunk had wrestled with the domestic problem, but like the rest of the world had not solved it, and was left to do its own washing.
As the name suggests, the "Community Kitchen" was established on a coöperative basis, with the understanding that after all running expenses were paid and each contributor had a certain share of profit, proportioned to the amount of surplus material he contributed, all the remaining profit was to go for the improvement of the town.
The "Kitchen" is now three years old and every visitor coming to Podunk naturally wanders into the pretty new library on Main Street. The sweet-faced librarian is always cordial and tells you with unmasked pride that this is the first library built of fruit and vegetables.
But complete regeneration came not to Podunk, until the Culture Club became an active organization, impelled forward by the brain force of the women of the community. Given a margin of leisure, it was demonstrated that culture will flourish as persistently in rural districts as in city precincts. Shakespeare and Browning were not neglected, nor were Wagner and Mendelssohn.
Nature study, Domestic Economy and Civic beautifying opened new and broad avenues of culture, and classes in these subjects were held every week. The women of Podunk began to know their birds and to call them by name. The church suppers took on a new aspect, for the dietetic unrighteousness of four kinds of cake and three kinds of sweet pudding, at the same meal, was openly discussed and frowned upon. Deacon Wyburn, who had a tooth sweeter even than Jack's, declared, at first, that this was heresy that should not be allowed to enter the sanctuary. But regeneration came to the deacon as indigestion departed.
And all of this happened, because Jack saw the need of an emancipation proclamation and the people of Podunk availed themselves of its freedom. I have always said that Jack was a man among men.
Great men live in word and deed,Tho' the hand that sows the seedNo harvest knows.Fixed as is the rolling seaBy its bounds, so this shall beTo thee and those;Something lost and something wonE'er the life that hath begunFor thee shall close.—Grace Agnes Thompson
Great men live in word and deed,Tho' the hand that sows the seedNo harvest knows.Fixed as is the rolling seaBy its bounds, so this shall beTo thee and those;Something lost and something wonE'er the life that hath begunFor thee shall close.—Grace Agnes Thompson
Great men live in word and deed,
Tho' the hand that sows the seed
No harvest knows.
Fixed as is the rolling sea
By its bounds, so this shall be
To thee and those;
Something lost and something won
E'er the life that hath begun
For thee shall close.
—Grace Agnes Thompson
By Helen Campbell
"The point is," said the young woman, "never to spend any time in self-pity and never mention one of whatever afflictions may have been apportioned to your individual self. The first takes your strength and spoils any good work you might do. The second is a bore to your friends and destruction to self-respect. In the first grip of things it is possible one may send up a howl. But at that or any other time, no matter what the impulse, Don't!"
Was she a young woman after all? For, as she brought out the "Don't!" staccato, I looked again. Really she seemed more like a nice boy, well up in athletics, and as far on in general college work as athletics permit. Her hair was short, cut close to her head, yet curly, and though rather a dark brown, yet showing gold where little tendrils had their way, here and there, behind an ear or on her slender neck. Her hands were small, of course, for she was a Southern woman, generations of whom had no need to use their hands in any coarsening work, yet could and did use them in delicate cookery, preserving, and the like, and knew every secret of cutting and generally overseeing the garments for a plantation. Delicately formed, straight as a dart and with the alert expression of a champion tennis player, she stood at the gate into the chicken-yard, and smiled a delightful smile.
"I shouldn't tell you one word," she said, "if you hadn't come from so old a friend. Oh, privately I would tell anyone interested, but printing is another matter. It will help, you say. I'm sure I don't know. Perhaps, but I somehow seem to think most find out for themselves, perhaps by a good many experiments, just what to do. But I will tell you just how it began with me. Nellie has told you, I don't doubt, that I was left a widow with three children. We had lived in town, after my marriage, in a rented house. When my husband died and I presently summed up my capital, it was, first, the children, then, not quite two hundred dollars left in the bank after the expenses of the long sickness and the funeral were paid. Added to this were nine hens and a rooster that I had kept at the end of the little garden at the back of the house, our cat and dog and about a fortnight's supplies in the pantry. Our clothes, too, were in fair amount and order. That was all. Lots of people came to condole with me and tell me what to do, but not one made what seemed to me a really practical suggestion. I knew what I could do, or thought I did, which amounts to the same thing, if you really go ahead and do it. I did it.
