124 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[August, 



For TnE Lancaster Fakmer. 

 AURORA. 



ET MAIiY K. VAN DTKE. 



Who IB slio with step so spri5htly, 



Poised on eastern liills afar, 

 riiiisrinsr l)acli ail shadDMs nit;Iit]y, 

 Liftinjr up day's curtain liriKlitly, 

 PromptinE: Pliiebus thus to lightlyj 



Vault "within his golden car ? 



Robes translucent, thickly apanjlcd 

 With dew diamonds, wrouifht by Heaven ; 



Spun gold tresses, mist entangled, 



As among them elfs had angled, 



Danced and skipped, and kissed and wrangled, 

 Since last fairy haunted even. 



From her mi.sty clouds, that cover 



Seeming ghosts, slow glide away, 

 And in mountain dingles hover, 

 Like a maiden coy from lover ; 

 Lest the daylight should discover 



That for which he still must pray. 



Prithee, is her name Aurora, 



Empress of the golden dawn, 

 Beauteous goddess, light restorer ? 

 All things lovely wake before her, 

 Bird and bee, and man adoi-e her, 



Only guilt she finds forlorn. 



Hail ! all hail ! thou Queen of Glory ! 



Time can ne'er thy grandeur blight ; 

 Thou hast laughed o'er earth's glad story, 

 Wept o'er fields of carnage gory. 

 Grieved to sec bright locks grow hoary, 



Ever since God spake thelight. 



Since the stars of night first chanted. 



Echoed by old ocean's wave. 

 Thou hast checked their song, undaunted, 

 Woke the forest-bird enchanted. 

 And in rainbow colors jiainted 



Everything outside the grave. 



That will hide our best endeavor, 



But cannot o'ershadow thee ; 

 For till Nature dies — forever 

 Queen of mornin?, thou shalt sever 

 Light from darkness — God the giver 



Thus ordained thy destiny. 



Thine example should remind us 



That we have a mission too ; 

 Morn should wake and ever find us 

 Faithful to the work assigned us, 

 Constant to the ties that bind us. 



Hopeful, loving, earnest, true. 



C'oxgackie, JV. Y.,Julyo1,lS75. 



THE GARDEN AND ORCHARD. 



Geraniums. 



Many people are obliged to rely upon the scarlet 

 Geranium as the only plant that will resist the burn- 

 ing summer suns and at tlic same time give brightness 

 to their yards. This makes it necessary to preserve 

 a large number of ])lants. Although the Geranium is 

 less essential in the comparatively moist atmosphere 

 of New York State, I have found it desirable to use 

 several hundreil plants this season. Of course, they 

 cannot lie sldred in the conservatory. My plan is the 

 following : First take a large number of young wood 

 cuttings and strip them of all buds and of all leaves 

 e-xcept the germinal ones. Cut them smooth with a 

 sharp knife below a joint. Fill a box ten inches or a 

 foot deep with soil within two inches of the top. Let 

 the dirt be sim))ly in its natural condition as found in 

 the garden — moist, but not wet. Press, the cuttings 

 down half their length or a third into the soil, with- 

 out making holes for their inscnion. Set them in as 

 close as coiivenient, without positive contact. Then 

 with the fingers careiully press the soil down between 

 them. Not a droj) of water must be put on. Set the 

 boxes in a cool room, out of the sun, or in a light 

 cellar. Let them stay there till si)ring. A few will 

 rot; most of them will have started roots; the rest 

 will be ready to do so. In early spring, if conveni- 

 ent, bring the boxes into a warm room till it is safe 

 to plant out. Those without roots, when once in the 

 garden, will not lie slow to do their duty. The cut- 

 tings should Ijc taken off in October or sooner. Mean- 

 while I cut back my old plants, strip off the leaves 

 until they sail under bare poles, and when they are 

 trim and compact pull them up or pry them out and 

 shake off most nf the dirt. In the cellar is placed a 

 box ten feet by six and four or tivc inches deep. In 

 this I plant or cover the roots of the geraniums, in 

 close array as possible. No buds or large leaves re- 

 main, and, above all things, no water is applied until 

 they are again planted out in the spring. My cellar 

 is moderately dry and cool and light. If, now, a per- 

 son has burdened the house with a half-dozen or 

 dozen large jjlants, let hii7i cut them into slips at once 

 and leave the old roots to a nuiet, dry winter's rest.— 

 B. W. Fowdl. 



Propagation of the Double White Moss Rose. 



This beautiful rose is not easily propagated, afford- 

 ing no suckers and seldom growing even from layers. 

