364 



THE ILLINOIS FAEMEE. 



Dec. 



like to pee him crmpare the Orange in a finished 

 hedge wiih the liiile fragile "prairie rose." Or, 

 if be could view the landscape from the Jlound, 

 on which this is written — look aown, as upon a 

 map, over the surcession of farms, stretchii g for 

 miies on the gently rolling priiirie, and see < n 

 every side the boundaries of field and farm de- 

 fined by a streak of deep, rich g-een, looming up 

 abeve the crops— he could not hut bo charmed 

 ■wiih the Bight. Ho would quickly retract iiis 

 slanler of the Osage. AVe at i^e West esteem it 

 the best plant in the vegetable kingdom for our 

 purpose; hence we are a little sensitive when 

 outsiders d-rogate it. We base its chief merits 

 upon its utility, and the absolute security it af- 

 fords the farmer. When f-ufifered to run up — and 

 many neglect to trim it — the appearance is not 

 ornniuental, except in the dist nice ; but when it 

 is kept neatly clipped, nothing can be more 

 graceful, or give (o field or farm, small or large, 

 such a charming finish. 



Where a wiuUbreak or screen is wanted, as 

 around a stuck farm, pasture or orchard, it should 

 be planted ch sely, and allowed to run up as tall 

 as it will; but along roadsides and wherevir the 

 view is worth preserving, it should by all means 

 be shorn off and the brush burnt. Horse power 

 machinery tor the purpose of shearing hedges 

 with precision, ease and speed, are now in pro 

 cess of construction. Should this operate well, 

 the cost of keeping the hedges in trim will be 

 merely nominal, though the expense of hand- 

 trimujing is not heavy. 



Bince I left this locality, five years ago, most 

 of the hedges have been perfected, dead fences 

 removed, and tiie whole Innd scape so changad 

 and improved in its outlines that it scarcely 

 seems iike the same region. The only complaint 

 heard againi^t hedges is of the neglect to trim 

 them by the roadside. In point of hardiness, 

 the 0.>-age hedges here wiihsti od winters that 

 have ki.led needling apple orchards thirty years 

 old, an i iilmosD every heart cherry in the coun- 

 try. Only in thnt part of Illinois where the go 

 pher abounds is there found a single iiawbackto 

 live fencing; and even ihert', though this ras- 

 cally "sub ccntractor" often e ts off the roots 

 and saps the foundation of the yoiug hedge, ihe 

 farmers are not uiscouraged from planting, and 

 hedgt'S will yet abound on every pr-irie farm. In 

 these terrible times farmers are wi!lii,g to put efif 

 everytliing but their hedging. Plants are in 

 greater demand than any other commudity, and 

 1 have known four to five hundred bushels of seed 

 planted in a single town. The seed will be scarce 

 Avhile the war confines. 



— We have a boy at home about three years 

 old, wl-.o, by the way, is a n gular "shaver" in 

 his talk. One day we were trying to teach him 

 his alphabet, at;d a.'-kcd him what "B" stood 

 for ? "Gt orge," was his prompt ans« er. ' No," 

 we replied : ''it stands for boy." "Well, ain't 

 George a boy ?"' he asked triumphantly. 



— "There's a divinity that shapes our ends," 

 as the dnughnuts said when the girls were mak- 

 ing theui. 



Pasturing Roads — Fence Laws. 



A writer in the Rural New Yorker gives a very 

 lucid digest of the law in regard to this subject. 

 We believe that the law in our state is substan- 

 tially the same as the obnoxious law to 

 which he alludes included, but as no one here 

 thinks of soiling their stock, with us, < f course, 

 there is no objection to it. The reason that our 

 farmers do not better understand their rights in 

 this case is the same as those alleg-^d, the differ- 

 ence being the owners of adjacent farms being 

 obliged to make a lawful fence are under no obli- 

 gation to make road fences. We know of no law 

 compeliit g farmers to fence the highway. It is 

 true, that sotre of our woodtu headed Judges 

 have at times given plain common sense and plain 

 law a wrong construction, yet we believe that the 

 great mnjoiity will maintain the law as it is, and 

 compel owners of stock to keep them on their own 

 premises. This is now the case in all counties 

 where there is little open piaine. It is a perfect 

 outrage against common sense or common jiistice 

 to compel the owners of a farm to fence out the 

 unruly anima's of his vicious neighbor, who may 

 01 may not own any land. Ed. Ills. Farmer. 



This is an important subject, which deserves 

 something more than a passing notice, as it is 

 connected widi the whole system of road and di- 

 vision fences, and involves the common and stat- 

 ute laws of the State, as well as long esiab!ished 

 customs and opinions of the pciple A gi-neral 

 opinion appears to have obtained among farmers 

 that there i^ no law to protect their crops from 

 the ravages c>f their neighbors' cattle, horses, 

 sLeep an I swine — that their only safety is to 

 ftnce out the world, or at least, they must have 

 a " lawful fence " to be entitled to iny claim 

 upon the ov.'ners of trespassing cattle for dam- 

 ages. The enormous expense i^f being obliged to 

 buiid a fence so as to turn all animals, from the 

 Ltrgest ox down to the smallest pig, is so impo;t- 

 aot an item in farming economy that it is proper 

 that farmers should know what the laws are, and 

 the extent of their power to protect the fruits of 

 their labor from destructitin by the action of care- 

 less, and oftentimes evil-disposed neighbors I 

 cannot, perhaps, give this information better 

 than to quote from sume interesting remarks be- 

 fore the American Institute Farmer's Club, by 

 Joseph Blunt, an able lawyer, whose legal opin- 

 ions are entitled to much weight. He said : 



" The law does protect a man's property. His 

 real estate and its products are his, and they lie 

 under the protection of the law, whether fenced 

 or unfenced. Any man invading his land, either 

 in person or with his flocks and herds, is liable 

 for all damage. He has no more legal right to 

 ravage, or to send his cattle to destroy his neigh- 

 bor's unfenced grain, than he has to cut down 

 his neighbor's unfenced woods, They are all 

 equally under the protection of the law. * * * 



