VOL. \vm. NO. 18. 



AND HORTICULTURAL REGISTER, 



161 



igul economy requires it, whether we think of the that pass the greater p«rt of the day in the moa- 

 xpense of a feeble family, or of the continued de- , dows during- the mild season, and that it cannot be 

 lands which they often make upon parents, even furnished by cows which are fed upon the parings 

 Iter they are sent forth into the world. I cannot and tops of vegetables of other food than the urass- 

 lut hope that this feeling will even aid in the pro- 1 es, and ore deprived of exercise— to say nothing 

 notion of the northern rail roads, from which it is j of the pernicious eficcts of the distillery slojjs ol- 

 dest truly observed the nivist eftectual relief can be | the sour and putrid remnants of the kilchen. And 

 fforded. It may be said, indeed, that pure milk yet this milk must be the staff of life of chiklhood— 

 an be procured from the farms which abound in the staff of which its bones and sinews are fnrmed ; 

 very direction from New York. But let it be re- 1 and its quality will do much in determining the fec- 

 oembered it must be transported for several hours ' bleness or vigor of the next generation in your city. 

 n conveyances which would serve admirably for j It is too true that the impure and often infected air, 



icomolive cAi(nis— which cannot fail to prepare the j and the limited exercise of children in a city ad- 



lilk to become speedily sour, whatever may be its ded to the incessant and intense excitement of its 

 iriginal quality, unless indeed it may have been I movement and bustle— wliile they often render 



reviously diluted and whitened with lime water. 

 )na rail road, it may be brought six times the dis- 

 mce in the same period, and almost without per- 

 eptible motion; to say nothing of the greater se- 

 urity of good food in places where grass is chea- 

 erthan slops, or even the mixture of decayed vege- 

 ibles and parings and remnants of salad, &c., 

 hich form the refuse of the kitchen, and whioli 

 ire so often procured as a dainty morsel for the 

 low, to be returned afterwards in the form of pure 

 ailk! 



I have recently met with a report addressed to 

 de Medical Society of Paris, on the subject of milk, 

 ?hich shows the importance of procuring this food 

 f the children from the purest source, in a new 

 ght; and proves that "distillery slops" are not 

 iae only thing injurious to its quality. .Messrs Pe- 

 .tt and D'Arcet, distinguished chemists in Paris, 

 irere led to examine minutely the quality of diffe- 

 «nt specimens of milk, from observing their very 

 ifferent effects upon children. Some which they 

 xamined, and which they found to be speedily 

 "hrown up by the children in coagulated masses, 

 i-as proved by chemical tests to have a predomi- 

 lance of acidity, though it was not peicepti'ile to 

 he taste. Other portions which were well digest- 

 d, were proved to have a predominance of aFkali, 

 diich is considered the natural condition of milk. 

 )n inquiry, it was found that the cows from which 

 he first milk was obtained, were fed in the stable, 

 vith remnants of vegetables as well as hay, and al- 

 oost without movement — that the alkaline and 

 lealthy niilk was from cows allowed to range and 

 ~eed in the meadows. 



These observations led them to examine the va- 

 -ying qualities of milk on a more extensive scale, 

 is to the simple fact of the predominance of acid or 

 iilkali, and for this purpose they availed themselves 

 jf a test which may be procured without dilficulty 

 rom a chemist. It is paper dipped in a solution of 

 Litmus. If it be of good quality, the 'blue color 

 will be changed to red by a fluid which is acid. A 

 tincture of the blue cabbage will detect aci.ity al- 

 so, if it is sufficiently fresh, in the same way. 



During a voyage through Flanders, M. D'Arcet, 

 In company with the celebrated chemist Gay Lus- 

 sac, visited some of the best dairies, in which the 

 cows are fed upon the meadows, and found the 

 milk wltliout exception, to contain a predominance 

 of alkali. They examined the milk of cows fed in 

 the suU on turnips, the leaves of vegetables, &c. 

 which were only allowed to pssi two hours a day 

 in the meadows, and found it as uniformly acid. 



The same experiment was repeated in the gra- 

 zing regions in the north of France, and uniformly 

 -with the same results. 



It would seem then to be fully ascertained that 

 pure and perfect milk can only be given by cows 



childhood precocious, and youth premature, lead 

 to decay equally premature in a generation taken 

 together, liut surely this is an additional reason 

 for seeking the purest and best possible nourish- 

 ment in order to counteract these inevitable causes 

 of decline. 



I am sure that many a mother will thank me for 

 adding that these chemists, on observing variations 

 equally great in the digestion of children fed by 

 different nurses, found the same difference in the 

 quality of their milk — and that which was thrown 

 up frequently coagulated, was uniformly sour when 

 it was received — not to tlie taste always — but as 

 tested by litmus paper. They observe that the 

 child is not only deprived in this manner of suita- 

 ble food, but he is obliged to call for it 40 or 50 

 times a day, in place of 4 or .5 times, and thus fa- 

 tigues and injures her own stomach, without being 

 nourished, and wearies and exhausts his nurse so 

 as to render the quality of the milk still worse. — 

 Such a state of things, they say, ought immediate- 

 ly to be remedied, and that it can often be done. by 

 giving the mother or nurse a more simple diet, or 

 by means of medicine, which a judicious physician 

 can prescribe, among which they consider minute 

 doses of super-carbonate of soda the best. 



