Bellefonte, Pa., September 21, 1917.
A GARDEN LESSON.
Said Uncle Josh, “Look here, b’gosh!
That isn’t the way to hoe,
Just scratch around and loosen the ground
’N then your stuff will grow.
’N dig out that weed; if it goes to seed
The Devil will be to pay.
Then thin out your stuff. There
enough.”
And Josh went on his way.
—From National Emergency Food Garden
Commission.
that’s
High diddle diddle this life is a riddle
For prices have jumped o'er the moon,
But plan a food garden on some vacant lot
And prices will tumble down soon.
Rock-a-bye baby in the tree top,
Father is hoeing his home garden crop
Soon he will harvest enough for us all,
And High Cost of Living will have a bad
fall.
If Old Mother Hubbard should go to the
cupboard
She'd find all the food she'd desire
For stored away there is foodstuff to
spare,
The product of canner and dryer.
Old King Food in his merriest mood
Set a-watching his garden plot
He counted his beets and he reckoned ehis
beans
And he said “Will we
not.”
starve? We will
Mary, Mary, no longer contrary,
Has made a home garden grow,
With turnips and beans to feed the ma-
rines
And the soldiers and sailors you know.
President Pack, come blow our horn,
Our allies are calling for wheat and
corn,
Set the nation to work to grow turnips and
squash
And we'll feed the whole world with our
food, by gosh!
Dickery, dickery, dock,
The. back-yards in our block
Are full enough of garden stuff
Our pantry shelves to stock.
“A dollar, a dollar, a ten o’clock scholar,
Why do you come so late?”
“I've stayed at home to dig the weeds;
This gardening stunt is great.”
There was an old man and he had a wood-
en leg
And he couldn’t steal
could he beg,
So he bought a back yard and he planted
some beans
And raised enough cash to buy a dozen
machines.
a ride, not a ride
Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief,
Taffy will not work, so he must come to
grief,
The neighbors planted seeds in their yards
and vacant lots
And spent the summer raising things on
thrifty garden plots.
They're canning em and drying 'em and
storing ‘em away
If Taffy cannot steal em he'll have gro-
‘cer’s bills to pay.
—From National Emergency Food Garden
Commission.
A CHANGE OF MASTERS.
Dr. Michaelis was being piloted
down Fifth avenue through the fog.
His little limousine, swung by big
springs on a long and heavy run-
ning-gear moved forward gently with
the south-bound line, which was
checked at intervals as trucks and car-
riages crossed the Avenue or melted
in the stream of traffic. He sat in a
corner, relaxed and introspective, with
one elbow half out of the open win-
dow, for although it was January, the
afternoon was very warm. During a
momentary gap in the compact pro-
cession a yellow taxicab, launched by
an ambitious driver, shot in abreast of
him, grazing his mud-guards and,
squeaking, stopped short as the whole
line halted obedient to the blue Colos-
sus at Forty-second Street. It car-
ried a woman with black eyes, who
suggested youth freed from the tram-
mels of its inexperience. She wore a
fur-trimmed cloak, and black hat with
white feather curling down one side,
and this feather trembled when she
saw Michaelis so close to her; but,
pressing her lips together, she lean-
ed across the short space which sepa-
rated her from him, and touched his
arm with a little air of ownership. It
was the free act of a moment, quick-
ly ended, and before he fully took her
in she was drifting away from him;
for a trilling whistle had pierced the
mist, gears were clanking everywhere,
and all cars but his and a huge limou-
sine ahead of it, one of whose tires
had exploded with a pistol-shot report,
were moving south.
Leaning out of the window, he
cried: “Sylvia! Sylvia!” but the yel-
low taxicab, like a log in the stream,
drew relentlessly away, as she stood,
dim in the growing darkness, turning
and looking back, waving half reluct-
antly; he heard her call, “Bon chien
chasse de race,” and she was gone.
