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THE ILLINOIS F^RMEH. 



285 



Stumps. 

 We occasionally see a fine piece of 

 of land covered with stumps — marring 

 its appearance and rendering its cultiva- 

 tion with the plow very difficult. A 

 writer in the Iowa Farmer, thus details 

 a plan by which they can be got rid 



of :— 



Provide yourself a pole, or lever, 25 

 feet long, and about four inches in diam- 

 eter at the smaller end, and about ten or 

 twelve at the larger end. Then get a 

 good strong chain, (I used a very heavy 

 logging chain, with a ring on each end,) 

 a wedge and beetle, and you have every- 

 thing necessary. 



The manner of operating is this : — 

 Hitch a yoke of cattle to the smaller 

 end of the pole or lever, and drive up to 

 the stump to be extracted; haul the pole 

 in such a manner as to leave about three 

 feet of the larger end past the stump. — 

 Then take your chain, and fasten it to 

 the pole, by throwing the chain around 

 the pole, and running one end of the 

 chain through the ring on the other end. 

 Then fasten the chain to the stump, by 

 passing it several times 'around it, and 

 fasten the end by driving the wedge 

 through the ring into the stump. Now 

 make your cattle haul in the direction to 

 tighten the chain around the stump, and 

 by continuing in this direction, the 

 stump will be twisted, out of the 

 ground. 



If the stump is large, or if sound and 

 growing, it may perhaps be necessary to 

 dig, and cut one or two of the main 

 roots, but this is seldom the case. The 

 amount of power required to pull a stump 

 in this way is very small, on account of 

 the leverage the cattle have. Indeed, 

 in pulling a common stump, they seem 

 to have less to do, than when pulling the 

 pole from one stump to another. Moses. 

 - -Elliota, Minn. 



-'**- 



jg@°"A dose of Electric Oil was ad- 

 ministered to a man of the name of Nash 



in this city a few nights since, w ich 

 rendered him very quiet for a time. 



" Horse Thief Detcctop." 

 Editor Illinois Faemer : 



I find in your April number of the " Illi- 

 nois Farmer," that a Mr. John II. Hosford 

 has written a line in favor of a plan to detect 

 horse thieves, and to recover stolen property, 

 similar to one proposed by me some time 

 ago. I am glad to see this matter again be- 

 fore the public, and hope that Mr. J. H. 

 Hosford ond others will continue to write, 

 and that the press and the farmers will con- 

 tinue to talk and act on this grievous evil, 

 until we can get a paper started to advertise 

 all stolen property, similar to a counterfeit 

 detector. 



Say let a paper be published twice a week 

 in Springfield, to be called the " Horse 

 Thief Detector." Let a prospectus be pub- 

 lished, and any and all that wish to sub- 

 scribe, do so. Horse and vigilant compa- 

 nies could subscribe — say five numbers for 

 each company ; all sherifis and constables 

 ought to have a copy ; and when any man 

 had a horse stolen, he could for a dollar have 

 his stolen property advertised, and spread 

 over the State to Sheriffs and horse com- 

 panies, much sooner than he pos.sibly could 

 go to a printing oflBce and get bills printed 

 and circulated, and with one-hundredth the 

 cost. Then there would be another great 

 advantage about this detector. When a 

 stranger proposed to sell or trade a horse, 

 with your detector you could at once see if he 

 was stolen. 



Yours, P. SIMMONS. 



-•••- 



j|@°> J. n. Palma, an old resident of 

 this city, and for many years a Mormon 

 Bishop, died at his residence near San- 

 gamon River, on Sunday evening-. 



■>%» 



Jl^^'It seems to be understood that 

 the Chicago and Mississippi Road will 

 remain in the hands of Gov. Matteson 

 for the present. The bond-holders 

 won't take the road and pay the laborers. 



So it is said. 



<«• 



j^="A steam machine for pulverizing 

 the earth has been invented at Cincin- 

 nati. It; is said to do the work better 

 than can be done by any plow. 



Corn. 



The past month has been a busy one with 

 farmers. There was a good deal of wet 

 weather in the Central parts of Illinois, and 

 but little low land was planted in corn. The 

 uplands are planted and the corn looks well. 

