1858, 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



503 



POTATOES. 



My potato ground was plowed April 12th, and 

 was dry enough. I drove a span of horses my- 

 self, and we plowed 1* acres in a day with the 

 largest sized double plow. I was in Court till 

 May 3d, and on the 4th we planted the potatoes. 

 About five cords to the acre of compost was 

 plowed in, with one horse, after harrowing the 

 first furrows ; then the land was opened in drills, 

 with a small plow and the seed dropped, and cov- 

 ered with the plow. The crop was cultivated 

 mostly with a horse — hoed once, and weeded af- 

 ter the crop was nearly grown. 



I cut most of the potatoes, a fair sized Jack- 

 son white, into four pieces, and placed them fif- 

 teen inches apart in the drills, and the drills three 

 feet apart. The rows are twenty rods long. For 

 experiment, I cut the seed very small in one row, 

 one eye in a piece, and placed them ten inches 

 apart. In other rows I planted whole potatoes. 

 On part of the piece I planted the Riley potato, 

 cut and whole in th,e same way. The whole acre 

 blighted somewhat about Aug. 15, until which 

 the piece looked remarkably uniform and well. 

 On the 7th of September, we dug the experimen- 

 tal rows, and a part of the others, and measured 

 the product. There was no difference in size or 

 quality or disease, between those whole and cut, 

 or between those in quarters and smaller pieces. 

 In seventeen bushels, there was not a half bush- 

 el of diseased potatoes, and they have not rotted 

 in the cellar. The yield is about one hundred 

 and fifty bushels to the acre, which is as large a 

 crop as I dare to raise in these times. It is less 

 work to plant potatoes in this way, but far more 

 to dig them, and I do not think the crop is in- 

 creased. My potatoes, as far as I can judge, are 

 more free from disease than the average. I 

 should expect this result on thorough drained 

 land, which has never been too wet or too dry, 

 a day during the season. I shall leave the rest 

 of the crop in the ground till October, and then 

 try plowing them out. 



MANGOLD WURTZELS. 



My mangolds were sown in drills on drained 

 land — plowed twice with a double plow — then, 

 after harrowing and rolling, opened in drills with 

 a horse-plow, by a furrow each way, about thirty 

 inches apart. Two cords, by measure, of fresh 

 barn manure was put into the drills on I5 acre, 

 and covered by two more furrows, rolled, and the 

 seed dibbled in, one foot apart, on the 27th of 

 May. No other manure vvas applied, except two 

 bushels of salt sowed after planting. The crop 

 is as fine as I ever saw. Some of the largest 

 roots measure each eighteen to twenty inches in 

 circumference. I cannot estimate the quantity to 

 the acre, but there is enough ! I shall have more 

 to say about mangolds another time. 



My corn is much above an average crop, and 

 my Swedes sowed June 28th, are looking finely, 

 and promise a good crop. Perhaps they would 

 have done better sowed earlier, this moist sea- 

 son, though they will grow a month yet. They 

 are on land newly broken up, and newly drained, 

 and my corn land was drained last fall. We do 

 not expect the full benefit of drainage so soon af- 

 ter the cold water is taken from the heavy sour 

 soil, but my results, thus far, equal the highest 

 expectations I have ever formed of the advanta- 

 ges of tile-draining. 



My letter has spread wider than was intended, 

 and I reserve for a future day what more I de- 

 sire to say. Your friend, H. F. French. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 BEE-HIVE3— PATSSTTS—CORSECTION". 



Mr. Editor : — As a place has been found in 

 your journal for the publication of an article, 

 over the signature of "Norfolk," headed the 

 "Bee-Hive," and dated at "King Oak Hill, April, 

 1858," which does great injustice to Mr. Lang- 

 stroth, I doubt not that you will, as a matter of 

 simple justice, admit the following to your pages. 



"Norfolk" gives a statement, but not the name 

 of its author ; he must, therefore, be held respon- 

 sible for this sentence : "if, as is stated, Mr. Lang- 

 stroth has borrowed the only good thing there is 

 about his hive from the Union, and gets cut off 

 from its use in making his hive by the patent— 

 his hive is good for nothing." 



Common prudence would cause most men to 

 hesitate before they brought such borrowing as 

 is implied above to the charge of such a man as 

 Mr. Langstroth, and men of even very large self- 

 esteem would pause before they pronounced that 

 the hive recommended by the most scientific 

 apiarian on this side of the Atlantic had but one 

 good thing in it ; but perhaps "Norfolk" is "the 

 man for the occasion," and is prepared to sub- 

 stantiate his charge and prove his assertion. 



An intimate acquaintance with both the Lang- 

 stroth and the Union hives, and the histories of 

 their invention, does not permit me to doubt for 

 an instant what that "only good thing" is which 

 Mr. Langstroth is accused of borrowing. I have 

 heard, from sources which can be given if required, 

 that Clarke and his agents claim directly or in- 

 directly, that Clarke is the inventor and present 

 or future patentee of the triangular comb guide, 

 which is now used in both of the hives men- 

 tioned ; but "Norfolk's" article is the first appear- 

 ance, to my knowledge, of such claims in print, 

 and I have not thought loose verbal statements 

 worthy of notice. 



Now the fact plainly appears, from proceedings 

 had before the Patent Office in the interfering 

 claims of Langstroth, Clarke and May, that neither 

 of the three contestants was the first inventor of 

 the triangular comb guide, although each of them 

 might have been an original inventor of it ; the 

 invention appears to have been first made in Eu- 

 rope, and is described in an English edition of 

 Huber, published in 1841, to Avhich the Patent 

 Office referred, and dissolved the interference 

 July 1st, 1857, since which time the comb guide 