 An intelligent gardener of Lanarkshire, Scotland, has 

 been quite successful in increasing this favorite plant 

 by layering in a peculiar way. The part of the gar- 

 den occupied by the white moss ro.se and other choice 

 plants was low and sheltered, the soil consisting al- 

 most entirely of rotted bark or tan formerly used in 

 the hot houses and melon frames. This substance is 

 not congenial to the growth of plants so long as it 

 contains any of the tannin or matter which renders 

 bark useful to tanners, but when decomposed and 

 reduced to a black mould it is superior to any other 

 soil for choice plants. 



In this soil the roses were planted, and after they 

 had established themselves for a yearortwo, his plan 

 was to layer them — not in the usual way, by bending 

 down the branches and inserting a part in the soil, 

 but by bending down every branch and covering with 

 an inch and a half of mould. Had he left a "single 

 shoot uncovered, his opinion was that the tendency 

 of the sap being to flow upward, too much of it would 

 find a passage in that direction, but when all the 

 branches were covered, they all received a like im- 

 pulse ; and this theory was borne out by the fact that 

 every eye pushed forth a vigorous shoot, which took 

 root below the sui-face. By managing in this way 

 more plants were produced from a given number of 

 stools in a single season than could be produced in 

 ten years by the old common method. 



By similar treatment the tree peony may be in- 

 creased in a manner that is really astonishing. A 

 single shoot, put down by the same gardener, for the 

 purpose of proving the excellence of the plan, had 

 twenty-seven rooted plants attached to it. Several 

 other choice plants that are not easily propagated in 

 the usual way, may doubtless be rapidly increased by 

 this simple and inexpensive mode of treatment. 



The Story of a Rose. 



A rose with so pretty a little story and so full of 

 romance as this ought to be beautiful, and so is the 

 Cherokee liose. Here is the story told of it : 



" An Indian chief of the Seminole tribe was taken 

 prisoner by his enemies, the Cherokees, and doomed 

 to torture, but fell so seriously ill that it became 

 necessary to wait for his restoration to health before 

 committing him to the fire. And, as he lay pros- 

 trated by disease in the cabin of the Cherokee war- 

 rior, the daughter of the latter, a young, dark-faced 

 maid, was his nurse. She fell in love with the young 

 chieftain, and, wishing to save his life, urged him to 

 escape. But he would not do so unless she would 

 flee with him. She consented. Yet, before they had 

 gone far, impelled by soft regret at leaving home, 

 she asked permission of her lover to return for the 

 purpose of bearing away some memento of it. So, 

 retracing her footsteps, she broke a sprig from the 

 white rose which climbed the poles of her father's 

 tent, and, preserving it during her flight throusrh the 

 wilderness, planteil it by the door ol^ her new home 

 in the land of the Suminolcs. And from that d.ay 

 this beautiful flower has always been known in 

 Florida and throughout the Southern States by the 

 name of the Cherokee Kose." 



A Wonderful Flower. 



One of the most exquisite woudei-s of the sea 

 is the opelet, a flower resembling very much the 

 German Chuia-aster. It has the appearance of a 

 double aster with a quantity of petals of a light green 

 color, glossy as silk, each petal tipped with rose- 

 color. These lovely petals are never still, but wave 

 about in the water, while the flowerclings to the rock. 

 So innocent and lovely-looking, no one could suspect 

 it of eating anything ; certainly, if it did, only a bit 

 of rainbow or a dro]) of dew. But those beautiful 

 waving petals have other and more material work 

 to do — to provide food for a large mouth, which 

 is cunningly hid deep down among them. They do 

 their duty famously, for as soon as a silly little fish 

 comes in contact with those rosy tips he is sti'uck 

 with a poison fatal and quick as lightning. He dies 

 instantly, and the beautiful arms wrap themselves 

 aliout him and drag him into the greedy mouth. Then 

 those lovely petals unclose and float imiocently on the 

 water just like our water-lily. This llower was long 

 ago talked of, but its existence doubted until the last 

 century. Now the opelet is known to be a thing that 

 really exists. 



Ashes in Orchards. 



The point to which we now call attention is that 

 our farmers and fruitgrowers have ignorcii, or rather 

 been ignorant of, the imjiortance of wood ashes as a 

 vegetable stimulant and as the leading constituent of 

 plants. Even coal ashes, now thrown away as use- 

 less, have been shown, both by experiment and analy- 

 sis, to possess a fair share of alkaline value. We will 

 relate only one experiment : Some twenty-five years 

 ago we treated an old hollow pippin tree as fojlows : 

 The holjflw, to the height of eight feet, was filled and 

 rammed with a com posit of wood ashes, garden mold, 

 and a little waste lime (carbonate). The filling was 



securely fastened in by boards. The next year the 

 crop of sound fruit was sixteen bushels from an old 

 shell of a tree that had borne nothing of any aeiount 

 for some time, and for seventeen years after flllinir, 

 the old i)ippin tree continued to flourish and bear wefi. 

