140 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Maech 



The hour for closing having arrived, the chair- 

 man announced the topic for the next discussion, 

 V'hich will be, Farm Buildings. Adjourned. 



Correction. — In the remarks of Mr. Howard of 

 last week, where the South Devons are spoken of 

 as not superior for dairy purposes, it should have 

 been North Devons. And in regard to the milk 

 of the Kerries of Mr. Austin, the quantity should 

 be from 12 to 14 quarts per day. 



For the Neio England Farmer. 

 KETROSPECTIVE WOTES. 



A New Era for Children. — The communi- 

 cation of Mr. Bacon, with the above caption, print- 

 ed in the Farmer, weekly, of Nov. 30th, and in 

 the January No. of the monthly, is deserving of 

 the attention of all the readers of this paper who 

 are interested in the education of children, and 

 who wish to see them instructed in all that con- 

 cerns the science and practice of soil culture. We 

 have examined portions of the '■^School anclFavi- 

 ily Readers," got up by Marcus Willson, and 

 published by Messrs. Harper, of New York, and 

 the result of our examination was a persuasion 

 that every progress-loving parent, who should 

 make himself acquainted with these works, Avould 

 form a resolution that they should be introduced 

 into the schools of the district. He would resolve, 

 also, we felt persuaded, that they should be used 

 in his own fiimily, to give his children the means 

 of becoming acquainted with the Avorks of the 

 great and benificent Creator and Contriver, and 

 with the more interesting and useful productions 

 of the world in Avhich they are to live. 



As to the other work — Emerson & Flint's Man- 

 ual of Agriculture — by the publication of which 

 "our young friends are blessed," as Mr. Bacon 

 says, I have not yet foiuid time to do more than 

 glance at it ; but am persuaded, from sundry no- 

 tices of it which have appeared in reliable journals, 

 that it will be found an excellent book in a farm- 

 er's family, if the father is intelligent enough to 

 use it as a text-book, and devote these winter 

 evenings, or other leisure time, to the hearing of 

 recitations by his children, and to endeavors to 

 increase its interest and instructiveness by apt and 

 familiar illustrations and remarks from his own 

 experience. While the older boy or boys are re- 

 citing and listening to their father's illustrations 

 and remarks, the younger children will catch now 

 and then an important item of information, and 

 pretty certainly, also, a portion of that enthusiasm 

 with which an intelligent farmer is likely to be in- 

 s])ired while thus engaged as the instructor of the 

 older boy or boys. 



Of its value in schools, experience will soon be 

 able to give the most reliable testimony ; but, as 

 in the case of its use in the family, so too in 

 schools, much will depend upon the intelligence, 

 the tact, the inspiration or entluisiasm of the teach- 

 er. We hope it will be found well adapted to in- 

 terest children as a school text-book, for if chil- 

 dren become interested in tlie study of it, they will 

 remain interested in after life, and thus we shall 

 have hereafter more mind'in our ljfe-j)ursuit, and 

 the business of farming more dignilied, attractive 

 and respected. 



Preparation of Bones for Use. — Of all the 

 methods for preparing bones for the use of the far- 

 mer, this, which is described by Mr. Grennell, of 

 Greenfield, in the Country Oenilcman, and copied 

 tlierefrom into this paper of Dec. 7th, and into the 

 Januarj' No., at page 23, seems to be the best in 

 several respects. The treatment with sulphuric 

 acid is expensive and dangerous, and requires, 

 moreover, the previous breaking down or grinding 

 of the bones. The fermentation of bones, which 

 was noticed in this journal last year, (see the week- 

 ly of Aug. 10th, or the September No. of the 

 monthly,) under the head of "Dissolving Bones," 

 though comparatively simple, cheap and easy, is 

 not so much so as Mr. Grennell's process, and re- 

 quires the breaking or crushing of the bones, which 

 Mr. G.'s does not. He takes the bones as he finds 

 them, and packs without crushing them. This is 

 one of the points, perhaps the most important one, 

 in which Mr. G.'s method of preparing bones for 

 use is superior to all others : There is no part of 

 the process that can present any difficulty to any 

 fanner. For the majority of farmers this avIII un- 

 doubtedly prove the method Avhich Avill be pre- 

 ferred to all others ; and so simple and easy is it 

 that hereafter there can be no excuse for those who 

 neglect to pick up, and collect, and prepare for 

 use all the bones about their premises. A barrel 

 of bones thus prepared will be worth a quarter of 

 a ton o{ some superphosphates. 



As Mr. Grennell, in reply to a Canadian farmer 

 who inquired through the Country Gentleman, as 

 to the state in which the bones are found after be- 

 ing packed a year, and as to their applicability for 

 turnip-manuring, has added a fow items of infor- 

 mation to those in the article under notice, we will 

 here give an abstract of such as may be useful to 

 those about to try Mr. G.'s method. 



In Country Gentleman of Jan. 2, INIr. G. states 

 that he finds the bones at the end of a year in 

 every state of decay — that knuckles and shank- 

 bones are occasionally slow to yield — that he com- 

 monly takes the vnidigested and throws them into 

 a barrel for the next year, and that, as he uses the 

 bones chiefly for grape borders and manuring pear 

 and a])ple trees, it matters little about the fineness 

 to which they are reduced. The ashes should be 

 of hard wood, and fresh. More Anon. 



MIDDLESEX AGEICULTUEAIi SOCIETT. 



We have before us the Transactions of the 

 Middlesex Agricultural Society for the j'ear ISGl, 

 with a List of Premiums for the Exhibition in 

 1862. It is printed in a very handsome manner, 

 by Benjamin Tooian, Concord, and comprises 

 1 14 pages. After a brief statement of the Exhi- 

 bition, the first paper it contains is the Address 

 of Ex-Gov. Washburn, the subject of vduch is 

 — "TAe Connection hctween the Social and Polit- 

 iccd Condition of a People, and the Mode of IJold- 

 ing and Cultivating their Lands." AYe had the 

 pleasure of listening to this Address on the day 

 of Exhibition, and found much in it to interest 

 and instruct. 



The ])am])hlet contains several very good re- 

 tvnts, — a branch in which most of our County 



