NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



21 



time. Lay the mould on this spreading of mortar, 

 and then spread the mortar on tlie top and sides of 

 the mould; press it down tightly, so as to fit the 

 mould, on all sides; smooth it off with the trowel 

 on top, and lay down another spreading of mortar; 

 then take hold of the handle of the mould and roll 

 it around so as to start it loose, and draw it out to 

 within three inches of the end, — spread on another 

 layer of mortar, and smooth it as before. So keep 

 doing, until you have your pipe the length required. 

 Be careful that you don't press with your trowel on 

 the pipe above the end of the mould, or it may cause 

 it to cave in, especially if the bore of the pipe be 

 large. Let the pipe remain three or four days, 

 until it gets hard and dry; then cover it up with 

 earth. Be careful and not let any large stones fall 

 on the pipe, — they will be apt to crack it. A pipe 

 properly made in this way, will remain perfect as 

 long as it is kept from the frost. R. A. Hutchin 

 SON. Geneva, July 29, 1850. 



Albany Cultivator. 



TO PREVENT SMUT. 



Messrs. Editors : — I will give you my experi- 

 ence in preventing smut. About twelve years ago, 

 on my farm in Brighton, I laised a field of wheat 

 of about five acres, which was so smutty that I 

 thought it would not pay for threshing; so I fed it 

 out. But, as a matter of experiment, I threshed 

 enough to sow the same field again. I soaked it 

 all night in water strong with salt, and stirred it 

 up and skimmed off all the smut and shrunk wheat 

 that rose to the top. In the morning I rolled it in 

 fresh slaked lime, and sowed it on the same field 

 where it had grown; and I did not discover a head 

 of smut in the field. I was much troubled with 

 smut before this, having to wash most of my wheal 

 before grinding; but since I have pursued this 

 course, I scarcely ever see a head of smut in my 

 fields. My neighbor, Mathew Dryer, was troubled 

 in the same way — pursued the same course for two 

 or three years — and got rid of the smut. These 

 are facts, and important facts for the farmer. The 

 question whether smut is caused by a bug, or some 

 other cause, although a very interesting subject ol 

 inquiry to the curious, is of very little practical con- 

 sequence as long as we know an effectual remedy, 

 easily applied, and within the reach of all. I should 

 of course prefer to sow clean wheat, if I could pro- 

 cure it readily; but I should sow smutty wheat that 

 had been limed aud brined in the way I have men- 

 tioned, with perfect confidence that the vitality of 

 Uie smut had been destroyed, and that its effects 

 would not be seen in the next crop. This confi- 

 dence has been gained by my own experience, and 

 my observation of its success among my neighbors. 

 I had tried various remedies previous to this. — Gen- 

 esee Farmer. 



Brighton, N. Y., 



HlR-iVM ROBBINS. 



IDIOCY. 



Dr. Enos Stevens, examining agent for the Mas- 

 cachusetts commissioners for the prevention and cure 

 o"f idiocy has a manuscript work wherein occurs thf 

 following: — 



"At Cambridge poor house, there are three well- 

 formed and strong brothers, whose names are Jo- 

 seph Cox, 23 Years old, George Cox, 20, and Wil- 

 liam Cox, 18. Thes3 are all the children their 

 mother had, — their father was a respectable me- 



chanic, and has a very intelligent child by a sec- 

 ond wife. The mother of those idiotic hoys was a 

 devoted, benevolent woman, who often took narcot- 

 ic drugs, and went out whole days and nights to 

 visit and assist the sick among her neighbors: leav- 

 ing her own children all put asleep by laudanum, 

 which is wine and opium.) Every day when they 

 cried, and every time she v,'ished to go out, she 

 put them all asleep with laudanum. At length 

 their whole organization assimilated to such a state 

 of body and mind, and they have grown up to the 

 size of manhood, with the avenues of their brains 

 practically closed by drugs; so that they have merely 

 infantile powers of mind and strength of bodies. 



ASHES AND LIME FOR PLUM TREES. 



I have in my garden a plum tree, which for tliree 

 or four years past, has not any portion of the plume 

 been sound. 



They are all bored or rotted, and fell from the tree 

 before they were ripe. Two or three other plum 

 trees of a different kind, which have borne less, 

 shared the same fate. Last year, a young tree which 

 stood near an ash-leach, and which had never borne 

 before, produced a solitary plum that was sound. 

 This suggested the idea that its preservation was 

 owing to the ashes which had been scattered around 

 the roots of the tree. Following out the hint thus 

 given, I la.st spring spread ashes and lime, with 

 manure and salt around all my trees. The result 

 has been, that they have all borne this year more 

 than usual, and most of the fruit has been sound. 

 This result I ascribe in part to the ashes and lime. 

 The same I find is recommended by "An Old Dig- 

 ger." And the conclusion is obvious, that alkali 

 enough will destroy the young insects as they lie 

 burrowed in the ground, or attempt to emerge from 

 it in the spring. If in this way sound plums can 

 be raised, it will be found a very easy way. Let 

 some of our readers try the experiment and note tlie 

 result. — Horticulturist. 



REMEDY FOR ASTHMA. 



An individual who has suffered much from asth- 

 ma, and who has in vain souglit relief from regular 

 physicians, wishes us to give publicity to the fol- 

 lowing remedy : 



"Procure common blotting paper, and thorough- 

 ly saturate it in a solution of nitre (saltpetre,) and 

 let it be carefully dried by the fire, or by exposure 

 to the rays of the sun. On retiring at night, ig- 

 nite it, and deposit it, burning, on a plate or square 

 of sheet or zinc or iron in your bedroom." 



In many cases, it is said, this has enabled per- 

 sons painfully afflicted to enjoy their rest. — Maina 

 Culticator. 



Hundreds of nights within the last five years, 

 when the bitter pain widened the time in propor- 

 tion as respiration became more difficult — hundreds 

 of nights has the difficulty been lessened by a sus- 

 pension of what seemed an almost interminable ag- 

 ony in the smoke of burning nitre. As a means oI 

 averting present suffering, the subscriber can reo- 

 omend, from his own experience, the tise of saltpfu 

 tre almost identically prepared as above. Many 

 times has he lain down in a smoke condenssd seem- 

 ingly to the smothering of a common healthy breath- 

 er, and found relief from the worst suffei i.ig. — Hon.. 

 Isaac Hill. 



