240 



FARMERS' REGISTER— CALCULATING MACHINE. 



Your Orange correspondent is mistaken in sup- 

 posing tiiat it is a worm which proves so destruc- 

 tive to pine timber. The mischief is done by a 

 email black bug about the size of the smallest 

 kind offield pea. It is possible, but I Jiardly think 

 true, that the bug is the parent of the worm al- 

 luded to by your correspondent. The latter is of- 

 ten found more than an inch long. I have never 

 seen it in the living timber, but always in the dead. 

 I discovered the black bug by cutting through the 

 bark at the holes perforated by them in the living 

 pines. They kill the tree by eating away the 

 tender inner rind of the bark. 



There is an error I think in the plan advised by 

 Mr. Edmunds, of Charlotte, in a former number 

 of the Register, for raising tobacco plants, which 

 ought to be corrected, especially as Mr. E. is 

 known to be one of the very best planters in Vir- 

 ginia. He recommends that the plant-bed should 

 be grubbed before burning. I am sure the better 

 plan is to cut down the small bushes close to the 

 ground with an axe, and grub after burning. By 

 grubbing in the first instance, you necessarily cover 

 a great many grass seeds with earth so deep that 

 the fire will not kill them. These are, by the hoe- 

 ing necessary to prepare the bed for sowing, 

 brought near to the surface, and vegetate as soon, 

 or sooner than the tobacco seed, proving very 

 hurtful to the young plants, and difficult to be era- 

 dicated. 



If arsenic will destroy crows I know an easy 

 plan of administering it to them. It is to bait them 

 with corn and crumbs of bread at some place 

 where they resort, until they go to it in numbers; 

 and then dissolving as much arsenic in water as 

 may be thought sufficient, mix it with meal, bake 

 or dry it by the fire, break in small pieces, and 

 place them at the bait. The crows will eat it 

 without hesitation, as soon as they alight. To 

 make them find and go to the bait early, it is best 

 to scatter some new white corn cobs at the spot. 



ference, and protest against the propriety of such a 

 rule being applied. In presenting to the readers of the 

 Farmers' Register the selections made from other pub- 

 lications, it is designed to take whatever may be most 

 valuable — not in the opinion of one individual alone — 

 but what may be so in the opinion of any other, whose 

 judgement deserves to be respected. Many matters 

 of opinion or of fact, contained in these selections, may 

 (and often do) appear to us as mistaken or false — but 

 it would be uncalled for and ridiculous in every such 

 case to be presenting our opinions, instead of leaving 

 readers to think and decide for themselves. Besides — 

 in selecting from the latest publications, and from very 

 remote countries, there are many statements which are 

 either so novel, or so dependent on testimony not with- 

 in our reach, that no mature opinion can be at once 

 made up: and any other would be improper to offer. 

 Yet to withhold these novelties from our readers be- 

 cause their value is doubtful, would be to keep them 

 in the dark as to the progress of agricultural discovery 

 and improvement. In agricultural science, as in all 

 others, it is proper that all opinions and practices 

 which engage attention in a considerable degree should 

 be made known, and the true will prevail, and the false 

 be disproved, or soon forgotten. I 



If the spot selected for baiting is situated so that 

 mischief may be done by other animals than 

 crows eating the poisoned bread, it will be best to 

 conceal some person near the bait \v'ho may hinder 

 the access to it of any thing besides the crows. I 

 adopted the plan the past spring, and the poisoned 

 bread was greedily eaten by the crows. I found 

 no dead ones, but my farm which had been pre- 

 viouslj^ much infested, was quickly cleared of all 

 but a few which I am persuaded did not eat the 

 poison. 



It has occurred to me that the best means of ex- 

 tirpating sassafras would be to bore a hole Avith 

 an auger into ihe tr^e and deposite in it some sub- 

 stance vvhich mixed with the circulating sap Avould 

 destroy the vitality of the roots, as well as the up- 

 per part of the tree. Will you, or some of your 

 subscribers, inform me Avhat substance is likely to 

 have this effect? I have without success fried 

 digging them up at all seasons of the year; and 

 t know fhat stock will not browse on them enough 

 to kill them, unless in the absence of all better and 

 more favorite food. There haA^e been kept in one 

 of my fields during the v/hole of the present year 

 more than one hundred sheep, sixty or seventy 

 hogs, twenty-three milch cows and work oxen, 

 besides colts and horses, without killing (as far as 

 I have seen) a single sassafr-as bush. I would 

 willingly pay five per cent, on the cost of my land 

 to have this pest entirely destroyed. 



W. O. G . 



Mft. babbage's calculating machiive. 



The following details will be read with considera- 

 ble interest; more especially as they set at rest the 

 attempts which have been made in some quarters 

 to depreciate one of the greatest projects of the 

 age. 



The Calculating Machine described ky Sir Da- 

 vid Bretoster. — Of all the machines which have 

 been constructed in modern times, the calculating 

 machine is doubtless the most extraordinary. Pieces 

 of mechanism for performing particular arithme- 

 tical operations have been long ago constructed, 

 but these bear no comparison either in ingenuity 

 or in magnitude to the grand design conceived 

 and nearly executed by Mr. Babbage. Great as 

 the power of mechanism is known to be, yet we' 

 venture to say that many of the most intelligent of 

 our readers will scarcely admit it to be possible that 

 astronomical and navigation tables can be accu- 

 rately computed by machinery; that the machine 

 can itself correct the errors which it may commit; 

 and that the results of its calculations, when abso- 

 lutely free from error, can be printed oft", Avithout 

 the aid of human hands, orthe operation of human 

 intelligence. All this, hoAvever, Mr. Babbage's 

 machine can do; and as I ha\'ehad theadA-antage 

 of seeing it actually calculate, and of studjang its 

 construction AvithMr. Babbage himselfj I am able 

 to make the aboA-e statement on personal observa- 

 tion. The calculating machine noAv constructing 

 under the superintendence of the iuA^ntor has been 

 executed at the expense of the British government, 

 and is of course their propertj^ If consists essen- 

 tially of two parts, a calculating part, and a print- 

 ing part, both of Avhich are necessary to the fulfil- 

 ment of Mr. Babbage's vIbaa-s, for the Avhole ad- 

 vantage Avouldbe lost if the computations made by 

 the machine Avere copied by human hands and 