He motioned his driver excitedly,
but they were pocketed by the crip-
pled car ahead, and the vehicles mov-
Ing past were too jealously closed up
to be broken into. After several min-
utes of restless, fuming delay, he was
free and across Forty-second, Street,
but then the other cars had scattered.
His machine, wakened from its leth-
argy, started in swift pursuit, dodged
in and out, skidding at times for yards,
overtook a dozen other cars, and just
below Thirty-fourth Street missed a
fat policeman by a hair. But the tax-
icab had been swallowed up by the
great city, and at the Farragut mon-
ument he cancelled a visit in Ninth
Street from his day-book, turned, and
went slowly uptown again, still
searching from both windows.
Sylvia Dare! It was fifteen years
ago that he saw her last, like a speck
on the upper deck of the steamer,
with her “swarthy man” towering
over her. She must have a master,
she always used to say, and had hit on
this Rumanian prince just as Michael-
is finished his year of being a needy
student in Vienna. Her last flutter-
ing good-by, as the great vessel warp-
d from the pier, seemed to carry to
him a reproach and a promise, but as
: they had both agreed that everything |
should stop then and there, he had not :
heard directly from her since, except
postal card from one of the cafes that
brighten the river at Budapest came
to him, bearing the single line, “Bon
chien chasse de race.” He had not
been sure that it was in her hand-
writing. But now she was here in the
same place with him; free, perhaps;
anyway, plainly inviting as—it flash-
ed over him—she must have been be-
fore.
After years of observation in stifling
dispensaries, packed with those ill and
those who fancied themselves so, of
learning in laboratories what trace
the microscope can show of the real
reason why things go wrong, of analy-
sis of ill-directed human motives
which create the half of all disease, he
had finally won out, as far as his pro-
fession was concerned. He was estab-
lished and even sought for in those
disorders where self-consciousness be-
trays itself, and where ugly spots in
character may be washed away by a
properly directed stream of interest.
He had learned the way to make flut-
tering hearts march evenly, and to put
neurotic women on their feet without
sacrificing the approval of their hus-
bands, by methods made public in his
book on Relapsing Personalities,
which was in its third edition and had
been translated into French. But he
had never ceased to think of Sylvia
Dare, and she had found him, after all
these years, ‘distinguished, sombre,
and impersonal, still brooding on the
blunder of his life in letting her, who
had so much to give and who gave so
generously, escape him.
Her home had never been in New
York, and thinking of the quickest
way to get news of her, Dangerfield
occurred to him.
Dangerfield, just back from three
years at the French embassy, fleck-
less at 6 p. m., true test of the man of
leisure, was in the club’s big foyer,
drinking a long glass of apple bran-
dy. He was bubbling over with re-
awakened patriotism, and it took Mi-
chaelis several minutes to get him on
to Continental topics. But he was led
there finally.
“Whom do you suppose I saw last
month in Paris?” he said. “The Prin-
cess Marinesco—you know, Sylvia
Dare; you remember that little force-
ful way of hers. Poor Sylvia! She
found her master. The fellow was a
brute, like most of those royalized Ru-
manians. Let’s see, how long has she
been gone? Fifteen years? Gad!
time flies! She doesn’t look it. She
hasn’t turned a hair. She might have,
for they say the prince pulled her
about the house by it before he finish-
ed. His valet shot him, finally. ‘Self-
defense,” the valet said. They hung
him, anyway.”
That was all Dangerfield knew, and
as the club was filling up with cock-
tail-drinkers, Michaelis left it, forgot
his car, and walked home through the
misty night. Fifth Avenue, almost
stripped now of its engines, stretch-
ed silently before him, dim and
glistening, lined with a double row of
violet lights, the farthest floating in
the air like twin balloons. Soon he
was at the spot where she had called
to him an hour before, with the well-
remembered quickness and defiance,
and, as always, lurking behind them
a whispered promise of surrender. He
was bound for the evening by profes-
sional obligations he could not shirk,
but which he met mechanically, saved
from error only by a long habit of be-
ing right. Through a dreary inter-
view over a wheezing millionaire, at
which the physician who called him in
consultation did the talking, and
through a three-hour meeting of a
medical society, over which he presid-
ed by the ill-luck of being its vice-
president, he kept picturing to himself
what his life might have been with
her warm sympathy; and imagining,
with her vigorous personality to fire
his energies, a far different success
from the material one he had.
