310 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Jul 



off at the time they begin to shed their feathers, 

 and supply their places with laying pullets. In 

 the selection of pullets, get a good yellow-legged 

 fowl, of medium size, (avoid large ones,) and make 

 no inquiry about the breed. Setters should be 

 shut in a lattice coop, open on all sides, and re- 

 main in the enclosure -with the rest, and have 

 plenty of food until she leaves the nest, when she 

 will soon lay again. 



The greatest nuisance that I have to contend 

 with, and which I think is the cause of more 

 failures in the management of poultry than all 

 other causes combined, is the vermin, or ticks, 

 that infest their roosts in warm weather. Many 

 doubt their existence because they could never 

 find any upon their fowls. When they get into a 

 building, it is nest to an impossibility to eradi- 

 cate them. Various means have been tried to 

 exterminate them, and all have failed because of 

 their tenacity of life and small size. It is use- 

 less to expect profit or pleasure while these pests 

 are allowed to increase. As they do not remain 

 upon the fowls any longer than to fill them, 

 something must be done to keep them under in 

 warm weather, and I have found nothing better 

 than the following : Have a smooth roost, and 

 nail a lath or two to the under side of the same, 

 to cover cavities previously made with an inch 

 auger, where they can secrete themselves when 

 filled ; then, once or twice a week, carry out the 

 laths and saturate them with boiling water. 

 Another remedy is to smear with poor oil once a 

 week, or oftener if necessary. Every person who 

 has a family should keep half a dozen laying 

 hens ; they will eat every thing that a pig will, 

 and, if well cared for, are more profitable. 



Concord, May 12, 1855. h. 



IT WILL SAVE time; 



We have always been advocates for the intro- 

 duction ot new machines and implements, for 

 the purposes of husbandry. We have often 

 echoed tlie popular remark, " Jif ivill save time.'''' 



It has sometimes occurred to us, that this 

 thought deserved a more careful consideration 

 What is the object of saving time ? Would it be 

 better for us all, if we could have our labor per- 

 formed entirely by steam and water-power, and 

 that wo should be exempt from physical toil' 

 certainly it would not. A certain amount of la- 

 bor with the hands, as well as the head, is essen- 

 to health and energy of character. 



Again, in a community where the laborers, as 

 in the Southern States, are ignorant, so that they 

 could not give their time to reading or writing 

 and the cultivation of the mind generally, ex- 

 emption from labor would be followed by the 

 worst consequences. 



In our New England cities, even, were em- 

 ployment suddenly to cease, though abundant 

 means of sustaining life were provided, we shoiild 

 at once have among our citizens a most danger- 

 ovis element, in a class unemployed in their ac- 

 customed labors, and without the resources to 

 preserve them in a life of leisure. 



It seems, then, that however desirable we are 

 in the habit of thinking a life of leisure to be, it 

 is not so under all considerations. Whenever the 

 time exempted from labor is occupied in the cultiva- 

 tion of the mind and heart, then is such time truly 

 saved. 



The mechanic, who by the aid of machinery, 

 or by double effort, finishes his day's work, so 

 that he has a long evening which he devotes to 

 the drinking saloon, or card table, has saved no 

 time. His condition would be better were he at 

 his task till bed-time, at his bench or anvil. The 

 former, who on an easy soil, can earn his week'a 

 support by a day's labor, and give all his leisure 

 to horse-racing and gambling, has saved no time. 

 A hard soil and a small return would be a bless- 

 ing to him, if they kept him from evil compan- 

 ionship. 



But when society has reached that condition, 

 as it has in most of New England, that our young 

 men and women are really desirous to improve 

 their minds ; when they have arrived at the pe- 

 riod, that they desire to increase their knowl- 

 edge, and will devote their leisure hours to books 

 and the elegant and innocent recreation of music 

 and lectures and refined conversation, then a par- 

 tial exemption from toil has become truly a 

 blessing. Severe bodily labor is hardly consist- 

 ent with the highest intellectual cultivation. To 

 be be more explicit, it is rarely possible for a 

 man to devote many hours in the day to hard 

 work with his hands, and in the same day per- 

 form much labor in study, while considerable 

 physical exercise daily is essential to intellectual 

 as well as bodily health and strength. Undoubt- 

 edly, most of our farmers, in the summer months, 

 work too hard for the best exercise of their men- 

 tal powers. Ten hours of labor under our hot 

 sun, in the field, is too much of a tax on one's 

 vital energies to allow him to be a severe student 

 the remainder of his waking hours. 



Then let us endeavor to save time. Let us 

 make use of plows and harrows of the most ap- 

 proved form. Let us introduce mowing ma- 

 chines, and horse^rakes, corn-shellers and potato- 

 diggers ; let us make the wind draw our water, 

 and the water drive our machinery, and the 

 steam take its place at the wheel. Let us, by 

 all means, here in New England, where men de- 

 sire knowledge, and know the value of leisure, 

 do all we can to lessen human toil. 



Time saved from bodily laljor, and given to ed- 

 ucation, is time indeed saved, and there is a re- 

 ciprocal action which is AA'orking WJnders in this 

 direction, and which is daily tending to i-elieve 

 the laborer. 



The farmer or mechanic feels the value of 

 time. He finds it necessary to have some hours 

 for study. He finds the labor of swinging the 



