The Lancaster Farmer. 



Dr. S. S. RATHVON, Editor. 



LANCASTER, PA., FEBRUARY, 1884. 



Vol. XVI. ; 



Editorial. 



FEBRUARY. 



" I quickly turned myself away 



From his cold silent gaze, 

 . And 60UKlit companionship Willi one 



Of a more genial phase, 



A hale aud shoruset burly man. 



That looked the soul of humor. 



And seemed to be as urbane as 



A fancy French perfumer. 



But soon ho don'd his rugged cloak, 



And with a chilling look- 

 That like a northern iceberg fell 



Into a sunny brook — 



He summoned up old Boreas — 



The god of winds contrary, 



And bid me say to mortals, that 



I'd seen old February." 

 Februaky, according to our present com- 

 putation of time, is tlie second month of the 

 year. Tlic name is derived from the Latin 

 Fehruariiis, rfnd was introduced into the 

 Roman calendar by Numa Tomi'ILIUs, the 

 successor of Romulus, as King of Rome. It 

 was regarded by tlie Romans as the monlli of 

 expiation, because on the 15tli of this montli 

 the great feast of expiation and purification 

 was held. The Latin name seems to have 

 come from /c6n(«m originally, which, in tlie 

 Sabine language meant a purgative, hence 

 the plural j'ebrua, meant the Roman festival 

 of purification ; and februure, fo purify, to 

 expiate. In Italian, it is Fcbbraro; in Span- 

 ish, Fcbrero; in Portugese, Feverieru; in Ger- 

 man, Fibrier ; in French, Fcvrier. 



Among our local ''Pennsylvania Dutch,'' 

 it is frequently called "Ilornung." It is the 

 shortest month of the year, having but twenty- 

 eight days, "till leap-year gives it twenty- 

 nine," which occurs in the present year (1SS4) 

 called Biasexlile. The second day of Febru- 

 ary is candlemas cUty, when, in the Roman 

 Catholic Church there is a candle procession, 

 to consecrate all the candles which will be 

 needed in the church during the year. Among 

 the old Pagan Romans there was a custom 

 also of burning candles to the goddess Februa, 

 Mother of Mars, to scare away evil spirits. 

 Among the Catholic churches, however, this 

 festival has a higher significance. The can- 

 dles symbolize Hivi who was called " the 

 light of the world— a light to lighten the 

 Gentiles." 



The second day of February is also our 

 " marmot," or " ground-hog" day. It is not 

 certain that the ground-hog prognostications 

 originated in America among the Pennsylva- 

 nia Germans. Be that as it may, however, a 

 notion existed in Europe, that if the weather 

 is fine and frosty at the close of January and 

 beginning of February, we may look for more 

 winter to come than we have had up lo that 

 time. 

 The Scotch had this proverb : 



"If candlemas day be dry and fair, 

 The half o' winter's come and mair ; 

 If candlemas day be wet and foul, 

 The half o' winter was gane at youl." 



Which Sir Thomas Browne included among 



his " Vulmr Errors.''^ This is surely not 

 American, nor German either. Nevertheless 

 it seems that there did exist among the Ger- 

 mans an old proverb, to the effect that "the 

 Marmot peeps out of his hole on candlemas 

 day, and if he finds snow he walks abroad ; 

 but if lie sees th? sun shining he draws back 

 into his hole again." To this has been added, 

 perhaps in America, that if he "sees his 

 shadow" he returns to his lair and remains 

 there six weeks longer, and that we shall 

 have no spring until that time, to which it 

 might be replied that we seldom, if ever, 

 have spring, short of six weeks after candle- 

 mas day. But, if he dunH see his shadow 

 then he will remain abroad, for we shall have 

 an early spring. 



February is the month in which the out- 

 door work of the farmer begins to loom up, 

 although subjected to many frosty interrup- 

 tions, especially in the latitude of Lancaster 

 county. Still, this is the month, among all 

 others, in which the farmers, in times past, 

 were wont to sow their clover seed, as soon as 

 the snow disappeared, no matter how frosty 

 it may have been, and it never has been suc- 

 cessfully demonstrated that it is not the best 

 time. 