Te next morning a hand-delivered
letter, topping the pile that awaited
him, did away with his plans for find-
ing her. “Dear Carl,” it ran, “I need
you sorely. Come to me. Till then I
am here—and yours, Sylvia.”
He had read it twice, standing up,
before he called his assistant, Lynn-
hart, an intense young man with
round shoulders and deep-set eyes.
“Busy day, Doctor,” Lynnhart said,
holding out the appointment card.
“Can’t see any one,” Michaelis jerk-
ed out. Lynnhart looked at him side-
wise. “Let me see,” Michaelis mutter-
ed, scanning the lined paper.
“Schenck? Tell him the solution isn’t
ready. Mrs. Gildersleeve—that awful
woman—telephone her I am sick—
out of town—anything. I’ll see Wat-
rous for two minutes. Mrs. Sniffens
—oh! you see her, Lynn.”
He did away with all of them and
half a dozen others and in a few min-
utes was humming up Fifth Avenue
to her hotel, through a sparkling at-
mosphere, for the hopeless fog of the
day before had vanished.
At the open door of her little salon
he stood for a moment, wavering,
powerless, paying the penalty of years
of repression, while she, gasping his
name, pushing aside her breakfast-ta-
ble, came running to him. He met her
half-way and caught her wrists, pull-
ing them to his sides, looking down in-
to her face.
“Sylvia,” he whispered, “the same
Sylvia, and free again, thank God.”
She trembled and ceased smiling.
“The prince is dead,” she said. This
from her lips fired him still further,
and tightening his grasp he drew her
toward him, but she was in a different
mood and turned away, shaking her
head. :
“No, no—not now,” she said; “there
is something else first—something dif-
ferent. Oh, my dear, why should
something always come between us?”
He did not seem to understand at
first, and tried to put his arm around
her, but she freed herself and put her
‘black-bordered handkerchief to her
face, leaving him nonplussed, uncer-
tain, till she turned, metamorphosed,
smiling again, the handkerchief crum-
pled in her hand.
“Oh, come,” she said, “truce—for a
moment, anyway,” and led him play-
fully to a chair beside a divan into
which she nestled. She launched a
battery of questions at him, about his
friends, his way of living, his daily
routine. She knew pages of “Relaps-
ing Personalities” by heart, and had
heard of many of his famous cures. He
did not try to keep up with her, feel-
| speculating as to why she was so rest-
perhaps once, five years ago, when a less, so ill at ease, with fingers inter-
ing his way, worried, the lover lost in |
the physician who could not help |
twining and strong limbs never still |
under her morning gown.
“But why so nervous?” he asked at |
last, quieting her ring hand which had i
no rings on it. “It surely isn’t that— |
I can’t flatter myself 2”
“Flatter yourself ?” she interrupted. !
“How could I flatter a career like |
yours, a great name like yours—"’
“What there is of it you nave!
done!”
“I have done? I? Why, what do |
you mean?”
“I mean,” he said, leaning over her, |
“that what there is of good in me is |
you, that my work is really yours; |
without your image, without the mem-
ory of your free spirit breathing life
into it—I mean, Sylvia—"
He stopped short in alarm, feeling
instinctively for her pulse—for she
had sunk back in the pillows, pale,
shrunken, her hand clutching her
heart.
“Quick!” she gasped, her breathing
labored, “my medicine—in the napkin
—with the hypodermic syringe—two |
pellets. Don’t stop to boil the wa-
ter.”
