1867. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



193 



apothecary has required at least four hundred 

 pounds of weeds in its production. About 

 thirty Ions of" the wet plants give one ton ol 

 kdp, as the incinerated mass is called, and 

 from this nine or ten pounds of iodine is ob- 

 tained. This would seem to involve a prodi- 

 gious amount of labor and expense, bringing a 

 high price upon the products. But the price 

 is exceedingly moderate, seldom ranging in 

 the English market above three dollars per 

 pound. It would never pay at such prices to 

 manufacture if the weeds did not yield other 

 valuable products, as potash and soda. With- 

 out stopping to consider in detail the produc- 

 tion of these salts, it may be interesting to 

 know that probably more than four thousand 

 tons of potash and" hco thousand of soda were 

 introduced into the English market the past 

 year, through the burning of sea-plants upon 

 the coa.sts of Scotland and Ireland. The en- 

 tire products of iodine from all sources must 

 reach nearly or quite five hundred thousand 

 pounds How great is the industrial value of 

 that which seems the most repulsive and worth- 

 less of all the products of nature ! To ^hat 

 science are we indebted for opening up this 

 great source of wealth ? The reader's reply 

 may be anticipated, — Chemistry. 



LETTER FROM THE FARM. 



"Truth is stranger than Fiction." 



Those who go down to the sea in ships usu- 

 ally come back pretty deeply freighted with 

 what are called "long yarns," and "fish 

 stories," and astonish us with a rehearsal of the 

 wonders of the great deep. But there are some 

 things that take place on the dry land, ec^ually 

 as marvelous as that of "Jonah's swallowing the 

 whale," or the "mermaid quietly combing her 

 hair on the crest of a wave," one of which I 

 will relate before I close. 



Last week I gave you a few incidents of my 

 winter travel at home, and now wish to say, 

 that, extending my visits, I called at the farm 

 of ]\Ir. Elijah Wood, of this town. He is well 

 known as a persevering, money-making farmer, 

 and an intelligent, liberal, and estimable man. 

 His articles have added interest and value to 

 your columns. Mr. Wood is a practical and 

 close manager. Wherever he labors upon the 

 soil, he generally succeeds in making it yield 

 him a fair remuneration. He has tested farm- 

 ing in nearly all of its varieties ; in raising 

 stock, as a principal interest ; milk, in the same 

 way ; corn, as a leading crop, then potatoes or 

 other root crops for market, and hay. 



Last summer he sold $600 worth of hay, 

 taking it from the field to his customers. He 



has had five horses and from twenty to thirty - 

 two large oxen in his barn all winter, with fod- 

 der sufficient, at present, to carry them through. 

 The fodder is good meadow-hay and corn- 

 stalks, butts and husks — the oxen feeding main- 

 ly upon the latter. Nearly all the cattle were 

 in excellent flesh, some of them fair beef. He 

 is testing this kind of farming for several rea- 

 sons, which it is not necessary to mention here. 

 He purchases manure, special or common, to 

 an amount that he thinks would be nearly 

 ec|uivalent to what would come from the hay 

 sold, if it were fed upon the farm. In addi- 

 tion to this, he has what comes from the fod- 

 der fed to the oxen, and one dollar a week per 

 head, for keeping each of them. These oxen 

 are intended for the spring market as working 

 cattle. He intends to use six tons of super- 

 phosphate of lime the coming season. 



Mr. Wood's barn is old and inconvenient. 

 He is making preparations to build, or remove 

 this one, and set it in the side-hill so as to 

 drive into the gable, as his ground is admira- 

 bly adapted to such a position. 



One of the most remarkable circumstances 

 that ever came to my knowledge was related 

 to me by Mr. Wood, with regard to one of 

 the oxen. He had frequently noticed this ani- 

 mal rubbing his nose against a post near which 

 he was tied, and occasionally an odor greeted 

 his olfactories, not half so grateful as that 

 which proceeds from a mow of good English 

 hay. On giving careful attention he saw what 

 appeared to be a small stick in one of the nos- 

 trils of the ox, and, after considerable effort, 

 got hold of it with his thumb and finger, and 

 drew out a stickj(?/ifeen (15) inches in length ! It 

 was about a quarter of an inch thick, and 

 when laid even with the end of the nose, and 

 alongside the cheek of the ox, reached above 

 the eye ! The ox continuing the rubbing, and 

 some matter oozing from the nostril, Mr. 

 Wood procured assistance, and throwing a 

 blanket over the head of the ox, as he stood in 

 the stancheon, they proceeded to a minute ex- 

 amination, and extracted twelve (12) other 

 sticks, not one of which was less than six (6) 

 inches in length ! One of these was a corn- 

 stalk 10 inclies long and half an inch in diame- 

 ter ! Mr, Wood's statements were deliber- 

 ately made in the presence of two or three per- 

 sons, and, strange as the whole seems to be, 

 we cannot doubt their entire correctness. 



