1862 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



365 



For the New England Farmer. 

 AGOING TOO FAST. 



\Vlio is agoing too fast? Why, that hair- 

 brained fellow, driving that carriage, and in dan- 

 ger of upsetting the carriage, killing himself and 

 two girls he has with him, beside spoiling horse 

 and carriage. This crazy fellow is not the only 

 one who is in danger from fast driving. "Agoing 

 too fast" is an epidemic of the age ; farmers, me- 

 chanics, and those of many other occupations, are 

 in danger, as well as that go-ahead, enterprising 

 diiver of the carriage. Though farmers are in less 

 danger of fast driving than traders, speculators 

 and manufacturers, yet, occasionally, we see one 

 driving a little too fast. Peleg Go-ahead had a 

 farm left to him by his grandfather, containing 

 about 250 acres of intervale and other respectable 

 land. Before his grandfather died he had been a 

 clerk in a grocery store. Soon after he came in 

 possession of this valuable farm he said he did not 

 intend to plod along just as his grandfather had 

 done, who only left fifteen or twenty thousand 

 dollars, "but it was in him, and he meant to do 

 something." So he commenced operations early 

 in the spring by hiring all hands that offered their 

 services, without much scruple about wages ; and 

 with this motley gang of colors and dialects he 

 went ahead, driving business, plowing and sow- 

 ing, reaping and mowing, to the end of the first 

 year. Being somewhat in the habit of book- 

 keeping, he found himself rather in the rear after 

 paying off his hands and taxes, but determined to 

 make it up by doing more business. The next 

 year he made a more vigorous effort, hired more 

 help at high wages, and astonished his neighbors 

 to see what a business man could do. Without 

 going into many particulars how he enjoyed him- 

 self with his span of dapple greys in riding out 

 with his young wife, and how his variety help 

 spent their time when he was away, be it enough 

 to state that at the end of the third year, instead 

 of imitating his plodding grandfather, the spirit of 

 his grandfather had the spectacle of seeing his 

 farm struck off under the hammer to the highest 

 bidder for the accommodation of Peter's creditors. 



Describing solitary cases of fast driving would 

 give but a feeble view of the reality. Fast driv- 

 ers may more consistently be classed in groups to 

 represent facts. In one of our large manufactur- 

 ing villages the lives of men and property wasted 

 in hurried speculations would compare with the 

 destruction caused by war ; hundreds of men 

 were made paupers, and not a few of them died of 

 consumption, broken hearts and brain fevers. I 

 do not state these remarks without some personal 

 knowledge of the facts. That insane desire to 

 gain property fast has been the destruction of a 

 vast many of our enterprising business men, and 

 has been the cause of stagnation in business and 

 dull times, little inferior to the calamity of war ; 

 instead of getting rich they make themselves and 

 others poor. Silas Beown. 



Mtnks as Ixsect-Catciiers. — A correspondent 

 of the Rural New- Yorker, who seems to make a 

 business of raising minks for their fur, relates the 

 following in regard to their catching grasshoppers 

 and bee-moths : Two years ago last Majr, I caught 

 seven young minks. I made a pen of boards near 

 my bees, twelve feet square, and put them in it. 



About the first of July, grasshoppers would occa- 

 sionally sail in, and they would jump and catch 

 them very quick. It soon became sport for boys 

 to catch grasshoppers and throw them on the side 

 of the pen, to see the minks jump and catch them. 

 Hearing the same jumping at night, I went out to 

 see what was going on, and I found they were 

 catching millers. The millers were so thick about 

 my bees, that I could catch about thirty or forty a 

 night in a pan of buttermilk, and now I have no 

 millers about my bees. My minks cannot climb a 

 rough board fence four feet high. They have 

 young once a year — from five to eleven — and be- 

 fore I take off their pelts, I keep them in the dark 

 for about one month, to make them dai'ker than 

 the wild ones. 



CULTIVATION OP CLOVER FOR 

 FODDER, 



Farmers who have kept, and themselves fed, a 

 variety of stock, sheep, horses, oxen and cows, 

 both dry and in milk, are pretty much of one 

 opinion, we believe, as to the value of clover hay 

 for such stock, viz : — that when it is well groicn 

 and properly secured, it is more valuable than any 

 other hay. Such, certainly, is our opinion, after 

 having fed it extensively, and particularly to 

 sheep. In a recent conversation with Mr. John 

 Day, of Boxford, who cuts large quantities of 

 clover, he stated that he feeds most of his clover 

 hay to cows giving milk, and he has noticed that 

 when the clover is exhausted, and herdsgrass and 

 red-top are supplied, twenty cows immediately 

 shrink two cans of milk per day ! We have heard 

 similar statements from other observing farmers. 

 If, then, clover hay is so excellent for produc- 

 ing milk, it must also be good for making flesh, 

 and especially excellent in promoting the growth 

 of young stock. 



Our object in this writing is to learn the opin- 

 ions of brother farmers, 



1. As to the best kind of clover for New Eng- 



land farms ? 



2. What is the best mode of producing it ? 



3. How should it be cured and packed away? 



4. Is there any way in which a fair crop can be 



taken, annually, from land devoted to or- 

 charding ? 



These questions are asked, in the hope that 

 many of our intelligent correspondents will reply 

 to them in articles for publication, as many per- 

 sons are desirous to engage more extensively than 

 they have ever done, in the cultivation of clover. 



The question as to the best manner of cultivat- 

 ing orchards, is a perplexing one. All the pro- 

 cesses, the plowing, furrowing, cultivating, and re- 

 moving the crops, are dangerous ones to the trees, 

 and the expense of the labor is materially in- 

 creased by the impediments which the trees offer. 

 If there is any way in which a crop of clover could 

 be taken off annually without frequent plowing, 