But can nothing be done to paliate the evil until 

 we can procure pure milk ? M. D'Arcet made 

 the experiment in his own family of adding one 

 half a grain of super-carbonate of soda to a pint of 

 milk from a city fed cow, and succeeded in render- 

 ing it harmless at least, and far more nutiitious. — • 

 One of his children, so feeble that he despaired of 

 being able to save him, was thus suitably nourish- 

 ed, and grew up to vigorous health, by observing 

 daily the quality of the mother's and finally of the 

 cow's milk, and taking the proper measures to cor- 

 rect its defects. Now it will be incomparably bet- 

 ter to procure the pure milk of the grass fed cows 

 on the banks of the H':dson and on the liills of Con- 

 necticut, than thus to feed the poor children with 

 a drugged mixture ; but it will be at least a tempo- 

 rary palliative until the northern rail road can be 

 completed, and pure milk can be obtained as easily 

 as the pure water of the Croton river. 



Housekeepers will be glad to know that by ad- 

 ding the same proportion (one half a grain only to 

 a pint of milk,) good milk may be kept 24 or 36 

 hours, without danger of souring, even in warm 

 weather. But let them beware of converting food 

 into medicine by increasing the quantity, for I 

 have known this "simple, harmless thing," as it is 

 called, even in the shape of excessive drafts of soda 

 water, produce sores in the mouth and lips, which 

 indicates corresponding sores in the stomach, and 

 this was followed by the miseries of dyspepsia and 

 decline. An able physician assures me that he 

 could ascribe the death of a patient, from a similar 



state of mouth and stomach, to nothing but the 

 famed morning cordial of Connecticut lay physi- 

 cians, "/<caWrts4 and cider." It is time the world 

 had learned that medicine cannot safely be used as 

 daily food or drink, w thout leading to disease. 

 Yours, &c. s. 



THE CULTURE OF FLAX. 

 Travelling through our hill towns we afe pleased 

 to observe that many farmers have turned their at- 

 tention to the raising of flax. This will be more 

 beneficial to them than the raising of multicaulis or 

 even the white mulberry. We should joy to wit- 

 ness a return of the times when nearly every fam- 

 ily had one or more spinning wheels for wool and 

 likewise the hand wheel for the drawing out threads 

 of fine linen : the sound of this instrument, disa- 

 greeable though it may be to some, would restore 



many of the pleasant recollections of childhood. 



What daughter of New England that would not be 

 proud to present as a portion of her marriage dow- 

 ry, counterpanes and sheets and pillows of fine linen 

 spun and wove by her own hand ? " She layeth 

 her hands to the spindle, and her hands hold the 

 distaff. She seeketh wool and flax and worketh 

 willingly with her hands. She maketh herself cov- 

 erings of tapestry ; she maketh fine linen. Many 

 daughters have done virtuously ; but thou excellest 

 them all." 



Every farmer who hr.s suitable ground may find 

 it his gain to have a plat of ground for flax. It is 

 easily produced on the same ground that will raise 

 a good crop of corn or oats. It should be prepared 

 so as to be free of the seeds of weeds and wild 

 grasses — before the seed is sown the ground should 

 be stirred and pulverized. The time of sowing is 

 the same as that of the earlier small grains. It 

 used to be the fashion for ladies to spend their half 

 a day or day in pulling flax, because they do their 

 work in a better manner than the other se.x often 

 do: it should be so pulled as to preserve evenness 

 at the bottom or roots composing each bundle. It 

 is made to stand in the field in stocks until the head 

 containing the seed becomes sufficiently dry for 

 thrashing, when it is taken to the barn floor and 

 thrashed with the flail after the usual manner of 

 thrashing rye or wheat. The best method of rot- 

 ting is believed^to be the spreading of the flax in 

 thin layers at a distance so as not to interfere with 

 each other, on a common mown field in the month 

 of September : the flax before the cold season ar- 

 rives will, by the aid of alternate rains and dews 

 and sunshine, become so rotted as to be broken out 

 witli ease. The breaking, which separates the 

 shive from the beautiful stran, used to be done with 

 the brake, a heavy instrument, which rises and falls 

 upon the stalk : it may be done either by hand or 

 by water or other moving power. Then follows 

 the swingle knife upon an upright smooth board, 

 which takes away what the brake has left Af\er 

 this the hatchel, in the hands of the lady spinster, 

 who prepares the article for her wheel, completes 

 the process, giving the hackle the softness of silk, 

 and leaving it ready for spinning. 



Many millions of dollars mirht be saved to the 

 country from the domestic culture of silk ; and so 

 might a few millions be saved by the cultivation of 

 flax. The linseed often pays the farmer for his la- 

 bor. But the substitution of elegant domestic lin- 

 ens for (he foreign trash that is now used as linens 

 would be such a benefit to the country as does not 

 occur every year. — Farmer's Monthly y^itiior. 



