The morning call., 1893-06-04
In the kitchen garden dark and beard

In the kitchen garden dark and beard
ed man was hoeing vegeta bles.
Many little children, in bare feet, played
around the porch. l entered and asked to
hoe The garden for nights lodging.
mo. we can't take you," said the man i:
''we amt got no accommodation"
Got barn, haven't youP'
YES"
And some hay In it?"
"a little" he replied, grinning.
We'll, that's all [ want"
ASK your mother" said the man to the
Oldest child, thirteen-year-old girl.
The little girl ran to the kitchen and all
the little urchins stared at me. Presently
she returned and said:
Mamma says certainly"
At about o'clock we went in to supper.
The mother was a strong, healthy-look-
ing woman in spite of her seven children.
ranging from l to Is years of age. She
had red face. turned-up nose, pretty
brown hair. and appeared to be about 80
or SO years of age. About every fifteen
minutes she stopped down from her cook
ing, picked up the baby, who, although
but year old, ran about the house with
the rest, chucked him up and down with
great rapidly, the while yelling out
nursery rhymes, pet names, baby talk,
special cluckings and other sounds de-
signed to amuSe or instruct, | could not
tell which. Her burst of maternal affec-
ton over. she put him down quietly and
resumed her cooking She repeated this
performance with mathematical regu-
larity.
We all sat down together. Emma, Ade-
line. Florence, Matte and Tommie sat on
my side of the table, and on the other side
little Martha, pretty dark-eyed little
maiden OF three summers, sat between the
hired man and her father, upon whose
knee the baby was perched.
The family. taken as a whole, presen ted
an interesting study in the gastronomy of
soft-boled-egg eating. The father welded
knife in dangerous proximity to the
baby's head. The baby himself ate from
his fathers plate, using his little crooked
fingers as implements. He grasped
pieces of the white with some little diff
Guilty on account of the slipperyness of the
material. The liquid yelk presented fewer
difficulties, as sufficient Of the yellow semi
liquid adhered to his thumbs for all practi-
cal purposes.
He was so absorbed in this labor that
the blade of his fathers knife, circulating
with fearful rapidly between the palernal
counteDance and The plate, failed 10 frighten
the baby in the least
Matte used fork on her soft boiled egg
Oracle used knife as her father did, on ly
she grasped the blade several inches nearer
the point than her papa. Adeline used a
knife IN one hand and a fork in the other.
Jimmy and Tommy cut off the top of the
shell, put on Jumps of butter and dug them
out again drenched in salacious coating
of egg.
The hired man was the most accom-
plished egg-masticator of the family. He
cut off the top of his soft boiled egg, put in
salt, pepper. sugar and butter, mashed 1t
all together with spoon into mass of
homogeneous consistency, graspedlthe egg
with both hands. threw his head back with
jerk, and poured the tempting contents of
the shell down his throat swallowing il
with one gulp.
Being in Rome I tried my best to do as
the Romans did, but l found it hard to
initiate their egg-eating. 1t was beyond
me. | must have seemed very awk ward
to them. and hope they made due allow
ance for my table manners.
While the children played hde-and-seek
around the house [ talked business with
the farmer and his hired man; and when
our voices were not drowned by the lula
bies Of his wife, who was putting the one
year.od egg-eater 10 sleep, the farmer
managed to inform me of the labor situa-
ton on his side OF Napa Valley.
he said that it was often such bother