 The flat lands will yet be planted. We 

 ought to recollect that much of our last 

 year's crop of corn was planted in June, and 

 most of it ripened welL 



The early varieties — ^white flint, yellow 

 flint, red blaze and King Phillip will ripen 

 well planted in the middle of June. 



: tt 



Hungarian Grass Seed is now a scarce 

 article. It cannot be had in Chicago or St. 

 Louis at any price. Many of our farmers 

 were so improvident the past winter as to 

 feed out this seed to their stock. Farmers ! 

 see to it that you provide food for your stock 

 next winter. 



The Instinct of Toads. — A curious 

 anecdote of the instinct of locality has 

 come to us from a highly veracious 

 quarter. In the town of Franklin, in 

 Venango county, once lived a gentleman 

 who was fond of bees. One mornins: 

 he observed four toads sitting just below 

 the hive. The next day the same toaas 

 were there, grave and solemn as sphy- 

 nxes before an Egyptian temple. One 

 was black; another bright colored; a 

 third blind; a fourth marked in some 

 other distinguished way. Thinking 

 they annoyed the bees, and seeing they 

 pertinaciously preserved their position, 

 day after day, he put them into a bas- 

 ket, carried them across the Alleghany, 

 and left them at the top of a hill. — 

 What was his surprise three weeks after, 

 to find them at their old post, as grave 

 and solemn as ever ! Again he remo- 

 ved them, taking them this time, in a 

 different^^direction; leaving them at a 

 point much further ofi*. In about six 

 weeks, however, they were back fo;- the 

 second time, A neighbor, to whom the 

 incident was told, and who was incred- 

 ulous, next tried to lose them. But in a 

 few weeks the toads were seen, one 

 morning, entering the garden, under the 

 leadership of one of their number, who 

 gave a "cheep, cheep,'' looked back for 

 his suite, and then hopped on, followed 

 by the rest, until he reached his old 

 station under the bee hive, where he 

 gravely took up his old quarters. — 

 PJdladelphia Ledger. 



Gas Tar for the Peach-Borer. — A 

 correspondent of the American Parmer 

 writes that he has found gas tar a preventa- 

 tive of the ravages of the peach borer. He 

 had previously tried lime, ashes soot, sul- 

 pher, tobacco stalks, and almost every reme- 

 dy recommended ; finally, knowing that the 

 borer deposits its e^^ at various times, from 

 June to October, in the bark of the tree, near 

 the surface of the ground, he cleared away 

 the earth from the body and roots of the 

 tree, to the depth of of a few inches, and 

 as soon the bark was dried suflSciently, it was 

 rubbed with a corn cob until it was smooth. 

 The gas tar was then applied with a paint 

 brush, as low down as the excavation would 

 allow, and for some three or four inches 

 above the surface of the ground. The earth 

 was filled into the holes again, and it was 

 found, the next season, that the trees 

 were perfectly healthy and uninjured by 

 the worm or tar. Four trees were thus 

 treated in 1855 — ^in 1856 all the peach, ap- 

 ricot and plum trees planted ; and of these, 

 the borer was only found in two peach trees, 

 in 1858. Gas tar is naturally very drying, 

 and should be applied with cautiou. In this 

 case it seemed to have been efficient, and not 

 to have been injurious. Still, we think, in 

 the case of young trees especially, a safe op- 

 eration would be, after digging the earth 

 from the stem, to place a ring of strong 

 brown paper around the tree, and smear it 

 with the tar. 



Princess Clotilde is paid to have •• >• e the 

 purchaser ef the celebrated fa;i belonging to 

 the late Qaeea of Oude- The fin is of white 

 silk, richly embroidered in eneralds and seed 

 pearl: the handle of gold and ivory, s-p!endidly 

 adorned with lubies and eerenteeu large brill- 

 iants of the first water. 



The announcement, Bf me time pince, that 

 Messrs. Searle and Tattle had been decreed 

 prizes by the Iniferial Institute of France fur 

 astronomical discoveries, has been couflrmfd 

 by letters from Beaumcunt, Secretary Perpet- 

 ual of that learned body. These gentlemen 

 are the first Americr.ns who have Lten award- 

 ed the astionuniical prizes. 



