1846. 



GENESEE FARMER. 



3T 



that some of the particles of salt might fall on the 

 centre of wheat plants, lodge, and when dissolved 

 injure this tender vegetable. One could easily 

 scatter a few handsfull, in the usual way of sow- 

 ing, wait a few days, and then satisfy himself 

 whether it would do to sow salt over a larger sur- 

 face. We have never heard of any injury, but 

 in all experiments, due care should be used to 

 avoid loss in any way. 



The fertilizers which promise the greatest ben- 

 efit to the practical farmers of this State are salt, 

 gypsum, lime, wood ashes, and charcoal. To 

 render salt and gypsum more available, the duty 

 should be taken off from salt and the canal tolls 

 reduced to a mere nominal sum on both salt and 

 plaster. The State should charge just duty 

 enough on salt to pay for inspection and super- 

 intendence. The idea of deriving a public rev- 

 enue by a direct tax on the salt eaten by a poor 

 man's cow, is precisely of a piece with a direct 

 tax on her milk, eaten by his children. The 

 rich man, worth $100,000, uses perhaps 20 lbs. 

 of salt a year ; while the comparatively poor far- 

 mer, with 30 head of cattle and 100 sheep, will 

 consume forty times as much. If the State 

 needs the $'200,000 which it gets — more or less — 

 from salt duties, there is a fair way to collect the 

 money by an equitable tax on the whole proper- 

 ty of its inhabitants. 



For the Genesee Farmer. 

 Mr. Editor : — In these times of temperance 

 reform the question is frequently asked, "if you 

 stop distilling, what will you do with your coarse 

 grain ?" In answer to this, I would say you had 

 better feed it out to your stock of various kinds. 

 I believe it would be more profitable for our 

 farmers so to do, than to take it to the stills at 

 the highest market price ; and surely more far- 

 mer-like. As it was a few years ago with ap- 

 ples, most of our farmers would cart their apples 

 to the distillery, and get 3 or 4 cents per bushel, 

 or a gallon for 6 bushels — and thought they were 

 doing pretty well ; but people have found out 

 lately that apples are worth at least' one shilling 

 a bushel to feed out to any thing, and all kinds 

 of stock or poultry will fatten on them without 

 the trouble of gathering them. So you see we 

 were paying 75 cents per gallon for the critter, 

 of no value, besides gathering tliem, &c. 1 fed 

 most of my coarse grain to my stock, and what I 

 gave my sheep was worth one dollar per bushel 

 in the increase of fleece and carcass ; and for 

 my oats and apples my poultry gave me more 

 than fifty cents per bushel. I was not like two 

 of my neighbor farmers, who, when the distiller 

 offered up fifty cents for corn a year ago, took 

 their crops to him at that price and tlien lost more 

 in value of their stock for the want of it tiian 

 they got for all their grain. Such farmers, Mr. 

 Editor, I think do not work it in the most profit- 

 able way, and I should like to read your opinion 



on this subject in the next number of the 1 armer. 

 Rkmarks. — We have long been aware of the 

 fact, that apples can be profitably grown to feed, 

 not only animals of the genus homo, but those 

 domesticated for the use of man. With regard 

 to selling grain for the manufacture of whiskey, 

 or alcohol, for consumption in the arts, it is pure- 

 ly a moral question, which each person must de- 

 cide according to his own conscience. 



A Small Farm with a Great Farmer. 



We copy the following paragraph from the 

 Report of the Committee on Farms, made for 

 the year 184.5, as introductory to a short note 

 from a public benefactor — a man who has prac- 

 tically demonstrated the way to be rich in rural 

 comforts, and independent, with a lai'ge family, 

 on 20 acres of land : 



" To Martin Smith of Wheatland, the individual whs 

 with only 20 acres of land, has sustained and brouglit up a 

 family of 13 children — had money on hand to assist hispoor 

 neiglihors who had 200 acres of land ; and who by his in- 

 domitable industry, good management and perseverance, 

 has been enabled to hold on to his grain crop .3 years, wai- 

 ting for a market — a diploma framed and glazed. 

 L. R. Langwortyv, 1 

 J. H. Robinson, | 



RoMANTA Hart, ! --, •,, „ 



Elisha Harmon, ^<^om™"ee." 

 T. H. Hyatt, 

 Jas. p. Fogg, 



For the Genesee Farmer. 



Mr. Editor : — I have long since felt it my 

 duty to express my warmest thanks to Mr. Wil- 

 liam Garbutt, for the very high compliments 

 he has paid our Family, through the Gen'esee 

 Farmer, as being a family of industrious habits, 

 and trying to get a living as we are commanded 

 by a high authority — that is, by the sweat of the 

 brow. 



We are again under renewed obligations to 

 the same gentleman for his inviting, and accom- 

 panying the Committee on Farms to our house, 

 and for the excuses we hope he made, for the 

 slovenly appearance of our place. Our thanks 

 are also due to the other gentlemen of the Com- 

 mittee, for their call and their friendly feelings. 

 I believe their visit did me more good than all 

 the tonics I had taken for many a day, for they 

 were all warm hearted and friendly. They no- 

 ticed some things that were not as they should be, 

 in a very pleasant and friendly, way, and we 

 hope we shall be able to put them to rights, by and 

 by. My warm thanks are due to the Committee 

 for their complimenting us so warmly for good 

 management, and for helping our neighbors, 

 (which, by the by, was no benefit to us, though 

 we did our duty,) and for the unmerited premium 

 the Committee has seen fit to give us, we shall 

 accept of it, with many thanks, and much plea- 

 sure. We shall keep it safe, and in some con- 

 spicuous place, to remind us of our friends that 

 we have seen. Although we have not had the 

 pleasure of a personal acquaintance, should it 

 please an all wise Providence to restore to me 



