160 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



April 



his land, to exclude the cattle of other persons, 

 or if he neglect to fence, subject him to their 

 depredations without indemnity, as is done in 

 many States, or if we may compel him to contrib- 

 ute to the erection of division fences, of a given 

 height, though he has no animal in the world to 

 be shut in or out of his field, there would seem 

 to be equal reason in compelling him to dig half 

 of a division ditch, for the benefit of himself and 

 neighbor. 



If, again, as we have already hinted, the Leg- 

 islature may authorize a Corporation to flow and 

 inundate the land of an unwilling citizen, to raise 

 a water-power for a cotton-mill, it must be a nice 

 discrimination of powers that prohibits the same 

 Legislature from authorizing the entry into lands 

 of protesting mill-owners, or of an unknown or 

 cross-grained proprietor, to open an outlet for a 

 valuable health-giving system of drainage. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 STEAM PLOW. 



Mr. Editor: — Your able and pleasing cor- 

 respondent, Wilson Flagg, Esq., seems alarmed 

 at the introduction of the "Steam Plow," should 

 such a discovery be made. He repudiates the no- 

 tion that the "Illinois State Board of Agricul- 

 ture" should encourage the use of such a ma- 

 chine, which, in its tendency, would "extirpate 

 the whole class of small farmers in the State." 

 In support of this theory, he compares the hand- 

 spinners and weavers, who should undertake to 

 compete with the manufactories of Lowell and 

 Lawrence. 



His article {Farmer, Dec. 18,) in its length and 

 breadth, I think is at variance with pul)lic senti- 

 ment, and I shall venture a few suggestions in 

 relation to it. 



If the steam plow should be introduced by 

 "mammoth corporations" (of which there is lit- 

 tle to fear,) we cannot see why it would bear un- 

 equally on "the small farmer." He has given 

 us no idea of the cost of the apparatus, which 

 may not be very expensive, in a small way, but 

 the outlay of a good plowing team, and the ex- 

 pense of feeding, is by no means a small item 

 with the farmer. Horse power has greatly re- 

 lieved man, as applied to the mowing, reaping 

 and threshing machines, rake, &c., but how vast- 

 ly has steam annihilated the horse, yet the horse 

 retains his former value and labor, and is dearer 

 than formerly. This kind of "progress" is de- 

 manded by all enterprising people, and the 

 growth of our country is their crowning happi- 

 ness. I should regret to see it otherwise. 



When the sewing machine was introduced, the 

 needle women were in danger. Wailings and re- 

 grets were the outpourings of humanity — but 

 Providence opens new sources of labor, the poor 

 needle-woman receives her "loaves and fishes," 

 and by industry and frugality I think she earns 

 full wages, as I do not learn that they have been 

 reduced. 



Now what is to be feared from "farm associated 

 capital ?" Surely, the argument fails when "Low- 

 ell and Lawrence" are made prominent objects 



of comparison, with smaller establishments en- 

 gaged in like manufactures. It is only necessa- 

 ry to refer your correspondent to the supremacy 

 of individual success over them all around you. 

 Stockholders in these mammoth corporations 

 can doubtless give a negative reply. 



But let us take a family of Shakers who would 

 seem to present the most consolidated form of 

 "association." Their thrift, skill, economy and 

 integrity are unsurpassed. Does this mammoth 

 corporation threaten destruction to the "pleas- 

 ant old farm-house," the "delightful groups of 

 trees," a state of "servitude" of families in the 

 "grand manufactory of corn and vegetables ?" Do 

 those outside abutters suffer by this great Shak- 

 er corporation ? Not at all. They never under- 

 sell. No form of corporation need frighten the 

 industrious farmer, neither can they depreciate 

 his products. 



If there is a tedious operation in farming, it is 

 plowing. Now we have all the improvements in 

 agricultural implements, with new forces and 

 powers. Shall we have the steam plow ? If it 

 can be worked on a hundred acres, it can be 

 worked on twenty. Would it not revolutionize 

 New England? Would it not improve the pas- 

 turing, enlarge the barns, increase cattle, sheep, 

 horses, the dairy, the corn crop, the reheat crop, 

 the most expensive and the most needful of all? 

 Give them a '^steam plow," a bounty of 12.1 cts. on 

 winter wheat, a generous bounty on a hundred 

 bushels of corn, till it becomes a well established 

 fact that New England can raise her bread, and 

 your plowing will tell at home in your own pock- 

 ets, and the coffers of your States. 



Hang no clogs upon agricultural enterprises. 

 Give them Legislative sanction and support to 

 the utmost, and while we must admit the jjlow to 

 be the pioneer implement of all farm operations, 

 the basis of all hope, let lis add any power that 

 shall "speed the plow." Henry Poor. 



New York, 1859. 



Most Profitable Breed of Sheep. — A 

 Canada West farmer, writing on this question to 

 the Genesee Farmer, says : "As far as my expe- 

 rience goes, the most profitable sheep are of no 

 breed. Buy poor and inferior ewes (of the na- 

 tive stock, if possible,) cross them with the best 

 Leicester or Southdown rams, according to their 

 roughness and other qualities, and they will pay 

 from 50 to 100 per cent, per annum, or more. 

 This is simply taking ad vantage of the established 

 maxim in breeding, that the first cross is the 

 best. You thus obtain an increase in mutton of 

 from 20 to 30 pounds, and an increase in wool of 

 from 50 to 100 per cent., besides a great improve- 

 ment in the quality of both." — Country Gentle- 

 man. 



Atmospheric Phenomena. — A correspondent 

 writing to us from Byson, 111., states that some 

 peculiar phenomena were witnessed in that place 

 on the morning of the 4;h inst., at 9 A. M., con- 

 sisting of several rainbows intersecting one anoth- 

 er, and at every intersecting point there was a 

 bright spot resembling a miniature sun. These 

 bows displayed all the prismatic colors, and were 

 exceedingly beautiful. They continued for about 

 three-quarters of an hour, and then disappeared. 

 — Scientific American. 



