THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



185 



that potatoes as a crop are so fluctuatiiij;. 

 They do not yiuld what ihey should, and tlic 

 quality is far from being what it ought to be 

 aside from the rot. In short, the potato is 

 disappointing, being largely raised, from ne- 

 cessity, for home use. 



There have some good potatoes been grown 

 the past season, which were from early plant- 

 ings of early sorts. They escaped the heat 

 and dry weather later on. It is always well 

 to plant early, as early as possible in our cli- 

 mate, on well prepared soil having good drain- 

 age, whether early or late sorts. Properly 

 managed and attended to, the chances are 

 for more moisture and more coolness; and, for 

 safety against the frost and dry weather of 

 spring, put well down in the mellow soil— at 

 least six inches deep, and deeper in sandy 

 loam. This will prevent the seed, however 

 small, from drying out, and sprouting will 

 go on there instead of in the cellar, the 

 tips appearing when the danger from frost 

 is over, and at the time potatoes are usu- 

 ally planted, thus getting a start of weeks, 

 and maturing the crop early, about the middle 

 or latter part of June, before drouth has pen- 

 etrated deeply. By this time the late sorts 

 will be well established, occupying with their 

 roots and young tubers the lower, cooler soil 

 weeks in advance of the usual planting, and 

 ripening so much the earlier, thus avoiding 

 drouth and frost, which often make serious 

 work with belated potatoes. Deep planting 

 requires deep working and enrichment of the 

 soil so as to have the seed in rich, mellow 

 ground, not droppi'd on the bottjmof the fur- 

 row on the hard, raw subsoil, and covered 

 with the plow, as it is often done. The roots 

 wants to penetrate downward as well as later- 

 ally. This puts them beyond the reach of 

 even as severe drouih as the one just past. If, 

 in addition, the surface of the soil is kept 

 stirred so as to form a fine mulch, a superior 

 crop is assured every season, if tlie soil has 

 good drainage so, as to carry off the water in 

 a wet season. 



I have not been growing potatoes of late 

 years, but as so much was said about the de- 

 terioration of the Early Rose, and as the 

 market st-emed to conlirm it, I planted some 

 the past spring as a test. The soil, an old 

 sod, was prepared last fall, and an early 

 working given in the spring when the plant- 

 ing was done. Selecting the soundest seed I 

 could find, I planted some in the usual way, 

 covering 2 or 3 inches deep, others C and 8 

 inches. The first were a failure— a few small 

 potatoes in a hill and a poor quality. This 

 agreed with the general crop of the neighbor- 

 hood. It w;is a matter of gratification— and 

 to the neighbors a surprise— to see the fine, 

 bright tubers that came up when the deep 

 planted were dug— which was the middle of 

 June— those covered six inches ripening 

 earlier, as they also came up earlier after 

 planting. They were clean and sound, and 

 when cooked were white, mealy and sweet, 

 with no rank, unhealthy odor. 



The objection to deep planting, that it is 

 more expensive to harvest the crop, holds 

 good so far as the digging is concerned, but it 

 is in no way an offset to the other advantages 

 of a longer, sounder and more uniform crop, 

 take one season with an other, drought hav- 

 ing much less effect. The greater freedom 



from disea.se, which results is a point that can 

 hardly be overestimated in view of the wide 

 spread, unsound condition of the tubers, for 

 there is less chance for rot with deep planting 

 in well-drained soil, the tubers being farther 

 down and better protected— at least there is 

 greater success. 



So much can I say for tlie Early Hose from 

 my own experience. Grown in the way de- 

 scribed, dug as soon as ripe, and stored in a 

 cool, dry place, they will keep sound and 

 sweet during the summer and through the 

 following winter, comparing favorably in the 

 .spring with the late sorts. Cure must be 

 taken when dug and put away to keep the 

 cellar cool and not too dry, by keeping the 

 windows open in cool weather, usually eve- 

 nings, and shut when warm, double windows 

 being a better prolection against heat. This 

 is the way a cellar should be kei)t, not only 

 for potatoes or fruit, but for all purposes. 

 Never dig potatoes under a. scorching sun. A^ 

 soon as dry take to the cellar, handle carefully, 

 reject all hacked, bruised or imperfect ones, 

 and put in barrels or bins, and close. 

 We are loo rough and careless witli our ])ot 

 toes. — F. O., in Country Oentlcmen. 



A generation or so ago, four bushel.s, or 

 sixteen pecks of seed wheat, were considered 

 a moderate seedinj^ for an acre of land; now, 

 not a few are contending that one peck will 

 suflice. It is clear that either the old-time 

 farmer was .singularly wanting in observation, 

 and recklessly lavish of .seed, or that the agri- 

 culturist tffto-day is advocating a " penny 

 wise and pound foolish " practice, not based 

 on the facts of ordinary expeeience. Are we 

 not going too fast, or were our forfathers so 

 hopelessly astray— is there no golden mean? 