"The first thing was to move into the country, where I had longed to have the children. It isn't country now exactly, for the station is not far away, but the house was out of repair, and I had the option of buying it at the end of the year, if I wanted it then. The owner couldn't do much and was glad to think it might be off his hands, and I took it for eighty dollars a year—this to include a few repairs.
"There was a big garden, not tended for years, not a fruit tree, and the four acres outside the fenced-in garden one mass of brush. My next neighbor was a farmer from the North, come South for his health and getting it, and he took an interest from the beginning; he ploughed my land for me, and agreed to go over it with the cultivator when it was necessary, but I must first manage to rake up and burn up allthe weeds and sticks, etc. The children helped me and we made a spree of it. I bought a cow of him, a good one, and, as one of my hens had begun to set on a box of nails, decided she should have eggs. He had some fine, pure-blooded Plymouth Rocks, and mine were Wyandottes, just as good and no fear as to crossing breeds, and so I started in. What I was after was broilers, and if broilers wouldn't support us, why there was something else that I felt sure would, and that was chicken pies. You smile, but let me tell you they weren't everyday chicken pies. Our old Dilly on my father's plantation was a champion chicken-pie maker, in demand for every wedding and general church entertainment, and she taught me just how, swearing me to secrecy long as she lived. So I watched her many times, realizing, at last, that it meant using the very choicest material straight through. No old hens simmered all day long to make them tender. On the contrary, she demanded the choicest broilers, and she made, not exactly puff paste but the most delicate order of pastry to put them in. To season to a turn and with no variation, and to have the gravy smooth and rich, these were her secrets, and I learned them so thoroughly that after once sampling them there was no further trouble as to orders. I sent little individual pies to every hotel and restaurant in the city I had left. I had bought a good cow, as I said, and soon bought another, to have plenty of cream, for that was one important item in the pies, and as the work got too much for me alone I presently had a girl to help, and at last another, all of us doing steady hard work, but liking it. I raised the chickens, you see, though I often hated to have them killed, and by this time we had small fruits, and all that grows in a well-kept garden. The children helped as well as went to school and were rosy, healthy creatures, my comfort and joy, and they always have been. I never have cleared over five hundred a year, but what more do I need? I make ten cents clear on each individual chicken pie and fifteen on the larger ones. Specials I make as large as people want them, but I prefer the little ones. Three sizes are made every day, and some families, who go away for the summer, have their chicken pies expressed to them each week and won't do without them. Some people fuss and say they are too rich. Others want me to charge less and say, if I would use lard instead of butter in the pastry, I could sell cheaper. But I answer that it is my business never to fall below the standard. Aunt Dilly would turn in her grave if she thought her rule was to have lard used instead of butter. I made some experiments and found it was distinctly best to stick close to the old original text. You can buy cheap pies anywhere and they taste cheap. These melt in your mouth. And you ought to know that two other women in the neighborhood have specialties, too, and I taught them, for my mother used to make a delicious chicken jelly for sick people and one woman does that and has a big market for it at the Woman's Exchange, and another makes cornbeef hash for three restaurants and has all she can do. The gist of it isgood cooking can always be made to pay. Keep to the best form you can find, never vary, and a living, and often much more, is certain. When women learn that, perhaps more of them will turn in this direction. Here is the home paid for, trees growing and yielding, children growing too, and Tom almost ready for college, and chicken pie has done it, and will keep on doing it, perhaps as long as I live. At any rate I should never stop doing something as perfectly as I could for that is half the fun of living. Don't you think so? We keep the evenings for as much of a good time as possible. I keep a littleof my old music and play accompaniments, for Tom has a fine baritone voice and we all sing, and Edith and her violin take the kinks out of any day's work. We have a fair little library and do not mean to fall behind or forget what quiet progress means. It has been a happy life, thank God! How could it help being so, with such children and a certain sure thing to do?"
