FARMERS' REGISTER— LEGAL GRAZLXG— BREAD MADE OF WOOD. 607 



plied without difficulty. Peeled slabs may be used 

 instead of boards, for the posts are so narrow that 

 tlie slabs can be cut to the proper thickness with 

 an adze very easily. I have not written to exhaust 

 tlie subjoct, but am in hopes that others wilt be in- 

 duced to give their thoiiifhls upon it, for I fully 

 believe that our Ibrests at^brd all that need be re- 

 (|uired for fence posts. I object to the common 

 mode of setting posts in tlie ground, lor the sole 

 reason that the greatest support is required wliere 

 they are the most liable to decay, tuid this I con- 

 ceive to be unavoidable. I would invite my bro- 

 ther farmers to make experiments for themselves, 

 and publish the results, for relbrm is loudly called 

 for. 



Holland Patent, Dec. 2d, 1S34. 



will feed theni out of the same spoon at our next 

 election. 



Norfolk County, Va., 

 Dec. 20</t, 183 1. 



A RADICAL. 



LEGAL GRAZING, OR THE RIGHT OF COMMON. 

 To the Editor of the Farmers' Register. 



I duly received the petition to the legislature for 

 the water fence law confining itseli^to the James Ri- 

 ver and its tributary branches; but as this does not in 

 any material way concern us, a number of signa- 

 tures need not be expected. I only regret that it 

 was not one of a difierent character — one, to alter 

 the general law of enclosures. I feel safe in saj^- 

 ing, that a memorial of this kind would receive 

 almost universal sanction in this county — though 

 the time has been, when it would have been scowl- 

 ed from among us as a lawless usurpation of the 

 rights oj" the poor. But these dark days are past, 

 and we hope, buried forever in the vortex of time, 

 and a brighter and more auspicious morn is dawn- 

 ing upon us. We have been taught wisdom in 

 the hard and christening school of experience. 

 We have clung eagerly to the old fabric, knowing 

 no man as a landholder only so far as he had it en- 

 closed with a lawful fence, until we are bankrupts 

 in stock raising, (and I like to have said, every 

 thing else connected with farming.) We can ne- 

 ver arrive to eminence, or even respectability, as 

 a stock raising counrty, as long as thu5 legal scourge 

 of grazing in common, exists. Though nature in 

 her smiling moments have lavished upon us her 

 choicest gifls — our lands carpetted with the richest 

 green, and fed witli tlie fattest soil, and meliorated 

 with the most happy clime, all inviting the varied 

 kinds of stock from more rigorous and snowy 

 climes, but we are deterred by the melancholy ex- 

 perience of the past, from attempting to aspire to 

 reputation in this all-important branch of judicious 

 husbandry. All the helps or advantages that the 

 leo-islature of Virginia canbetowon the agi-icultu- 

 ralcommunity tor many j-ears to come, would not 

 compensate them for the losses and injury that 

 have been sustained from this law : an unphilan- 

 thropiclaw, one, that is a friend to none — an ene- 

 my to the poor — a tyrant to the rich — a scourge to 

 the industrious — a flatterer of the careless and 

 indigent. I am glad to see the determined stand 

 that^many counties have taken to rid themselves 

 of this hardship. Asthe campaign is commenced, 

 and the baimer unfurled, it only requires that we 

 should rally to the standard; and if our representa- 

 tives now sitting, still persist in turning a deaf eari 

 to the loud calls that are now made upon them, Ave 



From the London Quarterly Review of Nov. 1st, 1834. 



ALIMENTARY SUBSTANCES BREAD MADE OF 



WOOD. 



Dr. Prout has of late clearly proved that all the 

 chief alimentary matters employed by man may 

 be reduced to three classes, viz., saccharine, oily, 

 and albuminous substances, the most perfect spe- 

 cimens of which are respectively sugar, butter, 

 and white of c^g. The saccharine principle, in 

 its extended sense, includes all those substances 

 which are chiefly derived from the vegetable 

 kingdom — means, in fact, the same thing as what 

 we commonly call vegetable diet. It comprehends 

 all those sub.stances, whatever their sensible pro- 

 perties may be, into the composition of which the 

 hydrogen and oxygen enter in the proportion in 

 which they form water; — for example — what per- 

 haps may not a little surprise the reader — the fibre 

 of wood, which chemists call lignin. Much skil- 

 ful manipulation and delicacy of experiment were 

 required to establish this result; but the nutritive 

 property of the woody fibre — in short, that a tol- 

 erably good quartern loaf can be made out of a 

 deal board — has been proved by the recent labors 

 of a German Professor, and maybe verified by 

 any one who will take the trouble to repeat 

 them: — 



"The following (saj-s Dr. Prout) was the meth- 

 od he employed tor this purj)ose. In the first place, 

 ever} thing that was soluble in water was removed 

 by frequent maceration and boiling; the wood was 

 then reduced to a minute state of di\ision, that is 

 to say, not merely into fine fibres, but actual pow- 

 der; and after being repeatedly subjected to the 

 heat of an oven, Avas ground in the usual manner 

 of corn. Wood thus prepared, according to the 

 author, acquires the smell and taste of corn-flour. 

 It is, however, never (juite white, but always of a 

 yeliOd'ish color. It also agrees with corn-flour in 

 this respect, that it docs not ferment without the 

 addition of leaven, and in this case sour leaven of 

 corn-flour is found to answer best- With this it 

 makes a perfectly uniforoi and spongy bread; and 

 when it is thoroughly baked, and has much crust, 

 it has a much better taste of bread than what in 

 times of scarcity is prepared from the bran and 

 husks of corn. Wood-flour, also, boiled in water, 

 forms a thick, tough, trembling jelly, like that of 

 wheat-starch, and which is verjMiutritious." — Phi- 

 losophical Transactions, 1827, Part II. p. 318. 



To make wood-flour in perleciion, according to 

 Professor Autenrietli, the wood, after being tho- 

 roughly stripped of its bark, is to be sawed trans- 

 versely into disks of about an inch in diameter. 

 The saw-dust is to be preserved, and the disks are 

 to be beaten to fibres in a pounding-mill. The 

 fibres and saw-dust, mixed together, are next to be 

 deprived of evervthing harsh and bitter Avhich is 

 soluble in water, "by boiling them, where fuel is 

 abundant, orbv subjecting them for a longer time 

 to the action o'f cold water, which is easily done 

 by enclosing them in a strong sack, which they 

 only half fill, and beating the sack with a stick, or 



