THE FARMER'S MONTHLY VISITOR. 



12.5 



simply because she is worth the trouble of kill~ 

 ing, and thus many of our faruiers perjJetuatB a 

 breed of animals that are a disgrace to the coun- 

 ti'j : they seem uneasy while they possess an ani- 

 mal that will draw the attention of their neigh- 

 bors or the butcher ; and woe be to it, if it put 

 on a better appearance than its fellows ? From 

 that time its doom is sealed. 



To improve the breed of animals, it is by no 

 means necessary to incur a great expense in the 

 purchase of crack stock from distant parts : if 

 the farmer will take his horse and ride across the 

 country some fine day, and view the live stock of 

 his neighbors, he will soon perceive that there 

 are abundance of means of bettering his circum- 

 stances by a cross or exchange at but little cost, 

 and he by this means is improving bis judgment 

 by comparison, and hoarding up experience for 

 a future day, that will be of more value to him 

 than the expense of many such pleasurable ex- 

 cursions; and improvement once begun and per- 

 sisted in for a short time, will produce such a 

 correspondent improvement in the mind and cir- 

 cumstances of the farmer as will insure its con- 

 tinuation, and richly reward all his labor and out- 

 lay. It is only to try it.SelecteiL 



Amidst the drought of the present year the 

 editor of the Visitor has been highly successful 

 in a crop of oats. Land which yielded less than 

 half a ton of hay to the acre in the sunnner of 

 1839, was ploughed up in the sward about the 

 20th of 3Iay 1840— about forty loads of manure 

 were spread to the acre ; a portion of it was 

 turned imder the sod — a portion was ploughed in 

 to the depth of four inches, and a portion was 

 simply harrowed under ; and the land produced 

 a very decent crop of Indian corn and potatoes. 

 The original sod was hardly disturbed either in 

 the last year's cultivation or the ploughing of the 

 present spring. The land was simply ploughed 

 once the present spring, and six bushels only of 

 oats sowed upon four acres. The oats came up 

 so thin that several persons pronounced there 

 would be nothing of them early in June : they 

 branched and spread in the course of the summer 

 so that they were as heavy upon the ground as if 

 double the quantity had been sowed. Some of 

 them were five feet in height, and the straws of the 

 size of pipe stems. The whole piece, with the 

 exception of the tramping and rolling over in 

 some spots by three unrully boys upon the Sab- 

 bath, stood up well — much better and stronger 

 than it would have done had the blades been 

 more numerous. The i)iece has been carefully 

 reaped; and the result is two hundred and sevenly- 

 Jive stooks of twelve bundles each, making twelve 

 loads which will weigh at least twelve tons. The 

 opinion is, that the four acres will turn out full 

 three hundred bushels of oats. We have seen 

 not another such piece of oats in this part of 

 New Hampshire : if any man has produced more, 

 we invite him to communicate the fact through 

 the columns of the Monthly Visitor. 



EfcouRAGE A Fondness for Reading. — Chil- 

 dren's hooks have been of late years so greatly 

 multiplied, that there is but little difficulty in 

 forming in the mind of a child a taste for reading. 

 When the taste is formed you will be saved all 

 further trouble. Your son will soon explore the 

 libraries of all his associates, and he will find 

 calm, and silent, and improving amusement for 

 many rainy days and long evenings. And you 

 may have many an hour of your own evening 

 solitude enlivened by his reading. The cultiva- 

 tion of this habit is of such immense importance 

 — it is so beneficial in its results, not only upon 

 the child, but upon the quietude and harmony of 

 the family, that it is well worth while to make 

 special efforts to awaken a fondness for books. 

 Select some books of decidedly entertaining 

 character, and encourage him for a time to read 

 aloud to you, and you will very soon find his in- 

 terest riveted ; and by a little attention, avoiding 

 as much as possible irksome constraint, you may 

 soon fix the habit permanently. 



The great difficulty with most parents is, that 

 they are unwilling to devote time to their chil- 

 dren. But there are no duties in life more im- 

 perious than the careful culture of the minds 

 and beartsof the immortals entrusted to our care. 

