WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 109, 24 September 1912, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

(Conducted by "Eileen.") HOME-MADE JAMS. HOW TO MAKE THEM A SUCCESS. (From an English paper.)

Jam in such a common article of food iu thU country that provision merchants and others who furnish our tables have profited by the demand, and cater so fill]j" for the needs of the community that the art of home-made jam-making is slowly dying out. People say they can buy jam cheaper than they can make it at home. And so they can, perhaps, in taking the actual cost into consideration; but there can be no comparison bet\V!?n the value of the two articles.

Honumade jam is what it professos to bo —made of pure fruit and sugar; th.; composition of that which is bought at tha provision merchant's is often very different from what you would expect frjm the reading of the label. x'heie are several makers whose names ar; household words, and whose goods are beyond reproach, but other manufacturer* are not so scrupulous. Catering for the love of cheapness, they are ob'i&cd to bring substitutes for fruit to their aid ; and not only substitutes for fruit which are, perhaps, in their way, wholesome, but barrel-loads of already cleaned plum-stones are imported annually into England. These stones evidently go into jams purporting to be plum. The house-mother should always endeavor to make the jam for her children's consumption herself. At anyrate, she has the satisfaction of knowing that it is clean and wholesome, even if the color be not so bright as the shop-made article. Perfect soundness of fruit is the essential point. Two fermented strawberries will sour a whole pot of jam. Moist sugar, unless the jam is to be used at once, should not be used. The broken or crumbled portions of preserving sugar should be sifted before use. The best sugar of all to use is loaf, brokeu into small lumps. The initial cost is a trifle more, but as jam made with this sugar requires no skimming, or so very little as to be of no account, it is not* so wasteful in the long run.

} Three-quarters of a pound is the proper ' quantity to allow per pound of fruit. If the jam is to be kept for a long ! time, boil the fruit for thirty minutes before adding the sugar. _ Let it com"e I to the boil again, and stir for twenty minutes. The pots to be used should not j only be dry, but they should be well * heated first'in order to remove any lurk- | in cr dampness. Tie down the jam whilst I it D is still hot. Use the special covers J obtainable for a few pence at any atai tioner's shop. Never let the pots touch J one another in the store cupboard, and never stand them one upon another. Do not scrub the shelf you intend to keep your jam-pots on the day of the jammaking. Do it a good week ahead. Mildew is apt to form if theie precautions are omitted. Jelly-making is more troublesome, and it is not a success if the jelly is dull or muddy in appearance. The berries I should be picked and put in a pan with a lwilf-pint of water to each one pound of fruit. This is boiled till tender, poured intp a fine flannel or muslin >b&g, and left to drip. The juiee w measured next morning, one pound of sugar i» allowed to each pint, and they are boiled together. The test for jam is applied, and 1 ft is ready for the jars. Another way ii to put the picked ferries in a jar and 1 steam them till tender in & pan or water, strain the liquid off carefully, and boil with sugar, as above. FICTION ABOUT WOMEH I POPULAR NOVELIST'S VIEWS.

A bitter condemnation of the masculine arguments against granting the yote t« women is put forward by Miss Annie Steele in a letter to The Times. The Conciliation Bill is shelved by petty party politics, she "eaja, and women who, as I, have for 50 years upheld the urgent need for humanity to use ev»ry possible factor in its effort to solve the problem of life must wait a(,»in —le'". U3 hope in dignity and peace. Yet, confronted once more with the puerile arguments used' against us in the House of Commons and the columns of the newspapers, some of us cannot refrain from crying aloud (like the soul* beneath the alter):

HOW LONG, 0 LORD! HOW LONG? Take the perfectly beautiful platitudes about the vote.striking at the root of marriage! Could it strike harder than the Income Tax, which absolutely penalises marriage, or that last, man-made absurdity, the Insurance Act, under which the only woman who can claim maternity benefit is the one who has dispensed with the legal position of wife! THE TRUCE OF GOD.

Then the equally beautiful fiction of the '"truce of God" between man and woman. Since when have women ceased to be hanged for murder by laws they have not made! We all know Shakespeare's and. Dick Swiveller's estimate of the man who lays his finger on a woman; but does it find favor with the masses? And violence is not only physi#al. What of the pressure put to force women's work down to the lowest remunerative level? That is must always be of lower value than man's by onefourth all know; but what male employer of labor looks this fact solidly, honestly, modestly in the face and takes it into account like any other factor with which he has to deal?

"WOMAN'S CHIEF END." ] Again, what damnable iteration ia there not concerning woman's proper work? What * sheer sham it is! Once, indeed, we were the makers, the menders, the mothers of the world; but the clamorous horde of men we ourselves have engendered by our false aexual standards has filched our work from us. We are now, for the most part, mere parasites, and like all parasitic life we clincr to what gives us being, foolishly, helplessly. But the evil is working its own undoing. Year by year the growing hordes of men find it more and more diflicult to feed themselves, so more and more women join the ranks of the workers. Yet still men pretend that every woman is under coverture bv snrnc male. It would be such a relief if they would abandon argument, range themselves boldly under Mr Asquith's banner, and say once and for all; "Sex. in itself is a disability."