It would be dillicult to establish an in- 

 flexible rule as to what should be done and 

 what left undone, in the garden and the field, 

 in the month of February, for that must ever 

 depend upon contingencies, over which the 

 farmer has no positive control. "Wind and 

 weather "—temperature, moisture, and the 

 general condition of the ground — will suggest 

 to the intelligent farmer, gardener and nursery- 

 man, what ouglit to be done, and when and 

 how to do it, independent of town or city 

 dictation. But, if he is not intelligent the 

 physical condemnation of ignorance, at least, 

 will be upon him, whether he be responsible 

 for it or not. Under ordinary circumstances, 

 however, when the month of February, makes 

 its advent, we may console ourselves with the 

 thought that two-thirds of the winter is past, 

 aud that the lengthening of the days, and the 

 increasing infiuence of the sun's rays are 

 gradually, but surely, breaking up the wintery 

 spell. 



"AN OPEN WINTER." 

 More thau two-thirds of the winter — so far 

 as the matter relates to what are called the 

 winter months— are past and gone, aud yet 

 we fail to discover that "open winter," 

 which had been so confidently predicted by 

 those who profess to be weather wise. Dur- 

 ing the late summer and early autumn of 

 l.'<.'^3, paragraph upon paragraph was quoted, 

 all going to prove, that from the general con- 

 duct of the pelicans, the geese, the ducks, the 

 deer, the coons, the niArmots, the bears, and 

 other bea.st8 and birds, a very mild winter 

 would follow in the wake of last summer and 

 autumn ; but, it appears that all the prognos- 

 tications, based upon animal instinct, have 

 utterly come to naught. And the very por- 



tion of our vast domain from whence most of 

 these prognostications came, were among 

 those which suffered most from the fierce 

 " blizzards" that so largely gave tone to the 

 present winter. It is bad enough when 

 human prophets shoot so wide of the mark 

 and prophesy falsely, but it is still worse 

 when animals— said to be guided by unerring 

 instinct— commit such meteorological blun- 

 der.s. Now, as animals generally do come 

 nearer to the truth through the dictates of in- 

 stinct alone, than human beings often do 

 through their reasoning powers, it seems to 

 follow that there must be some cause for their 

 mistake, in regard to the present winter. The 

 fact is, " Men cannot do as they used to did, 

 because things are not as they used to was," 

 and this category may also embrace the ani- 

 mal world. Through what is termed human 

 progress, or human improvement, the face of 

 our globe is becoming changed. Altered 

 circumstances, acting as causes, are producing 

 altered effects, all relating to altered ends, 

 and for the sake of universal harmony. 

 Springs, streams, watercourses, rainfalls, 

 storms and floods, have changed in their re- 

 spective characteristics, growing out of the 

 altered condition of the earth's surface. The 

 animal world is not yet prepared for this 

 change, which is an innovation upon their 

 natural domain, hence they must change their 

 tactics to the new order of things. A water- 

 fowl may, peradventive, say to itself—" we 

 are going to have a dry summer, therefore 

 there is no need to build my nest on higher 

 ground, I will just built it /if re,-" and behold, 

 an unavoidable flood conies, and "wpes" 

 nest and egg out of existence, because the 

 natural means to stay the flood have ceased 

 to exist. 



A hitherto wise "old sciurus," perchance 

 may say to his fellow rodents, " We are 

 going to have an o^Hn winter, hence I shall 

 not trouble myself about gathering, acorns, 

 hickory nuts and shellbarks for my winter 

 store." When lo, a northwest blizzard banks 

 up the snow in minature mountains about the 

 bases of the nut-bearing trees, bringing the 

 squirrels to grief, all because the face of 

 nature has changed so much as to make such 

 snow mounds possible, instead of a more 

 even distribution of it over the land. 



Thus, it will be percievcd, that "all signs 

 fail in dry weather," and not in dry weather 

 only, but perhaps quite as frequently in wet 

 weather. 



Much stress, by some people, is laid upon 

 the prognostications of the ground hoj[. We 

 need not repeat them here, for they are well 

 known to our readers, if not to wliole coun- 

 try- On Saturday, February 2d, of the pres- 

 ent year, was Candlemas, or "groundhog 

 day," and according to that species of philoso- 

 phy, there will be yet six weeks of severe 

 winter weather, because, forsooth, theground 

 hog, if he came out of his hole at all, saw his 

 shadow, and immediately returned to his 

 nest for another nap of six weeks at least. 



