Jasper Republican, Volume 1, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 March 1875 — FARM AND HOUSEHOLD. [ARTICLE]

FARM AND HOUSEHOLD.

—To clean flasks which have contained resinous solutions, wash with caustic alkaline lyes and rinse with alcohol; if they have held essential oils, wash with sulphuric acid and rinse with water. —Bituminous coal ashes from two to four inches thick will make nearly as hard and as lasting a floor in a cowstable as plank, ana, besides, it is not as slippery and does not afford a harbor for rats ana mice. —Do not use martingales on working teams. See that the hames are buckled tight enough at the top to bring the draft iron near the center of the collar. If too low, it not only interferes with the action of the shoulder, but gives the collar an uneven bearing.— -Scientific American. —Most of our plants are iqjured by too much heat. Fur a general collection of house plants it is not best to allow the thermometer to be above seventy, and if they could be kept in a room where the thermometer would usually not range much above sixty-five it would be the better. In the night time fifty is high enough. Give a iittle fresh air every fine day, and all the sunlight attainable. Cleanliness is as necessary to plants as to other bodies, therefore secure them from dust, if possible. Sweeping carpets is almost enough to kill both plants and sweepers. It will be a happy day for our lungs, as well as for the lungs of plants, when we get a good substitute for carpets, something that will not raise a cloud of dust every time a step is taken. Until this good time comes, give the whole plant a good syringing occasionally, or a bath in a pail of water. A little moisture in the air of a room is pleasant and healthy. We would not say that a greenhouse or a mushroom house would be a good place to live in, but we do say that a room that will keep a few plants in good health, other things being favorable, will keep a family in the same desirable condition. The family can breathe the confined, dusty, dry, over-heated air of a room and live, because they are out in the air a good portion of the time, but those who are confined to the air of our living rooms the greatest number of hours are the most delicate, and the plants having to remain in those overheated, ill-ventilated and dusty rooms, without a moment’s relief, must droop and die. Cleanliness, fresh air, moderate heat and a moist atmosphere will secure healthy plants.

—ln contradiction of the reported decline of churches in the Sandwich Islands since the withdrawal of missionaries in 1873 it is stated that there has been a great increase in the number of native pastors, churches and schools. During ten years $77,973 have been given for missions in the islands of the Pacific, and no difficulty is found in disciplining offending church-members. —Judge (to intelligent juryman): “ Would you convict a man on circumstantial evidence?” “Idunno wot dat is, Jedge.” “ Well, what do you think it is?” “ Well, ’cordin’ to my jedgment, sarcumstanshil is ’bout dis: Es one man shoots anudder an’ kills him, he orter be hung for it. Es he don’t kill him, he orter go to de plenipotentiary.” —An eminent foreign physician asserts that the drinking of coffee invigorates and improves the sight. Coffee, however, is not alone in that respect, as any fellow who, after a little spree, has found two key-holes in the door can testify.} The Piano Harp Cabinet Organ is a new invention, combining three and onehalf octaves of a piano-forte, or of an instrument with tones between those of the piano and the harp, with the organ. It is a beautiful instrument, costing but little more than the organ. The Mason & Hamlin Organ Co. are not able to manufacture it rapidly enough to supply the demand. —The Grand Opera-House in New York has not been sold to Senator Stewart, of Nevada. But A. T. Stewart talks of buying it and the property adjoining for $1,000,000, and opening another dry goods store. Medical Advertising.— The medical profession are outspoken in their denunciation of the system of medical advertising, and declare that any medicine that is advertised is a fraud. How thoroughly inconsistent and unfair is such an argument. The men who are so loud in their criticisms are those who advertise themselves as medical smarts by ostentatious display; splendid residences with massive door-plates; fast horses and costly carriages. . Dr. J. Walker, of California, an old practitioner, respected alike for his skill and conscientious independence, dares to differ; and having discovered in his Vinegar Bitters— a purely herbalistic medicine, free from all spirituous poisons—a wonderful specific for numerous disorders, advertises the same for the relief of his fellow-man, and is borne out in his declarations of its many virtues by thousands of invalids who are being cured of disease by its use. 27