1863. 



THE ILLINOIS FAEMER. 



149 



we may refer to one exposed in the last number of 

 the New York Observer. The editor of that ex- 

 cellent paper says : " One of the latest shaves is 

 by circulars for an Agricultural Magazine for pay- 

 ment in advamce. This ' sell ' may serve the mis- 

 cerants another year. It has worked for one. 

 Their circulars, or sample copies of the Magazine 

 are sent widely over a part of the State the first 

 year, and the balance retained for victims during a 

 second year. They give the number of the office, 

 but it is a number on a back street, and there is 

 neither sign nor other indications of such a Maga- 

 zine about the entrance. There is a pretense of a 

 desk in an office jointly occupied by a half dozen 

 soulless vagabonds, each having a separate system 

 of swindling the mightily good natured and cred- 

 ulous public. If you call to. obtain redress for 

 some friend in the country, who is a dollar out of 

 pocket without return, you are assured the articles 

 were promptly mailed, or else, oftener, that the 

 book-keeper is out, and the matter cannot be look- 

 ed into. You ask for a late number of the Maga- 

 zine, but not a copy is within the pretended office. 

 The fact is, that while they pretend that the Mag- 

 azine is well advanced into its second volume, there 

 has, in reality, never been but one number printed. 

 That was revamped at the opening of the second 

 year, and a new date and Volume II. inserted. The 

 green ones in the country have been sufficiently 

 numerous to afibrd support to three or four as 

 craven hearted scamps as are often allowed at 

 large. Letters of complaint and remonstrance 

 multiply upon these base fellows, and the city 

 friends of the victims repeat their calls and de- 

 mands, until any one office or location becomes 

 unsafe for the continuance of the fraud, and they 

 disperse to some other streets, each to originate 

 some new form of robbery to practice upon the 

 public. A stampede of this kind has just taken 

 place among one of these inglorious cliques. Look 

 out for circulars of some mighty marvel." 



"We think there have been more than one of 

 these swindling concerns in the city of New York, 

 during the last year. They advertise widely the 

 paper or magazine they pretend to publish, with 

 the offer of attractive premiums of all sorts to gull 

 the credulous. Their schemes are facillitated by 

 the wonderfully prevalent eagerness for change, 

 characteristic of the great number of newspaper 

 readers, — so many of whom will throw aside a 

 journal they may have been in the habit of read- 

 ing, and which they know to be well established 

 and thoroughly trustworthy, for any catch-penny 

 affair that springs up and that can promise the 

 most enormously. Such schemes are also facilita- 

 ted by the fact that the publishers of high stand- 



ing have in some degree, — and, as we think, most 

 unwisely — educated the public to expect a doxuxur 

 of some sort as a premium on their subscriptions. 

 Every offer of the kind however should be scru- 

 tinized closely, and no confidence whatever re- 

 posed in any which are not fully authenticated by 

 names long and well known to the reading public. 

 — We have on our table one of these humbugs 

 in the way of a valuable scientific magazine. Peo- 

 ple cannot be too careful in regard to these things. 

 They are of almost daily occurrence, and one wouM 

 thiak they could never succeed, but the fools are 

 not all dead. This plan of paying people to sub- 

 scribe for a paper should be sufficient to condemn 

 it. Ed. 



Pairbank's Scales. 



In a recent number of the Boston Daily Even- 

 ing Traveler, is the following report of a case tried 

 in the Superior Court of that city : 



The plaintiffs claimed $90.00 balance due for a 

 platform scale sold defendant. The defence was, 

 that the scale was to be equal to a sample of Fair- 

 banks' make. He claimed that it was inferior, and 

 therefore demanded a deduction from the price. 

 Evidence was introduced to show that the scale 

 supplied was not of more than half the strength 

 of the Fairbrnks' Scale, with which it was to be 

 equal in every respect. Verdict for plaintiffs |64.- 



60. .. ,.: 



For the Illinois Farmer. 

 Agricultural College— Grant of Lands 

 to the State of Illinois. ;^ 



To the Agriculturalists and friends of Agrundtur y 



throughout the State : 



It is doubtless known to all of you that the mu- 

 nificent donation of lands by the Congress of the 

 United States to the State of Illinois, for the pur- 

 pose of establishing, by ample endowment, a sys- 

 tem of agricultural education on a substantial, en- 

 during basis, was accapted in due form by the Gen- 

 eral Assembly at its last regular session. 



What now remains to be done is, to dispose of 

 this grant, by suitable legislative enactment, in 

 such manner as will secure, beyond peradventure, 

 two things : 



1st. The fulfillment of the condition upon which 

 the grant rests, so that its object will not entirely 

 fail; and ':•'.■'.,/':■..-);}"-::■■'",'■':■':-,' 



2d. The attainme'nt of the greatest possible ben- 

 efit to the industrial classes of the whole State, 

 whose highest interests it was specially designed to 

 promote. '' - ':—■;■'''-'■/'-■■■■■:■.''; '^'r-v.^ /'■,: 



Impressed with the paramount importance of the 

 subject in its relation to the welfare of our State 

 for all future time — anxious that it may receiYC 



