1869. 



NEW ENGLAND FAR]MER. 



553 



training, they have indeed looked sleek and 

 smooth, and their soft and flabby handlino; has 

 passed with ipexpei ienced men for quality ; 

 hnt wht n put on ordinary keeping and used 

 for the common purposes of producing milk 

 or beef, they have sadly disappointed the ex- 

 pectations of those who purchased them in the 

 show condition. 



I do not olject tD keeping stock in good 

 order. Cattle should have plenty of the best 

 pasture in the grazing season, and of the best 

 bay or its equivalent in winter, with some m al 

 or grain to the calves and cows in milk. Nor 

 is a moderate allowance of grain to all the 

 srock in winter objectionable : and where corn 

 is not too dear, is probably not more expen- 

 sive than to feed hay alone. What I object 

 to is the unnatural method, already stated, of 

 so much housing and over-feeding with oil 

 Cake, large quantities of milk, &c., so that 

 breeding animals, old and young, are kept 

 just, as fat as all this care and stuffing will 

 make them ; and that, not with honest, solid 

 tlesh of well marbled (lean and fat,) as gaod 

 bief ought to be, but of the soft and greasy 

 sort, tha will produce the fashionable touch. 

 — Hon. T. C. Jones, in Ohio Farmer. 



AGRICtriiTUKAL ITEMS. 



— It is stated that the Percheron horses, intro- 

 duced into Central Ohio within the last fiw years, 

 arc givicg good satisfaction, and are bsing bred 

 more extensively this year than at any previous 

 one. 



— Mr. J. Harris says in the Agriculturist that he 

 does not know how he could get along without 

 petroleum. He keeps the wood work of his farm 

 tools and implements saturated with it, to keep 

 the rain, sun and air from swelling and shrinking 

 and ruining them. 



— William Egger, of Losvvilie, N. Y., a Swiss 

 dairyman, says in the Rural New Yorker that 

 cows should be salted every morning, and if in the 

 stable, before foddering, but never after taking 

 water. This is the practice of the best stock- 

 keepers in Switzerland, and he thinks much pref- 

 erable to salting them once or twice a week, or to 

 keeping it constantly within their reach. 



— For a remedy for splints and spavins, D. P. 

 Hawes, Woodville, Iowa, says in the Rural New 

 Yorker, "Put into a large-mouthed bottle six 

 ounces oil of origanum ; two ounces gum camphor ; 

 two ounces meriurial ointment; one ounce tinc- 

 ture of iodine. Melt by putting the bottle into 

 cold water, and heat the water after the bottle is 

 put in it. Apply twice, daily, on splints; three 

 limes, daily, on spavins, for four or five days. 



— In one of his letters from the West, "Carlton' 

 says, "I would not make the farmers of New 

 England discontented. I would not advise every- 

 body to put up their farms at auction. I would 

 not advise any well-to-do farmer of Massachusetts 



or Vermont to leave his old home and rush out 

 here without first coining to survey the country; 

 but if I were a young man measuring off tape and 

 ribbon, or selling st;'ys and buttons to simpering 

 young ladies in a city store, I would give such a 

 jump over the counter that my feet would touch 

 ground in the center of a great prairie!" 



— A correspondent of the Rural New Yorker 

 gives the following ps his plan of curing sowed 

 corn. I cut my corn with a stout cradli-, when it 

 stands up, or with a corn-cutter when lodged; 

 allow it to lay on the swath a day or two, then 

 rake up and bind the same as oats and rye. I 

 then take an ordinary fence stake, drive it tirmly 

 in the ground, set three bundles of corn around it, 

 and tie them ; then seven to ten more around these 

 (according to size,) and bind them at the top, with 

 one or two bands ; I then cap the whule with two 

 bundles. When put up in this way, they will 

 stand till thoroughly cured, when they can be 

 stacked or put in the barn the same as corn stalks. 



EXTRACTS AND REPLIES. 



CEMENT WATER PIPE. 



I would like to make some inquiry about cement 

 water pipes. Are they liked by those who have 

 tried them ? What proportion uf sand and gravel 

 is used, say to a barrel of cement ? 



Daniel T. Pieece. 



Prescott, Mass., Sept. 27, 1869. 



Remabks. — Properly made cement water pipe 

 we believe gives good satisfaction, but if poorly 

 made it is very unsatisfactory. Mr. L. M. Hill, 

 of Amherst, in your county, has nearly 200 rods 

 laid by Mr. Benjamin Livermore, of Hartland, 

 Vt., who has had much experience in the business, 

 and has we believe invented and patented some 

 process by which the construction of the pipe is 

 much facilitated. Mr. Hill would probably answer 

 any inquiry you wish to make. Our impression 

 is that some six to eight parts of sand are used to 

 one of cement, in ordinary work. But we know 

 nothing of the proportions used in making water- 

 pipe. We understand, however, that much of the 

 cement in the market is totally unfit for that use, 

 — does not work or "set" right, — and that of the 

 same lot^? one barrel will be good and the next 

 worthless, while to the unpracticed eye both ap- 

 pear alike. 



CHESS turning TO WHEAT! 



Having read the communication signed "E," 

 from Th'tford, Vt., in your issue of Oci()t)er 2d, I 

 was reminded of a similar occurrence that hap- 

 pened in Tuubridge, Vt., not more th;(n thirty or 

 forty miles from the place where this wonderful 

 transmutation occuned. and have thought tlnit a re- 

 petition of it might be serviceable in tlie .-olution 

 and proper understanding of some of the won- 

 ders, not to say miracles, of these latter days. 

 Now, I am, like your correspondent "E.," an un- 

 believer in these alleged changes of wheat to a 

 class and species of plant so widely dilfereiit from 

 wheat as is chess. But to the story of our eye 

 witness: "A quantity of ground was sowed to 



