Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1884 — To Cook and to Sew. [ARTICLE]

To Cook and to Sew.

A lady writer in the Rural New Yorker says: “A mother who allows her boys to grow up ignorant of wholesome cookery and the fine art of sewing, fails in her duty. Henry Ward Beecher’s mother taught him At an early age to sew ; and for lads full of activity, who cannot be kept quiet, sewing is an excellent pastime or discipline. If boys sewed more and romped less, and girls sewed less and romped more, the gain would be mutual. Then, too, if every member of the family knows how to prepare a meal the relief to the mother or wife is almost immeasurable. ”

There are said to be 36 varieties of oak in the United States, 34 of pine. 9 of fir, 5 of spruce, 4 of hemlock, 12 of ash, 3 of hickory, 18 of willow, 3 of cherry, 9 of poplar, 4 of maple, 2 of persimmon, and 3of cedar. The New York Museum of Natural History is to have a complete collection of the native woods of our entire country. The logs are being prepared for that purpose. They will be for the most part five feet long. ,a section of half the thickness of the logs at one end being removed. In this Way both (the longitudinal and transverse grainings are shown. There is also a diagonal cut on the section, ..which displays the graining also. The remainder of the log remains in its natural condition, with the bark attached.

Dr. Nachtigal has described some curious trees of the about Lake Chad in Africa. The butter tree bears a peculiar nut whose oil is much used as a substitute for butter; a leguminous tree—Parkia biglobosa—produces seeds from which a meal is made which is an exceUent food; while the wood-tree has a fruit which bursts like the pods of cotton and reveals a soft and lustrous mass of fibers, which may be used for a variety of purposes, such as stuffing cushions and mattresses.