1864. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



43 



SONG OP THE BLACKSMITH'S WIFE. 



~~ My husband's a blacksmith, and where will you find 

 A man more industrious, faithful and kind ? 

 He's determined to thrive, and in that we agree, 

 For the ring of his anvil is music to me. 



Though dark his complexion and grimy his shirt, 

 Hard and horny his hand, and disfigured with dirt ; 

 Yet in that rude casket a jewel I see, 

 And the ring of his anvil is music to me. 



Ere Aurora's fair nymphs chase the night from the skies, 

 Ere the sun pierce the glooming, from bed he does rise, 

 Ere the lark leaves her nest, at his forge he will be, 

 And the ring of his anvil is music to me. 



Though to labor he owns, we are far from being poor, 

 Industry has banished gaunt want from our door ; 

 For the blacksmith's a man independent and free, 

 And the ring of his anvil is music to me. 



At a distance from home I have seen with delight, 

 The red sparks from his chimney illumine the night, 

 And have heard the fast strokes on the anvil rebound, 

 And my heart has leaped up at the musical sound. 



Those strokes on the anvil, say, what do they prove ? 

 Forethought and affection, industry and love ; 

 A resolve to be honest, respected and free ! 

 That's the tune on the anvil that's music to me. 



MAKING PORK AT THE "WEST. 

 While many Western farmers allow their hogs 

 to run at large in the woods, or in short pastures 

 during the summer, and to come up in the fall 

 .poor, stunted and hidebound, there is a class who 

 pursue a more economical plan, and aim to keep 

 their hogs in a thriving c ondition from the time 

 they are weaned till they are sent to market. The 

 course of fattening adopted by many intelligent 

 pork raisers is thus described by a Western farmer 

 in the Albany Cultivator : 



They arrange their crops so as to have a regu- 

 lar succession, upon which the hogs are turned, 

 something in the following order : First, into 

 clover ; after this into a field of rye, as soon as 

 the grain is fully out of the milk. They are next 

 turned upon the wheat stubble, or into the oat 

 field, while the grain is still soft. As soon as the 

 grains of Indian corn are fairly formed, the corn 

 and stalks are cut up at the ground, and this is 

 fed to the swine, stalks and all ; or what is also 

 common the hogs are turned into the smaller fields 

 of corn to help themselves, where they take on 

 fat rapidly, while the weather is warm and the 

 corn soft. Corn in this state has all the advan- 

 tage of that which has hardened and been cooked. 

 Thus the animals are kept constantly thriving, 

 and with good breeds, are ready for the knife at 

 almost any time. 



Sheep Shedding Wool.— Mr. Lewis Clark, 

 in the Wisconsin Farmer, says the best plan to 

 keep the wool on sheep is to keep them fat, and 

 that if sheep "run down" from any cause, and are 

 fed high at once, their wool will start. Even a 

 change of pasturage, from a poor to a timothy 

 and clover pasture, will start the wool from a lean 

 sheep. But the feeding of corn, beans, wheat, rye, 

 barley, oats, vegetables, or anything that sheep 

 will eat that makes fat, avoiding sudden changes, 

 •will not only cause the wool to stick, but will in- 

 crease it more than enough to pay the additional 

 cost. 



MAINE AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS. 



A law was passed by the Legislature in 1862 re- 

 quiring the municipal authorities of the respect- 

 ive towns and plantations in the State to make re- 

 turn of certain agricultural statistics to the office 

 of the Secretary of State annually. From a com- 

 munication in the Portland Courier, it appears 

 that 237 towns have made these returns. 



In the 237 towns making these returns there 

 are 41,778 heifers, 67,008 cows, 39,659 steers, 36,- 

 085 oxen, 277,970 sheep, 1,028,102 lbs. wool, 33,- 

 054 horses, 618,842 bushels corn, 215,899 bush- 

 els wheat, 4,255,473 bushels potatoes, 1,361,387 

 bushels apples, 4,458,778 lbs. butter, 821,970 lbs. 

 cheese, 124,830 lbs. honey, 74,843 lbs. maple su- 

 gar, 19,968 gallons maple molasses ; 996 sheep kill- 

 ed by wild animals, 1,371 sheep killed by dogs. 

 Damage to sheep by dogs, $5,905. 



Kennebec county has the largest number of cows, 

 9,557 ; Oxford the most oxen, 5,487, and steers, 

 7,089 ; Somerset the most sheep, 47,745, and the 

 greatest amount of wool, 261,268 lbs, and swine, 

 8,132 ; Oxford the largest number of colts, 1,792; 

 Penobscot the largest number of horses 4,657 ; 

 Oxford raises most corn, 120,659 bushels; Som- 

 erset the most wheat, 36,519 bushels ; Oxford the 

 most rye, 14,245 bushels ; Somerset most barley, 

 106,903 bushels ; Penobscot most oats, 171,061 

 bushels ; Aroostook most buckwheat, 23,679 

 bushels ; Penobscot most potatoes, 929,499 bush- 

 els, and turnips, 29,396 bushels ; Lincoln most 

 beets, 13,030 bushels ; Kennebec most apples, 249,- 

 440 bushels ; Somerset most upland hay, 59,885 

 tons; Oxford most intervale hay, 11,882 tons; 

 Kennebec makes most butter, 575,513 pounds ; 

 Oxford most cheese, 168,651 pounds; Penobscot 

 produces the most honey, 36,328 pounds ; Oxford 

 makes the most maple sugar, 53,560 pounds ; 

 Somerset raises the most beans, 15,169 bushels. 



For the New England Farmer . 

 ROGER'S HYBRID GRAPES. 



NOTE FROM SAGGAHEW. 



Messrs. Editors. — I have just noticed in the 

 monthly Farmer for November the inquiry of 

 "Vitis," in regard to Roger's Hybrid grapes. Had 

 I not, most unaccountably, overlooked the weekly 

 number containing it, a reply would have reached 

 him sooner. 



He asks if he is right in supposing No. 19. of 

 these new grapes to be "the most promising one 

 for Massachusetts," and "whether No. 5, or any 

 of the other numbers, are proving to be valuable 

 for us here in New England ?" 



In reply, I will say that No. 19 is proving to be 

 an excellent ©ut-door grape for this latitude, and 

 I am confident that it is one of the very best of 

 the few desirable numbors of Mr. Roger's grapes. 

 It is yet too soo*n to say which is the best, and 

 from experience thus far it seems very probable 

 that no one of them will ever be so considered — 

 from the fact that several of them are so nearly 

 equal in qualities, (though essentially different 

 from each other) that it is difficult to decide which 

 is the better one for general cultivation. Nos. 4 

 and 15 were the first ones "figured," and have had 

 the start of all the others in getting into the hands 

 of propagators, but it is now well known that sev- 

 eral of the others are every way equal to these, if 

 not superior. If I read ihe reports correctly, No. 



