1881.] 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



135 



upon the scene. He is engaged in important 

 literary work, lie tells you, which renders it 

 absolutely necessary that he should consult 

 these precious volumes. "Will you lend them 

 for a few days ?" It requires a (linty nature 

 to resist the appeal ; but if you suffer good- 

 nature to gain the mastery over judgment 

 and experience, the probability is that you 

 have seen your favorites for the last time. 

 Or if, by some lucky chance, you should finally 

 succeed in forcing the enemy to disgorge, you 

 will find your books so stained and dog eared 

 as to be deprived of half their value. The 

 fiend is probably in the habit of reading at 

 breakfast, and uses his egg-spoon as a paper- 

 cutler. 



Dr. Samuel Johnson was greatly displeased 

 because Garrick refused to lend him his rare 

 Shakespearian quartos. There can be no 

 doubt that Johnson was thoroughly honest, 

 and the thought of personally appropriating 

 these books would never have entered his 

 mind. But he was slovenly and careless. He 

 would have handled them with unwashed 

 fingers, and might have suffered them to lie 

 exposed where any intelligent thief could have 

 cai-ried them oft'. Was Garrick to be blamed V 

 There can be but one answer to the cpiestion. 

 Various devices for preventing the ravages 

 of this pest of the library have generally 

 proved entirely inadequate. One of the ear- 

 liest consisted in writing doggerel verses on 

 the fly-leaf of the book, and possibly, in af- 

 fixing to the inside of the cover a printed 

 label, bearing, besides the name of the own- 

 er, a solemn warning against the crime of 

 peculation. One of the oldest books in pos- 

 session of the writer contains the following 

 laconic couplet : 



"To lose this book would cause me grief; 

 Whoever takes it is a thief." 

 Another— a school-book— has the following, 

 in a school-boy's sprawling hand : 



Steal not this book, for fear of shame, 

 Here yon see the owner's name. 

 Still more clear and unmistakable was a 

 stanza which, thirty years ago, could be 

 found in ,school-books innumerable. The 

 spirit of the lines is so boyish that no one but a 

 boy could have composed them ; and this was 

 probably done in the days when men and boys 

 were still hanged for stealing. They exist in 

 numberless recensions, but the one we re- 

 member reads as follows : 



Steal not this book, my honest friend, 

 For fear the gallows will be your end. 

 Up the ladder, down the rope, 

 There you'll hang until you choke, 

 Then I'll come along and say, 

 Where's that book you stole away. 

 Printed labels are sometimes found in old 

 books, which, beside the name of the owner, 

 bear a Scriptural passage or a stanza espe- 

 cially addressed to borrowers. The following 

 quotations, which we find in Warren's Study 

 nf Book Plates, are certainly pungent and 

 appropriate. An early book-plate reads, 

 "Psalms xxxvii : 21: The wicked borroweth 

 and payeth not again. " Another has "Go 

 ye rather to them that sell, and buy for 

 yourselves. — Matt, xxy: 9." Still another 

 quaint application of Scripture is made, on 

 an early book-plate, for a somewhat difterent 

 purpose. ' 'Revelations x : 9: Take the book 

 and eat it up." 



Tliat was a curious device which was 

 adopted by an eccentric physician of the last 

 century. lie aflixcd a label to his volumes 

 bearing the inscription : 



Stolen from the Library of Dr. John Brown. 

 Of course, if the book was found at home, 

 these words had no significance ; but else- 

 where, they conveyed a serious imputation. 



It is pleasent to lend books to those who de- 

 serve the privilege ; and we cannot help ad- 

 miring the si)irit in which a celebrated anti- 

 quarian of the .sixteenth century inscribed 

 his books, as "The Property of Joseph Grol- 

 lerand His Friends." Nothing can be too 

 precious for a friend of sympathizing tastes, 

 who accepts your trust with a due sense of its 

 vulue ; but we think there is room for another 

 l)rotest against the common notion that books 

 are, like umbrellas, to be regarded as common 

 property. 



Selections. 



AN EAST DONEGAL DAIRY. 



David M. Eyers's Stock of Imported and 

 Blooded Cattle. 

 David M. Eyer, living in East Donegal 

 township, near Schock's Mills, is one of the 

 most successful practical farmers in this 

 county, and he has made his farm one of the 

 finest to be seen anywhere. It comprises over 

 one hundred acres of land and stretches from 

 the river back towards Maytown. His resi- 

 dence and farm buildings are models of com- 

 fort, convenience and neatness, and his land 

 is in the best condition for the cultivation of 

 crops. As an instance, we remember a year 

 or two ago, an acre of tobacco cultivated by 

 himself brought the largest price we have 

 heard of an acre bringing in this section, 

 viz, $436. 