Without questioning, he went as she
directed, shook too tiny pellets from a
glass cylinder into a spoon, melted
them and drew the solution up into a
small transparent syringe. In less
than a minute he was back again and
deftly forced the shining hypodermic
needle into the arm which lay bared
for him. The effect was magical. She
made a low sound of satisfaction,
threw her head on her arm like a child
going to sleep while her lips glistened
red again, a faint fush tinging her
pallor. Michaelis waited until her
breathing had become regular, and
then, putting up his watch, went over
to the breakfast-table pulling his mus-
tache, his forehead wrinkled. He pick-
ed up the little vial, turned it to the
light, studied its finely printed label,
and looked sharply over toward the di-
van. She was watching him lazily,
with half-closed eyes, and seeing the
question in his face, nodded yes to it.
+ How long have you been taking
it?
She beckoned him to the divan be-
side her, but he moved reluctantly,
and chose the chair, embarrassed and
ill at ease, like a man controlled by
something beyond himself.
“It did not begin until years after I
was married. Oh, years and years!
It was only four years ago. What I
went through before—but that is
neither here nor there. This began
it.”
She held out her left arm which was
crooked just above the wrist. “You
see, it never got quite straight again.
As he had been drinking, it took some
time to get a doctor, and even after it
was set the pain was so terrific the
doctor gave me an injection. Of
course, he repeated it, and—and so the
wretched thing went on.” -
“But you must have known,” Mi-
chaelis said, like a parent reproving
a wayward child.
“1 didn’t at first. Once, after a
week or so, I asked him if so much
morphine wasn’t dangerous. ‘Not in
surgery,” he laughed. ‘We use it all
we like.” He was an ancien interne
des hopitaux, straight as a string, and
I trusted him. Oh, Carl, you know the
rest of it.” :
But he was now distant, formal, im-
personal, trying to be the critical cli-
nician who must find the right way
and point it, even when it leads away
from him.
This dismayed her, and, leaning to-
ward him, she threw her arms about
his knees, the wide sleeves of her
gown touching the floor. He patted
her shoulders, soothed her, and then
gently released himself, urging her to
tell him everything.
So she continued: “The young doc-
tor came so often the prince became
unreasonable, insane (you know what
drinking men are,) jealous, and for-
bade him the house. That was when
it really began, for then I got my own
outfit—Oh, must I go on? You know
the story—every doctor knows it.”
It was the same old story, mor-
phine, comforter, then friend, until it
changes to the brutal master, keeping
its solitary, friendless slave at its feet
in trembling expectation and obedi-
ence.” :
“I often stopped it for a week, once
for thirteen days, but then, after some
quarrel, the pain at the wrist would
begin again. I would see the little
needle shining in its case, so sure to
blot out pain—and all the other
things—" : :
“Yes, of course,” Michaelis said,
coldly, “but, now he is dead, why
now ?”’ :
“I have tried, oh so many times—
and cannot.”
Michaelis muttered, as though to
some third person: “That's the bru-
tal part of it. It rots the will so, blots
the vision. It kills purpose, honor,
truth—” a
Catching the look of pain in her
face, he stopped, while she, getting up
impulsively, put both her hands on his
broad shoulders, pressing them to the
back of his chair, and sat down on his
knee.
“Carl Michaelis,” she said, “look me
in the face. Is untruth there?”
He looked at her with effort, but the
desire his muscles rebelled at was
lurking in his eyes. “Sylvia,” he said,
slowly, “you might be steeped in lies,
and I would never know it.”
“And yet you doubt my truth—
doubt me?” :
He lifted her gently to the divan
and stood over her. “You don’t un-
derstand—you can’t. You can’t know
or hate this thing as I do. It isn’t you
I doubt, but you are no longer you. A
fiend has got a hold on you, and you
love him. Can’t you see? It is as
though you were my wife and were
living with sore beast who had alien-
ated you, and while you belong to him
how can you belong to me? And be-
longing to him, how can I trust you or
believe you?” .
“Oh,” she said, pushing his arm
from the back of the divan and sitting
upright, her indignant eyes brilliant
against the pallor of her face, “you
are cruel, unfair. Why should you
treat a physical weakness as though it
were something immoral—something
unclean ?”
