1854. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



555 



ba, while we should certainly take the Isabella as 

 being less acid. Our tastes do not agree ; so that 

 pronouncing one as decidedly better than any 

 other would not amount to anything more than 

 an announcement of our own peculiar tastes. 

 tanner's trimmings. 



Mr. Editor: — T wish to make a few inquiries 

 in regard to fertilizers. 



The tanning business is carried on two miles 

 from where I live, where lean obtain 5 or 6 cords 



of trimmings from the hides after I)eing tanned,! mane feeling. lias nature done her work in such 

 by hauling it away. The heap has been collect- a bungling manner, in forming that paragon of 

 ing six or eight years, and I should presume was animals, the horse, that he requires to have a 

 partially decomposed at the bottom. Would it large piece of bone chopped oif with an axe, to 

 be prolitable to haul it that distance as a fertili-j reduce him to symmetry — or that Ijcauty and grace 

 zer 1 (a.) \ can be obtained only by cutting a pair of its largo 



If so, what would be the best method of using it ? muscles ? 



DOCKING HORSES USELESS AND 

 BARBAROUS. 



AVe are glad to see tliat the abominable prac- 

 tice of docking and nicking horses is getting out 

 of fashion. It prevails in no country in the world 

 but England and the United States : we got it 

 from tlie mother country, and the sooner we leave 

 it off, the better. It is wonderful liow anyl)ody 

 but an ignorant, narrow-minded block-head of a 

 jockey, sliould ever have thought of it, being as 

 offensive to good taste as a violation to every hu- 



My land is a very light loam, but not sandy. I 

 have, however, two acres of clayey loam where I 

 intend to sow spring wheat. I have bought some 

 Mexican guano, and dry ground bone, with which 

 I intend to manure my clayey land. When should 

 it be applied, in the spring or fall ? {b.) 



Scars/nont, Me., Oct., 185-i. j. M. 



Remarks. — (a.) You may use the trimmings you 

 speak of with great advantage by plowing them 

 in sufficiently deep to prevent the escape of vola- 

 tile matter, or by composting with moist meadow 

 muck or loam. They would be a cheap manure 

 hauled six miles. 



(b.) Apply the guano and bone in the spring, 

 on the furrows, and work it under with the culti- 

 tor or harrow. 



ASHES. 



Friend Brown : — I wish to inquire through the 

 Farmer respecting ashes that has been in the 

 ground for fifty years, whether there is any value 

 to them or not as a manure ? I have a large quan- 

 tity which I wish to use, if of any value, s. s. 



"The docking and nicking of horses," says an 

 intelligent writer on Farriery, "is a cruel prac- 

 tice, and ought to be al)andoned by the whole 

 race of mankind. Every human being, possessed 

 of a human heart and magnanimous mmd, must 

 confess that both the docking and nicking of horses 

 is cruel ; but that creature called man attempts 

 thus to mend the works of his Almighty, wise 

 creator — in doing which he often spoils and dis- 

 figures them. What is more beautiful than a 

 fine horse, with an elegant long tail and flowing 

 mane, waving in the sports of the wind, and ex- 

 hibiting itself in a perfect state of nature 1 Be- 

 sides, our Creator has given them to the horse for 

 defence as well as beauty." 



The same author relates an instance of a fine 

 hunting horse owned by an Englishman, wliich 

 could carry his rider over a five- barred gate with 

 ease ; but he thought the horse did not carrij as 

 good a tail as he wished, — he tlierefore had him 

 nicked, and when the horse got well, he could 

 scarcely carry him over two bars. "Thus," said 

 he, "I have spoiled a fine horse ; and no wonder, 

 for it weakened him in his loins." Any man of 

 common sense would give ten per cent, more for 

 a fine liorse whose tail had never been mutilated, 

 than for one which had been under the hand of a 

 jockey. 



SOLIDIFIED MILK. 



The last numl)cr ot iiie ^ ■—„ Midlcal 



Monthly contains an account of a visit made t)y 

 a committee of medical gentlemen, appointed by 

 the New York Academy of Medicine, to the es- 

 tablishment of Mr. Blatchford at Armenia, N. Y., 

 (some 30 miles east of Pou^hkeepsie) whore " sol- 

 iried milk " is prepared. It the opinions expressed 

 in the article referred to, respecting the value of 

 this new description of food, are well founded, 

 the juvenile population, at least of New York, may 

 indulge in liearty solf-congratulations ; for "swill 

 milk "has already couunitted appalling ravages 

 one-fourth the usual crop, although there is no! in their ranks. The editor describes the process 

 appearance of disease. J. n. k- of solidific^ition as follows 



RBBtARKs. — The ashes you speak of will un- 

 doubtedly be worth ooU«^fine and using. If they 

 have not been freely leached they are o-tiii ^xxiiQ 

 valuable. 



THE SHOE SHOP AND THE FARM. 



Mr. Editor : — Last spring I left the shoe shop 

 for a farm, which I hired, and went into debt for 

 tools, seed, &c., and notwithstanding the severe 

 drought,! find I shall be able to make a good liv- 

 ing. I liave resolved to stick to the farm as long 

 as I have been engaged in shoe-making, ten years, 

 and read the New England Farmer every week, 

 and if I make no more progress in farming than 1 

 have done this year, I shall have a comfortable 

 home and living, and a far pleasanter occupation 

 Potatoes in this section are but little more than 



Middlcton, Vt., 1854. 



Wheat. — It is estimated that the Canadas will 

 raise the present season a surplus of 12,000,0(10 

 bushels of wheat, which, of course, will look 

 abroad for a market. By the new reciprocity 

 treaty, provincial grain and (lour come into our 

 market free of duty.— /?w//a/o Courier. 



To 122 lbs. of milk, 28 lbs. of Stuart's white 

 sugar, were added, and a trivial pn^portion of bi- 

 cari)onate of soda, a ti-aspoonful, merely enough 

 to insure the neutrali/.ing of any acidity, which 

 in the summer season is exhilnted even a few min- 

 utes after milking, although iuapprecialdo to the 

 organs of taste. The sweet milk was poured into 

 evaporating pans of enamelled iron, umbedded in 



