1863. 



KFAV ENGLAND FARMER. 



379 



EXTRACTS AUT> BEPLIES. 



HOLDFAST. 



I would like to inquire throtiph the colnmns of your 

 valuable! jiapcr if tlierc is anj- cure for a hold fast? I 

 have a valuaMe three-year-old steer who has a hold- 

 fast on his under jaw, and unless it can be cured I 

 shall lose biui, and thus spoil the pair, m. 



hauhkury pkeseuve. 



Will any one tell me how to make it, and how to 

 can it up ? What is the price per bushel in Boston ? 

 N.H., Sept., ISGS. M. 



DKAIX TILE. 



I wish you would inform me tbou,£;h your paper the 

 cost of the different kinds and sizes of tile a rod. 



Also, if you do not think that one and a half inch 

 round tile, laid in softish hard pan, where the land is 

 not very wet, and has considerable fall, would not be 

 Jarge enough and as good as any of the other kinds of 

 tile ? Please inform me, also, of ihe two nearest places 

 to Claremont where it is manufactured. AV. i'. h. 



Cfaremont, X. II., Oct. 1863. 



Remauks. — The size of two-inch tile is usually 

 about fourteen dollars at the yard, and about twenty- 

 eight dollars per thousand for three inch tile. 



The round tile would probably answer every pur- 

 pose on sueU land as you describe. 



I have an inquiry or two which I would be thankful 

 to have answered. I am about laying a lew drains on 

 apiece of land that has ample gradual descent; I 

 sink the trenches about three and a half feet deep, and 

 width of shovel at liottom. Now, what I wish to learn 

 is this ; would it do best to put in twelve inches depth 

 of stone at bottom and cover up, or lay in larger ones 

 so as to leave an opening for the water to pass through ? 

 There are stones suitalile for either way on the lot. 



Grofoti, Oct. 3, 1863. o. P. 



Remarks.— Make a gullet of the larger stones, by 

 all means. 



/•'or t/ie New Ewjland Farmer. 

 TRIMMING THS "WHITE PINE. 



Mil. Editou : — I had occasion a few days since 

 to visit' Exeter, N. H., and on the way oliserved 

 many white pine trees by the side of the railroad. 

 Many of thera were covered witli limbs from the 

 top to within four to si.\ feet of the ground. Will 

 such trees make valuable lumber ? Could not the 

 value of tiie trees for lumber be greatly increased, 

 by cutting off the lower limbs which could easily 

 be done with the aid of a ladder and saw or 

 hatchet P 



Nt-arly all that buy wood to keep a fire are well 

 aware that wood is very high, and would it not 

 pay, or nearly pay for cutting. There are some 

 seasons of the year when the farmer has very lit- 

 tle to do, and this miglit furnish employment for 

 some of his leisure time. Perhaps you have a 

 poor neighbor who would be glad of an opportu- 

 nity to remove them for the fuel, which would not 

 only ir crease the value of the lumber, but also the 

 value and beauty of the farm. UlLL. 



Mdhuen, Sept. 21, 1863. 



The Hums. — One of the correspondents of the 

 American Institute Club closes a letter, blowing 

 up a *'new humbug of Wm. R. Prince's," with the 

 information that, although he has none for sale, 

 yet to accommodate his friends he will send a 

 dozen grains of a certain wonderful "Iowa sweet 

 corn" fcr twenty-five ceu^s reuntted to him! 



MAHVELS OP MAN. 



While the gastric juice has a mild, bland, sweet- 

 ish taste, it ])osscsses the power of digesting the 

 hardest food that can he swallowed. It has no 

 influence whatever on the fibers of the living an- 

 imal, but at the moment of death, it begins to eat 

 them away with the power of the strongest acid. 



There is dust on sea and land — in the valley 

 and on the mountain top — there is dust always 

 and every wliere. The atmosphere is full of it. It 

 penetrates the noisome dungeon, and visits the 

 deepest, darkest caves of the earth. No palace 

 door can shut it out ; no drawer is so secret as to 

 escape its presence. Every breath of wind dashes 

 it upon the open eye ; which yet is not blinded, 

 because there is a fountain of the blandest fluid 

 in nature incessantly emptying itself under the 

 eyelid, which sjireads itself over the surface of the 

 eyeball, at every winking, and washes every atom 

 of dust away. This liquid, so well adapted to the 

 eye itself, has some acridity, which, under certain 

 circumstances, becomes so decided as to be scald- 

 ing to the skin, and would rot away the eyelids, 

 were it not that along the edges of them there are 

 little oil manufactories, which spread over their 

 surface a coating as impervious to the liquids nec- 

 essary for kecjiing the eyeballs washed clean, as 

 the best varnish is impervious to water. 



The breath which loaves the lungs has been so 

 perfectly divested of its life-giving properties, that 

 to re-breathe it, unmixed with other air, the mo- 

 ment it escapes from the mouth, would cause im- 

 mediate death by suffocation ; while, if it hover- 

 ed about us, a more or less destructive influence 

 over health would be occasioned. But it is made 

 of a nature so much lighter than the common air, 

 that the moment it escapes the lips and nostrils it 

 ascends to higher regions, above the breathing 

 point, there to be rectified, renovated and sent 

 back again, replete with purity and life. How 

 rapidly it ascends is beautifully exhibited any fros- 

 ty morning. 



But foul and deadly as the expired air is, na- 

 ture — wisely economical in all her works and ways 

 — turns it to good account in the outward passage 

 through the organs of voice, and makes of it the 

 whisper of love, the soft words of affection, the 

 tender tones of human sympathy, the sweet strains 

 of ravishing music, and the persuasive eloquence 

 of the finished orator. 



If a well-made man is extended on the ground, 

 his arms at right angles with his body, a circle, 

 making the navel the centre, will just take in the 

 head, the finger-ends and the feet. The distance 

 from "top to toe" is precisely the same as that be- 

 tween the tips of the fingers wiien the arms are 

 extended. The lengtli of the body is just six 

 times that of the foot ; while the distance from the 

 edge of the hair on the forehead to the end of the 

 chin is one-tenth of the length of the whole stat- 

 ure. 



Of the sixty-two ]uiinary alements known in 

 my nature, only eighteen are found in the human 

 body, and of these, seven are metallic. 



Iron is found in the blood ; phosphorus in the 

 brain ; limestone in the bile ; lime in the bones ; 

 dust and ashes in all. Not only these eighteen 

 human elements, but the whole sixty-two, of which 

 the universe is made, have their essential basis in 

 the four substances — oxygen, hydrogen and car- 

 bon — representing the more farriliai nr-ncs of 



