HOME AND EDUCATION

...Mr...

...Apply the same test to the buying of window curtains...

...This does not mean that intelligent parents are looking for rules of conduct...

...This is a house fly, because housekeepers allow it to make its home in their kitchens, dining rooms and nurseries...

...House-Flies as Carriers of Disease AS IF IN response to the needs of the women who are interesting themselves in a warfare against flies, there appeared in the September issue of the Journal of Hygiene, which is published at Cambridge University, England, an article which presents in most readable form the facts that are known to science concerning these pests and the part they play in carrying disease...

...Simple, is it not...

...The book is really all about children, their inherent tendencies, the way they learn to be good, and the way they learn to be bad, and the problems of modern home training, of modern school training, modern social training...

...It might be called the Tuberculosis and Diphtheria agent, because it picks up these germs and carries them directly into your homes...

...A letter from Mrs...

...i hope to find space on my page in future issues of the magazine, for some of the good things i have marked for quotation...

...Flroence Kelley says: "The Health Officer, Dr...

...An uncarpeted staircase loses all its terrors in a family whose footfalls are muffled...

...It is simply out of the question to make with the embroidery needle a realistic rose...

...In the transition from old methods and theories to new as to the bringing up of children, much confusion has arisen as to which are "sentimental" and which are sound...

...And I want to suggest that in reading this book it is well to go through it and get the general philosophy and spirit before passing judgment on details...

...If so, a good photograph or a good colored print would have been better...

...Where Health Officer* and Housekeepers Co-operate Rochester, N. Y., with nearly 200,000 population, has not had one death from typhoid in three months...

...See how cleverly It can carry things on its sponge-like feet...

...Each one of us should in a degree be an authority...

...Flowers, books, stationery and handkerchiefs fit into this plan...

...A special study of the connection between flies and the prevalence of the so-called summer complaint, or the seasonal diarrhea of children has been made, and Mr...

...or someone, the maker or the dealer or the buyer, went on a foolish chase after novelty...

...But we are apt to be a little narrow, and place too much value upon our individual experience...

...These two facts make the location of dump heaps a very important matter...

...The only important objections to bare floors relate to their noisiness and to the fact that they (particularly the tiled and cement ones) are hard on the feet...

...It is not the shop girls alone who suffer from our irrational method of buying unsuitable gifts at the last moment...

...The glass in fact seems much better adapted to this kind of treatment than to being cut...

...Was her object to cut off the view of one room from another or to prevent a draft...

...But this is not the worst of the attempt for while we are laying stitches closely side by side and trying to conceal them and to secure a smooth, even surface, we are leaving out of the account the possible decorative value of the stitches themselves...

...The small reading circle I often refer to, and like to help with suggestions now and then, will, I am confident, find Professor O'Shea's work one of the very best possible for their purpose...

...it would enlarge its volume...

...When we come to these common experiences of human life, we all feel we know something about them and we mothers have quite decided opinions...

...For in my judgment the book covers a much wider and more important field than the school room...

...We have improved somewhat, but not as much as we ought...

...Was it to relieve the bad outline of the doorway or to cover up unbeautiful woodwork...

...Note:—Outlines of the lessons in Domestic Science and a list of reference books can be obtained without cost by addressing The Home and Eudcation Department, La Pollette's Weekly, Madison, Wis...

...Nash's recent investigations show that 97 per cent., instead of 90 per cent...

...But out of all the investigation, observation, and wide discussion of recent years, there should evolve a reliable, practical, ready-for-use wisdom...

...throughout the discussion of observations and experiments of wide and intense human interest, the author preserves the calm, impersonal research attitude...

...In making carpets it used to be quite common to attempt realistic flower effects for which the material was entirely unsuited...

...The flies themselves can travel half a mile from the places where they come to life, though they usually do so by stages...

...They could anticipate the holiday trade with choice gifts without the risk of loss and waste in left-over novelties...

...Even children enjoy, quite as much as their surprises, the receipt of gifts they expect—a new dollar bill from an aunt, a choice book from a friend...

...Have you a window which looks out on an irretrievably ugly view and which you want to cover permanently without excluding much light...

...For years, the Consumer's League has been trying to educate the public to the idea of early Christmas shopping...

