THE AGRICULTURAL GAZETTE. 



237 



r>~ 



M** 1 *" 



~. .TTTnnual Country Meeting shall not be 



•f b ° W,nE ,« . Commifee of -hich at least three 

 upon until a v Director or Stewards o 



- •"•" h4 \ e A C '1n "urn. one of which shall hav, 



_berf *•■■" "" r ^..^...im one ot wlucn snaiuimc 

 ^^(threetobe a q^um,one ai[ ^ ^.^ aod 



•** M D '? C , n °wns and the- r ; ocalities as the Council 

 W^V* nd ha« reported upon their respective 

 *•" ,h,n ft the purposes of the Society." . ; 

 ^^'VlZ hen proceeded to the nomination of 

 m Conned then p ^ commi ttee : - 



^ toUo«u* F»«™"' c tain S p enc er; Colonel 



%•- Mil**. M- r * > * - - « m»- nu:M A fc 



^^.^wiaed that in future the period during which 



?^, "aid require the land intended for the sites 

 the Society wouiarcij^^^^ ^ show-vards. would be 



it vat 



tke Society wou H. Hon ^ Show . yardgf wou i d be 



I**"" Lbs ''instead of « six weeks," as stated in 

 .. Oiree BDontQs. m- nn.mr.il in 1841. to be 



^nTSed'upon by the Council in 1841, to be 

 ** Cd/h authorities of any town prior to its being 

 JSSZ ctpete for selection ^^^^^ 



tns«r 



,W !f^meetine of any particular year : such occupation 

 !T&f however, by the ^^ co^act^ o 



on the 



US nS being understood to interfere with any right of 



.rnLV unto the actual time of the meeting, 

 ^ro Ctev Meeting of 1845,-Viscount Hill, 



* of the town of Shrewsbury, and Mr. Brittain, jun. 



man Secretary of the Chester Agricultural Society), on 



hit of the city of Chester, transmitted to the Council 



documents in favour of those places respectively, as sites 



for holding the country meeting of 1845. 



1 -Shrewsbury. 1. Memorial from the Mayor and 



' Corporation of Shrewsbury, under the Great Seal of 



the Borough, and signed by the Town-Clerk. 

 " Memorial of the nobility, gentry, agriculturists, and 

 ""inhabitants generally of the county and town of 

 Salop: signed by Viscount Hill, Chairman of the 

 public meeting held in the Shire Hall. 



3. Memorial from the Inhabitants of the Town of 

 Shrewsbury ; signed by Edward Haycock, Esq., 

 Mayor, and ninety-five of the principal inhabitants. 



4. Memorial of the Shropshire Practical Farmers' So- 

 ciety ; sigred by Viscount Hill, President. 



5. Answers to the Official Queries of the Society ; signed 

 by J. S. Peele, Esq., Town-Clerk of Shrewsbury. 



6. General Plan of Shrewsbury, with the Show-ground, 

 Trial-ground, Approaches, Public-rooms, and site 

 for Pavilion, marked thereon. 



7. Special Plans of the Race-course, and a room capa- 

 ble of accommodating 1200 persons at dinner. 



II.— Chester. 1. Memorial from the City of Chester; 

 signed by Henry Kelsall, Esq., Mayor. 



2. Memorials from the South Cheshire, Denbighshire, 

 and Flintshire, Anglesey, Holywell, Daresbury, Ha- 

 warden, Chester, and Wirral Agricultural Associa- 

 tions ; signed by their respective officers. 



3. Statement of the mode in which the requirements 

 of the Council are proposed to be met in Chester. 



4. Plan of the Marquis of Westminster's Schools. 



5. General Plan of the City, and indications of the va- 

 rious points proposed in reference to the meeting. 



6. Small plans of the City, showing the various lines of 

 Railway connected therewith. 



7. Table of Distances of the various Market-towns from 

 Chester. 



The whole of these Documents having been read to the 

 Council, it was moved by Mr. Miles and resolved unani- 

 mously, "That a Meeting of the Committee appointed to 

 consider the sites offered for holding the Country Meeting 

 m 1845 » be summoned for Wednesday the 17th of April, 

 at eleven o'clock, to which the plans and papers, now sub- 

 muted and read to the Council, be referred. 



