206 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



May 



lamb in his flock weighing 104 lbs. 

 Repiiblican. 



■Sprinf/Jield 



For the New England Farmer. 



LEGAL PROTECTION TO FRUIT TREES. 



''How does it happen that there is so little 

 choice fruit cultivated in this place?" I asked of 

 a resident, last fall. "There are," I continued, 

 "no early or fall apples, no pears, good or bad, 

 very few peaches, no grapes ; in fact, though 

 possessing every advantage for the successful cul- 

 tivation of the very choicest fruits, there is in 

 the place scarcely a thing gro^vn worthy the 

 name of fruit !" 



"Well, I can tell you the whole and only 

 cause, and it is all told in one single word, 

 '■Boi/sf Boys, big and little, will manage in 

 spite of you to get the best of your fruit, and 

 most likely break down and destroy your fruit 

 trees ; and it is more vexatious and provoking to 

 raise the fruit and have such scamps get it and 

 ruin your trees to boot, than it is to have noth- 

 ing. I tried it till I got sick of it, and gave it 

 up!" 



The manner in wliich this response was utter- 

 ed, showed it was no "fancy sketch," but "real 

 life." The man felt wliat he said. 



"But," I replied, "put the law on such fel- 

 lows!" 



"Law !" he repeated, with a scornful leer. "I 

 tried law once, to my satisfaction. I found one 

 of the vermin on one of my trees one night, and 

 made a complaint against him before a justice of 

 the peace, who found him guilty, and fined him 

 one dollar and costs ! From that time my gar- 

 den and fruit trees found no peace till the first 

 was ruined and the latter broken down and 

 killed. That's the beauty of the law. If the fel- 

 low got into my house, at the same time, and 

 stolen a crab, or had passed a counterfeit one 

 dollar bill on me designedly, he would have 

 fetched up at the States prison ! But he could 

 trample down my garden, and break down my 

 fruit trees which were worth beyond price to me, 

 and yet the law would fine him only a few dol- 

 lars, and let him off to run riot in his mischief!" 

 Well, thinks I to myself, must these things 

 be so ? Must we be deprived of the inestimable 

 blessing of having abundance of choice fruit, a 

 blessing great as it is which every man in the 

 commonwealtli with only a half-acre lot may en- 

 joy, because, forsooth, vagrant boys, grown and 

 ungrown, will steal it? Nothing conduces more 

 to the enjoyment of the family than abundance 

 of good fruit, and no good can be had with less 

 expense. 



If every family which has the means, could 

 have the most tempting fruits of the varieties 

 which flourish here, how greatly would family 

 expenses be reduced ! Tens of thousands of dol- 

 lars that are now sent abroad for supplies and 

 f >:• foreign fruits would be saved at home and 

 added to the wealth of the commonwcahh. 



It is not the straggling, moss-grown tree that 

 stands on the open common or by the road-side 

 tempting every passer by to "pluck and eat," 

 that needs or merits protection. If a man has 

 no more wit than to expose his treasures openly 

 to the pu))lic, thus daring them to violate the law, 

 let him suffjr loss under the mild pressure of the 



present law. But as he who breaks into a house 

 and takes property either day or night is made 

 to feel the rigor of the law, and that justly, so 

 let him who will break into or enter a garden, 

 yard or orchard, and take fruit day or night, be 

 made to feel a like deserved rigor. 



Will not our Legislature now in session think of 

 these things ? Let them give us a chance to try 

 what virtue there is in something beside turf 

 and grass. Give us something that will bring 

 the "boys" down from the apple-tree and pear- 

 tree too in double quick time, and make them stay 

 down ! IcHABOD Hoe. 



THE GREATEST GRAIN MARKET IN 

 THE WORLD. 



In the progress of our city and of the West 

 generally, facts of the most astounding character 

 not unfrequently come upon us unawares, and 

 before we are prepared for them. If any one had 

 asked us, two days ago, which of the great grain 

 depots of the world, (depots at which grsyn is 

 collected directly from the producer,) was the 

 largest, we probably would have named half a 

 dozen before hitting the i-ight one. If the same 

 question were put to each of our readers, we 

 doubt if any one of the whole number could 

 answer it correctly, nor do we believe that any 

 one of the whole number would credit the correct 

 answer to the query, unless it was sustained by 

 an array of figures, the truth of which could not 

 be questioned. Our attention was called to this 

 subject yesterday, by a gentleman engaged in the 

 grain business in this city, and with his assis- 

 tance, we have given it a thorough investigation, 

 the result of ivhich, greatly to our surprise and 

 gratification, establishes the supremacy of Chicago 

 as a grain port over all other ports of the world! 

 That there may be no ground for incredulity, we 

 proceed to lay before our readers the statistics, 

 gleaned from authentic sources, which confirm 

 this statement. In the table which follows, we 

 have in all cases reduced flour to its equivalent 

 in wheat, estimating five bushels of the latter to 

 one of the former. The exports from the Euro- 

 pean ports are an average for a series of years — 

 those of St. Louis for the year 1853, those for 

 Chicago and Milwaukie, for the current year, 

 and those for New York are for the past eleven 

 months of the same year. With these explana- 

 tions we invite attention to the following table : 



■\Ylieat. Ind.Com. Oats, Rye, Total. 



bush. bush. . Barley. bush. 



Odessa 5,600,000 .. 1,440,000 7,040,000 



Galatz & Ibrelia.2,400,000 5,600,000 320,000 8,320,000 



Dantzig 3,080,000 .. 1,328,000 4,403,000 



St. Petersburg.. .. all kinds .. 7,200,000 



Archangel .. .. 2,528,000 



Ilisa .. .. 4,000,000 



St. Louis 3,082,000 918,384 1,081,078 5,031,468 



Milwaukie 2,723,574 181,937 841,650 8,747,161 



New York 5,802,452 3,627,888 .. 9,4£0,335 



Chicago 2,946,922 6,745,583 5,034,216 13,726,723 



By comparing the exports of the difierent 

 places mentioned in the above table, it will be 

 seen that the grain exports of Chicago exceed 

 those of New York by 4,290,393 bushels, those 

 of St. Louis by more than two hundred and fifty 

 per cent., and those of Milwaukie nearly four 

 hundred per cent. Turning to the great grana- 

 ries of Europe, Chicago nearly doubles St. Pe- 

 tersburg, the largest, and exceeds Galatz and 

 Ibrelri combined' 5,406,727 bushels. 