Yes, how could it help being thus with such a spirit at work to bring it about? That was the thought as I looked at the mother, and wished that all dolorous and uncertain women might have the same chance. Joining the Sunshine Circle or the Harmony Club might be the first essential. After that things would take care of themselves.
Cora A. Matson Dolson
For me a basket and a bookWhere cooling hemlocks grow;And, in the deep of wooded nooks,The spikes of cardinal glow.A book to bring but not to read—Enough to know it near,To turn a leaf I do not need,The song is with me here.A bird-note comes adown the wood,It seems to stillness wed;A tap, then gleam of scarlet hoodHigh in the tree o'erhead.The Indian-pipe is waxen stemmed;The squirrels near me play;While on this bank by mosses gemmedI dream the hours away.
For me a basket and a bookWhere cooling hemlocks grow;And, in the deep of wooded nooks,The spikes of cardinal glow.A book to bring but not to read—Enough to know it near,To turn a leaf I do not need,The song is with me here.A bird-note comes adown the wood,It seems to stillness wed;A tap, then gleam of scarlet hoodHigh in the tree o'erhead.The Indian-pipe is waxen stemmed;The squirrels near me play;While on this bank by mosses gemmedI dream the hours away.
For me a basket and a bookWhere cooling hemlocks grow;And, in the deep of wooded nooks,The spikes of cardinal glow.
For me a basket and a book
Where cooling hemlocks grow;
And, in the deep of wooded nooks,
The spikes of cardinal glow.
A book to bring but not to read—Enough to know it near,To turn a leaf I do not need,The song is with me here.
A book to bring but not to read—
Enough to know it near,
To turn a leaf I do not need,
The song is with me here.
A bird-note comes adown the wood,It seems to stillness wed;A tap, then gleam of scarlet hoodHigh in the tree o'erhead.
A bird-note comes adown the wood,
It seems to stillness wed;
A tap, then gleam of scarlet hood
High in the tree o'erhead.
The Indian-pipe is waxen stemmed;The squirrels near me play;While on this bank by mosses gemmedI dream the hours away.
The Indian-pipe is waxen stemmed;
The squirrels near me play;
While on this bank by mosses gemmed
I dream the hours away.
By Kate Gannett Wells
Old age becomes more of a problem when living in it than when viewed afar off. It is a question of economics and ethics more than of wrinkles. It is so easy not to mind it when well, rich and beloved; it is so impossible not to object to it when sick, poor and unwelcome. It creeps into almost every home and, though we try to alleviate it and succeed to a certain extent, through affection, cookery and cleanliness, the vast majority of the world does not know how to manage to live on almost nothing, and yet it is upon those of small or of no means that the support of old age presses most heavily. So love only is left, and too often not even that.
Then one wonders if one ought to refuse marriage and devote one's self to one's parents;—or, if married and children are many, and food and lodgings scant, shall one also house one's aged parents? If the ethics thereof are difficult to settle when money and space are available, it is a hideous task for decision when both are lacking.
Nowhere does the attempted settlement to remove the stigma of pauperism from the aged through legislation threaten to be more puzzling than in England, where after January 1, 1911, a workhouse inmate of above seventy years and "fairly respectable" is entitled to leave the house and receive in lieu of its shelter five shillings a week.Is acceptance of such pension outside of a workhouse more honorable than being dependent on Government for support inside the workhouse? That is the question the Old Age pensioners of England are trying to solve. Who is going to house, feed and clothe them for five shillings a week? What does that amount to, set against the care of an infirm, old, undesired relative who is not wanted either for his keep or his affection, and who will only grow older? Even as a boarder of no kin whatever to his landlady, is he likely to be as comfortable as in the workhouse? Startling have been some of the discoveries that have followed upon this apparently beneficent legislation.
