160 THE FARMER AT HOME. 



they could, by the impression maie on their feet, go from place to 

 place with the precision of persons who can see, not only in their own 

 houses and about their own premises, but for miles from home, find- 

 ing any fixed object with unfailing certainty. True, such a discipline 

 of feeling cannot be achieved without repeated and successive efforts. 

 And we have known persons both blind and deaf with whom one 

 might converse tolerably well by spelling the words to be used, and 

 marking each letter with the finger, on the inside of their hands, they 

 pronouncing the letters as soon as made, as though they had seen 

 them. 



FENCES. In this country, next to a good soil, good fences may 

 be considered one of the most indispensable conditions of good farm- 

 ing. Without them the crop is never safe ; cattle are sure to become 

 unruly and troublesome ; and neighbors, too, become vexed, and at 

 last quarrelsome. In some countries, as in France, there are few or 

 no enclosures. The inhabitants principally live in villages, and the 

 animals of all kinds are kept under the charge of individuals who pre- 

 vent them injuring the crops. In England stone walls and hedges 

 are used for forming enclosures, and the last are so abundant as to 

 form one of the most prominent and beautiful features in the land- 

 scape. In the United States, rail fence of some kind is principally 

 used ; the most common being the post and rail, or the Virginia 

 worm fence. The hedge-fence is yet scarcely known among us, and 

 the attempts that have been made to introduce it, either owing to 

 unskilfulness, the selection of improper materials, or the peculiar 

 nature and dryness of our climate in the summer months, have not 

 been very successful. It is probable, however, that these difficulties 

 will eventually be surmonnted, and hedges become common. At 

 present, where stone can be procured suitable for wall, fences partly 

 or wholly of this material are the best that can be made. A stone 

 wall of five feet is better security against unruly animals than a rail 

 fence of seven ; and though generally costing more at first, is not un- 

 frequently the cheapest in the end. Where stone for a wall cannot 

 be had, a good fence is made by laying a wall of three feet, placing a 

 rail on the top of this, then staking it, and finishing with another 

 rail. 



FERMENTATION. An intense commotion, to which certain 

 substances of vegetable or animal origin are, more or less, liable, 

 from the spontaneous reaction of their constituent elements. The 

 process embraces a series of changes of composition, and terminates 

 in the formation of new products, which differ essentially from the 

 original substance, as well as from one another. Fermentation is 

 accordingly divided into three kinds ; and to these, epithets have been 

 applied descriptive of the products to which it gives birth, namely, 

 the saccharine, the vinous, the acetous, and the putrefactive. The 

 first of these produces sugar ; the second, alcohol^ the third, vinegar, 