His wrists twitched with a gesture
half of reproach, half of defense. “I
can’t help it; my experience makes me
see it so. There is very little physic-
(Continued on page 7, Col. 1.)
RR
.THE SIGN OF THE RED CROSS..
Translated from the French Legendary
Poem, “Le Brassard,” of Vicomte de
Barrelli.
The Goddess of Pity was winging her way
Afar to the field where a young soldier
lay
(So humble a victim of war's cruel aim,
Yet Love's ministrations the wounded may
claim!)
In touch of her fingers the soldier found
rest.
The goddess again would continue her
quest,
But paused as she listened to murmurings
low,
“The name of this
might know!”
angel, oh, would ¥
She smilingly sought out a white linen
band
All untaught in letters, yet deft was her
hand—
She dipped in his lifeblood her finger so |
[fair
And pressed the fine linen lo,
was there!
Red Cross
The daughters of France,
and charm,
Now wear the Red Cross
their arm!
—By Harriet N.
Magazine.
loving legend
as a sign on
Cross
Ralston, in Red
THE FAMILY BALANCED RATION |
(By Carl Vrooman, Assistant Secretary of
Agriculture.)
In time of war, as in time of peace,
it is not only important, but essential,
that the people be well fed. Victory
does not depend alone on guns and
soldiers; it depends as well on the ef-
ficiency of every man, woman, and
child back of the firing line.
To maintain this efficiency there
must be enough food, and it must be
so cooked and so combined as to be
both palatable and nourishing.
The selection or orgenization of
food in the diet is as important as the
organization of an army; a small
amount of food rightly combined will
give more energy than a large amount
badly combined, just as a small disci-
plined force of scldiers is more effec-
tive than an untrained mob.
There is nothing mysterious about
planning the cheapest, most palatabl:
and most nutritious mezls. On the
fingers of one hand the different
groups of food can be counted thus:
I. Foods depended on for mineral mat-
ters, vegetables acids, and body-
regulating substances.
II. Foods depended on for protein.
III. Foods depended on for starch.
IV. Foods depended on for sugar.
V. Foods depended on for fat.
If all these grcups are included in
the diet, the body will lack no neces-
sary kind of material. To illustrate:
Group I. Foods depended on for mineral
matters, vegetable acids, and body-
regulating substances.
Fruits :—Apples, Pears, ete. Bananas, Ber-
ries, Melons, Oranges, Lemons, etc.
Vegetables :—Salads—Ilettue=, celery, ete.
Potherb, or ‘“greens.” .Potatoes and
root vegetables. Green peas, beans,
ete. Tomatoes, squash, ete.
Group II. I'oods depended on for protein,
for muscle building:
Milk, skim milk, cheese, ete. Eggs. Meat.
Poultry Fish. Dried peas, beans,
cowpeas, ete. Nuts.
Group IIL. Foods depended on for starch:
Cereal grains, meals, flour, ete.
Cereal breakfast foods.
Bread. Crackers.
Macaroni and other pastes.
Cakes, cookies, starchy puddings, ete.
Potatoes and other starchy vegetables.
Group IV. Foods depended on for sugar.
Sugar. Molasses. Syrups. Honey. Can-
dies. Fruits preserved in sugar, jel-
lies, and dried fruits. Sweet cakes and
desserts.
Group V. Foods depended on for fat:
Butter and cream.
Lard, suet, and other cooking fats.
Salt pork and bacon.
Table and salad oils.
Thinks of foods in these groups. If
possible, see to it that at least one
food from each group is served at
least once a day. Learn from a study
of these groups how to make up your
own menus, and how to substitute one
food for another in aczordance with
palatability and price. When laying
in supplies of foods, thirk in terms of
these groups. Realize, for example,
that when it is difficilt to obtain meat,
dried beans and peas, dried fish and
nuts can be eaten instead, and that the
cereals, too, are rich in protein. When
potatoes are scarce, ricz or cornmeal
is an excellent substitute.