 There are no duties we can neglect at such an 

 awful hazard. A good son is an inestimable 

 treasure. Language caunot speak its worth, A 



bad son is about the heaviest calamity which can 

 be endured on earth. Let the parent, then, find 

 time to train up the child in the way he should 

 go. — Mothr's Jlssislant. 



Productions of New Hampshire< 



The statistics collected by the Marshals, in ta- 

 king the last census, embrace a vast amont oi' 

 useful information. According to that census, 

 the following was the state of agricultural pro- 

 duction and agricultural property in this State, 



Bushels of Wheat, 

 Rye, 



Corn 

 " Oats 



" Buckwheat 



" Barley 



" Potatoes 



No. of horses and mules 

 " neat cattle 

 " sheep 

 " swine 

 Value of Poultry 

 Pounds of wool 

 Tons of hay 



" hemp and flax 

 lbs of gathered tobacco 

 " silk cocoons 

 " sugar made 

 Value of produce of Dairy 



" " orchard 



Galls, of wine made 

 Value of lumber produced 

 The New York Journal of Commerce esti- 

 mates the total value of the annual agricultural 

 productions of the United States, at something 

 more than five hundred millions of dollars. Of 

 this sum, as will be seen by the above table. 

 New Hampshire produces its full proportion. — 

 At the current prices, the value of its grain crops 

 alone will amount to $2,370,000; lits potatoe 

 crop to $1,250,000, and its hay at five <lollars per 

 ton, the minimum price, to nearly $2,500,000, 

 making for these articles alone, more than six 

 millions of dollars per year. — Coos Democrat. 



442,954 

 395,530 

 1,252,572 



1,198,989 



115,463 



121,400 



6,234,901 



39,850 



261,088 



606,891 



120,167 



$97,862 



1,268,980 



496,647 



53,040 



115 



mi 



1,097,308 



$1,585, 955 



$220,056 



94 



$401,358 



New Agricui-tdral Paper. — S. VV. Cole, late 

 editor of the Yankee Farmer proposes to issue 

 a monthly paper, of the size of tne N. E. Farmer 

 to be called the "Farmer's Journal and Maga- 

 zine of Useful Arts." In a specimen No. be e.x- 

 pressess the design to commence the first of Oc- 

 tober. The ternis aie 50 cents per year in ad- 

 vance, in all cases. While the Yankee Farmer 

 was under the care of Mr. Cole, it always indica- 

 ted industry, inquisitiveness, and sound practical 

 wisdom in matters pertaining to agricidture. 

 The proposed paper will doubtless be well con- 

 ducted, and will be well worth the cost. We 

 wish our wortliy brother success. — JV. E. Far- 



The Effect of Under Draining. — There is 

 a field on the estate of the Earl of Leicester, 

 at Longford, in this county, which some years 

 ago was occupied by Mr. John Sherratt, and 

 brought forth rushes in such abunolance, that the 

 occupier gave leave to any body to carry them 

 away who would be at the trouble to mow them. 

 Three years ago llie field was drained, under the 

 direction of Mr. T. Harper, of Foston ; and this 

 year, we are told, the present occupier, Mr. T. 

 Robinson, has cut three tons an acre of ns nice 

 herbage as ever grew. — Derbyshire Chronicle. 



The Old Coat.— It is better to turn the old 

 coat, said my aunt Prudence, than to run in debt 

 for a new one. But see, replied I, there is a hole 

 in it ! Never niiud that, said she — put iu a patch ; 

 a patch upon the sleeve is better than a writ up- 

 on the back ; the old coat will set easier at home, 

 than a new one iu prison.— Selected. 



Management of Children. 

 Keep your Sons employed.— Let iday be hut 

 their occasional privilege, and they will enjoy it 

 far more highly. Employ them in the garden, if 

 you have one, as woik, not as play. Give them 

 daily and regular duties about the house. It will 

 do them no harm to perform hnmhie services. 

