THE FARMERS LIBRARY AND 



589 



the Goverament? and who shall guaranty to 

 what purpose it may not be abused ? When 

 did men ever possess the chance to exercise 

 power for selfish ends, with impunity, that they 

 failed to do it ? Are they less prone to do so 

 when banded into parties ? — we care not what 

 party — political or religious? Who will guar- 

 anty how long it will be before this new func- 

 tion — this Editorial office — will begin to insinu- 

 ate party doctrines, and favoritism or hostility to 

 particular institutions and branches of industiy, 

 ■under the guise of beiiejiting Agriculture? — 

 And is this the only boon to be offered to the 

 landed interest, like a tub to the whale, to divert 

 it from the recollection of the minions it has 

 paid and the millions it is yet to pay for the mil- 

 itary machinery of the Government ? — for the 

 hundreds of thousands paid annually for mili- 

 tary schools — for the more than S100,000 to be 

 paid this year for military sun'eys and maps ? 

 If Uncle Sam can set up his periodical for the 

 benefit of Agriculture, why not construct free 

 roads, and build free bridges, and manufacture 

 poudrette, for its benefit ? and illustrate its phi- 

 losophj' by chemical experiments ? Would not 

 all these things, too, benefit and enlf|-bten Agri- 

 culture? Truly, he would make a formidable 

 rival in any branch of business ; bat in this of 

 publishing a periodical, with materials taken 

 annually from individual proprietors, let him 

 beware that, in experimenting to see on how lit- 

 tle they can live and yet w^ork, he does not sei-ve 

 them as the Frenchman did his horse. And 

 how, then, will he get along with his great free 

 agricultural periodical — free at the cost of poor 



inventors ! 



EDITOR FARMERS* LIBRARY. 

 May 22, 1846. 



Since writing the above, we have been fa- 

 vored with the loan, only for a few minutes, of 

 the last "Annual Report of the Commissioner of 

 Patents," and Inspector General of Agricul- 

 ture. The Commissioner's part of it, it is clear 

 enough, from the little we have seen, is written 

 with a clearness and force, and a high apprecia- 

 tion of the importance of Agriculture which does 

 him much credit. We complain not of him, nor 

 of any of his accomplished and diligent asso- 

 ciates, some of whom, it is earnestly and honor- 

 ably urged by the Commissioner, are so meanly 

 compensated as to show that at Washington 

 salaries are too often graduated with utter dis- 

 regard of the talents required for a proper dis- 

 charge of the ofBce. This report of the Patent 

 Office consists of 1184 pages, of which nearly 

 eleven hundred are composed of agricultural 

 items ! collected and made up chiefly of the 

 cream of agricultural papers. 



The Commissioner says, " The sum now an- 

 nually appropriated for agricultural purposes is 

 taken from the Patent Fund, all of uhich has 

 (1249) 



been paid into the Treasury by inventors, and 

 which has been set apart by law for the promo- 

 tion of the useful arts and for the benefit of that 

 class of citizens /roOT whom it has been collect- 

 ed. They justly complain (.says the Commis- 

 sioner) of this ?n«sap plication of the Patent Fund, 

 and demand that it shall be appropriated to the 

 increase of the efficiency of the Patent-Office" 

 — and, we add, or else the expense of obtaining 

 patents should be abated to that amount, and the 

 inventive genius of the country be unfettered 

 and brought into yet fuller and freer play. 



For what has been done in the way of appli- 

 cations for agricultural inventions we have 

 turned, as w^e always do, with interest to the 

 Report of the accomplished examiner. Doctor 

 Page, who says briefly, not multiplying woras 

 where there is no need of it : 



" Number of applications 133 — number of pat- 

 ents granted 48. 



" But little novelty has been presented to the 

 office in the waj' of agi-icultural implements; 

 and although the subject is one of fast growing 

 interest and value, and has received some rich 

 contributions from chemists and philo.sophers, 

 yet those branches usually coming before the of- 

 fice have not received as many accessions as in 

 former years. Some improvements have been 

 made in plows, particularlj- wheel-plows; sev- 

 eral new devices have been patented, and one 

 new and apparently valuable invention for 

 adapting the set and draught of tlie plow in a 

 ready manner, so as to take more or less land, at 

 pleasure. 



•'The bee-hive has been the subject of much 

 attention — many of the hives presented, exhibit- 

 ing only changes of form, without the attainment 

 of any new principle in bee management. It is 

 believed that no effectual means have yet been 

 discovered of preventing the ravages of the bee 

 moth, independent of constant personal atten- 

 tion ; although several of the inventions patented 

 for this purpose will doubtless, to a considera- 

 ble extent, diminish the evil. In spite of all the 

 artifices to decoy the moth into traps and to de- 

 posit its eggs where the grub will be so remote 

 from the entrance to the hive as to perish in tlio 

 attempt to reach the comb, this insect retains 

 enough of his instinct to enter as it is wont, with 

 the bee, and deposit its eggs directly in the 

 comb, even in the uppermost part of the hive. 

 As the moth exists only at certain seasons, and 

 does its work only at night, it follows that the 

 entire enclo.sure of the hive at niclit will e.x- 

 clude the enemy with certainty. For this pur- 

 pose the hives are sometimes arranged under a 

 lightly jointed house, provided with ventilated 

 doors of wire gauze, which are shut regularly 

 at night and opened early in the morning. The 

 objections to this plan are. the e-tpcnse of the 

 fixture and the unfailing attention required to 

 open and close the doors ; for a single act of 

 neglect in this duty might result in the destruc- 

 tion of the hives. A curious invention has been 

 patented, worthy of mention in this connection. 

 The patent was granted for combining a hen- 

 roost in such manner with the door of the hive 

 that the weight of the fowls going to roost would 

 operate, through the medium of levers and pul- 

 ley, to close the door of the hive, and the door 

 opened by reverse action in the morning when 

 the fowls leave the roost. If, as tlie inventor 



