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X H E SOUTHE 



ft N PLANTER. 



rosa. Intermediate between these, there is another 

 which may be described as pestle-shaped, meas- 

 uring ten inches or more in length, and quite 

 smooth on the surface. These two kinds, namely 

 the Cucurbita mclopcpo and C. verrucosa, with all 

 their varieties, are generally of a dwarf habit, with 

 ^rect stems. 



Cucurbita oirifcra, with its varieties, auriantutca, 

 the Orange or Apple squash, and the piriformis or 

 pear-shaped and variegated squashes* has a run- 

 fling or climbing stem. Some of the orange squashes 

 are the very best of the summer squashes for table 

 ase, far superior either to the scalloped or waited 

 squashes. 



The Vegetable Marrow, as it is called in Eng- 

 land, has been considered by botanists as a variety 

 of the Curcubita ovifera of Linnams ; if this be cor- 

 rent, cultivation has forced it to a most unnatural 

 size, and has greatly changed its original form. 



T. W. Harris. 



Vox the Southern Planter. 



At a meeting of the State Agricultural Society 

 of Virginia in November, 1854, a committee was 

 appointed to ascertain if by the aid of the friends 

 of this Society, Agricultural Professorships could 

 not be established at one or more of our Literary 

 Institutions. 



p Should this arrangement be made, a large por- 

 tion of these funds will be thus absorbed. With 

 many of my brother farmers, I think a more judi- 

 cious investment may be made of any surplus 

 which shall exist. Virginia derives from her agri- 

 culturists much the larger portion of her revenue ; 

 the farmers have an undoubted right to have estab- 

 lished at her colleges, and at her Military Institute, 

 agricultural education, embracing scientific lec- 

 tures and practical experiments. Her agricultu- 

 rists have a right to require that her seats of 

 learning shall offer to their sons facilities for 

 attaining such knowledge as their avocation may 

 require, so far at least as such means can accom- 

 plish this object. Why, of all classes alone, should 

 fche farmers be expected to contsibute especially 

 to the establishment of those chairs at our Univer- 

 sity and Institutes, which ore connected with their 

 particular employment 1 Would it not be as rea- 

 sonable that the professional gentlemen of our 

 State should, by their individual contributions, 

 support the particular lecturers on whom their 

 sons attend 1 If at our colleges such an educa- 

 tion as may prepare the lawyer or the physician 

 for the duties of after life, be accessible to these, 

 and very properly so too, why should not the same 

 institutions afford to the farmer's sons agricultural 

 education upon terms equally easy 1 The subject 

 has been long, far too long, neglected ; but the 

 period has arrived when if this abuse continue, it 

 will be from the supineness of the farmers them- 

 selves. They have in their own hands the remedy; 

 let them promptly apply it. No one who saw the 

 numbers, and observed the intelligence and gene- 

 ral bearing of the representatives of the agricultu- 

 ral interest of Viginia in Richmond last fall, can 

 doubt the influence of this class. Let the agri- 

 culturists of the State call upon the Legislature 

 w> establish, under competent professors, at her 

 different literary institutions, such courses of lec- 

 tures, agricultural and veterinary, as the wants of 

 the State may demand, and as the friends of the 

 previous proposition may require. The call will, 

 I imagine, be quickly responded to. 



I alluded above to an investment which I thought 

 would be more judicious. It is to purchase for 

 the use of the members, with the surplus funds of 

 the Society, such superior stock animals, stallions, 

 jacks, bulls, boars, rams — such seed grains and 

 grass seeds, implements of husbandry, &c, &c., 

 as in the wisdom of the Executive Committee, and 

 of a committee of two or more gentlemen, mem- 

 bers of the Society, may most conduce to the 

 prosperity of the " Old State." This latter com- 

 mittee might be appointed by the Executive Com- 

 mittee for the purpose of purchasing these ani- 

 mals, &c. Let these animals, &c, be distributed 

 by the Executive Committee, or by a committee 

 elected for the puspose, throughout the four great 

 divisions of the State, the animals all to be exhibited 

 every fall at our State Fair as Society animals ; 

 not for premiums of course. The details of this 

 scheme I leave to the wisdom of the Society. In 

 a future communication I may enlarge upon some 

 of le advantages which it appears to me to 

 possess. 



A Valley Farmer. 



GAS TAR FOR SEED CORN. — REMEDY FOR 

 SMUT IN WHEAT. 

 Near Easton, Md., April, 1855. 

 To the Editor of the Southern Planter. 



Dear Sir — I enclose one dollar for subscription 

 for the present year. 



In reference to the use of gas tar on seed corn, 

 I take occasion to say, that I have used it 'with 

 good effect as against blackbirds. It is not un- 

 likely, that its power in causing the absence of 

 insects from the corn-hill does indirectly as much 

 towards preventing injury from birds, as is done 

 by a positive dislike of the latter for the tar. 



It will be well to exercise care in its use, as my 

 negroes have in several instances suffered from 

 sore eyes and eruptions about the hands and face 

 after handling the corn which had been coated 

 with it. 



The practice of your correspondent who puts his 

 wheat into boiling water, reminds me of a fact 

 lately stated by a farmer living in the " bay side" 

 of Talbot county, a region which suffered severe- 

 ly from last summer'/? drought. He said, that in 

 every instance within his observation, when the 

 seed wheat had been moistened in the usual pro- 

 cesses for preventing smut, it had vegetated earlier 

 and had continued to grow better than where it 

 had been sown dry, and that on his own farm he 

 had observed, where the wheat lay on the ground 

 through the night, and was ploughed in early in 

 the morning, the same thing had occurred. As a 

 preventive of smut, I have no doubt the use of- 

 boiling water is good. We use here, with almost 

 perfect effect, the Glauber's salts and lime recom- 

 mended in the Farmer's Register 12 or 15 years 

 ago. For convenience in measuring, say seven 

 pints of the salts dissolved in seven gallons of 

 fresh water; one peck of unslacked stone lime, 

 slacked to powder by pouring on it about a gallon 

 and a half of water; use these quantities upon 

 every ten bushels of wheat, by first stirring in the 

 salts while the grains are thoroughly wetted, then 

 intermixing the newly slacked lime. 



If I were to do as Mr. Ruffin has done in the 

 case of marling versus sheep-sorrel, I could bring 

 almost as many witnesses both to prove the un- 