Mr. Eyer within the past few years has 

 been devoting himself to acquiring a herd of 

 imported and blooded stock. He now has 

 twelve head of as fine cattle as can be found 

 in this couury, and he is justly proud of 

 them. His herd is as follows : 



"May," is a half Guernsey and half Durham; 

 she has had three calves, was dry but two 

 days last year, and made eleven pounds of 

 gold edged butter per week when fresh. 



"Gentle," a sister of the former, has the 

 same record. 



"Twinney," a sister of the former two, 

 gave a crock full of milk the morning the 

 calf wjis born, and is never dry. 



"Graybill," half Guernsey and Durham, 

 gave fourteen and a half pounds of butter 

 when fresh. 



"Wild Deer," is a Durham, and the mother 

 of these just named, and gave twelve pounds 

 of butter when fresh. 



"Daisey," is a common cow and gave nine 

 and a half pounds of butter when fresh. 



"Blymm," is a Durham, and gave ten 

 pounds of butter when fresh. 



"Sir Leon," registered' No. 28'22, is a Jer- 

 sey bull purchased from Col. James Young. 



"Lacte," registered No. 3-'),C27, is a full 

 Jersey, purchiised from Samuel C. Kent, ol 

 Chester county. 



"Achievement of Donegal," registered No. 

 11,441, is an imported Jersey heifer, and her 

 first calf is due June 28th. 



"Lydia," registered No. 580, is an import- 

 ed Guernsey heifer, with her first calf ; she 

 gives very rich milk. 



Mr. :^er believes in having everytliing 

 convenient and has water running into the 

 [jassage of evei7 row of stalls in the barn, 

 convenient to feed troughs, and easy methods 

 of cleaning out the stalls. 



His dairy fixtures are all modern. He has 

 in use the Mosely creamery— the most conve- 

 nient and l;ilx)r-saving machine we have seen 

 in use— he also li;is a patent churn, butter 

 worker and stamp,all reducing the amount of 

 work which was formerly required. He does 

 not make much butter at present, George 

 Williams, the popular ice cream maker of 

 Marietta, getting mo.st of the cre.am, which 

 is .so rich that Mr. W. is enabled to make 

 better ice cream than he ever nuide before. 

 Mr. Williams says he never had such thick 

 rich cream from any dairy. 



Mr. Eyer is entitled to a great deal of 

 credit for proving, as. he has to his own satis- 

 faction, that it does ^y to keejifine stock on a 

 farm. He has kept an accurate account of 

 the stock and finds that it yields him a hand- 

 some profit on the investment. 



A BIG FARM. 



A Wheat Farm of 75.000 Acres in Dakota, 

 and How It is Worked. 



In an article on Dakota and its mammoth 

 farms a New York Herald correspondent 

 gives the following interesting particulars 

 about one of the largest farms iu that im- 

 mense Territory : 



A great deal of interest has attached of late 

 years to scientific farming on a large .scale. I 

 have seen nearly all the big farms in Dakota, 

 but have not yet made up my mind as to the 

 practicability or profit of mammoth farming. 



One of the best big farms in Dakota is Mr. 

 Daliymple's. It consists of 75,000 acres and 

 cost from forty cents to .?o per acre five years 

 ago. The taxes are ten cents per acre per an- 

 num for school, road and : county purposes. 

 There is no government tax. The farm is 

 laid oft' into 5,000 acre tracts with a superin- 

 tendent over each division. He has a foreman 

 and gang foreman under him. The superin- 

 tendent subdivides his 5,000 acres into 2,500 

 acre lots, and these also have foremen. All 

 the business is conducted on regular vouch- 

 ers, and all supplies are drawn on requisi- 

 tions, tlie same as in the army. The division 

 foreman gives all orders. Money is paid on 

 time checks, and 'each workman receives his 

 money whenever he wants it. Mr. Dalrym- 

 ple is cultivating 25,000 acres, and 5,000 acres 

 is being added each year. The crops are sow- 

 ed in April, and about, three weeks are taken 

 for the planting season. Wheat of the 

 Scotch Fife variety is planted, and one bushel 

 and twenty quarts is sown per acre. All the 

 planting is done by machinery. It takes 400 

 head of horses and mules to plant the crop. 

 One seed sower plants about 200 acres, and 

 each harrower about 100. 



The new land is broken after the crop is in, 

 and the breaking is generally commenced 

 early in May. The land produces No. 1 hard 

 Fife wheat, and the yield is twenty to twen- 

 ty-four bushels per acre. 

 The cutting of the crop commences August 