Appointment of Seedsmen. — Mr. Miles then brought 

 2jJ ard th e motion of which he had given notice, for the 

 Jjncial appointment of Messrs. Thomas Gibbs and Co. as 

 the recognised Seedsmen of the Society. He stated to 

 the Council the peculiar claims of the Messrs. Gibbs on 



e honorary appointment now proposed to be bestowed 

 ST n themb T the Council, the intimate connexion of Mr. 

 i nomas Gibbs with the late Board of Agriculture, and 

 th f 88entl *l services he had rendered to its members— 



to th 8 ' UtiHty ' and B ratuitous services of his sons 



ciall C -P resent Society on so many occasions, and espe- 

 ■nd T K ln reference to the business of the Country Meetings, 

 seed* "? toriet y of the firm for the excellence of their 

 had I the Clrcum stance especially that the Society 

 onit-r ay8 a PP lied to them both for the uniform and re- 

 test f 8U i Pply ° f seeds in model experiments, and for the 

 new i lvation or information required in the case of 

 ci f 8eeus or Plants of any kind transmitted to the So- 

 had al a Concluded b y remarking that as the Society 

 in* ci ? made the honorary appointments of a consult- 

 Counr i emiSt and En 6 ineer > he did not think that the 

 than b C ° Uld - P * y * better com P liment t0 those gentlemen 

 tion Th PP p lnt - nS them t0 the honorary office in ques- 

 of the s r ., P / e8ident having borne testimony, on the part 

 deredK *u » e,dClub ' t0 the services gratuitously ren- 

 conde l tk eSSr8 * Gibbs t0 that body, Mr. Shaw se- 



wiscar ^ motion ' whi ch, on being put from the chair, 

 to f ff V nanimousl y> ami Messrs. Thomas Gibbs and 

 iDooin Ji i . oon " 8trcct ' Piccadilly, declared to be duly 



Gla« b \, eedsmen t0 the Society. 



«*beck n IlL T K - pANS -— Captain Stanley Carr, of Tiisch- 

 s >r John \v , beck ' transmitted to the Society, through 

 Handlev Lu . bbo <*> Bart., and at the request of Mr. 

 WcceiifniiV* 60 !? 611 of the S ,ass milk-pans employed so 

 *Vr o % Germ *n dairy, and referred to in his 

 Wibur* i„ ^Economy of Schleswig, Holstein, and 



Si m the first volume of the Society's Journal [ 



(page 380). "The milk," says Captain Carr, "when 1 

 brought to the dairy, is immediately strained through a 

 horse-hair sieve into the vessels, whether of wood, 

 earthenware, copper-tinned, zinc, cast-iron (lined with a 

 China-like composition), or glass, placed in rows on the 

 floor. All these different kinds of utensils have been 

 tried with various success, in the hope of discovering 

 how, in hot weather, more especially when a thunder- 

 storm is gathering, the milk can be guarded against a too 

 early acidity ; for, as it is a fixed and invariable rule that 

 the cream must be removed from the milk before the latter 

 gets at all sour, and an equally established fact, that all 

 the oily particles cannot be obtained in a shorter period 

 than 36 hours, vessels in which, during sultry, and espe- 

 cially damp weather, the milk could be kept the due 

 time, are a great desideratum. As yet, however, there 

 reigns much diversity of opinion on the subject ; and 

 shallow wooden vessels, as nearly as possible equally 

 wide at top and bottom, containing when full about eight 

 quarts, but in which, during summer, seldom more than 

 six quarts are poured, are in most general use. They 

 have, however, some disadvantages, of which the chief is, 

 the great difficulty and the consequent labour and close 

 attention requisite to remove all acidity (which in some 

 states of the atmosphere is almost unavoidable), and 

 which, -penetrating the pores of the wood, sometimes 

 resists all the patient scrubbing ; first, with hot water 

 and small birch scrubbers ; and secondly, with boil- 

 ing water and a hard round brush made of pigs' 

 bristles (with which every hair'sbreadth is carefully 

 polished over), so that the despairing dairy-maid is com- 

 pelled to resort to washing in a ley of wood-ashes, or 

 boiling, or even scorching over lighted chips, followed by 

 countless rinsings in pure spring-water. To diminish in 

 some measure this labour, the plan of painting the milk- 

 pails and dishes with a preparation of cinnabar, linseed- 

 oil, and litharge, has been adopted by the milk-vendors 

 in towns, and in some country dairies ; not only, how- 

 ever, is the expense considerable, as the vessels must be 

 finished off with peculiar care, and require to get three 

 coats of the composition at first, and one yearly after- 

 wards, but the milk, for some days after they are brought 

 into use, has a perceptible taste of paint. The tinned 

 copper milk-pans are very costly, and must be carefully 

 watched lest they should require re-tinning. The zinc 

 are as yet little known, and the assertion of their effect 

 in better severing the cream from the! milk not suffi- 

 ciently proved. The cast iron, lined with enamel, though 

 assuredly durable and very clean, seem too expensive; 

