608 



TAllMER'S REGISTER— STONE FENCING. 



treading it with the feet in a rivulet. The whole 

 is then to be completely dried, eitlier in the sun or 

 by fire, and repeatedly ground in a flour-mill. The 

 ground wood is next baked into small flat cakes, 

 with water rendered slightly mucilaginous by the 

 addition of some decocliou of linseed, ma'low 

 stalks and leaves, lime-tree bark, or any othersuch 

 substance. Professor Autenrieth prefers mursh- 

 mallow roots, of which one ounce renders eighteen 

 quarts of water sufFniently mucilaginous, and 

 these serve to form tour pounds and a half oi' 

 wood-flour into cakes. These cakes are baked un- 

 til they are brov/n on the surface. After this they 

 are broken to pieces, and again ground, until the 

 flour pass through a fine boalting-cloth; and upon 

 the fineness of the flour does its fitness to make 

 bread depend. The flour of a hard toood, such as 

 beech, requires the process of baking and grinding 

 to be repeated. Wood-fiour does not ferment so 

 readily as wheaten-flour, but the Professor found 

 fifteen pounds of birch-wood flour, with three 

 pounds of sour wheat-leaven, and two pounds of 

 wheat-flour, mixed up with eight measures of new 

 milk, yielded thirty-six pounds of very good bread. 

 The learned Professor tried the nutritious proper- 

 ties of wood-flour, in the first instance, upon a 

 young dog; afterwards lie fed two pigs upon it; 

 and then, taking courage from the success of the 

 experiment, he attacked it himself. His family 

 party, he says, ate it in the form ol" gruels or soup, 

 dum|)lings and pancakes, all made with as little 

 of any other ingredient as possible; and found 

 them palatable and quite wholesome. Are v/e, 

 then, instead of looking upon a human being 

 stretched upon a bare plaidc as the picture of ex- 

 treme want and wretchedness, to regard him as 

 reposing in the lap of abundance, and consider, 

 henceforth, the common phrase 'bed and board' 

 as compounded of s}non3"mous terms? 



The Laplanders of Tryssild, and the mountain- 

 ous part of Oesterladen, are said by Von Bach, 

 in his Travels through Norway and Lapland, in 

 ISOG — 7—8, to make a bread, called by them 

 Barke Brod, in thelbllowing manner: — 



"When the young and vigorous fir trees are 

 felled, to the gi-eat injury of the woods, tlie tree is 

 stripped of its bark for its whole length; the. outer 

 part is carefully peeled fi'om the bark; the deeper 

 interior covering is then shaved ofT, and nothing 

 remains but the innermost rind, which is extreme- 

 ly soil and white. It is then hungup several days 

 in the air to dr}-, and afterwards baked in an oven; 

 it is next beat on wooden blocks, and then ]'ouud- 

 ed as finely as possible in wooden vessels. But all 

 this is not enough: the mass is yet to be carried to 

 the mill and ground into coarse meal like barlcj- or 

 oats. This meal is mixed up with thrashed oat- 

 ears, or with a few moss- seeds; and a bread of 

 about an inch tliickness is formed of thiscomijosi- 

 tion."— p. 87. 



In another place, the same traveller, talking of 

 the Enare Laplanders, says, — 



"In summer they scarcely eat anything but fish 

 from the fresh water lakes, and drink v/ifh great 

 oagerness the water in which the fisli li;is been 

 boiled. In winter they must, put up v.-ith dried 

 fish, and with soups ot\vater, fir bark, and i-ein-dcer 

 tallow. They peel off, in summer, the innermost 

 bark of the fir, divide it in long strips, andhano- 

 them in their dwellings to dry for v.-inter stores! 

 When used, these strips of bark are minced in 



small pieces along with the rein-deer tallow, and 

 boiled together for several hours with water, till 

 they form a thick broth." — p. 324. 



it is not improbable, says Dr. Front, v,-hcn 

 speaking of this method, that during the above 

 processes the lignin combines with wafer, and 

 Ibrms an artificial starch; what the change may 

 be we will not voiture to decide. As tor ihe 

 spongy bread made by the Tubingen Professor, 

 we should like very nuich to taste it; but with re- 

 spect to the poor Laplander's coarse and husky 

 variety of the siajf <f life, it can be, we greatly 

 fear, little better than the newly-invented patent 

 bread of our own metropolis. 



One v/ord on this new-fangled article. It is well 

 known that in tlie old established way of baking, 

 the steam which arises during the process is al- 

 lowed to escape as of no value; but accident dis- 

 covered, a few years ago, that this va]jor, if con- 

 densed, exhibhed traces of alcohol, and the collec- 

 tion of itimmedialely became an object of cupidhy 

 and speculation; and this, together with some 

 saving of fuel during the process of baking, sug- 

 gested the peitent and the formation of the com- 

 pany upon a great scale. One of its recomnienda- 

 tions wns, that bread so made, though kept lor any 

 length of time, does not become sour; and this 

 we understand is the fact; but how and at what 

 expense is this incorruptibility ]~rocured.' Sour 

 bread is unquestionably bad; but is not bread 

 which, if kept too long, is liable to become sour, 

 the very article we want? In the nevr method, 

 the distillation (for such it is in reality) is pushed 

 as far as it can go: the whole product of the fer- 

 mentation is obtained and collected, so that the 

 residue, or loaf, may be regiirded as a caput ntor- 

 tuuni, incapable of undergoing further change; 

 but is it not rather unluckily deprived, at the same 

 time, of its saccharine j.rinciple — in sliort, of ail 

 nutritive property? For our own parts, we adhere 

 to the old orthodox 'bread v.nth the gin in it.' 



THE WAY TO BUILD STOXE FKrfCES — SOW- 

 ING ASHKS W ITH GAPSUM. 



Madison County, (Va.) Jan. 2\si, 1835. 



To tho Editor of tlie Farmevs'' register. 



I noticed in 3'our January No. of the Farmers' 

 Registei', information ;\sked for, by "A Querist," 

 respecting the best mode of making stone fencing. 

 Having had some experience in i.his operation, I 

 will endeavor to describe my mode. The mate- 

 rial which I use is round river stone — of all, the 

 most dilncult to make stand. The stone wall or 

 fijnce, when built (on a level surface) is 4.V feet 

 lilgh, 4 feet wide at (he base and the sides drawn 

 in regularly as they rise. The ];roper!o"m is pre- 

 served easiiy and correct!;/, by making use of the 

 frame which will be nov^^ described. Two planks, 

 each 7 feet. 10 inches in length, 9 or 10 inches 

 wide, and \\ iiu'-hes thick, arc couj.led together 

 like the raflers of a house, or so as to be some- 

 thing like the letter A, but presenting other ];ro- 

 fiOrtions. The two j.-ianlcs, (leprcseiitcd by the 

 sides of the A,) arc united at the top by the sides 

 of the ends — and tlie other ends, or feel, are 

 spread open so as to bo 4 feet apart, and are se- 

 cured at that distance by a ho'izontal cress piece, 

 or collar beam, as it may be called, which is made 

 of scantling, and is to be at 4^ feet, peiY-endicular dis- 