...Chapters I, II, III, IV...

...Where is there a thoughtful mother who has not longed for some rational philosophy, not too technical or difficult for her understanding, that would guide her in determining, according to the best modern authority and ideals, whether she was pursuing a consistent policy in the management and training of her children...

...About tiled and cemented floors in kitchens no such positive statement can be made but most of the object tions to them come from people who wear thin-soled shoes without rubber heels...

...The majority of the unsuitable materials that still remain in the average house are there for one of two reasons: Either the housekeeper failed to ask herself before she started out to buy: "What purpose is this thing to serve and what material is best suited to that purpose...

...Nash thinks that he has proved conclusively that the high death-rate among artificially fed infants as compared with that among those who are breast-fed can be traced to flies and the poisons which they introduce into milk...

...Today the question is, how to give our children the greatest joy and the largest freedom for natural spontaneous growth, without "spoiling" them...

...These features while most helpful for "study purposes" are, from my point of view, somewhat misleading...

...It excludes also all permanently draped curtains that must be immovable...

...What do you want them for...

...Do we suppose that if a woman seriously asked herself why she was getting something to hang in them, she would ever buy strings of beads or shells...

...The author is J. T. C. Nash and the title of the paper is "House-Flies as Carriers of Disease...

...This is right...

...Perhaps after thinking, you will decide that rather than spend enough money to buy curtains whose only excuse for being is their beauty, you will buy beauty in some other form...

...Here is the place for a fabric which possesses the characteristics of stained glass...

...To illustrate...

...How much better for the merchants if there were more of this standardized shopping...

...If so, she went far astray when she made her purchase...

...It excludes a fabric with a big pattern that is cut up into meaningless forms when the curtain is thrown back...

...Was it merely to get a thing of beauty into her house...

...CONSIDERING the great improvement that has been made of late in the choice of materials for household use, considering the facts that painted and hardwood floors have taken the place of carpets, that tile and enamel have banished wood from bath rooms, and that unwashable materials no longer find favor in kitchens, it seems almost as if-the subject "The Right Use of Materials" ought to be treated as a piece of history rather than as a lesson...

...For I do not agree nor will you agree, with all of them...

...In my own experience I have never been able to keep a record of observations of my growing children, but I am certain that mothers who have aptitude for this important work will find Professor O'Shea's book full of helpful suggestions as to how to make their observations of scientific value as well as interesting childhood reminiscences...

...the elaborate table of contents, the marginal topics and the careful resume at the close of each subject, together with the general text-book make-up, give the impression that it is written for student and professional use...

...Every material has a beauty and dignity of its own which are lost when it is made to look like some other material or to produce decorative effects for which it is unsuited...

...It is sufficiently difficult to produce the effect with brush and paint but with thread and needle it is impossible...

...More money would be expended with less nervous strain, with greater satisfaction and increased happiness...

...They are designed for the use of individuals and of clubs...

...And so down the list...

...To regulate the light...

...We all know how it is when Christmas day comes...

...If its only purpose is to be beautiful, it has a hard role to fill...

...The most beautiful effects in glass are obtained by melting it and blowing it into shape...

...But the makers have learned their mistake and are now content with the simple conventional patterns and geometrical forms to which the material naturally lends itself...

...Houghton, Mifflin Co., Boston...

...Musca domestica, or the common house-fly, breeds chiefly in decaying garbage, in horse-manure and the manure of other animals that feed on vegetable materials...

...We ought to dismiss from our minds as quickly as possible all thought of irremediable blunders, but why not adopt better standards of Christmas giving...

...This book of Professor O'Shea's fills this need...

...There are no startling discoveries, no sensational conclusions...

...Among grown-ups it is often a wise plan to send the same gift from year to year where one is found especially pleasing and adapted to the tastes of the person remembered...

...In this broad way it is most valuable material for all readers who are the least bit interested in the development and education of children and youth— and who is not...

...Cast iron gives beautiful low-relief effects, but attempts to produce in it the lacy effects of wrought iron, lead only to clumsy and unsatisfactory results...

...The paper as a whole is noteworthy for the clear and interesting way in which it presents the results of scientific work to unscientific readers...

