142 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



NOVEJtIBEB. 12, 183*. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, NOV. 12, 1834. 



FARMER'S WORK FOR NOVEMBER. 



Leaves for Mimurc.—in many situations it would be 

 good economy to rake up leaves of trees, and tlie mould 

 which has been produced by their decay, as much as can 

 be procured at a reasonable expense, and cart and spread 

 them in the barn yard, as a layer to absorb the liquid 

 manure of your cattle, as well as to afford food for plants 

 by their decomposition. Liliewise, it would be well to 

 place quantities of leaves under cover in situations 

 where you can easily obtain them in winter to use as 

 litter for your stables, &c. They do not rot very easily, 

 but they serve the purpose of little sponges to imbibe 

 and retain liquid manure, and by their use your crops 

 may be supplied with much fertilizing matter which 

 would otherwise be lost. 



Barricade your cellar, harn, S,~c. against the intrusion 

 of frost.— The most profitable banks for farmers are such 

 as prevent his vegetables from freezing, and keep his 

 basement story comfortable with but little fuel. 



Manure your grass ground. — You may now carry out 

 and spread compost, soot, ashes, &c. on such of your 

 mowing ground as needs maimre. Some say, however, 

 that a better time for manuring mowing ground, is im- 

 mediately after haying, and a writer for the N. E. Far- 

 mer with the signature Caledonia, (see vol. xiii. p. 41,) 

 prefers Spring. Any time, however, will answer, when 

 the o-round is free from frost and snow, and the grass in 

 a stale not to be injured by the cattle, cart-wheels, &c. 

 But, previous to manuring your grass land, it will be 

 well to harrow or scarify it. Also, it will often not be 

 amiss to sow grass seeds at the same time, to produce a 

 new set of plants, and supersede the necessity of break- 

 inirup the sod, to prevent its being "bound out," as the 

 phrase is. 



Water-courses. — Attend to ditches and channels which 

 give passages for water from highways, &c. and man- 

 age in such a manner that your ground may be benefit- 

 ted by the wash of roads, &c. 



Stock for lVi7iter.—Do not undertake to winter more 

 stock than you have abundant means of providing for. 

 When young animals are pinched for food at an early 

 period, they never thrive so well afterwards, nor make 

 so good stock. 



Cow-house, Stable, ^c. — The stable or cow-house 

 should never be completely closed up, however cold the 

 weather may be, although it is desirable that strong 

 . draughts of cold or damp air should in winter be guarded 

 against. It may be set down as a general rule, that stables 

 or cow-houses are too close when, on enteiing, the breath 

 i« aifected or any smell of urine can be perceived. 



It is very important to keep cow-houses and cattle- 

 stables clean and well littered. Dung left in stably 

 soon renders the air unwholesome, and is the cause of 

 disorders. Cows in a stable will succeed the better u" 

 allowed a square space of at least six feet each way fof 

 each cow. Two or three ventilators near the ground on 

 the north side in summer, and the south side in winter, 

 afford, at a trifling expense, an fxcellent way of renew- 

 . ing or sweetening the air in stables ; and these may be 

 shut when necessary by means of straw, or what is bet- 

 ter, sliding doors. 



Good food for milch C01CS. — Beat up in a mortar dry 

 corn-cobs, pour boiling water over them, or boil them in 

 a pot, stir them frequently while boiling, and when cold 

 give the liquor to your cows. 



Banking up houses. — The best mode of banking up 

 hauses, so as to keep frost from cellars and render the 



lower rooms warmer than they would be otherwise, is to 

 set single boards on edge, parallel with and about a foot 

 and a half or two feet from the sills or sleepers of the 

 house, and fasten them in that position by pins or stakes 

 driven into the ground. Fill in a layer of dirt between 

 the boards and sills, and over that place a layer of straw 

 or other litter. Then place boards flat-wise, or nearly 

 horizontally, descending a little from the house, so as to 

 shed rain and carry it over the boards placed edgewise, 

 as stated above. The straw or litter will efl'ectually pre- 

 vent the frost from penetrating your cellar, to spoil your 

 vegetables. Next to a smoky house and a scolding wife, 

 a freezing cellar is earnestly to be deprecated, and if pos- 

 sible avoided. 



PRIME PRODUCTIOIVS. 



Large Carrot.s. — Mr. James Francis, of East Sud- 

 bury, Mass. has left at the Office of the N. E. Farmer, 

 "for exhibition only," two Orange Carrots, of surpass- 

 ing magnitude and very fine proportions. Their weight 

 is G.i lbs. and the largest is 134 inches in circumference. 



Siamese PIimpkiks. — We have been presented, by 

 George B. Elkins, Esq. with a pair of prime pumpkins, 

 united after the manner of the Siamese twins. They 

 were produced in Nantucket, and prove that the epitliet 

 ".b'KHii heap," when applied to that island, is a palpable 

 as well as an opprobrious misnomer. 



Il'EMS OP INTEI-iLIGENCE. 



Election. The votes for Governor, in Boston, at the 

 recent election, were, Davis, 5607 — Morton, 2026— Bai- 

 ley, 404 — Allen, 523. Mr. Abbott Lawrence was elected 

 Member of Congress by a vote somewhat larger than 

 that of Gov. Davis. Samuel T. Armstrong is un- 

 doubtedly elected Lieut. Governor. 



