FOR PROMOTING AGRICULTURE . 



forth from thousands of farms in Massachusetts towards 

 the nearest market, laden with the gooseberry substitute. 

 Efforts to solve the wheat-growing problem did not 

 cease, and in 1814, four members reported in the Journal 

 their success, and described the method, in raising a large 

 crop free from " rust" (a blight which the grain was 

 thought to be specially liable to in sea-shore towns), name- 

 ly, John Lowell at Roxbury, Josiah Quincy at Quincy, 

 Peter C. Brooks at Medford and John Jenks at Salem. In 

 1814 a gold medal, of $50 value, was given to Andrew 

 Haliburton of Portsmouth, N. H., for his newly invented, 

 but not patented churn. In principle, though not exact 

 form, it was the same as the rotary churn now in use. 

 The value of cut feed for cattle was becoming understood 

 and in 1815, the trustees awarded Elisha Hotchkiss of 

 Brattleboro, Vt., the highest premium for his hay or straw 

 cutter, and bought of him his patent right for the State of 

 Massachusetts. Certificates granting liberty to use the 

 apparatus were freely given by the secretary of the society 

 to persons in this State, on application. Two years later 

 another patented cutter appeared, which was an improve- 

 ment, and embodied the main principle of that now in 

 use. 



In 1814 an article appeared in the Journal, with cor- 

 dial editorial commendation, relating to the mangel-wur- 

 zel beet. It was a translation from " the most approved 

 work on agriculture in use in France." The vegetable is- 

 termed in literal translation " the root of scarcity," which 

 seems a quaint if not ambiguous name, until the text 

 explains it. The statement is that the Germans, and the 

 French who copied their practice, pluck the lower leaves 

 of the vegetable during its four growing months for suc- 

 culent food for cattle, and that the root will keep sound, 

 after harvesting, for eight months, thus supplying the cat- 

 tle the rest of the year. Hence, the intimation is that a 

 liberal cultivation of this root will offset and defeat 

 scarcity in other sorts of feed during the round year. 



