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NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



July 



requires but little labor, comparatively, to go 

 over a field that was well plowed and harrowed, 

 and where weeds and grass have not been 

 allowed to spring up, — but where this work was 

 slighted, and weeds have been allowed to take 

 root, the labor of hoeing is slow, tedious and 

 expensive, and the soil is robbed of a consid- 

 erable portion of the nutriment that ought to 

 have sustained the prime crop. 



Harvesting the Small Grains. Do this be- 

 fore the grain is fully ripe. See article on 

 another page of this number, on this subject. 



Celery. Set celery plants. Cover them 

 with boards for a week to keep the sua off, 

 and water freely. 



Cabbage. Set cabbage plants in every 

 nook and comer for a late crop. They are 

 excellent for the stock, and excellent for bipeds 

 all through the winter, as "cold slaw." 



It will not be too late to put in melons, and 

 cucumbers for pickles early in this month. 

 Wherever early crops have been taken off put 

 in ruta bagas, and later in the month the flat 

 turnip. 



It will not be difficult to get tico crops on 

 a considerable portion of the ground occupied, 

 and where such is the case, the profit will be 

 more than doubled. The market gardeners 

 get fow crops, — spinach, peas, potatoes and 

 cabbage. The peas are sowed the moment the 

 spinach is off", then potatoes are planted be- 

 tween the rows of peas, and are fairly estab- 

 lished by the time the peas fail. The pea 

 vines are then cleared off and cabbage plants 

 set in their place. 



July will be a busy month to every good 

 farmer, — but if he takes its work with some 

 system, and does not attempt too much, he 

 will find the work of haying interesting, and 

 the month one of calm and rational enjoyment. 



FRUIT PRBSEBVING HOUSE. 

 While sipping his wine one day with some 

 philosophic friends, Dr. Franklin noticed that 

 a fly which he had taken from his wine as he 

 poured it out, and thrown carelessly upon the 

 table, supposing it to be dead, was showing 

 signs of life. Now as the life of a lly can be 

 preserved during a "bottled-up" imprisonment 

 of several years in a cold wine cellar ; as other 

 animals survive the stupor of hibernation, the 

 Doctor and his friends began to philosophize 



on the probability of the discovery of some 

 scientific means by which human life may in 

 like manner be held in suspense for fifty or a 

 hundred years. The Doctor suggested that it 

 would be pleasant to take a nap of a century 

 or so, and then be permitted to open one's eyes 

 on the changes which might occur in the world 

 during that length of time. We were reminded 

 of this little incident in the Doctor's history 

 by what we saw and heard at the formal open- 

 ing. May 20th, of a building in Cambridge, re- 

 cently erected by the Massachusetts Fruit Pre- 

 serving Company. Science may be compelled 

 to stop short of the Doctor's hopes, but it is 

 certainly doing great things in the way of pre- 

 serving fruits, vegetables, fresh meats, fish, &c. 

 After examining the building and testing the 

 preserved fruits, the president of the company, 

 Dr. Geo. B. Loring, explained the principle 

 on which the house is built, — being that per- 

 fected by Prof. Nyce of Cleveland, Ohio. 

 The building is two stories high. The walls 

 are some three feet thick, formed on the inside 

 and outside with sheets of galvanized iron, and 

 between them a packing of wood shavings. The 

 second story is the ice room, separated from 

 the fruit room by a floor of galvanized iron, 

 made water tight, and so inclined as to allow 

 the water from the ice to run off. The floor 

 of the fruit room is also of galvanized iron, 

 with shavings, &c., below, to prevent the en- 

 trance of moisture. Some patentable matter 

 is spread upon the floor to absorb moisture and 

 to affect the air. The object of the house is to 

 secure uniform and proper coldness, dryness, 

 purity, absence of light, and, if possible, the 

 great agent of decomposition, the oxygen of 

 the air. 



Dr. Loring spoke with much confidence of 

 the success of the new method, regarding it as 

 of great value, not only for the preservation 

 of domestic fruits, but of foreign fruits ; and 

 remarked that the construction of these houses 

 would render the business of dealing in the 

 latter, now so hazardous, quite safe and remu- 

 nerative. Eggs, vegetables, and other pro- 

 ducts of the farm could be preserved with 

 equal facility ; and he had no doubt that by 

 building these houses on a smaller scale, the 

 use of cellars would be superseded to a 

 great extent. The advantage of this would be 

 that the fruit would not only be preserved for 

 a much longer period, but would be kept in 



