4l4 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[ August, 



STATE AGRICULTURAL EXHIBITION. 



The Fair of the Pennsylvania State Agri- 

 cultural Society will be held this year in the 

 Main Building, Fairmount Park, and on the 

 grounds, opening on the 8th day of Septem- 

 ber, 1879, and, in connection with the Perma- 

 nent Exliibition now held there, it promises 

 to be second only to the World's Fair held 

 there in 1876; and, it is hoped that the joint 

 attraction will again crowd the structure and 

 the grounds with an immense concourse of 

 visitors. That every branch of American 

 art and industry in its latest and most perfect 

 develoement should be fully repi-esented, is 

 but a dictate alike of business interest and 

 patriotic pride. 



The dairy industry, with its herds of thor- 

 oughbred cattle, and its lately introduced 

 processes and machinery for cheese and butter 

 making; the wool industry, with its improved 

 breeds of sheep; as well as the silk, cotton 

 and flax industries, with the products of the 

 loom; the finest breeds of swine and poultry, 

 and the results of fish culture, all will be rep- 

 resented there. The State Society offers 

 $9,000 in prizes for live stock alone. A ring 

 for the display and exercise of horses and 

 cattle will be provided, but all racing will be 

 prohibited. Liberal premiums are also offered 

 for all kinds of manufactured goods; heating 

 lighting, ventilating and cooking apparatus; 

 tools, implements and machinery, and the 

 products of the fine arts. The Turkish, Tu- 

 nisian and Scandinavian Courts in the east 

 nave of the building have been allotted to 

 fruits and flowers; and the products of vine- 

 yard, orchard, garden and conservatory have 

 never had more elegant accommodations pro- 

 vided for them heretofore. Horses and cattle 

 will be assigned to quarters within the main 

 building. 



Of course the best of its kind should be 

 placed on exhibition there, but as it would be 

 impossible for any one to determine before- 

 hand which is best, let no one decline to be an 

 exhibitor, merely because he may think his 

 productions may not be the best— that can 

 only be determined by comparison. On the 

 whole, we thiuk it a good move on the part of 

 the State society to hold its annual exhibition 

 on the classic ground it has selected this year, 

 and, if it were to make them permanently 

 there, and in future become less of a tramp, 

 we believe it would be better for the Society, 

 socially and financially, and it also would be 

 more useful to the State at large. Let the 

 interior exhibitions be in the hands of the 

 counties or districts; because an itinerating 

 State exhibition, nine times in ten, does not 

 amount to as much as an ordinary county 

 fair, if it does not prove a failure. 



PALLISER'S AMERICAN COTTAGE 

 HOMES. 



This work is illustrated by forty plates, 

 each of which is nine inches by twelve in size, 

 containing fifty designs of modern low priced 

 cottages and workingmen's homes, suitable 

 for erection in city, suburb, village, or the 

 country. There are two hundred and sixty 

 separate drawings ; giving plans, directions, 

 perspective views, sections, details and speci- 

 fications; also descriptive letter press on the 

 back of plate, giving forms of contracts, and 

 other matters relating thereto. This, to all 

 intents and purposes, as well as utilities and 

 values, is a SIO.OO book, both in size and 

 quality, and in style it is just the thing needed 

 for such house' as are called for daily by the 

 masses of the people. If a poor man desired 

 to build but a single house in all his life, it 

 might be more to his interest than the cost of 

 a dozen copies of the book ; which can now be 

 obtained at the astonishingly low price of 

 $5.00. It is in one Koyal Quarto volume, 

 printed on heavy tinted plate paper, hand- 

 somely bound in half leather, with side stamp 

 in gold. It is eminently a book for the 

 people, and it is difficult to comprehend how 

 any carpenter or builder can aftbrd to be with- 

 out it. All the opinions of the press, whose 

 commendations are of any value in regard to 

 such a work, have given the highest testi- 



monials of its character. If any of our 

 patrons or the public desire a copy of the 

 work, we will volunteer to be the medium 

 through which they may obtain it without any 

 trouble to themselves. The Scientific Amer- 

 ican says : 



" This firm is doing valuable service in its 

 frequent publication of copiously illustrated 

 works containing designs for dwellings which 

 are not only moderate in price but in accord- 

 ance with a constantly improving popular 

 artistic taste. American village architecture 

 has long been remarkable for lack of beauty, 

 chiefly perhaps on account of the rapidity 

 with which new towns spring up in this 

 country, and the necessity of building at low 

 cost. Now that the best architects do not 

 think the planning of a workman's cottage 

 unworthy of their skill, we may look for the 

 application of better principles both in con- 

 struction and exterior appearance. The 

 present work is a notable instance of what 

 may be done toward adapting really tasteful 

 and new designs to the exigencies of moderate 

 outlay. Here are fifty designs, each giving 

 the necessary plans, elevations, and perspec- 

 tives of cottages, none costing more than 

 $4,000 to erect complete, and ranging from 

 that figure down to as low as $325 for a very 

 neat two-room one and a half story dwelling. 

 All are tasteful, many picturesque and ele- 

 gant. They are intended for the country and 

 look rural, which is much more than can be 

 said of the ineffectual attempts to imitate 

 French city architecture on a reduced scale, 

 which of late years many architects have 

 made in planning country homes. Full forms 

 of specifications and agreements are given, so 

 that the reader has only to select his design 

 and make a contract with a builder to have it 

 constructed." 



THE TOBACCO FLY. 