Well was it that Miss Edith Sellers of England, of her own free will, visited relatives of the inmates of a London workhouse, hoping to carry back to the latter place the joyful tidings that they were wanted in families. Alas! out of 528 such inmates only 221 had any relatives, and more than half of that number knew that, if they went to their kinspeople, they would not be taken in. Some who had felt sure of a welcome were bitterly disappointed. "Old folk give no end of trouble; keeping them clean takes up all one's time. Besides they must have somewhere to sleep," was generally answered. One grown-up daughter, supporting herself, her mother and brother in two rooms, one no better than a cupboard, grieved she could not take back her father. Other sons and daughters, by blood or by law, waxed indignant at being urged to receive their kinsmen, even for the sake of the shillings. They had neither room nor food for them; each generation must care first for its own children and not take up burdens of parents, worse still of grandparents, aunts and cousins once gotten rid of; especially, if they were of the drunken variety, as was too often the case.
Fortunately Miss Sellers found a few other homes which promised to receive a pensioner for the sake of his pension, or from real affection. After all the bitter work-a-day life in these narrow homes, attics, cellars, two or three rooms at most, would have been more wretched for the pensioners to bear than their blighted hopes. "To work a bit harder," in order to take in one's aged mother, is not possible in thousands of cases. Better to remain a workhouse pauper and be sure of warmth, cleanliness and food than to wander forth uncared for or to be an unwelcome burden on an overworked child.
Therefore is it that the English Old Age Pension Act does not solve its own problem, for the infirm or sick must still be sheltered in some refuge which should have no workhouse taint of pauperism attached to it.
However much there may be among us of similar reluctance to take home aged pauper relatives, it has not yet become a matter of public investigation, though, if it were, it is possible that there would be as much unwillingness manifested here as in England. Certainly many of our almshouses and homes for the aged poor suggest that there will be the same forlorn hopes shattered, if pensions should ever be conferred instead of legal residences in almshouses.
Fortunately for us, old age is still an individual question. All the more, then, should elderly people not let themselves get crabbed. Of course, if other people would not nag one with being old, one would not be,—quite so old!
What old age, whether poor, middling or well-to-do lacks is amusement. It is lonesome to keep jolly by remembering that one's mind ought to be one's kingdom. Meditation is all very well, but so also is the circus, the "greatest value of which lies in its non-ethical quality." Even if it has its symbolism, it does not mercilessly set one to moralizing, save as a three ring circus and a "brigade of clowns"(the result of trying to make as much money as possible) incites to weariness. The real "gospel of the circus" lies in its democracy, in its revealings of the power of training on acrobats and animals through kindly persistence, and in the mutual good will and law abiding qualities of the household of a circus. Always has it belonged to the people, and even ministers have not been discounted for their attendance.
It seems a wide jump in fancy from old age to a circus, and yet to me they are intimately connected through the dear old people, poor and well to do, whom I have known, who found in it their objective base for amusement. To them the clown and his jokes were links in the spirit of human brotherhood. Alas, as a pension of five shillings a week will not permit of the circus in its glory, old age asks for the minor blessings of five cent shows, public parks, and good tobacco. Just to be out doors is rejuvenating.
All the more is amusement desirable, because legislation has undertaken to set the goal when one shall no longer work. To retire teachers, officers, workers, merely because they are sixty-five or seventy is an insult to human nature, which rejects any arbitrary limit save that of incapacity. The average of average people, though perhaps unable to earn their living after seventy, are still capable of being occupied. Therefore let the old folks work at household and woodshed drudgery as long as they can, however irritating their slowness may be to the young and merciless. Let the old serve also in semi-public ways, because of their experience, even if they are not wanted round.
It is a common saying that it is harder to resign office at seventy than at sixty, just because old age clings to occupation as its protection. But if with most of us, if not with all, as the years increase, occupation shrivels and the fads or hobbies, the solace of earlier days, cease by their very weight to be pursued,—then may there still be amusement provided for the elderly before they become "Shut Ins," dependent on Christmas and Easter cards for enjoyment.
By Helen Coale Crew