132 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[ September, 



cut flowers; George O. Hensel, best collection 

 of plants (106 varieties); George O. Hensel, 

 best collection of ferns. 



Second Premiums.— C A. Getz, collection 

 of flowers (107 specimens); Lenora Hershey, 

 bouquet; George O. Hensel, second best col- 

 lection of ornamental and foliage plants. 



Spemal Mentimi. — Mrs. Mary E. Wilson, 

 M. D., collection of plants; Mrs. Anthony 

 Mott, begonias; J. Frank Landis, century 

 plant; L. I. Steinhauser, orange tree and 

 foliage plants; Leonard Bacliler, passion 

 flower; Miss Ai'mstrong, passion flower; 

 Robert Dysart, hanging basket. 



Class 3— Vegetables. 



First Premiums. — Jacob M. Mayer, best 

 assortment of vegetables; Charles A. Bauer, 

 first premium each for carrots, Lima beans, 

 endive and yellow tomatoes; Casper Hiller & 

 Son, best Snowfiake potatoes; John C. Lin- 

 ville, best beets and cashaws; Benj. L. Lan- 

 dis, best red sweet potatoes. 



Honorable Mention. — John B. Erb, cab- 

 bages, beans. Trophy tomatoes and sweet 

 potatoes; Benj. L. Landis, yellow sweet 

 potatoes. 



Class 4 — Ceeeals. 



First Premiums. — Joseph F. Witmer, 

 Foltz wheat, clover seed and timothy seed; 

 David M. Mayer, Red Mediterranean wheat; 

 J. F. Landis, oats; Johnson MiUer, rye and 

 yellow corn; Charles A. Bauer, sugar corn; 

 Calvin Cooper, Chester county, Manlmoth 

 corn. 



Honorable Mention. — Elmer Cooper, Chester 

 county. Mammoth com. 



Class 5— Domestic Productions. 



First Premiums. — John C. Linville, three 

 pounds of butter; Mrs. E. S. Hoover, largest 

 display of canned fruits; Mrs. John Zellers, 

 two loaves home-made bread; Mrs. John B. 

 Erb, blackberry and grape wine; Mrs. Peter 

 Regennas, best canned peaches; Mrs. J. F. 

 Hershey, best hard soap; Mrs. Heinitsh, crab 

 apple jelly; Mrs. Adam S. Keller, best mixed 

 pickles; Mrs. D. H. Heitshu, best jar of 

 canned pears; S. G. Gensemer, best currant 

 wine. 



Second Preinium. — Maria S. Landis, five 

 pounds Alderney butter. 



Class 6— The Apiary. 



First Premium. — J. F. Hershey, for honey 

 and hive of bees. 



Honorable Mention. — Peter S. Reist, box of 

 honey. 



Class 7 — Poultry. 



First Premiums.— Dr. J. H. Mayer, best 

 collection of Brahmas; H. E. Stoner, best 

 Leghorns; H. H. Myers, best Bantams. 



Second Premiums.— W. H. Amer, second 

 best Leghorns; Chas. E. Long, second best 

 Bantams. 



Special Mention. — H. E. Stoner's collection 

 of Golden Hamburgs and Game cocks. 

 Class 8 — Light Implements. 



No competition; discretionary premiums 

 awarded to John R. Buckwalter for tobacco 

 fork and I. L. Landis for posthole diggers. 



Class 9— The Dairy. 

 ■ Honorable Mention.— S. E. and G. S. Ball, 

 fine display of dairy products and salt meats. 



Class 10— Fine Arts and Industrial. 



First Premiums. — Benj. F. Landis, oil 

 paintings and crayon drawings; Mrs. A. F. 

 Spencer, wax cross; Mary Bachler, toilet set, 

 wax boquet, rustic cross, sofa cushion, thread 

 tidy and bullion work. 



Discretionary Premiums. — Mrs. J. H. Hos- 

 tetter, afghan; Mrs. H. R. Barr, crayon 

 portraits; Christie "W. Gruel, counterpane; 

 Jennie Scheetz, quilt; C. R. Frailey, penman- 

 ship; Mrs. E. S. Hoover, tidies; Annie R. 