When the flies come to the top of the earth 

 they are very full of eggs, before they are fully 

 developed or their wings are formed. Its 

 body is thick and plump, and it will crawl up 

 on any bush, weed, grass, fence, or anything it 

 can get to, remaining there until its wings are 

 strong enough to carry the body. As soon as 

 they can fly they commence laying eggs. 

 They deposit their eggs the first night of their 

 winged existence. I have conflned them in a 

 room, and give it as my opinion that nine- 

 tenths of all their eggs are deposited the first 

 night after they begin to fly. Of course, they 

 are likely to be killed by sucking the flowers, 

 and are likely, also, to leave the tobacco and 

 go to the flowers before depositing all their 

 eggs ; but, accordmg to my observation, they 

 are too busy depositing their eggs to pay 

 much attention to blossoms. After they have 

 deposited all, or a great portion of their eggs, 

 then they are busy sucking flowers; their 

 bodies have become more sharp and elongated; 

 they can fly with greater ease and rapidity, 

 and have nothing to do but suck the blossoms 

 for two or three nights and die. And it is 

 during this time, when they have deposited 

 the greater portion of then- eggs, the largest 

 number of flies are killed. I have conflned in 

 a room, and provided for it everything to 

 sustain life, and flnd that it lives only two or 

 three nights after depositing its eggs. My 

 opinion is that the fly impregnates the worm 

 while it is on the tobacco. And with all due 

 deference and respect to the opinions of 

 others, in my humble opinion I do not think 

 the killing of the fly while sucking the blos- 

 soms will lessen the number of hornworms to 

 any very great extent. 



Now, you ask just here what I propose in 

 the premises. Let the farmers throughout 

 the tobacco districts put in a fewer number of 

 acres — to lessen the crop one-half would not 

 be too much. Let what ground you do culti- 

 vate be of the best quality and well-manured. 

 We believe it possible to produce, with proper 

 manuring and cultivation, 1,500 pounds of 

 good tobacco per acre. Let no worms arrive 

 at maturity or become large enough to be 

 impregnated by the fly. Let the tobacco you 

 do cultivate be a better quality than has 



heretofore been cultivated, and the results 

 will be that farmers will realize more money 

 for what tobacco they do cultivate than at 

 present. — Exchange. 



We publish the above— although its author, 

 and the journal in which it was flrst published 

 a/e both unknown to us — simply because 

 among its glaring errors there may be some 

 grains of truth, and we give our readers an 

 opportunity to receive them in a practical, off- 

 hand way. 



It is just DOssible, that those who may 

 depend upon destroying these "Tobacco-flies" 

 (Sphinx Carolina, et 5-maculata) by poison- 

 ing the flowers they visit in the evenings, or 

 by striking them down with paddles, or by 

 catching them in nets, may attach too much 

 importance to those remedies, or may kill the 

 flies after they have deposited all, or nearly all 

 their eggs; and then, supposing they may 

 have circumvented the enemy, may relax 

 their vigilance, to the detriment of their crop. 

 It may also be true that in the earlier life of 

 the fly it deposits the greater portion of its 

 eggs, although not before the females become 

 fertilized : but to assert that the fly "impreg- 

 nates the worm," is a most preposterous 

 assumption. True, the author does not say 

 that he witnessed the act, but he gives it as his 

 "opinion," an opinion, than which nothing 

 could be more absurd. As well might he 

 give it as his opinion that a cock impregnates 

 a chick when it is a day old, or a bull 

 impregnate s a sucking calf. Even if we had 

 never found the male and female tobacco flies 

 in the very act of coition, we could not 

 believe such a monstrosity as he refers to, 

 reasoning on analogy alone. The worm is the 

 infant of the fly, and in it the sexual organs 

 are as little developed as they are in a chick 

 or a calf, and are beyond the power of repro- 

 creation. 



Nothing could more clearly illustrate that 

 editors of agricultural journals should have 

 sufficient knowledge of entomology to prevent 

 them from publishing such articles without 

 note or comment, no matter from whom they 

 may come. It is singular, too, that out of the 

 great body of tobacco growers in the country, 

 there are so few among them who seem 

 capable of making and recording accurate 

 observations upon the transformations and 

 habits of the enemies that so conspicuously 

 infest their crops. This opinion only excels in 

 absurdity the one we refuted and ridiculed 

 about a year ago, to the effect that tobacco 

 worms changed into grasshoppers, and in that 

 form deposited the eggs upon the plants. 

 And then one paper after another copies these 

 articles as standard agricultural literature — 

 sometimes enhancing their absurdity— but 

 never adding a word as to the impossibility oA 

 such wonder-working tales. It is true, there 

 are many wonderful phenomena in the trans- 

 formations of the insect world, but they are 

 all orderly in their development, and in con- 

 formity with pre-established law, clearly seen 

 and understood when those laws are known. 



OUR LOCAL EXHIBITION. 



By reference to the proceedings of our local 

 Agricultural and Horticultural Society, it 

 will be seen that a resolution was carried to 



hold an exhibition the present season in the 

 Northern Market House, if the building can 

 be obtained for that purpose. This in our 

 opinion would be a very appropriate place, 

 and although we do not attempt to speak with 

 authority, yet we do not entertain a doubt 

 about its use being readily granted for that 

 purpose. The exhibition nJight be opened 

 there on Wednesday morning and continued 

 to Friday evening, without at all interfering 

 with the market hours. The stalls and tables 

 are ready at hand, and no expense would be 

 incurred in fitting up, and everything would 

 be protected from sun "or rain; besides, the 

 building is spacious and the ventilation per- 

 fect. All that is required is for the Board of 

 Managers, who, under the new by-laws have 

 the superintending control of all fairs, to be 

 energetic, and the members to earnestly sec- 