At Ipswich Lamb Fair, a Mr. Ransome presented a 

 turnip sliccing cart, wliich will slice a load of turnips 

 and spread them over a field for sheep, as the horse walks 

 forward. — Lon. pa. 



"Lund floioing ii'ith milk and honey." We are in- 

 formed by Mr. J. Vermylia, living at River Aboite, in 

 this county, that on the 7th of August last, he put a 

 swaim of bees into a flour barrel, and on the 7th of Oct. 

 inst. he took the swaim from the barrel, and found 12!l 

 pounds of honey of the best quality, which had been 

 gathered by those industrious collectors of the sweets of 

 life, entirely from the blossoms of the forest. — Detroit 

 Courier. 



Dr. Anderson, of Tennessee, has invented a hemp- 

 cutter, which, with a single horse and rider, and three 

 or four hands to take up the hemp, will cut six or eight 

 acres of good hemp in a day. It has been tried and was 

 successful, though susceptible of fuither improvement. 



English operatives. An investigation was lately made 

 into the state of education in the factories of Great Brit- 

 ain. — The result is as follows; 



Of about 50,000 operatives in England, ti6 in a hun- 

 dred can read, and 43 in a hundred can write. 



Of about 30,000 in Scotland, ',)0 in a hundred can read, 

 and 53 in a hundred can write. 



Of 1,500 in Belfast, Ireland, DO in a hundred can read, 

 53 in a liundrcd can write. 



The returns of this town are, however, no criterion of 

 the state of education in that country generally. 



Indigo. We are informed, says the Literary Gazette, 

 that the African Indigo is, we are assured by competent 

 judges, who have examined specimens of it on the coast, 

 superior to that imported from the East Indies, and this 

 accounts for the beautiful dye and brilliant color of the 

 native clothing. Its prime cost on the Niger is not six 

 cents a pound. 



Half Cents. We have befoie us, says the editor of the 

 United States Gazette, two counterfeit half cent pieces. 

 These are piobably manufactured in Canada; and we 

 understand that the maker clears by his work twenty- 

 four cents on each pound of copper thus worked up. 



Bowduin College. By a catalogue just received, it 

 seems that there are at present 147 students. A new 

 system of cnllege government has been adopted. The 

 old system of suspensions, rustications and expulsions is 

 abolished ; and when any student shall become neglect- 

 ful of his studies, or guilty of grossly improper conduct, 

 his parents or guardian are to receive particular infor- 

 mation, and remove him , if necessary , to his home .—Kcw- 

 buryport Herald. 



Longevity. The Vincennes Sun records the death of 

 Mrs. Angeline Mallet, at the advanced age of 110 years. 

 It was her lot to. raise a family of fourteen children to 

 the age of women and men, and to live to bury them all ; 

 all of them having left behind them large families. 



Life preserver. The late distressing lossof human life 

 by the shipwreck of one of the Eastport packets, cannot 

 fail to direct the attention of persons going to sea, to the 

 life-preserving belts made by the Roxbury India Rubber 

 Company. There can be no doubt that many lives might 

 often be saved by them. Mr. Durant, it will be recol- 

 lected, when he descended into the water, found himself 

 very much at his ease in that element with one of these 

 life preservers on. — Boston Atlas. 



A S-<j-u-a-s-h. We have now in our office a squash, 

 raised by Mr. Joseph Carpenter, on a farm in Smithfield, 

 belonging to Nicholas Brown, Esq. of this city, which 

 measures four feet seven inches round the middle, in one 

 direction, and four feet four inches in the other. It 

 weighs Jifty-six pounds, and sprung from seed brought 

 from Marietta, Ohio. — Providence Journal. 



Extraordinary Natural Curiosity. As Thomas Win- 

 ter, of Soulby, near Kirkby Stephen, was, on the 8th 

 inst. building a stable for the Rev. John Collinson, he 

 had occasion to break a blue whin stone, and in the 

 centre he discovered a small cavity, in which was a live 

 spider with several young ojies ! The stone and spider 

 are now in the possession of the Rev. John Collinson^ 

 vJho, we understand, has taken them with him to his 

 house in Kibblesworth, in the county of Durham. — Ber- 

 wick Advertiser. 



Meteorological stone. A Finland journal gives an ac- 

 count of a singular stone in the north of Fnland, where 

 it answeis the purpose of a public barometer. On the 

 approach of rain, this stone assumes a black or dark grey 

 color, and when the weather is inclined to be fair, it is 

 covered all over with white specks. This stone is, in all 

 probability, an argillous rock, containing a portion of 

 rock-salt, ammonia or saltpetre, and absorbing more or 

 less humidity, in proportion as the atmosphere is more or 

 less charged with it. In the latter case , the saline parti- 

 cles, becoming chrystalized, are visible to the eye as 

 white specks. 



[There are several kinds of flagging stone on our streets 

 that undergo similar changes, and never fail to indicate 

 a change of weather. — Ed. J^. ¥. Gaz.] 



Temperance Convention. A Convention of Delegates 

 from the Temperance Societies in Nova Scotia, was late- 

 ly held at Halifax, N. S. The Delegates, stating that 

 they represented 14,000 people, presented an address to 

 their new Governor, Campbell, requesting his co-oper- 

 ation in tlieir efforts. In answer, he assured them they 

 should be given most heartily. He remarked that he 

 had " reason to believe that many individuals had indulg- 

 ed in intemperance, who were not before addicted to that 

 vice, under the mistaken idea that it would guard them 

 against the epidemic [the cholera] which has proved so 



