No. 216.] 63a 



Mr. Wakeman, presented a circular from Richard Varick De Witt, 

 of Albany, giving a notice of his establishment in Albany as a Pa- 

 tent Agent. 



5 Clark Rich, of Shoreham, asks for information relative to cheap 

 coffins for a vault, to be durable. 



Charles Henry Hall. A rich specimen of the double flowering ap- 

 ple from his grounds at Haerlem was exhibited. The flowers have 

 stems as long as cherries and are clustered more. 



Theodore Dwight, presented for examination the Elator Noctilu- 

 cus, a perfectly harmless bug, of a dark color, of an inch and a 

 quarter long, which has on each side of the head a bright lamp about 

 one sixteenth of an inch in diameter, whose brilliancy is diminished 

 or increased at the will of the insect. When brightest it resembles 

 the bulls-eye light on a small scale. It lives on the sugar cane, and 

 its present dwelling is a joint of sugar cane sufficiently hollowed out 

 for it, this is occasionally wetted and the insect feeds upon the in- 

 side of the house he lives in. 



Chairman. As no one oflfers, after repeated invitation, to converse 

 upon the subject of the day, Dairy Husbandry; I will endeavor to 

 say something upon it. The cow from time immemorial, among sa- 

 vage and civilized people, has been an animal of great interest, in- 

 deed rnany rude nations living a shepherd's life, to this day take an 

 interest in her approaching to idolatry, she is kind and docile in her 

 habits, and furnishes them in a great measure with the means of 

 subsistence, and this last, precisely in proportion to her feed and the 

 care that is taken of her; strong inducements surely, not only for 

 care but veneration. 



The cow is to be found in every quarter of the world and almost 

 every temperature, and travellers and historians unite in saying that 

 everywhere, she is either small or large, a little or a great milker, 

 according to the richness and abundance of her feed, and this among 

 rude nations consists chiefly of the natural pastures, of the earth. 



It is said by the highest authority, that there are some tribes of 

 Tartars, such as the Eluth, in Asia, that have as large and perhaps 

 as well formed cows, and certainly as great milkers as any in the 

 world, for the reason that their pastures, in richness, will com- 

 pare with any. I will engage there are no herd books here, to trace 

 the genealogy of two or three herds of cows, in the hands of as 