 and the glass have many opponents, on account of their 

 brittleness, and the vague notions respecting glass and 

 electricity, inducing the idea that if the electric fluid get 

 into the milk, it cannot get out again ! whereas, as it is 

 ascertained that it always attaches itself to a conductor, 

 and, in the absence of anything more attractive, runs 

 along the surface, it is more likely that the milk should 

 be protected in glass, which is a non-conductor, than in 

 any other substance. In my dairy, which contains 

 upwards of ISO cows, the glass vessels have been used for 

 more than four years ; and I give them a decided 

 preference over all others. Their form is good, being 

 16 inches broad at the top and 12 at the bottom; 

 the glass is dark bottle-green, transparent, and 

 perfectly smooth, about one-eighth of an inch thick, 

 and provided with a rounded rim at the upper edge, 

 which makes it easy to retain a safe hold of them, even 

 when full. They contain eight quarts, but never receive 

 more than six. They cost Sd. a piece, and their dura- 

 bility may be estimated by the fact, that to encourage 

 carefulness, each dairymaid is allowed one dollar per 

 annum extra, as pan-money, being bound at the same time 

 to pay lOrf. for each one she breaks, yet hitherto no girl 

 has broken to the extent of her dollar. It is self-evident 

 that acidity cannot be communicated to glass, and the ease 

 and rapidity with which they are cleaned, requiring merely 

 to be first washed with lukewarm water, then rinsed in 

 cold water and placed in a rack to dry, effect such a saving 

 in fuel and labour (diminishing the number of our dairy- 

 maids by at least two), that the less quantity of butter 

 obtained, supposing (which I by no means concede) that 

 the milk, during a few weeks in summer, does sour sooner, 

 and consequently throws up less cream in glass than in 

 wood, is more than compensated by the lessened expense 

 of the establishment, not to mention the great advantage 

 of attaining the indispensable cleanliness and purity of the 

 vessels with more certainty, because at a less expenditure 

 ot time and trouble. Although it is an ascertained and 

 undeniable fact that the quality of butter depends much 

 on the nature of the pasture, the locality of the dairy, the 

 universally prevailing cleanliness of the whole management, 

 and very essentially on the purity of the water employed, 

 still I ascribe much of the reputation which our butter 

 has of late years enjoyed (and which is verified by our 

 obtaining at all seasons one penny per pound above the 

 market price in our neighbourhood) to the beneficial 

 introduction of glass milk-dishes. At the suggestion of 

 Mr. Hayter, M.P., it has been ascertained from Mr. 

 Apsley Pellatt of the Falcon Glass Works, Blackfriars, 

 that in consequence of the heavy duty and restrictions of 

 the Excise on manufactured glass articles in this country, 

 glass milk-pans of a size and shape similar to those or 

 Captain Carr, but of white flint-glass and stronger mould, 

 could not be made for sale in England for less than /s. M. 

 each : but should that price, under the restrictive circum- 

 stances of the case, obtain purchasers, there would be no 

 difficulty in manufacturing a superior and serviceable 

 article of the kind to any extent that might be required. 

 The milk-pan presented by Captain Carr to the Society is 

 of the common dark-green bottle-glass, and weighs b* lbs. 

 It is round in shape, and nearly 4 inches deep, measuring 



17 inches across the outside of the top, and 11 inch 

 across that of the bottom. 

 Siberian Cow-parsnip. 



__ . -Captain Carr's communi- 

 cation contained also the following Agricultural refer- 

 ences : — " There is nothing new here, except that 

 spring is unusually long delayed, the ground still frozen 

 up and likely to continue so, until we get a heavy gale 

 with rain from the southward. The grain-crops of last 

 year, especially Wheat, make the worst yield I ever 

 remember. A new plant, Heracleum Sibiricura, has been 

 successfully introduced here, as yet in a small way, from. 

 Russia, giving a very early and abundant food for sheep; 

 but it is probably already known and valued in England : 

 if not, I should have pleasure in sending you some seed. 

 The last journals have been most interesting." 



Mr. Gibbs informed the Council, that the plant in 



question was a very early green crop, although perhaps 



not quite so much so as the Prickly Comfrey : if allowed, 



however, to remain uncut for some time, it became at last 



the heavier crop of the two. He stated that the seeds 



should be sown in a bed, and the plants, when sufficiently 



large, planted out at least three feet apart, if in a soil 



likely to bring them to a large size. He believed the leaf 



constituted the only edible portion of the plant. Messrs. 



