Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1891-09-30
PEN, INK, AND PAPER.
ADELAIDE L. ROUSE.

l spent a month with Elmira last
summer. Elmira is an excellent house
keeper; her bread is perfect, her linen
is as white as snow, and she has place
for everything and everyt thing in Its
place, except pen and ink. A tritilDg
exception, You may think, IN an other
wise perfect me,,dge, but 1t did not
seem trihing to John one hot, sticky
JuIy dav. John is Elmira's husband,
and one of the most patient of men;
but let the most patient man In exist
ence leave his haylng and come to the
house with neighbor to sign paper,
if pen and Ink are missing the chances
are that something will be said that
would not look well in print.
John came in with a neighbor who
was to sign a receipt. He went to the
sitting room closet, where writing ma
terials are found when an occasional
letter is writtenCthe is not literary
householdj; he found a bottle of ink,
mostly dried away, and penholder
minus pen. Elmlra's hands were in
the bread, but she ran in answer to
Johns call After some search ing in
jar of lamplighters pen was found
and fitted in a holder. The ink was
improved by the addition of few drops
of water, and as no other paper was at
hand a leaf was cut from one of the
children's copybooks. John wrote the
receipt, stopping once to remove hair
from his pen, and rs he had no blotter
he passed the damp paper to his neigh
Dor, who wrote his name and hlotted 1T
with his square thumb, and then wiped
| the thumb on his hair. After John
had made the remarks alluded to, and
vowed that if he lived through haying
he'd have place under lock and key
where he could find writing materials
without securing the neighborhood for
them, Elmira went on with her bread,
J ohm returned to his bayfield,, and /,
who had always lived with writing ma
terials at my elbow, made a mental
memorandum of the incident for future
use.
Elmira's IS not the only household
where 1t is work of time to ''drum
mp" the necessary things to do a bit of
writing, and oftentinnes when these are
found a table must be cleared to write
on. How much trouble and. friction
would be saved if there could be desk
in the living room filled with every
thing needful. The key should hang
over it, and every member of the fam
lily should have access to it. 1t should
be supplied with paper and envelopes
of different sizes, postal cards, stamps,
pens, ink, both red and black pencils,
eraser, mucllage. paper cutter, cards, a
box of rubber straps, and one of "H"
fasteners, newspaper wrappers, and if
possible a scales for weighing letters.
There might also be ball of cord,
wrapping paper, pasteboard for doing
up photographs, and all the parapher-
MALTA for wrapping up packages.
If such a store of conyeniences was
at hand how many thing that are neg
lected would be done at once. The
acknowledgment for the little gift
would not be delayed till you are al
most ashamed to send it; the paper you
marked to send to friend would go at
once if you could lay your hand on
stamped and glued wrapper; it would
not be such task to mail that photo
graph or the little package if that ever
handy desk stood in the room. OF
course it will cost something to get
desk and stock it, but many of the
things will last long time, and it will
pay in the saving of time and temper.
-Agriculturist