A knowledge of these facts will pre-
vent much sickness and useless ex-
penditure of money. Consult with
neighbors. Get in touch with your
county agent, your Statz Agricultural
college, or with the United States De-
partment of Agriculture if you want
more infermation.
The war must be won in the kitch-
ens and on the dining tatles of Amer-
ica as well as in the irenches. The
Department of Agriculture stands
ready to supply information to help
the housewife do her bit toward win-
ning the war.
FURTHER SUGGESTIONS.
Further suggestions for planning
well-balanced family menus will be
found in the following buMetins sent
free of charge by the United States
Department of Agriculture upon pos-
tal card request: :
Corn Meal as a Food and Ways of
Using It: F. B. 808.
How to Select Foods—I. What the
Body Needs: F. B. 808. .
How to Select Foods—II. Cereal
Foods: F. B. 817.
How to Select Foods—III. Foods
Rich in Protein: F. B. 824.
How to Select Foods—IV. Fruits
and Vegetables.
Home Canning by the One-period
Cold-pack Method: F. B. 839. .
Drying Fruits and Vegetables in the
Home: F. B. 841, 976.
Food Requirements and the Menu,
Extension Circular No. 65, Penna
State College School of Agricul-
ture, State College, Pa.
Er —————
——Through an intensive cam-
paign by a crew of trained thrift
workers, a Detroit savings bank with-
in a few weeks obtained 7,500 new de-
positors, and another bank recently
celebrated its first birthday by put-
ting 5,000 new names on its books.
——=Subscribe for the “Watchman”.
—
Fatigue Duty at the Front.
1
|
Six o’clock on an August morning.
{ The sun, although not yet very high in
i the sky, is streaming down on ground
already baked by many rainless,
! sweltering days.
| day, although signs of a storm are in
! the air, a storm that has been threat-
ening for days and yet never comes.
In the dusty village street a platoon is
just forming up preparatory to going
out “on fatigue,” a working party
which means about two miles behind
the front line. Breakfasts were eaten
{ half an hour ago, washing and shav-
ling and all the other decencies of a
| British soldier’s life were performed
even earlier.
The platoon commander has a very
spruce appearance, with well polished
boots and buttons and belt. He has
the face of a boy, and looks as though
in normal times he would still be at
school, the mustache he wears seems
to be having a real struggle for exis-
tence, yet there is a set of the jaw and
a poise of the head which speaks of
experience in command which in ordi-
! nary times would not develop until ten
| years later.
The platoon moves off after being
critically inspected by its commander.
The heat soon begins to tell its tale in
perspiring faces and loosened jackets,
and the men look longingly at the
i closed cafes and estiminets as they
leave the village. There is a march of
a mile to the Royal Engineers’
“Dumps” where the platoon obtains
| its tools for the day's work. Arrived
there, rifles are swung across the back,
and each man takes a pick or shovel.
Next to the rifle, he has often been
told, these are his best friends at the
front.
There is still two miles of marching
to the scene of the day’s labor, miles
during which the rifle on the soldier’s
back and the pick or shovel in his hand
grows inconceivably heavy and hot.
At the appointed renedzvous the par-
ty is met by a non-commissioned offi-
cer of the Royal Engineers, who
points out the work to be done—a
length of new trench to be dug.
Equipment and coats are removed and
stacked near by; each man is given
his task.
At first the task seems incredibly
heavy owing to the sweltering heat,
but that soon wears off and the men
plug along steadily at their job, a nat-
ural spirit of competition urging the
majority to make as good a show as
their neighbors. The turf is carefully
removed first and stacked ready for
further use, to serve as cover for the
fresh earth of parapet and parados.
Work proceeds as steadily as the heat
permits; in boiling hot weather there
must be occasional breaks, and in a
short time something that looks like a
trench begins to appear. .
At midday there is a diversion. An
aeroplane is seen overhead, the offi-
cer’s glasses reveal the enemy mark-
ings on the wings, and in a very few
seconds, a British machine comes
dashing out of the clouds to oppose it.