 — Scicni'ijff AjiicrUuin, 



Exterminating Live-Forever. 



Do you know of any w.ay to exterminate lipc-fornier 

 and tansy, except grubbing them out? I purchased 

 a farm which has both the above pests on it. Per- 

 haps some of your readers may be able to help me by 

 knowing some way to get rid of them. a. v. m. 



[Probably the easiest and simplest way is smother- 

 ing. On a small scale, this is most easily done by 

 burying deep under the soil. On a large scale, by 

 plowing under with an extra large double Michigan 

 plow, when they will not see daylight for a year, and 

 the task will be finished. In some particular "instances 

 they might be deeply covered with tan or saw-dust, 

 and smothered.] — Conntrij Gentleman. 



THE POULTRY YARD. 



Breeding Poultry for Profit. 



So many subscribers have made inquii-y about 

 " breeding on a large scale," and " breeding for profit 

 in eggs and poultry," that we give our views with 

 some lunts on the subject. 



Doubtless a large majority of those who engage in 

 poultry-keeping expect to make it pay, at least , ex- 

 penses, while there are many who anticipate profits, 

 larger or smaller, according as the east of the indi- 

 vidual is the more visionary or practical. When a 

 breeder starts in fowls, and goes down to the " hard 

 pan" of practical utility, success is certain. If fowls 

 are rightly managed, they can be made to pay a 

 handsome profit, though none be sold for fancy prices. 

 The question then is, How can this be done? 



The nature of fowls requires certain conditions, 

 which if disregarded will result in failure ; then, in 

 order to succeed, how important it is that we under- 

 stand the natural conditions under which they thrive 

 the best. Give a few fowls the range of a farm in 

 summer, and with a small amount of grain how well 

 they will do. The demands of nature are fully sup- 

 plied from the animal and vegetable kingdoms, and 

 the nearer we can imitate and follow these conditions 

 of nature, the surer will be our success; it is from 

 these we must reason and base all ouroperatious. As 

 regards the number of Ibwls one can keep, they are 

 limited only by his facilities ; but whether we keep 

 many or few, it is a safe rule to keep no more than 

 we can keep well. It is iinnatural for fowls to be 

 kept together in large numbers, as they are deprived 

 of proper range, and their supplj' of green food is apt 

 to be insutiieient ; besides, their runs become more or 

 less fouled, and the exhalations from a large number 

 generates a poison in the surrounding atmosphere 

 which predisposes the birds to roup, cholera, and epi- 

 demic diseases. Another very strong objecticm to 

 keeping a large number Under one roof is, that the 

 attack of an epidemic or contagious disease would 

 result most disastrously in sweeping through the 

 flock, and carrying olf a large number; while if the 

 fowls were scattered in smalidetached buildings, dis- 

 ease would appear in one first, where it could be 

 checked at once without spreading through the lloek, 

 and the loss would be comparatively small. We have 

 kept several hundred fowls, from year to year, and 

 aside from fancy prices, have made them very pnifll- 

 able, especially for eggs. We have always followed 

 the plan of colonizing or scattering our birds over 

 considerable territory, in suitaljle houses, which are 

 fully described in The Nation for March. Of the large 

 breeds, ;ve do not keep over thirty or forty in one 

 flock, and prefer to divide this number in two rooms 

 under the same roof; of the smaller breeds, forty to 

 fifty could be kept in one lot. Small flocks always do 

 better in proportion to their cost than large ones, and 

 we consider a building that will comfortably house 

 fifty fowls, large enough to be eomijatible with the 

 best thrift and health of its inmates. 



It is asked, "How much room is needed for fifty or 

 one hundred fowls?" So much depends on soil and 

 location, no definite answer can be given. On an acre, 

 fii'ty to one hundred Ijirds can be safely kept, but in 

 no case should the number he so large as to destroy 

 the grass. To ijreserve this, and keep every part of 

 the grounds untainted, is necessary. When a spot 

 once becomes bare, it is fouled and tainted, and the 

 surface should be pared, dug up, and dressed w ith 

 fresh soil once or twice a year ; or, better, if the fowls 

 can be kept oft', to seed it anew. Yards can be so ar- 

 ranged as to leave part of them vacant, and the fowls 

 changed from one to the other often enough to pre- 

 serve the grass and keep it fresh. Plenty of shade 

 should be furnished, and if orchards are not at hand, 

 the quickest-growing shrubs and bushes should be 

 planted ; quinces, dwarf pears, cherries, grapevines, 

 elders, etc., all thrive well in hen yards, and soon 

 make a good shade; better than nothing are rank 

 and tall-growing vegetables, such as corn and sun- 

 flowers. The best soil is gravel or sand ; but what- 

 ever the soil may be, the drainage should be good 

 enough to keep the grounds dry and free from mud. 