Thomas Gibbs and Co. having planted a small piece of 



ground, consisting of loam upon gravel, with the 



Heracleum Sibiricum, they found the leaves to be very 



succulent and to attain the great height of from seven to 



eight feet ; and as the plant had not yet been extensively 



cultivated, they placed at the disposal of the Council, for 



distribution among such Members as felt an interest in 



the cultivation of this plant, the whole stock of seed they 



had obtained from their experiment, in the hope that so 



extensive a trial as would probably be thus made of the 



qualities of the plant would procure satisfactory results 



in reference to its further cultivation. 



Pollen of Wheat. — Mr. Groom (Florist to the 

 Queen), of Clapham Rise, Surrey, favoured the Society 

 with the following communication:— " In reference to 

 the effects I have observed from the use of bone 6aw-dust, 

 of which a sample was presented to the Council at its last 

 meeting, I feel no hesitation in saying that I have expe- 

 rienced the most beneficial results from its use. I have 

 now tried it two seasons, and think, if possible, it has 

 answered better this season than the last. It has pro- 

 duced a most luxuriant growth, with a beautiful dark 

 healthy green, and a robustness of habit in the plants, 

 equal to the summer growth ; the plants also retain their 

 lower leaves much longer, which is most essential with- 

 plants cultivated in pots. There is another point of im- 

 portance, which is, that I do not think any injury will 

 arise should the bone saw-dust be used in what may be 

 termed excess, as I have tried a very large quantity in the 

 soil without the plants appearing in any way affected, 

 except in luxuriance of growth. There is also a most im- 

 portant result in an Agricultural point of view, which I 

 have no doubt will be found to take place from the free 

 use of the bone saw-dust, and that is, the increased fertilis- 

 ing power of the pollen, which will in a great measure do 

 away with the light and defective ears in the grain crops, 

 as I believe a great part of the failure arises from the 

 want of vitality in the pollen."— It is perhaps worthy of 

 remark, that Chemists have found in their analyses ot the 

 pollen of plants a predominance of those elementary prin- 

 ciples of which bone is constituted; and that the purity of 

 the bones employed as a manure, and the state of division 

 into which they are reduced, has a considerable influence 

 on the results obtained by their action is strikingly exem- 

 plified in the following statement of Mr. Miles, M.P., in 

 reference to his experiments on the growth of Swedes, in 

 the Society's Journal, vol. iii. page 426 :— " A curious 

 fact, however, came out in the application of different 

 descriptions of bones used at the distance of 27 inches. 

 In the one case, the bones were procured as they came 

 from the kennels, with the usual quantity of animal matter 

 adhering to them, and crushed at home ; in the other, 

 they were brought as refuse from a large button- manufac- 

 tory, after having been thoroughly cleansed for the purpose 

 of manufacture : the respective proceed was,— 



Turnips on bones crushed at home . • II tons 8 cwts. 

 Do. do. from button-manufactory .16 10 



African Guano.— Mr. Forbes, of No. 2, Great St. 

 Helen's, presented to the Society three specimens of guano 

 collected on different islands in the Bay of Angra Peguena,. 

 on the western coast of Africa. •■ We have as yet, says 

 Mr. Forbes, " no arrivals of this guano into the port of 

 London, but some cargoes are daily expected, when I 

 shall take the liberty of submitting fresh samples. Mr. 

 Miles stated that the African guano had reached Bristol, 

 and having received from Mr. Greening, of Nelson-street, 

 in that city, the analysis of it, made by Professor Here- 

 path, he had the pleasure of then submitting it to the 

 inspection of the Council : — ■ I have i analysed Mr. 

 Greening's sample of African guano, and find that it is 

 quite equal to that of Peru of good quality. The results 

 are below ; but I have not particularised those matters 

 contained in it, which Agriculturists do not yet know the 

 value of; all those which are known to be beneficial are - 



Phosphate of lime 21 parts. 



Soluble phosphates, with a little common salt 8 

 The elements of ammonia . . . .11 



Other matters, almost entirely organic . . 60 



100 parts 



(Signed) William Herepath." 



Adjournment of Council.— Mr. Shelley gave 

 notice, that he should move ac the next monthly Council 

 M That the Council at its rising on the first V ednesday m 

 July next do adjourn over the period of the country meet- 

 ing in that month, until the first Wednesday iaAu S u8t ' 



Mr. Colman announced his intention o'.P"^"^!? 

 o_:^_*u *-.„;„«„ T,iA.„rhn for trial at the South- 



