210 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Jan. 



" To die, then, by the sword or bowstring, implies the pos- 

 session of wealth, and the surviving relatives glorify them- 

 selves in perpetuating this record of financial standing and 

 consideration." 



To the observant traveler in the East, one of its most 

 noticeable features is the absence of farm life among its in- 

 habitants. Between village and village you rarely meet 

 with isolated farm-houses or cultivated areas. You pass 

 directly from the town or hamlet, with its surrounding 

 gardens and arable land, into a wild, unbroken territory, in- 

 fested only by wild beasts and lawless men. From motives 

 of security, the people all live together in the villages ; the 

 farmer going to his farm, two or three miles away, every 

 morning, and quitting work an hour before sundown, to re- 

 turn to his distant family. Even in the neighborhood of 

 large cities you find this to be the case, and within fifteen 

 miles of Constantinople itself, with its million or more of 

 population, could still be shot, only a few years ago, wild 

 boars and wolves in the dense forests surrounding the Bents 

 of Belgrade. 



Another very noticeable fact is the utter disregard of fer- 

 tilizers. Great heaps of manure accumulate in the sheep- 

 folds, the poultry-yards and horse-stables, which are allowed 

 to waste from lack of knowledge of their value. It is true 

 that on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris, where are 

 grown the celebrated melons, three of which make a camel's 

 load of say six hundred pounds, a hole is scooped in the 

 sand, a handful of hen or pigeon manure thrown in, the seed 

 planted and nature left to do the rest. But this is the ex- 

 ception to the rule. Nor should we blame these people too 

 severely, when we have such bright and shining examples of 

 the same pernicious practice in this country. In California, 

 in the vicinity of Santa Barbara, the manure is hauled, not 

 to the field, but to the public highways, where it is carefully 

 spread to keep down the dust ; and in Canada the farmers 

 were reported only this last summer as dumping it by the 

 cart-load into the rivers. 



The droppings of the cow, on the other hand, are carefully 

 preserved, worked up with coarse straw and stubble, and 

 dried for winter fuel ; for over large areas the woods have 



