1869. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



391 



which lay packed av/ay behind the occupant's 

 head, ready to iId cfflce when called. 



We were next ushered into the parlor. A child's 

 wagon stood in the way. In removing it it com- 

 menced a tune. How many more were concealed 

 behind we did not inquire, but should not have 

 been surprised on sitting down in a rocking chair, 

 to hear it emit musical sounds. Four centre 

 tables were ranged on one side of the room of a 

 most beautiful pattern, and the most elaborate 

 workmanship and artistic skill, which merit a 

 brief description. The largest has 4000 pieces of 

 eight different kinds of wood worked into the face 

 of it, in wiiich is wrought Bennet's country seat, 

 surrounded b}' appropriate shrubbery and trees. 

 Next is one a tritle smaller with 2800 pieces, in 

 which appears Barnum's country seat at Bridg- 

 port, also worked wiih various woods, adorned in 

 the same manner, and imparting to it a life-like 

 glow and beauty. The third is smaller still, with 

 2200 pieces, and viewed separately would be con- 

 sidered a highly wrought work of art. The fourth 

 is of the size of a light-stand, having 100 pieces 

 very unique. 



Other curiosities of less attraction to be found 

 here, are passed over, but a visit will amply repay 

 the trouble to all who have the desire to witness 

 what the ingenuity of man may compass. How 

 many organs and fiddles he has constructed dur- 

 ing ihe long winter evenings of the sixty-eight 

 years he has lived on this earth, we know not; but 

 judging from the number of articles he has made, 

 he must have commenced very young or been very 

 industrious. D. W. Heywood. 



Barre, Mass., June 23, 1869. 



■WHEN DO BEES SELECT THEIR HOMES ? 



A swarm of bees were lost soon after they were 

 carried out in the spring. The hive containing 

 the comb was not moved. On the 8th of June, 

 bees were noticed about the hive, — only a few, 

 however. The hive was not noticed again until 

 the 13th, when there were apparently as many 

 bees about the entrance as there were at tlie hives 

 containing good working swarms. After the bees 

 liad done work for the day, the hive was exam- 

 ined ana found to contain but a few bees, — among 

 them some drones, — perhaps not one hundred 

 workers and drones together. On the 14th of June, 

 a good large swarm took possession of the hive, 

 and have remained at work. Will some one 

 versed in bee-ology tell us when the bees find 

 their new homes ? Is it before or after swarming } 



Mast Yard, N. H., June 20, 1869. f. 



DECOCTION OF OAK BARK FOR "WAKT8. 



If "B. B." in a late number of the New Eng- 

 land Farmer, has not found a remedy to cure 

 the warts on his heifer, please tell him to try white 

 oak bark. Boil the strength out of the bark and 

 then boil the liquid down very strong, almost to a 

 syrup, and put a very little on each wart, just 

 enough to wet it. j. p. p. 



No)th Wtare, N. H., June 4, 1869. 



AGRICULTUKAL ITEMS. 

 — The Iowa Agricultural College is five stories 

 high, and contains over one hundred rooms ; the 

 farm 648 acres. 



— A correspondent of the Canada Farmer who 

 sold the milk from twenty-six cows to a cheese 

 factory last year, commenced feeding corn on the 

 last of July from an acre planted ia drills. In 

 September he omitted the corn for four days, and 



the result was a diminution of fifty-two pounds of 

 milk a day. The corn feeding was again resumed, 

 and in four days the cotvs gave their customary 

 quantity of milk. 



— The value of Canadian cattle exported into 

 the United States during tue first three months of 

 1869 was $236,252— nearly double the value of 

 those exported during the same period of 1868. 



— Dry wood ashes sprinkled lightly from a fine 

 sieve upon turnips is good to keep off insects. 

 When applied by the hand enough is often thrown 

 upon them to injure the tender plant. Hold the 

 sieve low and simply dust the leaves. 



— An old stable keeper in England says he has 

 never had a bad foot on his horses since he com- 

 menced the practice of bedding on a thick layer 

 of sawdust. Pine sawdust he finds the best, oak 

 the worst. 



— The Tribune says, a farmer in Ohio had a 

 thrifty orchard which blossomed freely, but bore 

 no fruit. He washed twelve of the trees once a 

 week with strong soap suds, and was gratified by 

 a fair harvest the subsequent season. 



— A shrewd farmer in the Vermont Legislature 

 declined answering the speech of a member who 

 was remarkable for nothing but frothy and pugna- 

 cious impudence and self conceit, thus : "Mr. 

 Speaker, I can't reply to that ere speech, for it al- 

 ways wrenches me terribly to kick at nothing." 



— A daughter of Samuel Clark, of Starksboro, 

 Vt., aged six years was recently poisoned by eat- 

 ing arsenic. The mother being absent when the 

 child returned from school, she went into the cel- 

 lar, and picked up and eat a piece of bread and 

 butter that had been sprinkled with arsenic and 

 left for rats. 



— Mr. Joseph Harris expresses the opinion that 

 indigestion is the source of nearly all ordinary 

 complaints in horses, and that this is brought on 

 by irregular feeding and watering; by exposure, 

 fatigue, by long journeys without food, in a storm, 

 and then by over-feeding and neglecting to rub 

 them dry before leaving them for the night. 



—During a cold storm on the night of May 28, a 

 farmer near Ipswich, England, lost 216 out of 300 

 ewes that had been turned on the unsheltered 

 marsh lands just after having been shorn. Their 

 carcases were found the next morning iu heaps 

 where ihey had huddled together in the vain at- 

 tempt to keep warm. 



— A small tablespoonful of kerosene oil mixed 

 with one quart of ground corn and whole buck- 

 wheat mixed with skimmed milk or water, is re- 

 commended for gapes in chickens by one corres- 

 pondent of the Country Gentleman, while enither 

 puts a small pinch of fine tobacco in the mouth of 

 the patient with water to wash it down. This 

 loosens the worms which are either sneezed out 

 or swallowed. 



