Jasper County Democrat, Volume 23, Number 75, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 December 1920 — CHRISTMAS GIFTS FROM THE FARM [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

CHRISTMAS GIFTS FROM THE FARM

AST Christmas I spent with a schoolmate who lives In the country. I had gone to her home in the early autumn to board because I had much writing to do and needed quiet. At the same time I needed the sweet, pure country air. When we

first began talking of Christmas, fully six to eight weeks before that date, Ruth, my friend, began the old-time plaint; “I know I shall get a lot of pretty things from my city friends and relatives, and what on earth can I get in this old ark that is fit to send them?” “This old ark" was the village general store, where we were when we brought up the subject of Christmas giving. “Ruth Preston,” I answered her, “with all the opportunities you have for making the most delightful, unusual and really worth while gifts, you should worry about about Storekeeper Wlggln’s limited stock of cheese and chewing tobacco.”

“What do you mean?” gasped Ruth. “Well, you never lived In the city, cooped up In an apartment, or in a house In a big town where the nearest woods and nearest garden were miles and miles away. Did you,

now?” She admitted that she never had. “Imagine that you did live In such a place. What would you say If you

were to receive a beautiful little baby flr tree eighteen inches high, a luscious deep green, growing in a pretty little wooden tub painted deep green? Suppose It came to you carefully wrapped 'in wet burlap so that the

express people could see what it was. and keep It right side up 7” “It would be pretty,” admitted Ruth. “And suppose you lived in a big elevator apartment with a tiny kitchenette and a new maid every week or so and all the goodies you had you made yourself or got at a case or dug out of cans with a can opener. How would you like to get a great big fat

mince pie, packed in a box so carefully that It couldn’t crush or break?”

I had set her to thinking. Soon after that we brought up the subject once more. I sent back to the city for .two dollars’ worth of narrow red ribbon, Christmas labels, tags and stick-

era. “What are you going to send him?” I asked Ruth one day as she mentioned her very wealthy brother who had lived In a distant city for twenty years, and whom she wished to remember. “Oh, dear, Tom has so much money that anything I could afford would look cheap?” she complained. “Neckties are silly and I don’t know the latest styles. I’d love to surprise him once—”

“Make fifty r of those oldfashioned big cookies, such as your mother used to make for you and Tom when you were youngsters. I know how they taste—want one right now! Wrap each in white tissue, stick a tiny fancy label on, to fasten the tissue together, pack them firmly in a box and send them along to him. Watch his mouth water!” Ruth did it and the letter she got from her brother brought the quick tears to her eyes. To my brother’s wife I sent a small crate of mixed vegetables. She was* delighted. I sent them early-enough for her to use them for the Christmas dinner. There was a small Hubbard squash, some choice potatoes, onions, beets, carrots, tur-

nips, a cabpies, a dozen pears and a licious crab aped in.

bage, some apha r d winter little jar of deple jelly tuckFor our old

school teacher, still striving to teach the younfe idea how to shoot, Ruth and I Joined in making a big fruit calge. To a friend who had a number of small children, Ruth sent half* a dozen Jars of pure honey. I don’t know how many little J*r* of jellies and chili sauce and baby pickles and jams and other preserve* and condiments we sent along. To % a doctor friend —the one who sent me to inhale the country air for

six mbnths—l sent two dozen big, rich duck eggs, quite fresh. On each egg I pasted a tiny sticker, a little Santa or Christmas tree or stocking, or something of that sort. I placed these in 1 a wire case which holds each egg firmly, marked them plainly, and they-reached the good doctor without a. break oj- a crack. Every year Ruth’s great aunt sends her something of value. This great-aunt owns a string of business blocks in a big city and keeps a lawyer busy attending to her estate. At my suggestion, Ruth prepared a goose fpr the oven, stuffed It, sewed it up in a cloth and pack-

ed it in a box, the corners of which she filled with ap-

pies and onions for roasting. This she sent to great-aunt, not without fear and trembling. “The very idea of sending her something to eat,”

she gasped, “she’ll think it an insult.” She Invited a select few in to dinner, she wrote, and boasted of the “home-grown goose straight from my dear niece who lives on a farm.” And all her guests raved. To friends who had chil-

dren we sent baskets of native nuts: walnuts, butternuts, hickory nuts, chinquepins and the like. We also made some delicious molasses kisses, wrapped them in waxed paper, packed them with sprigs of evergreen and sent them along. If you live in the maple belt, you surely have some maple sugar left. If It Is black, melt It over and recast the

cakes. They will be d»i licious. If you have popcorn, tie up four bunches.

six ears to a bunch, and send It as a present. Country popcorn “tastes different,” you know! It does. I’v«(-' tasted ■ it. —Marlon Aldrich, in The Farmer’s Wife. • /