...A better name is the Typhoid Fly, because it Is the mosl convenient agent for Introducing bowel troubles Into your homes...

...The Right Use of Materials (A Reading Course in Domestic Science.—Lesson viii...

...I kept wishing, while I was reading it, that I had some reliable memoranda of my own with which to make comparisons and test the author's conclusions...

...That is what makes such a book interesting and stimulating...

...THE HOUSE FLY CAMPAIGN OR CRUSADE AGAINST THE HOUSE FLY This Is a fly...

...But its larvae flourish also in waste-paper, old rags and straw...

...Here is a vote of thanks to our mothers and aunts who began the good work and after that has been passed a question seriously put to ourselves as to how we may build on the foundation they laid...

...Think a long time about that just as you did about the portiere...

...We ought to have...

...We try to shake off our weariness and postpone our regret at our foolish expenditures, and to be pleased with what we have given and to be happy with what we receive...

...For practical purposes, therefore, it is sufficient to know the life-history and habits of this fly only...

...Do you want a curtain simply for beauty...

...A single fly-speck may contain 3000 germs...

...Goler, enlisted the women to fight the flies while he looked after the milk and water...

...Wood has a beauty of its own which is spoiled when it is highly polished or when its grain is made over prominent by being filled...

...Social Development and Education, By M. V. O'Shea, Professor of Education, The University of Wisconsin...

...The subject has universal interest, there is so much room for difference of opinion, and subject for lively discussion, that its consideration cannot fail to bring out the best thought of any group of women and have for them the highest educational value...

...It leads people to try to secure in one material effects which that material can never give and it prevents them from making a given material yield its best effects...

...as formerly supposed, of the flies that come into houses are of one kind, that known as Musca domes-tica...

...Take the matter of doorways for example...

...The picture is taken from a postal sent out by the women...

...Go into the stores at holiday time as a spectator and you will see that the women behind the counters are not nearly as nervous and distracted as the women who are buying—trying to think what to get for this one and that one and when the selection is made, very likely, regretting that something else was not chosen...

...He finds also that the disease comes and goes with the fly season and that it is less prevalent in years when flies are few...

...A fly frantically trying to save itself from drowning in a small pitcher of milk quickly spreads dirt and germs through the entire mass...

...Nash attaches even more importance to the proper home-care of milk than he does to public inspection, since a given amount of filth carried by a fly will affect a small amount more than a large one...

...That excludes all fabrics that are so thin that they merely let light in and do not regulate it...

...It seems to suggest that what is needed is a material which either has a very small pattern or no pattern at all and in which the light, as it passes through, reveals beauties of texture...

...In buying it, its coloring should be studied with daylight falling through it and also with lamp light falling upon it...

...Another wise expedient is to select some gift that will be generally appreciated and instead of making a tremendous effort to think of something different for every one, send the same gift to a number of friends...

...It may be a pound of choice tea, a photograph, a bit of fancy work, or a Christmas letter...

...The search for novelty in decoration has two things to answer for...

...In such a case you need not consider how the curtain will look when it is in folds...

...If so, her purpose was surely defeated...

...The greater part of these objections could be overcome if people would wear rubber heels...

...Christmas Shopping IT IS hardly needful to point out the moral of Ernest Poole's story which appears on another page of this magazine, but I hope the women whom it reaches will read it...

...Reference: The Furnishing of a Modest Home...

...Conducted by BELLE CASE LA FOLLETTE and CAROLINE L. HUNT "Social Development and Education" THE title of this book as well as the chapter headings are rather formal...

...That this is an artistic blunder is proved by the fact that artists admire most and see the greatest possibilities in cross stitch and kindred kinds of embroidery in which the stitch itself stands out boldly and is made to contribute to the effect...

...But there is a large amount of data, discussed in the light of experience and of our new thought and philosophy and some principles and some definite, tangible lines of action are outlined which enlighten and satisfy those who realize the necessity and value of this kind of help...

...It would not lessen trade...

...He has made "spot" maps showing the location of the cases and also the location of manure piles and dump heaps of various kinds and finds that the cases are always most numerous near these breeding places...

...This is particularly true late in the summer for it has been found that flies' feet grow dirtier as the season advances...

...If it accords well with other furnishings it may have a large fine pattern...