 Garber, water color painting; Mrs. C. Cooper, 

 cushion cover; Walter H. Kinzer, stufted 

 birds; Viola Bushong, vase of dried grasses; 

 Mrs. Peter Regennas, quilt; Lizzie C. Thomas, 

 marking on linen. 



Honorable Notice. — Mrs. Jane Hess, quarter 

 of silk quilt; Annie Alexander, sofa mat. 



Class 11— Musical Instruments. 



First Premiums. — Alex. M'Killips, best 

 variety of organs; W. H. Manby, best tone 

 organ. 



Class 12— Miscellaneous. 



First Premium.— S. B. Urban, six leaves of 

 tobacco; J. M. Hess, four laths of tobacco. 



Second Premium. — Chas. A. Bauer, six 

 leaves of tobacco. 



Discretionary Premium. — L. S. Gross, six 

 stalks of tobacco. 



We have been authorized to pay the above 

 reported premiums, so far as they are in ac- 

 cordance with the awards of the judges, made 

 in the books of entries. Therefore, all 

 holding premium cards will present them at 

 our place of business, corner of North Queen 

 and Orange streets, within thirty days from 

 close of fair, as after that date they will be 

 considered as forfeited to the Society. 



Contributions. 



For The Lancaster Fakmer. 

 THE MOON'S SIGNS AND PHASES. 



Mr. Editor : I am not sure that it will be 

 profitable to your readers to pursue tlie con- 

 troversy with your "Seeker after Truth" any 

 further, but I will ask your indulgence for a 

 reply to his communication in the August 

 number of The Farmer. 



Instead of endeavoring by facts and argu- 

 ment to answer the reasons I have given for 

 disbelieving that the moon's clianging signs 

 and phases have any influence on the weather 

 and the crops, he seems desirous of abandoning 

 the original ground of difference between us 

 and making it a matter of personal contro- 

 versy. Unless he wished to excite the preju- 

 dice of farmers against an opponent whose 

 arguments he could not answer, why does he 

 quote as if they were mine, the words "igno- 

 rant farmers" — a phrase of his own invention 

 or introduction, and never used by me. 



Probably it was a slip of the pen, when at 

 the commencement of his article he speaks of 

 a "controversy on ''solar" influences, as I am 

 not aware of any difference of opinion in 

 regard to the sun's influence ; but when he 

 goes on to say that Amateur Farmer "denies 

 in toto the moon's effect on terrestrial mat- 

 ter," he asserts what he can find no warrant 

 for in anything I have written, and what is 

 in fact not true. Nor is it any nearer the 

 truth when he asserts that "he (Amateur) 

 simply tells us * * * that the moon can- 

 not raise the water in the sea. " He will look 

 in vain over my several articles in The 

 Farmer for any denial of the moon's influ- 

 ence in causmg the tides. I fully agree that 

 the moon exerts an influence on both the land 

 and water of the earth, as I am a believer in 

 the Newtonian theory of gravitation. But 

 this is a very different thing from believing in 

 the sign theory advocated by my opponent. 

 What I maintain and have attempted to show, 

 is not that the moon has mo influence on the 

 earth, but that the influence or power attribu- 

 ted to its changing signs and phases upon the 

 growth of vegetation, the state of the 

 weather, &c., is without warrant in philoso- 

 phy or fact— is in truth a delusion inherited 

 from a darker age — a mere notion, origina- 

 ting no one knows how, when or where, and 

 which its upholders of to-day can furnish no 

 substantial reasons for believing ; and so far 

 as I can discover are even unable definitely 

 and intelligibly to state just what their theory 

 is. In fact our "Seeker after Truth" appears 

 to have abandoned the attempt to sustain the 

 notion he favors either by facts or arguments, 

 for he admits that he is as "ignorant" as lam 

 of the laws which regulate this supposed in- 

 fluence, and therefore does not undertake to 

 enlighten us the least respecting the theory ; 

 and when I ask for facts— for "a series of ex- 

 periments extending over a considerable 

 space of time," he answers with one or two 

 isolated facts, and in his last communication 

 informs us that proof of the kind called for 

 need not be expected unless we "coidd be 



assured of a life as long as that attributed to 

 Methusaleh I" Is not this equivalent to an 

 admission that the belief we are considering 

 is a mere notion, incapable of verification in 

 any way— a "superstition," in short, as 

 Chambers's Encyclopedia calls it — resting on 

 no rational or substantial basis whatsoever. 



