186 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



June 



GRAFTING. 



Every boy on the farm — and every girl, too, 

 we think — should be early taught how to bud 

 and graft. The boys will need it on the trees, 

 and the girls on the roses and other flowers. It 

 is an operation more nice than difficult, and a 

 pleasing one when understood. 



The HoHiculturist, for April, gives a recipe for 

 making a liquid grafting toax, as follows : 



1 pound of rosin. 



5 ounces of alcohol, 95 per cent. 



1 ounce beef tallow. 



1 tablespoonful of spirits of turpentine. 



The rosin is melted over a slow fire. It is then 

 taken off, the beef tallow added, and the whole 

 well stirred with a perfectly dry stick. When 

 cooled down a little add the spirits of turpentine, 

 and last the alcohol, in small quantities, stirring 

 the mass constantly. Should the alcohol cool it 

 down too much, so that a lump forms, warm it a 

 little till it melts again. Keep it in a corked bot- 

 tle, and lay it on in a veiy thin coat with a brush. 

 If it is put on too thick, a crust will soon form 

 on the surface, preventing the alcohol from evap- 

 orating, and consequently the mass from harden- 

 ing. In a room sufficiently warmed, the wax 

 must be of the consistency of molasses ; the 

 quantity of the alcohol may, therefore, be in- 

 creased according to circumstances. 



EXTRACTS AND REPLIES. 



tJNDERDKAINING. 



Will you inform me through your valuable maga- 

 zine who could be employed as a reliable engineer 

 here in Middlesex county to lay out work for under- 

 draining ? I am deeply interested in your monthly 

 pamphlet, and in no department more than that which 

 has brought to light the great benefits to the farmer 

 through successful drainage. 



Wayland, April, 1863. Edward H. Shekman. 



Remarks. — Messrs. Shedd & Edson, Iron Build- 

 ing, 42 Court Street, Boston; or Mr. Albert E. 

 Wood, Concord, Mass. They are competent and en- 

 tirely reliable. 



SAVE THE dogs ? 



We learn that Mr. Albert Fearing, of Hingham.has 

 recently lost eight of his fine sheep, killed by dogs. 

 Among them was a buck of much value. In Ohio, 

 the sheep-owners around Youngstown, held a meeting 

 to devise measures to relieve themselves from the de- 

 struction caused by dogs. It was asserted in the 

 meeting that within two weeks, the wool-growers in 

 the vicinity of Youngstown had lost ^1125 by the rav- 

 ages of dogs. 



KICKING cows. 



In the Farmer of April 25th a Leominster corres- 

 pondent, "A. C. W.," makes some inquiries and sug- 

 gestions in relation to an article upon kicking cows. 

 He asks what we do with the milk pail while holdmg 

 on to one teat with the right hand and at the same 

 time slapping the cow smartly with the other, and es- 

 pecially, he asks, when we catch the uplifted foot, and 

 hold it close to the cow's body until she settles down 

 into our lap ? "It seems to me," he continues, "it 

 must require considerable strength and agility to be 

 done successfully without spilling the milk or spoiling 

 the pail." In answer to the above first named inquiry, 



I would say, all that is necessary, is, to set the pail 

 one side before commencing operations. As "A. C. 

 W." says, it requires considerable strength and agility 

 to be done successfully. But a common farm hand 

 will do it nearly every time, and if he is successful in 

 catching the foot he will have no trouble in setting the 

 pail one side ; if not, ten chances to one he gets the 

 milk spilled or the bottom knocked out of the pail, as 

 is very apt to be the case if nothing is tried. "I would 

 suggest, he says, "if it might not be safe and better 

 in both cases to strap up one of the fore legs after the 

 fashion of the famous horse-tamers ?" In relation to 

 this method I know nothing ; but this I do know, if 

 this is the best method, and those who try it have no 

 better success with their cows than the famous horse- 

 tamers that have visited this vicinity have had with 

 horses, I should advise them to sell as quick as possi- 

 ble. I most heartily concur with "A. C. W.," in rela- 

 tion to preventing kicking, and think, should it be 

 strictly followed, ^here would be comparatively few 

 that would acquire the habit of kicking. 

 Strafford, Vt., April, 1863. Elery. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 RETROSPECTIVE NOTES. 



If any reader of the April number of this jour- 

 nal should sit down some evening, or at any other 

 leisure time, and re-read it, marking on the mar- 

 gin every passage which either taught him some- 

 thing new and likely to be of value in his own 

 practice, or reminded him of something which, 

 though not entirely unknown, was yet almost as 

 completely covered up and kept out of sight by 

 the shades of forgetfulness as if it had been in the 

 region of the unknown, and had never been 

 thought of before ; if he will mark with his pen- 

 cil, also, every passage containing a fact or opin- 

 ion which he thinks may prove useful, and which 

 he would like to treasure up in his memory ; if he 

 would mark, too, every passage which suggests 

 anything which he may think would be useful to 

 have fresh in his mind at meetings of his Farm- 

 er^ Club, or when talking with a neighbor farmer 

 in chance interviews, and to present, at such times, 

 either in the form of inquiry, or as subject for con- 

 sideration or discussion ; — in a word, if any read- 

 er will mark every passage which seems to him 

 noteworthy, for the above-named reasons, he will 

 find, on turning back over the several pages after 

 he has completed his re-perusal of this April num- 

 ber, that there is much in it that is valuable ; more, 

 probably, than he may have thought when he first 

 hurriedly glanced over it, or perused it without 

 any such taking note of the noteworthy passages. 

 Such was the impression, at least, made on one 

 reader when he took up this number to look again 

 at some statement he had found there, and turned 

 leaf after leaf to find it. The unexpected frequen- 

 cy of pencilled passages surprised him very much. 

 It seemed as if he had not found so much of val- 

 ue in it, when he had read it. 



As there are so many passages quite noteworthy 

 and of practical value, in this month's issue of the 

 New Englaivi Farmer, it has occurred to me that 

 it might be more likely to do good, to take the 

 briefest notice possible, of several of the passages 

 I find pencil-marked, than to confine my comments 

 to any single article, as it has been customary with 

 me CO do. 



First, then, among the pencilled passages, I find 

 the extracts made by the Editor, in his leading 

 article, from a letter by Mr. Oliver P. Mead, cov- 

 ered all over with pencil marks ! These utteran- 

 ces or outpourings of a soul that loves beauty, 

 and to whose eye a farm-house embellished with 



