AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 303 



Dr. Watson, of Staten Island, states that a cordon of hop leaves 

 around a tree will act as a perfect safeguard against the ordinary 

 canker worm — not one of which would pass over it. 



Mr. Goodsell, of Oswego, N. Y., thought that the difficulty as 

 to Indian meal, in England, and elsewhere, consisted in the want 

 of knowing how to cook it properly. When I was in London, 

 some years ago, I found in a London eating-house a landlord who 

 understood it. He sold large quantities of Indian meal, coarse 

 ground, under the name of Tuscarora rice! He made money by 

 it until a live Yankee came, who cried out — what we give our 

 pigs ! Mush and milk ! And the landlord was ruined. 



Prof. Mapes believed the same experiment would do well here. 

 Indian meal was disrelished and thought unhealthy, and the 

 reason was because it was not cooked long enough. Instead of 

 half an hour, it should be cooked two houi'S. 



HORSE-SHOES WITHOUT NAILS. 



Mr. Sewall Short, of New London, Conn., exhibited his patent 

 horse-shoe, the principal advantages of which, he said, are, first, 

 the doing away with all necessity for nailing the shoe on the 

 hoof; second, the ease with which the shoe can be fitted to the 

 hoof and the hoof to the shoe; third, the conveniencs in the 

 winter season, when all of a sudden the ground becomes covered 

 with ice, as the smooth shoe can be removed, and the corked or 

 roughed shoe fixed on with almost the same ease as one pair of 

 boots is exchanged for another. The economy of this arrange- 

 ment would be readily understood by those who have had to w'ait 

 several hours at the blacksmith's to have their horse-shoes 

 corked, at a time when every smithy is thronged with horses. 

 The patent shoe consists of an upper portion or cap, and a lower 

 portion, or shoe proper The upper portion resembles the shape 

 of a peak to a boy's cap, but made the proper size and shape to 

 fit close round the upper side of a horse's hoof, and to fasten at 

 the heel by means of a small iron screw. The shoe is made of 

 malleable iron; the lower edge of the cap is turned inside so as 

 to form a ridge or ketch which fits into a groove round the out- 

 side edge of the lower portion or shoe proper, which resembles in 

 other respects the ordinary horse-shoe, except in having no nail- 

 holes. When the upper and lower portions are placed in their 

 proper positions, and fitted on the hoof, they are fixed firmly and 

 tightly together, and on the hoof by simply turning the screw 

 above described with a small wrench. The growth of the hoof is 