Those interesting evolutions known as
“maneuvering for position” begin,
with occasional sputtering of machine
guns as one or the other gets into ad-
vantageous position. Gradually the
British aviator drives the German
lower until he is within range of the
anti-aircraft artillery. The German
perceives his danger and decides to
slope homewards. His stay has not
been long, but it was evidently long
enough for him to spot the location of
i the working party, for soon after he
returns, shells begin to come over
from the German batteries in unpleas-
ant proximity to the work.
The officer in charge quickly comes
to a decision and gives an order.
Everyone ceases work and gets into
the partly dug trench, where they
stay, getting what cover they can, un-
til the burst of fire ceases as suddenly
as it began. Casualties number four,
one man killed, three slightly wound-
ed, so slightly that after the use of a
field dressing they are content to sit
and smoke and wait for the rest of the
party before going back.
Work goes on with an hour’s rest
and several short breaks until three
o’clock, when the men form up once
more and march away homeward.
Such is one day’s work if one is a
private on “fatigue duty.”
Digging trenches, of course, is not
the only duty of working parties.
They are employed in clearing, repair-
ing or improving front line trenches,
carrying materials, laying light rail-
ways, felling trees, assisting in min-
ing operations, pumping water, mak-
ing roads, building dugouts, or a score
of other tasks. They may be employ-
ed for the day in the front line or 15
miles from it.
The vast amount of work that has
to be done both in and behind the
lines, work which is mainly done by
regular infantrymen, is hard for the
layman to realize. It is very well
summed up by the remark of a Welsh
soldier in reply to the recruiting pos-
ter question, “What did you do in the
great war daddy?”
“Put half of France and Belgium
into sandbags, my boy.”
Whatever the task, the British pri-
vate on fatigue duty is generally fair-
ly cheerful about it, with one excep-
tion. He has a rooted objection to
anything that takes him into the
trenches during his period of “rest,”
not so much because he has any great
fear of being killed or wounded, but
because he feels that “out of the
trenches” ought to mean out altogeth-
er until the time comes for his next
turn of duty. He feels that he is en-
croaching on preserves that ought to
be kept strictly for the use of men
who are “up.”
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His Exemption Claim.
One of the registrars in a Virginia
country - district tells a story of a
Negro obviously within the prescribed
ages and of powerful physique, who
turned up on registration day. The
registrar had a good deal of difficulty
in making the applicant understand
the questions. .
“Do you claim exemption?” he
asked.
“What's dat, suh?”
“Is there any reason why you
should not render military service—
why you should not fight your coun-
try’s battles ?” ; ;
“Oh, yes, suh,” replied the appli-
cant, much enlightened. “I’s gunshy.”
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going up to the “back of the front,”
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FARM NOTES.
—Ways of Using Barnvard Ma-
{ nure.—There is a right and a wrong
; way to use barnyard manure.
It is as hot as mid- |
When
the rainfall during the'year has been
above normal, there is an abnormal
condition, and it is doubtful if a mod-
erate application of manure plowed
under in the fall would often cause the
soil to dry out more quickly than one
on which no manure was applicd. Of
course, it is a well known fact that in
some instances long manure plowed
under in the ‘spring, or even in the
fall, will cause crops to seuffer for
lack of moisture,, for the simple rea-
son that such manure intercepts the
movement of capillary water from be-
low to the region where surface root-
lets get in their work. This only em-
phasizes the importance of changing
the system of farming, so that manure
is not applied to stubble land. There
are very few farms that can be main-
tained in productiveness without hav-
ing a certain area in meadow or pas-
ture all the time.
The right theory is to use such a ro-
tation as will bring every foot of the
land under the beneficial influence of
grass. This being the case, the place
to put manure is on the grass land.
