244 



THE GENESEE FAEMER. 



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limestone, whose interior finishing is in keeping, 

 with its outside perfections. Nice framed engrav-' 

 ings next to the barometer greet the eye at tlie ves-' 

 tibule; then not only the ample liall, but the walls' 

 of each room are hung with large oil puintingsand 

 superb engravings. Unique sliells from the far- 

 oft" Pacific islands, and articles of vertu indigenous 

 and from abroad, fill the mantels and tables, in 

 common with vases of flowers, leaving room only' 

 for books and papers. 



As "man lives not by bread alone," I hate to dwell 

 on the suburban fare here. Sutfice it to say that 

 the Java was neither medicated witli roots, or cream- 

 less; the bread had not given up its saccharine to 

 form a baker^s pufty, insipid loaf; the butter con- 

 tained that aroma which Boxjssingatjlt says no 

 chemist can analyze, and the strawberries had un- 

 dergone no fermentation in their transit tVom the 

 garden to the table. The host liimself was once a 

 traveler in France and Germany — an importer of 

 German fabrics in Maiden Lane, New York. Fron: 

 a pale, polished citizen, with a poor appetite and 

 worse digestion, he has become, by force of daily 

 exercise in the open air — call it not drudgery — a 

 strong, hirsute man, who, without being eithei 

 "gluttonous or a wine-bibber," can now avdle a 

 quart of strawberries with his tea, with more im^ 

 punity than he could once eat a saucer full. Tlien, 

 wliat is still better, his intellectual comforts hav( 

 been also multiplied, increased, and improved, ai 

 his physical man was renovated by air and exer 

 cise. 8. w. 



A STOCK FARM IN CANADA. 



Eds. Genesee Farmee: — Late in tlie afternooi 

 of the 13th of June, 1860, I arrived at the residenci 

 of a Canadian farmer, whose name is well knowi 

 as one of tlie best importers and breeders of im 

 proved stock the country can boast of. Geokg; 

 Miller, Esq.^ of Markham, C. W., is a, plain, hon 

 est, hard-working man, who has seen some sixt 

 summers. Like the late Mr. Bates, of Kirkleav 

 iugton, he loves to be among his sheep and cattk 

 and knows and treats each individual among thei 

 as Avell as if they were his cluldren. After tea b 

 took me over his farm. He has 1100 acres, .300 o 

 which comprise the home farm under his own iir 

 mediate supervision — the rest being farmed by ter 

 ants under his directiop. In tlie first field w 

 entered were seen depasturing some eighty Leicet 

 ter sheep, mostly ewes, witli their lambs, and 

 few Cotswolds. It was easy to distinguish at 

 glance the long-bodied, round-barreled Leicester 

 with tlieir short, slender legs, almost hidden fror 

 view, from the gigantic, square-built Cotswolds 

 with broad backs of nearly a yard across. Ther 

 were some choice imported rams among then 

 which had been prize-takers both in England ani 

 America. I was surprised to find tliat, notwitb 

 standing the apparent difterence in size betwee; 

 the two picked rams of each breed, the diflerenC' 

 in live weight was only about four pounds in favo" 

 of the Ootswold. 



One imported Leicester ewe was literally rollini 

 with fat, and unable to move about, having hat 

 one of her legs injured a few days previously bjl 

 one of the neighbor's horses breaking into thi 

 fiehl. She cost thirty-four guineas in England 

 AH the animals allowed themselves to be approacbe* 



shaven lawn of many acres, fenced from the road 

 by an open, painted fence, neither high nor forbid- 

 ding ; then the long, circular, well kept, gravelled 

 roadway, from gate to mansion, is shaded by alter- 

 nate shade and fruit trees. Here are dwarf pears 

 and standards, and dwarf cherry trees now filled 

 with green fruit. Then on one side, nearer the 

 house, is seen long beds of strawberries and bushes 

 of small fruits, that even the feathered songsters 

 make it their paradise, and here feed without stint 

 or fear ; for at Oanandaigua, the fruits of the earth 

 are in such variety and excess during the season, 

 that no one fences against biped depredation, and 

 the birds are welcomed con amore. It is said here, 

 that there is hardly an Irishman so poor as not to 

 own a small fee simple whereon to plant fruit trees 

 and vines, and make a garden ; in fact, his very 

 nature seems changed here by force of the ex- 

 ample set him — not only by his wealthy magnate 

 employers, but by the constant, well directed, tidy 

 industry of the people generally — so that the pig 

 in the shanty and the puddle 'before the door, is no 

 longer the Celtic badge in Canandaigua. 



But a jji'opos of Sonenburg and its new and 

 matchless improvements: here is no wilderness of 

 flowers, but roses enough, and here and there on 

 the border a few graceful lilies — presiding like tall 

 Flora in her snowy wreath over her parti-colored 

 family — a cluster of pinks, a bed of choice verbe- 

 nas, etc. Then, as if to contrast the utile with the 

 dulci, here are broad beds of now ripe strawber- 

 ries, long rows of raspberries; Wilsori's Albany, 

 that have stood five years intact, now yielding a 

 delicious crop. The corners are spaded under with 

 coarse manure late in August ; but the same treat- 

 ment on a sandy soil would make too niuch vine. 

 Sand needs only a little top-dressing, but a heavy 

 calcareous clay needs vegetable matter spaded in, 

 not so mucli to feed the plant as to give porosity 

 and absorbent power t<j tlie soil. Here is yet no 

 cold grapery, but outside grapes in variety and full 

 bearing ; and many peach and plum trees — the lat- 

 ter in full and liealthy bearing, while peaches were 

 few. But such patches of clover, orchard and 

 Hungarian grass, fields of beets — not turnips — and 

 patches of drilled corn for the bovines and horses, 

 sweet corn for the table, and monstrous asparagus 

 and rhubarb, told that this hard, compact soil was 

 a saver of ammonia, and needed .little more than 

 mechanical amendment to make it productive. 



On the edge of the lawn lay the house plants in 

 pots, now luxuriating in their translation from the 

 late coal-fire of the room to the outer air and tlie 

 fructifying dews of heaven. But here let me say, 

 from the result of experiment, that tropical fruit, 

 as well as flowers, may be successfully grown if 

 kept only during cold weather in the house. True, 

 a lemon tree will be • dwarfed in the tub, but its 

 fruit will be perfect and even larger than on the 

 fully expanded tropic indigenous tree. 



As you approach the mansion of Sonenburg, 

 Avith its bay windows and Elizabethan gables, look 

 out on the nice broad walk lest you step on some 

 of the eighty-seven young turkeys, which the pro- 

 prietor — a good churchman, and of course fond of 

 the "comforts of good living" — is rearing for his 

 own table ; the hen-turkeys being confined in coops, 

 accounts for the obtrusiveness of their legionary 

 broods. Here is a house of brick and chisseled 



