20 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[February, 



True it does, but it does not follow that it will 

 come down in the same place, unless there is 

 some element there for which it has affinity. 

 It is notorious that in the West India Islands 

 where all the mahogany and otlier trees have 

 been removed, tlie clouds, that once came 

 down in showers of ram, now, in a great 

 measure, pass entirely over them, leaving 

 them dry and arid. Of course, there are ex- 

 ceptional counter influences also at work, 

 but these influences would be more frequent- 

 ly and more mildly affected by the presence of 

 trees. As to the severity of the present win- 

 t3r, may not om- earth be passing through a 

 moist and frigid belt in the realms of space, 

 just as it passed through a vast meteoric field 

 in November 1833 ? Influences beyond the 

 sphere of the earth may occasionally be 

 brought within its sphere. 



The following extract conclusively shows 

 that there will always be a variety of reason- 

 ings and opinions on this prolific subject, and 

 although tlu: cause may not yet be fully devel- 

 oped, yet the observations which have been 

 made at various times and places, are assum- 

 ing the form of approximations to the true 

 cause. Science is a progressive work and 

 many of its decisions are not yet final. 

 The Cause of Drouths, 



"The question is often asked, why drouths 

 are more common latterly than in former 

 years. The miin reason, we concede, how- 

 ever, to be because the forests have been cut 

 down. The eflects of forests iipon the atmos- 

 phere are twofold. They fill the air with 

 dampness, and again this dampness, when it 

 is condensed into clouds, is attracted by tlie 

 forests. The roots of trees run deep into the 

 ground and absorb the moisture that is con- 

 tained in it a considerable depth below the 

 surface. This moisture, much of it at least, 

 is evaporated by the leaves, and thus the air 

 is loaded with water. The amount of water 

 that is drawn up from the strata of the earth 

 lower down than the roots of ordinary culti- 

 vated plants penetrate, is enormous. This 

 water, if not drawn up by the roots of the 

 trees, would gradually make its way into 

 creeks and rivers, and ultimately into the 

 ocean. Cutting down the forests has two 

 other effects, both of which result in decreas- 

 ingthe amount of rain. Dry and parching 

 winds are unimpeded in their progress, and 

 the result is that they carry off the moisture 

 which is in the atmosphere. Another result 

 is tiiat small streams of water have in many 

 instances been entirely annihilated, except 

 during the winter months. This has decreased 

 the volume of water in tire creeks and rivers, 

 and consequently, decreased' the attractive 

 force of the clouds and the amount of water 

 evaporated from the surface of the earth in 

 any particular section." 



But there is another source of solicitude in 

 regard to our forests, independent of meteor- 

 ological considerations. Even if it were cer- 

 tain that their removal had no effect on the 

 rainfall of the country, there is danger of a 

 timber famine in the near future; and some- 

 thing, it seems, ousht to be done now to 

 avert it, and should it transpire that there 

 never would be a dearth of timber for the 

 purposes enumerated in our concluding ex- 

 tract, yet health, refinement, beauty and con- 

 tentment might suggest the wisdom of re- 

 taining them, or reproducing them. We 

 cannot conceive of a country without trees, 

 as being anything else than monotonous, cold, 

 stift' and formal, attributes that must be re- 

 volting to a refined moral constitution. It is 

 anything but flattering to. our moral man- 

 hood, that the beautiful works of nature 

 must be subordinated to the one ab.sorbiug 

 principle of pecuniary emolument— the sale 

 of our souls and bodies to the great Moloch 

 of wealth, and its attendant proclivities. 

 Where our Forests are Going. 



"To make shoe pegs enough for American 

 use consumes annually 100,000 cords of tim- 

 ber, and to make our lucifer matches, 300,000 

 cubic feet of the best pine are required every | 

 year. Lasts and boot-trees take 500,000 cords 

 of bkcb, beach and maple, and the handles I 



of tools 500,000 more. The baking of our 

 bricks consume 2,000,000 cords of wood.orwhat 

 could cover with forest about 50,000 acres of 

 land. Telegraphic poles already represent 

 800,000 trees, and their annual repair con- 

 sumes about 300,000 more. The ties of our 

 railroads consumes annually thirty years' 

 growth of 75,000 acres, and to fence all our 

 railroads would cost $45,000,000 with a yearly 

 expenditure of $15,000,000 for repairs. These 

 are some of the ways in wliich American for- 

 ests are going. There are others, our packing 

 boxes for instance, cost in 1875, S12,000,000, 

 while the timber used each year in making 

 wagons and agricultural implements is valued 

 at more than $100,000,000." 



EXCERPTS. 



"The toad, which used to be thought a most 

 malignant reptile, is really one of the most 

 useful creatures a gardener can have about 

 him. In the matter of feeding, anything that 

 creeps or crawls will do for him— wood-lice, 

 beetles, spiders, slugs, worms, even snails 

 with their shells being snapped up by his dex- 

 terous tongue and swallowed as if by masric. 

 Kept in a garden or a green-house, they will 

 destroy an immense number of injurious in- 

 sects while doing absolutely no harm them- 

 selves." 



It affords us great pleasure in being able to 

 endorse the character of old Bufn umericana, 

 as well as many of his congeners. But, not- 

 withstanding their good qualities, they are 

 still "malignant reptiles," but their malice is 

 governed by their stomachs, and then it is 

 only directed towai=ds insects. Toads cast 

 their skins just as snakes do, but we seldom 

 if ever find'thecastoftsktn of a toad. Because 

 they generally, if not always, very compla- 

 cently swallow it. 



"A dairying company of London has lately 

 estabUshed a laboratory at which samples of 

 milk received from farmers are subjected to 

 chemical analysis. Prizes have been offered 

 by the company, which are to be given to 

 those farmers whose milk supply stands high- 

 est in quality during a stated period of time. 

