THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



Summers pears ought to be gathered a week 

 before ripe ; early autumn kinds about ten 

 days or more ; late fall and winter varieties 

 yaghp to be allowed to hang upon the trees as 

 long as they may and escape frost. 



ANTISEPTIC PAINT. 

 We have been frequently asked whe- 

 ther gas tar was good for painting fences and 

 buildings with. The following, from the Coun- 

 try Gentleman, may be an answer. 



Its bad smell is an objection with some 

 But that does not last long. 



Antisept c Paint. — The Country Gentle- 

 man speaks very favorably of Gas Tar as a 

 paint to preserve timber. From the nature of 

 the substance we are inclined to think it pos- 

 sesses this valuable property in a high degree. 

 The paper referred to says : 



The preservation of wood is a subject of 

 great and increasing importance. In this 

 country and in Europe, patent after patent has 

 been taken out for various processes of accom- 

 plishing this object. Metallic Salts are gene- 

 rally employed, and afford, unquestionably, the 

 means of increasing to a great degree the du- 

 rability of timber. The high price seems to 

 be the chief objection to their use, and espe- 

 cially to the use of corrosive sublimate. 



To exclude the oxygen of the atmosphere is 

 the first thing to be secured — decomposition 

 cannot take place g unless oxygen be present in 

 some form or other. The albuminous matter 

 of the sap, too, is a great cause of decay, and 

 the more so, if in a moist state. It acts pre- 

 cisely as yeast in the fermentation of bread. 

 If we boil yeast, its fermenting power is de- 

 stroyed. By steaming wood we coagulate the 

 albumen (white of egg,) of the sap, and thus, 

 to a certain extent, lessen its liability to fer- 

 mentation or decay. The exclusion of the at- 

 mosphere and water, and the coagulation of 

 the albuminous matters of the sap, or recent- 

 ly formed portions of the tree, are the two 

 <ireat points to be secured in the preservation 

 of wood, — and, we may add, of almost every 

 vegetable or animal substance. 



The various metallic or mineral paints se- 

 cure to a certain extent the former object, and 

 a solution of a metallic sulphate the latter; and 

 we would advocate the use of both articles to 

 a much greater extent than is now practised 

 by most farmers. • We hope to live to see the 

 time when every wooden implement on the 

 farm shall receive a good coat of paint every 



year. Such a practice will pay, now that good 

 timber is getting scarcer and higher every 

 year. 



There is a substance, however, that to a cer- 

 tain extent, at least contains, in itself, both 

 these qualities. Gas tar will coagulate albu- 

 men, and exclude the air and moisture. It is 

 cheap and easily supplied; why then is it not 

 more generally and bountifully used ? In 

 England, hedges take the place of our not very 

 picturesque Virginia fences, and the home- 

 steading is of brick or stone, but the extent to 

 which gas tar is used on the doors of build- 

 ings, gates, &c, affords conclusive evidence 

 that, were board fences used, as with us, they 

 would be preserved, if not ornamented with a 

 frequent coat of this odoriferous paint. We 

 do not recollect to have seen it used for this 

 purpose, in this country, except on the magni- 

 ficent farm of J. S. Wadsworth, Esq., of Gene- 

 see, N. Y., where it has been employed for 

 many years in painting board fences, and proves 

 to all what its advocates claim. 



The art of preserving timber and wooden 

 implements from decay is one of the most im- 

 portant in the whole range of domestic econo- 

 my. Little valuable knowledge on this sub- 

 ject has yet been acquired. It is a field of in- 

 vestigation which, to be explored, requires a 

 long series of patient experiment. Time alone 

 can demonstrate the preserving power of any 

 composition. The article from which we 

 have taken the foregoing extract, concludes as 

 follows : 



Is prejudice or ignorance the cause of the 

 general neglect of gas tar as a paint and as a 

 preventive of decay ? The experience of those 

 who have used gas tar on posts in the ground 

 is, so far as we know, without exception, in fa- 

 vor of gas tar. We have met with one gen- 

 tleman who thought that, while gas tar retard- 

 ed the decay of timber in the ground, it accel- 

 erated its decay above the ground. We can- 

 not think that there is any foundation for this 

 opinion ; if there is, we should be pleased to 

 hear from those who are competent from ex- 

 perience to speak on the subject. We have 

 many such among our readers. Will they not 

 favor us with their experience in the use of gas 



Mr. French, of Braintree, Mass., said at 

 one of the agricultural meetings in Boston, 

 that he had made many experiments as to the 

 cost of keeping stock. His horses cost him 53 

 cents a day, and his oxen $ 1 per yoke. 



