1869. 



XEW ENGLA^'D FAKMER. 



281 



the lungs filled with small thread-like worms, 

 from half an inch to two inches long, and of a 

 whitish color. He then killed a healthy, well- 

 conditioned wether, examined its lungs and found 

 nothing of the kind. 



—A short time before his death, Gen. Washing- 

 ton wrote a letter containing the following passage : 

 "It is hoped, and will be expected that more effec- 

 tual means will be pursued to make butter another 

 year, for it is almost beyond belief that, with 101 

 cows reported on a late enumeration of the cattle, 

 I am obliged to buy butter for the use of my own 

 family." 



— The well known seedsman, James Vick, writes 

 to the Rural New Yorker that he has about three 

 bushels cf the potato recently named the King of 

 the Earlics, which, at $50 a potato — at which price 

 ■ these potatoes are said to be sold — he estimates to 

 be worth )g(30,000. Instead of thinking this variety 

 a week earlier than the Early Rose, he pronounces 

 it two weeks later, and evidently has but a poor 

 opinion of it. 



— The AVorcester County, Mass., Horticultural 

 Society will hold its Thirtieth Annual Exhibition 

 of fruits, flowers, plants, and vegetables, at Hor- 

 ticultural Hall, Worcester, Mass., Sept. 21-24, 

 1869. A liberal list of premiums, from $20 to $1, 

 has been made up. The society also offer a piece 

 of plate valued at $25 "for a safe, certain and eco- 

 nomical method, better than any now known, of 

 destroying the currant worm, or preventing its 

 ravages." 



— It is already easy to distinguish the English 

 from the American elms on Boston Common, by 

 the more advanced condition of the buds on the 

 imported trees. It is spring in old England ; and 

 these trees are true to the habits of their ancestry 

 and their infancy, regardless of the many scores 

 of years that they have experienced the bleak tar- 

 diness of the New England climate. They also 

 remain in foliage in the fall considerably longer 

 than the American elms. 



— The Ohio Farmer compares the reports made 

 by the cheese factories at the meeting of the 

 Dairyman's Association at Barrc, with that of a 

 factory in Loraine County, Ohio, and concludes 

 that the old Bay State is much behind Ohio in the 

 production of cheese. In Massachusetts there was 

 an average of 10 1-10 lbs. of nnilk used to one of 

 curel cheese; in Ohio 9 6-10; the price obtained 

 for the Massachusetts manufacture was $13.50 per 

 hundred pounds; for the Ohio, nearly $16. 



—President Abbott, of the Michigan Agricultu- 

 ral College, in the course of an essay on agricul- 

 tural education, published in the Western Rural, 

 says : "A good agricultural education at the pres- 

 ent time would consist of a good knowledge of 

 botany, chemistry, zoology, physiology, geology, 

 meteorology, and the like, with a knowledge ot 

 mechanics ; and joined to these a knowledge of 

 their applications to agricultural science, so far as 



those applications are supposed to be known ; with 

 next, a knowledge of those theories and applica- 

 tions to the science which are commanding the at- 

 tention of both scientific and practical men, wiih, 

 lastly, some knowledge of the deficiencies of agri- 

 culture both as a science and an art." 



THE EOLIiER. 



Few implements used in the management of our 

 farms are possessed of a higher practical value than 

 the roller. As its form is various, so also are the 

 uses to which it is applied. It would be poor 

 economy to dispense with its assistance in any sys- 

 tem of tillage, be the nature of the soil what it raiiy. 

 In some remarks upon the importance of the rol- 

 ler, a foreign author very judiciously observes : — 



"The first object usually aimed at in the use of 

 this instrument, is to break those clods or mdu- 

 rated masses of earth which have resisted the action 

 of the harrow ; or, at all events, to bury them in the 

 ground, so that at the next harrowing — which, 

 when thus buried, they cannot well escape — they 

 must of necessity be somewhat diminished in size." 



The second object, according to our author, is to 

 give a superior degree of compactness to the soil, 

 and to effect a more perfect union of its component 

 parts. The third use to which it is applied, is to 

 press down and consolidate the earth about the seed, 

 and to cause the latter to adhere bet;er to the soil. 

 The fourth is to cover with mould, or to press into 

 the earth, the roots of those plants sown the preced- 

 ing autumn, and which may have been detached 

 or thrown up by the action of frost. Some persons 

 think it has a tendency to destroy the insects which 

 are constantly lurking beneath the sifrface, and 

 ready at all times to prey upon the young and ten- 

 ter vegetation. 



The shape of the roller is various. It is gener- 

 ally roimd, though sometimes hexagonal and octa- 

 gonal, and a roller armed with long spires or 

 spikes, intended for pulverizing or breaking the 

 clod?, as well as for scarifying and loosening the 

 earth where it has become "bound out," and re- 

 quires loosening and renovating, is sometimes 

 used. 



A very good roller may be made by taking a hol- 

 low log— say three feet in diameter — and affixing 

 to each end a gudgeon by which to draw it ; but 

 the best kind of roller is that made by constructing » 

 two trucks of the required diameter, and having 

 placed them on edge, six feet apart, with a cross 

 beam or axletree extending througli the centre of 

 each, fasten them by strips of stout plank, four 

 inches wide, so that the roll will resemble the drum 

 of a factory, when finished. A frame may be add- 

 ed, with a convenient seat for the driver, where 

 weight will often be necessary to give efficiency 

 to the implement, especially where the soil is very 

 light and dry, as well as on those fields where 

 there are clods to pulverize, or small cobble stones 

 to be pressed down. 



Every one who has rolled a field sown with 