 It will help you and help them still more, to 

 have them bring wood or coal, to scour the knives, 

 to make their own beds, to keep their own room 

 in order. You may thus render them highly use- 

 ful,and gieatlv contribute to their liappinegg,aiid to 



their future welfare. If you are sick, it is still more 

 important you should train your sons to these 

 liabits of industry, for they stand particularly in 

 need of this moral and physical discipline. Louis 

 Phillippe, the present king of France, was in 

 childhood and early youth required to wait upon 

 himself in the performance of the humblest offices. 

 It was through this culture that he was trained up 

 to be one of the most remarkable men of the 

 present age. 



Having been much engaged during the last 

 month, the Editor of the Visitor offei-s as a substi- 

 tute for his usual quantity of original matter the 

 address which he delivered before the Lyceum 

 of the city of New York last winter. It is a long, 

 and will probably be considered a tiresome aiti- 

 cle : yet at the time it elicited some applause 

 from men we esteemed to be better judges than 

 ourselves. If the readei-sof the Visitor will take 

 it in detached portions, they will find a variety if 

 not entertainment. It is impossible the head of 

 any one man should be so comprehensive as 

 continually to bring forth new matter sufficient 

 not to cloy the appetite of the intelligent and 

 critical reader. 



Asparagus. — The New Genesee Farmer 

 gives the following method of cultivating this 

 popular vegetable : 



An observant neighbor proposed to us, the 

 other day, to recommend planting asparagus in a 

 single row, each plant two feet apart; in beds, 

 the plants crowd each other, and as if surrounded 

 by weeds, send up more slender stems. These 

 remarks agreed entirely with our own observa- 

 tions ; for though we have been at the expense of 

 making deep beds of the best materials, our fin- 

 est asparagus grows in common soil where the 

 seed was accidentally dropped. In beds it is 

 difficult to remove such seedlings as spring up, 

 without injuring the roots of the older plants ; 

 but from a row this may be easily done ; and all 

 plants that intrude on them should be treated as 

 weeds. 



To raise the plants : separate the seeds from 

 the berries, and sow them in a bed late in the fall, 

 (not in the spring) covering them with fine earth 

 lialf an inch deep. If put in rows, so that the 

 hoe can pass between them the next season, they 

 may be kept clear of weeds more conveniently ; 

 and when one year old, if they have had |)lenty 

 of room, they may be transplanted. One long 

 row may be the best. And be careful that not 

 more than one plant is set in a place. 



The cropping tliat asparagus endures, is very 

 severe : and it seems reasonable that the plants 

 should be strengthened by the growth of three 

 years before they are molested. To cover the 

 stools in the fall with stable manure, and to rake 

 off the coarser parts in the spring, is an old and 

 excellent practice : it protects them from the 

 frost of winter and manures them at the same 

 time. Strewing salt over them liberally in the 

 spring, also adds to their vigor. In a few years, 

 an asparagus plant, neither crowded on by others 

 nor over-cropped, will form a stool from 12 to 18 

 inches across. 



Some entertain a notion that it is prejudicial to 

 stir the soil among corn iu dry weatlier, and that 

 weeds prevent the evaporation of moisture by a 

 hot sun — but the reverse is the fact. The ex- 

 haustion of moisture by a plant, is in the latio of 

 the surface of its leaves and stalks 

 the sun and air. 



The poorest and humblest man that lives, has 

 an interest in preserving the earth's wealth and 

 guarding her capacity of improvement. The pos- 

 sessions that now create a self-importance in 

 their preseut owners, will soon be no longer ])er- 

 sonally theirs, and may hereafter bear the now 

 unknown names of his children's children ! 



Common Schools in New Hampshire.— The 

 Interest of the Literary Fund of $64,000 and 

 $19,000 derived from a tax on banks, are apjiro- 

 priated to the su|)portof common schools in this 

 State. Besiiles this, about $90,000 are rai.sed an- 

 nually by a direct tax for the same object. The 

 number of children betwitn 4 and 14 is about 

 75,000.— CoHg-. Journal. 