 The samples of milk are carefully examined 

 by the company's analyst, whose analyses and 

 reports will decide the competition for the 

 prizes. It is expected that much valuable in- 

 formation respecting methods for producing 

 the richest possible milk will be secured in 

 this way. " . ■ 



A " tir.st-rate " idea, provided the farmers 

 sell to their patrons the same kind of milk 

 tliey "sample," and have analyzed. 



" Evergreen and other trees and shrubs 

 with brittle wood should have the snow shaken 

 off their branches after every heavy snow fall. 

 Many valuable trees become permanently dis-- 

 figured from the bending or breaking of 'their 

 limbs, by heavy masses of snow and ice."' 



"That's so," for on one occasion we saw a 

 heavy snow fall in May, (Whitsuntide Mon- 

 day) when the early peach trees were in bloom, 

 and they suffered very much by tlie bending 

 and breaking of the branches. It was prior 

 to 1825, but we cannot name the particular 

 year. In six liours the snow disappeared. 



"An agricultural journal tells of a man 

 who plants, two or three weBks after the crop 

 is planted, a new hill of corn in every fif- 

 teenth row each way. This is the reason : If 

 the weather becomes dry during the filling 

 time, the silk and tassels both wither and dry 

 up. In this condition, a return of moist 

 weather revives the silk, but the tassels do 

 not recover. Then, for want of pollen, the 

 silk is unable to fill its proper office. At this 

 time, however, the replanted corn is ready to 

 supply fresh pollen, and the fiUing is com- 

 pleted." 



If the above is a really good thing, we be- 

 lieve we would risk a little ihore of it— say, 

 every fifth row, instead of fifteen. If it was 

 too late for the second plant to ripen, it might 

 be just in time for a late crop of " roasting- 

 ears." | 



"Some experiments by a number of Ger- 

 man scientists seem to show that the nutri- 

 tive value of pea straw is equal to that of 

 clover hay. Oat straw is interior, botli in 

 proportion of nutritive matter and in diges- 

 tibility." 



When we were a boy, cattle took more 

 kindly to oat straw than to any other kind of 

 straw— indeed they seemed to like it as well 

 as hay. " Pea straw," was not much of an 

 item among farmers then, but what there was 

 of it, so far as we can recollect, was not 

 deemed of much value. If it is more nutri- 

 tious than clover hay, that fact will be an im- 

 iwrtaut item in our'domestic economy. 



"After considerable investigation. Dr. 

 Frankland concludes that the persistence of 

 fogs in large cities is due to the fact that the 

 minute particles of vapor become covered 

 with an oily coating from the smoke— the 

 evaporation of the fog being thus greatly re- 

 tarded. This is considered a satisfactory ex- 

 planation of the nature Of 'dry fogs,' .so 

 often observed." 



Important perhaps as an item of knowledge, 

 but hardly of much value to those who do not 

 live in large cities or towns. 



'^ Lake Village.— Another Lake Village, 

 assigned by experts to the age of bronze, has 

 been discovered at Auvernier, near Nenf- 

 chatel. Several millstones quite new, others 

 half made, have been brought to light, from 

 which it is inferred that the place may have 

 been the seat of a manufactory of these arti- 

 cles. Another conclusion drawn from this find 

 is that Swiss pile buildings served as actual 

 dwellings for the primeval inhabitants of the 

 land, and were not, as has been supposed, 

 used merely as storehouses. " — Nature, 



Interesting as an item of antique history, 

 or archteology, but belongs to the non-es- 

 sential. 



THE NEW HOLLAND CLARION. 



This excellent weekly journal, published by 

 Geo. H. Eanck, at §1.50 a year, comes to us 

 ''■enlarged and iJ»(^rorert," and especially im- . 

 proved. It is now a large {20 by 2(3) eight col- ' 

 umned folio, printed on good white paper. In 

 mechanical execution it is not inferior to the 

 best paper in the county of Lancaster, and in 

 a premium competition would stand as good 

 a chance to carry the first prize, as any other. 

 It does our heart good (and our eyes also) to 

 read such papers ; things reflected from its 

 columns look so fragrant and so fresh; and it 

 makes us feel so proud of the "United States 

 of Lancaster county. " There is a "style" 

 about some papers, that makes even a com- 

 mon-place article look artistic and learned, 

 and the Clarion is one of those. When we 

 take a retrospective view of the newspapers 

 of our county we are more than a little aston- 

 ished at the rapid progress they liave made, 

 both in quantity and quality. Wiien we quote 

 from the columns of such a paper, we feel 

 convinced that it has a " grit " about it. In a 

 recent number — in its new dress- it sounds a 

 note that ought to be familiar to "everyone," 

 even if their had been no instrument in the 

 county to sound it. It verbreates and rever- 

 berates a smooth harmonious note in the fol- 

 lowing,|which echos and re-echos "that's so:" 



" Every one of our Lancaster county farm- 

 ers should subscribe for the Lancaster Farmer 

 our home journal, which is conducted by men 

 who know sometliing about practical farm- 

 ing, and are not mere theorists. Much valu- 

 uable information can be obtained throughout 

 the year from the Farmer and every one who 

 will' venture to invest a dollar in it will find 

 the investment a profitable one. John A. 

 Hiestand, publisher, Lancaster, Pa." 



There is no discord about that, and those 

 to whom it is addressed, could not possibly do 

 anything better than to act on its suggestions. 

 We, ourselves, may know little or nothing 

 about the worth of our paper— or any other 

 paper — but we believe the Clarion does. This 

 is a discovery which the Clarion made and 

 promulgated years ago, which, it is clear to 



