412 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Sept. 



young men, in the spring, to work on his farm. 

 When a young man presented himself, he would 

 ask him, "When was the right time to cut hog- 

 yokes ?" One would say, in the spring, another 

 in the fall or winter ; others, not knowing what 

 else to say, thought it was in the old of the moon, 

 or in the new. To all such he would say, at once, 

 "Well, you may go along ; I don't want you." At 

 length a young man called, no hrighter nor smart- 

 er in his appearance than others, to whom he put 

 his usual question, "When is the right time to 

 cut hog-vokes ?" "Well," said he, "I always cut 

 them when I come across them." "Then," said he, 

 "you are the man for me. You may go to work." 

 Verily, there is a time and season for every work 

 that is done under the sun. N. s. 



Monadnock, No. 4, 1860. 



Remarks. — The questions put by the father 

 were a pretty good test of a man's ajytness, or 

 that peculiar characteristic of the Yankee to take 

 advantage of every circumstance to facilitate his 

 business. Now a hog-yoke is a thing of peculiar 

 form, and if one were to start into the woods to 

 hunt for one, he might spend hours or days in 

 vain, so that it will be seen that the answer of the 

 young man was a shrewd one, — that he cut them 

 whenever he came across them. 



DEADENTNG- "WALLS AND C3ILINGS. 



Men of ingenuity, lend us your ears. There 

 is no greater nuisance in modern houses than 

 that of the transmission of sound through parti- 

 walls. Any practical, inexpensive and efficient 

 means of deadening sound will be a great boon. 

 Solid walls and solid floors transmit sound in the 

 highest degree. The Metropolitan Building Act 

 provides that all parti-walls shall be solid and of 

 a certain thickness in proportion to height and 

 length. How is the evil to be overcome ? "P'or 

 ■ eight years," writes a studious friend to us, "I 

 have occupied a house in London ; and during 

 the whole of this time, there have been neighbors 

 having young families. They are musical, and, 

 I must confess, labor most industriously at the 

 scales ; morning, noon and night one or other 

 child howls and strums, apparently without mak- 

 ing any progress." There is no objection to 

 neighbors' children learning music and singing 

 — quite the reverse ; but it is most objectionable 

 that walls should so readily transmit sound, and 

 render the ladies' efforts so widely known. Some 

 persons always take a corner house, so as to be 

 free from such nuisance on one side at least. Is 

 there no remedy ? The late Mr. Cubbitt had some 

 (rouble at Balmoral with certain floors, and re- 

 membered in taking down an old palace floor 

 (many years before,) vast quantities of cockle- 

 shells fell out from betwixt the joists. These had 

 been used in plugging. The idea was acted upon. 

 Cockles were dredged, and brought ; the shells 

 were cleaned and dried, and used, v.'ith beneficial 

 eflect. The cellular spaces thus produced ab- 

 sorbed sound. Some highly cellular texture may 

 be applied to walls, ceilings and floors, which 

 shall resist fire and ordinary decay, allow of fin- 

 ish, and yet .deaden sound. Who is to invent 

 and introduce such materials ? They may patent 



the invention and make a fortune, if they will 

 only abate the existing nuisance, and enable us 

 to have solid parti-walls and fire-proof floors 

 without being compelled to hear what is going 

 on up stairs and in the next house. — The Builder. 



For the New England Farmer. 



CATTLE DISTEMPEK. 



Two Cows Slauqhteeed by Tns Commissioners at East 

 Lexington, 11th inst. 



A short time previous to the extra session of 

 the Legislature, I expressed my doubts, in a com- 

 munication to the Farmer, of the contagiousness 

 of the disease prevailing among Mr. Chenery's 

 cattle and others, and intimated some lack of con- 

 fidence in the post mortem examinations that had 

 already been made, as they betrayed, to my mind, 

 a pitiful ignorance of physiology and pathology. 

 Nothing has transpired since to remove my 

 doubts. 



A week before the extra session of the Legisla- 

 ture, a meeting of the State Board of Agriculture, 

 the cattle commissioners and other interested was 

 held at the State House, when Dr. Bartlett asked 

 why it was, if the disease was so contagious as 

 represented, that Mr. Chenery's cattle had not 

 communicated the disease to any of the adjacent 

 herds, &c.? Dr. Loring replied that every precau- 

 tion had been taken to prevent its communica- 

 tion, and the reason why no cattle had become 

 diseased from Mr. Chenery's was simply because 

 they had had no opportvmity. That it was con- 

 tagious was as "obvious as foot-prints upon new 

 fallen snow." 



When the disease was raging among Mi*. Che- 

 nery's cattle last season, a part of the herd was 

 turned out to graze adjoining a pasture occupied 

 by the herd of Mr. Stearns Smith, with nothing 

 but a common stone wall to separate them. At 

 this time, two, at least, of Mr. C.'s cattle (calves) 

 died in the pasture, and one of them was not no- 

 ticed till decomposition had taken place. Mr. 

 Smith's cattle have not appeared to be affected 

 in the least. No town in the State is more free 

 (Mr. C.'s farm excepted) from cattle disease and 

 panic than Belmont. 



Last A])ril Mr. Chenery's oxen canie'to Mr. 

 Peter Wellington's barn for hay — they had been 

 there not long before. Last November these ox- 

 en were thought to have the catlle distemper — 

 pleuro-pncumonia — but had recovered at the time 

 of getting the hay. Mr. Wellington had several 

 cows in and about the barn, three of which, at 

 least, were tied up in the barn while the hay was 

 being loaded. Two of these were boarders, and be- 

 longed to Mr. Edward Mulliken of North Cam- 

 bridge. The third belonged to Mr. Peter Wel- 

 lington, and ate from the same crib with Mr. C.'s 

 oxen while in the barn. 



Last week, Wednesday, the Board of Cattle 

 Commissioners met the full Board of Selectmen 

 at Mr. Peter Wellington's barn and after exam- 

 inations and consultations, Mr. Mulliken's cows 

 were slaughtered by Dr. Thayer, who, with oth- 

 ers, had pronounced one of the cows, at least, to 

 have diseased lungs. She had coughed a little, 

 but appeared to be perfectly well. On examining 

 the lungs of each cow, they were unanimously pro- 

 nounced to be as healthy as those of any cow in the 