In the fall of 1S79, 12 plats, of 1-lG acre 

 each, were laid off in a field of fair average 

 fertility, which had been in clover for the two 

 years preceding. The soil was a good clay 

 loam. The land was thoroughly prepared, 

 and tlie seed drilled in without fertilizers of 

 any kind, on the 15th of October. One plat 

 was seeded with three pecks of " Boughton," 

 a smooth, white, and rather tender variety; 

 the next adjoining, with three pecks of 

 •'Champion Amber," a bearded red, and 

 hardy wheat; the next with four pecks of 

 "Boughton," the next with 'four pecks of 

 "Champion Amber," and so on up to eight 

 jiecks of each. 



To sum up.— It appears that the verdict of 

 the experiments of this year and the last, 

 with these two varieties, is in favor of mod- 

 erately thick seeding (0, 7 and 8 pecks per 

 acre), for average soils in this section of 

 country. The three-peck "Champion Amber" 

 plat of 1881, shows, however, that on superior 

 soils these amounts can be safely reduced. 

 Why should four pecks give, in both varieties, 

 the smallest returns? Is it possible that, like 

 the Church of Laodicea, this amount of seed 

 IS neither one thing nor the other — not enongh 

 to secure the advantages of heavy seedmg, 

 and too much to secure those of light V Again 

 the lower i-atios of straw to grain in the 

 eight-peck plats of both varieties, as com- 

 pared with the nine-peck ; Show that the 

 opinions of those who assert that heavy seed- 



ing will incred'e the strawat the expense of 

 the grain, are not well taken. .\s lo varieties 

 —in the twenty-six exi)erimeiit8 of the two 

 years, twenty-five are in favor of the "Cham- 

 pion Amber." The five-peck "Boughton" 

 plat of 1881, gave a yield of grain exceeding 

 that of the corresponding "Champion Amber" 

 one, by only 20-100 bushel. Finally, these 

 experiments confirm the observations of 

 Stevens and others, that heavy seeding tends 

 to hasten the maturing of the crop; the heavily 

 seeded plats were cut two days earlier than 

 those that were thinly seeded.—/. M. McBride, 

 in AiiieriMn Ayriculturint. 



ARTIFICIAL MILK. 

 Although milk is not a niereenmlsion of fat 

 and alkali, inafinuch as it contains albumi- 

 noids, salt and sugar, Schisclikoll' nevertheless 

 found that he could prepare emulsions very 

 similar to milk by closely imitating its natural 

 components; t. e., by first preparing a'liquid 

 similar to the more fiuid part of milk, and 

 then mixing with it fats of analogous compo- 

 sition to those in real milk. As other chem- 

 ists had none before him, he found in whey a 

 third albuminoid substance different from 

 either Albumen or Caseine; and he observed 

 in his experiments that while Caseine without 

 Albumen would not yield cream but only milk, 

 and that while the two albuminoids together 

 gave both milk and cream, the presence of 

 the third new albuminoid was necessary in 

 order that the cream should be in a condition 

 similar to natural cream. SchischkolT de- 

 scribes a "good emulsion as one that smears 

 glass strongly, rises slowly, and fornn a de- 

 cidedly deeper layer on standing than would 

 be formed by the fat which is contained in it; 

 it should be white and lustrous. Under the 

 microscope it appears to be composed of small 

 globules of tolerably equal size. It is seen 

 plainly that the act of emulsifying consists in 

 dividing the fat into little globules, and fix- 

 ing these globules in i>osition by the aflhesion 

 of the emulsifying liquid to their surfaces. 

 It was noticed that the globules in the emul- 

 sion were apt to be smaller in proportion as 

 the molecular attraction of the liquid for any 

 one of the constituents of the fat was greater, 

 and that in proportion as the globules were 

 smaller the emulsions were less permanent. 

 Shaking promotes the sub-division of the 

 globules, and may consequently hasten the de- 

 struction of an emulsion. By long continued 

 shaking the emulsions were in, fact, com- 

 pletely decompo-sed into fat and soap, which 

 would not again act on one another. The 

 emulsions were destroyed also by cooling, by 

 diluting them with much water, by allowing 

 them to stand for a sulFicient length of time, 

 and by manipulations which promote the for- 

 mation or separation of soiip, such as warm- 

 ing or the addition of strong lye, or the like.— 

 Amerirxin Agrictiliurist. 



A HALF MILLION IN HORSES. 

 The Frt.shion Stud farm, situated about a 

 mile and a half east of this city, on the State 

 street road and opposite the coaling station 

 of the Pennsylvania railroad, it is believed 

 has not an equal in this country. It was 

 l)urcha«ed about ten years ago by the well- 

 known horsemen, Budd Doble and Charles 

 H. Kernor, for H. N. Smith, the prominent 