My opponent again refers to the tides as 

 tending to support the sign theory. I ask 

 again, as in a communication published in 

 the May number of The Farmer, how the 

 rise and fall of the tides lends any probability 

 to the belief in question, seeing that the tides 

 change from ebb to flood twice a day, while 

 the signs change from up to down only twice 

 in twenty-seven or twenty-eight days ? Why 

 does not "A Seeker" attempt to show that 

 the force of the tides is governed by or in cor- 

 respondence with the ascending or descending 

 signs ? If the changing of the signs has the 

 marked effect on the growth of vegetation and 

 the stability of fences, that is claimed by him, 

 one would suppose its effect would be no less 

 marked on the waters of the sea. Yet — to 

 say nothing of astronomers— no advocate of 

 the sign theory that I have heard of ventures 

 to assert that either tlie height of the tides or 

 the times of their recurrence is influenced in 

 the smallest degree by the changing signs of 

 the moon. 



Whilst duly appreciating Seeker's efforts to 

 throw light on the subject, I would have been 

 still more obliged to him if he had explained, 

 as I asked him to do, what was to prevent his 

 lence, constructed when the sign was going up, 

 from settlingdown , after the sign turned down- 

 wards, two weeks or less afterwards; or have 

 the fences been alternately raising and sinking 

 each time the sign has changed, ever since they 

 were made V Does the power of the moon to 

 raise or sink fences become exhausted and 

 cease to operate forever after, as soon as the 

 first change of sign has occured ? It is either 

 so, or else it must have been some other cause 

 than the signs of the moon at the times in 

 which the two fences were built that caused 

 one to raise or remain up from the ground 

 and the other to sink into it. 



In regard to my experiments with bricks 

 on a grass plot, "Seeker" says they might as 

 well have been placed "on solid rocks." But 

 he fails to tell us why the changing signs 

 would not have as much effect on my bricks 

 as on his fences. If he writes again I hope 

 he will explain this, and also tell us if he 

 thinks the numerous careful experiments by 

 scientific observers cited by Dr. Lardner, 

 tending to prove that the moon's changes 

 have not the eflect attributed to them, are t9 

 be discredited because of his one or two iso- 

 lated facts, unconfirmed, and I infer never 

 attempted to be confirmed, by further experi- 

 ments of the same kind. It is true he tries 

 to discredit Dr. Lardner by reference to a 

 mistaken opinion he expressed, and an alleged 

 disreputable affair in which he was once en- 

 gaged, but in my opinion it is not creditable 

 to one who professes to be "a Seeker after 

 Truth," to delve among the forgotten 

 scandals of by-gone days for the purpose of 

 discrediting an adversary in on a question 

 of physical science. It reminds me of the 

 man who undertook to dispute with another 

 respecting one of Euclid's geometric demon- 

 strations, and when he found he was getting 

 the worst of the argument, settled the question 

 (in his own mind) by declaring that Euclid 

 was a benighted heathen, and therefore un- 

 worthy of belief. 



Never having before seen or heard of "Prof. 

 Mansill" or his almanacs, I can say nothing 

 of his ability to predict the coming weather, 

 though it is a little strange, if his predictions 

 have proved reliable or valuable, that a 

 knowledge of his works has not become more 

 diff'used among astronomers, meteorologists, 

 farmers and sailors, and all who are specially 

 interested in foreknowing the weather. It 

 may all be as " Seeker " alleges, but as he 

 does not say that the Mansill theory is based 

 upon or confirms the sign theory, I don't see 

 that it is particularly pertinent to the ques- 

 tion at issue between us. 