There never will be any regret about
manure drying out a soil if it is used
as a top dressing on meadows or on
pastures. In such case every atom of
the manure is utilized and a response
is immediately made in a stronger
growth of grass, while in turn no in-
jurious results whatever can come
from the manure when the pastures
or meadows are broken up. Of course
many a man hasn’t the right system
under way of using permanent pas-
tures to a greater or less extent. Pos-
sibly because of their location adja-
cent to the building he desires to pro-
duce the grain in the same fields year
after year and thus is tempted to use
his manure where he can most quick-
ly convert it into bushels. The theory
of that, however, is wrong, and the
quicker the system can be changed so
that every field can be given a square
deal, the better it will be for the reve-
nues of that particular farm.
In applying manure to the field
three methods are pursued: (1) The
manure is placed in larger or smaller
heaps over the field and allowed to re-
main some time before being spread.
(2) It is broadcasted and allowed to
lie on the surface for some time or
plowed in immediately, and (3) It is
i to the hill or drill with the
seed.
The first method is objectionable be-
cause it increases labor of handling
and chances of loss by fermentation
and leaching, while uniform distribu-
tion of the manure is not secured. The
spots on which the heaps stand are
strongly manured with the leachings
of the manure, while the rest of the
field receives the coarse parts of the
manure largely deprived of its valua-
ble constituents. Another disadvan-
tage of this method is that proper fer-
mentation is interfered with by the
leaching out of the nitrogenous mat-
ter and the drying action of the wind.
The practice of storing manure in
large heaps in the field is subject to
some extent to the same objections. If,
however, the heap is not allowed to lie
too long and is carefully covered with
earth the loss may be greatly reduced.
Spreading the manure and allowing
it to lie on the surface should be prac-
ticed only on level fields, where there
is no danger from surface washing. It
has been claimed that when manure is
spread broadcast and allowed to lie on
the surface there may be a serious loss
of ammonia into the air; but experi-
ments have shown that, in case of
properly-prepared manure, loss from
this cause must be very small. On a
leachy soil there may be a loss of sol-
uble constituents in the drainage if
the manure is spread a long while be-
fore the crop is planted; but in ordina-
ry practice the loss from this source
is also likely to be insignificant. In
this method of application the fertiliz-
ing constituents of the manure are
uniformly distributed, the liquid por-
tion being gradually and thoroughly
incorporated with the soil particles.
One serious disadvantage, however, of
the method is that the manure before
being plowed in is leached to a large
extent of its soluble nitrogenous com-
pounds, which, as we have already ob-
served, are necessary for fermenta-
tion, and therefore it does not so read-
ily ferment in the soil. It is not ad-
visable, therefore, in the case of light
or sandy soils, to follow this practice;
but it is preferable to plow the ma-
nure in as soon as spread.
As to the depth to which it is advis-
able to plow the manure in, the gen-
eral rule should be observed that it
should not be so deep as to prevent
the access of sufficient moisture and
air to insure fermentation and nitri-
fication, and to permit of rapid wash-
ing down of nitrates to the drain. In
not exceed four inches. In light soils
very compact soils the depth should
this depth may be considerably in-
creased, although in such soils there
is more danger of loss by drainage
than with heavy clay soils.
Application in the hill or drill is
useful where the supply of manure is
limited and the full, immediate effect
is desired. For forcing truck crops
this method is especially valuable.
Well-rotted manure is best suited to
this method of application. It has
been claimed, however, that manure
applied in this way sometimes injures
the appearance of root crops, especi-
ally potatoes, by increasing the
amount of scab.
The so-called parking system, or
feeding animals on the land, is a
method of application which has many
advantages; but the distribution of the
manure by this system is irregular
and subject to the same objection as
broadcasting. :
The application of liquid manure
has certain obvious advantages, and
is largely practiced, especially in Eu-
rope. Manure leachings is a quick-
acting, forcing manure, and is especi-
ally valuable for grass. The expense
of cisterns for collecting the leachings
and the trouble of hauling and distrib-
uting, together with the care which
must be exercised to prevent loss of
nitrogen from the readily fermentable
liquid when it stands for any length
of time, render it doubtful, however,
whether this method is practicable ex-
cept for special purposes and under
peculiar conditions. — Philadelphia
Record.
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