No. 11. Rural Comforts. — Compost Dressing. — Brown Corn. 



35V 



simple work of nature ; piles of mire, shaped 

 into habitations by the hand of time and tem- 

 pest, and as (jniitless of gflass windows, white- 

 wash, and comfort of any conceivable kind, 

 as a cavern in the back of an American wil- 

 derness! But the Frenchman is a genuine 

 'Gallio' in private life, and careth for none 

 of these tilings; yet he is witiiin 50 miles of 

 a people whose study is every thing of do- 

 mestic convenience. To what can the ex- 

 traordinary difference be attributed, which 

 makes the man of England and the man of 

 France as essentially antipodean as if the 

 diameter of the earth divided them? It can- 

 not be climate, for in three-fourths of France 

 they have shower for shower with England ; 

 or if there be a distinction, the winter is 

 keener and the summer more torrid, thus 

 both requiring more diligence in repelling 

 the effects of season. It cannot be poverty, 

 for tlie French peasant has generally become 

 a proprietor: it cannot be government, for if 

 governments act at all in the matter, it is to 

 Bet the example of building: yet the French 

 peasant goes on from year to year and from 

 age to age, sitting in a cottage as naked of 

 comfort as if he sat on a hill in Siberia, and 

 a Tartar hut would be well equipped to the 

 best of these hovels: they have not even the 

 merit of being whitewashed sepulchres, for a 

 brush has never touched them since the mo- 

 ment they arose from their original mire; — 

 the truth is, that ' home,' as it has been a 

 thousand times observed, is not French ; 

 there is but little gathering around the fami- 

 ly hearth, and the cottage is not the place of 

 their mirth; they return to it to sleep, and 

 go to it as men to the churchyard, because 

 they cannot help it. Their festivities are for 

 the guingette, their superfluous coin is ex- 

 pended on the gilded head-gear of the rustic 

 belles, or the flame-coloured waistcoats and 

 flowered stockings of the rustic beaux; while 

 the summer lasts they live in the open air, 

 working, dancing, eating, and flirting through 

 the day ; and when the winter comes, they 

 cluster together in their huts like bees, with 

 no more concern for their furnishing than a 

 generation of rabbits in their warren; there 

 they hibernate, dismal, dark, and frozen, un- 

 til the first gleam of sunshine rouse them, 

 and lets the whole tribe loose like the swal- 

 lows — and then all is fluttering, frisking and 

 huntinj flies — or matters full as light as flies 

 — again." J. C. 



The right depth and width of the furrow 



— the right kind and application of the seed 



— the right times of hoeing, and the right 

 time of haivesting — are all matters de- 

 pending upon the skill and judgment of the 

 farmer. 



Compost Dressing for Mowing Groauds. 



In low lands, whether with or without 

 rocks, with or without hard pan ; as well 

 upon flat elevations and side hills, as in 

 drair.ed swamps; the crop of liny may be in- 

 creased to almost nny extent by a process in- 

 finitely more simple, and less expensive, and 

 much quicker, than by ploughing and hand- 

 labour. The method of making compost-ma- 

 nure is the most simple that can be imagined ; 

 it is done with facility on the sides of roads, 

 and in the cow and hog-pens, with the refuse 

 of chip yards, leaves from the woods, peat 

 and mud taken from the ditches, ashes, sand, 

 earth taken from the back yards and sinks, 

 scrapings from streets, with mixtures from 

 almost every article that can be enumerated 

 or imagined, — all will serve as manure for 

 mowing lands, producing the most valuable 

 and lasting effects as used for top-dressing 

 only. These compost heaps should be well 

 turned and intimately mixed bet()re they are 

 applied, when the spring or autumn season 

 will be equally suitable for their operation, 

 taking occasion to sprinkle over it a small 

 quantity of herdsgrass seed. — Monthly Visi' 

 ter. 



Brown Corn. 



This variety of corn was cultivated by B. 

 Cooke, Esq., of Keene, N. H., last season, and 

 the crop amounted to over 50 bushels on half 

 an acre of land. The soil was a sandy loam 

 on a sand bottom; the crop the previous year 

 being corn and potatoes, a part of each oa 

 greensward, broken up in the spring. The 

 mode adopted was as follows: — 



After the gathering of the crop, rather late 

 in the fall, a coat of the richest manure wag 

 spread and ploughed in : thus the land rested 

 until the spring of 1840; another coat of ma- 

 nure was then spread, and the land was well 

 ploughed twice, deep and fine, and harrowed, 

 so that the earth was pulverized and the ma- 

 nure well mixed. The surface being levelled 

 with the harrow, the field was marked off 

 into rows, two feet and a half each way, with 

 a simple machine made for the purpose, drawn 

 by a horse, leaving a furrow three or four 

 inches wide and about two inches deep. The 

 corn was planted on the 13lh of May, five or 

 six kernels to the hill; the crop was hoed 

 three times, great care being taken to keep 

 it clear of weeds: at the first hoeing the corn 

 was thinned to four stalks in the hill, at the 

 second to three ; the land being left perfectly 

 level and not hilled in the least. The earli- 

 est ears were hard in one hundred days from 

 the time of planting, the whole field being 

 gathered some time in September ; the crop 

 accurately measured, yielding rather over 50 

 bushels. — Monthly Visiter. 



