1877.1 
AMERICAN AGrRICULTURIST. 
*' Proceedings" remain as a bstinj,' record of his pains- 
taking industry. Personally, Mr. Bragdon was one of 
the most positive of men ; as one writer aptly expresses 
it, " he did his own thinking." He was one of the most 
-out-spoken of men, and an opponent had never any doii bt 
as to his position : on the other hand he was one of the 
most devoted of friends, a large circle of whom will miss 
Ms genial presence, and when they mourn, what seems 
his untimely departure, will think with pleasure upon 
ills brilliant talents and his winning way?. 
Xlae I>e5itBi of J, B. Root, of Itoclc- 
ford, 111.— A circular received about the middle of last 
month infonrffe us of the deuth of Mr. Root, after a short 
illness, but gives neither the date of his death or other 
particulars. Mr. R. was one of the loading market gar- 
deners and seed-growers of tbe West, and was the 
^author of a very useful " Garden Manual." He was an 
occasional contributor on gardening matters to our col- 
nmns. His writings are of an eminently practical char- 
acter, and show great fertility of expedient, and we are 
informed by those who have visited his gardens that they 
Tvere managed with skill and showed the most careful 
culture. Such a man is a loss not only to his own State, 
"but to the whole country. 
Xlie Uses of Asbestos. — Mr. H. W. 
Johns, besides using asbestos in his roofing, has recently 
perfected a paint in which asbestos is largely employed, 
to protect wood-work of all kinds from ordinary exposure 
to fire. He also works it into a covering for steam and 
.liot air pipes, wljich prevent all danger to wood-work 
from these, and at the same time, by preventing the 
Tvaste of heat, make a saving in fuel. 
EjOSI I^etters. — ^VBio is to Oisiiiae ? — 
The Dead Letter Office not long ago made out an esti- 
mate that one letter in every To, is defective in date, or 
direction, or signature, or sealing. We, in common with 
others, often receive letters of this class. Letters come 
with considerable sums of money, entirely unsealed— &n 
invitation to anybody to help themselves to the contents. 
Others contain an order with money, hut lacking either 
name of place or signature, or both. In such cases they 
must be held until the writer sends a second letter, 
*' blowing up" the Publishers or th(rP. O. Department. 
In one such case the writer omitted his residence in the 
second letter. In those cases, "Who is to blame ?" — 
Moral.— A1.-W AYS date a letter in full, giving P, 0., (not 
merely the town), and give the titafe ; sign it ; seal it; 
Mrect it plainly and rightly, iind read over the direction. 
Xlie Complete Ai»ei-ic:i.iii Xrapper, 
or the Tricks of Trapping and Trap Making, by Wm. II. 
Gibson, N. Y. : James Miller. This adds a handsome vol- 
ume to the list of works on trapping, a subject always 
fascinating, as it leads to a life in the woods, and the 
pleasures, (and sometimes the reverse), of camping out. 
This work is especially intented for boys, and is illustrat- 
ed with a profusion of engravings, which, witl^the excel- 
lent style of the work, make it a capital l'I ft for boys, 
especially those who live in the country. Trapping in- 
volves the destruction of life, and so far as that goes, 
seems cruel, but it is often useful and sometimes neces- 
sary, and as boys will set traps at any rate, it is proper 
that they should know how to do it in tlie best and mo^t 
merciful manner. Sent from this ofllcG, post-paid for §1.75. 
HooIcs oai ^iUet'p, — "Dr. Wm. C. P.'* 
Hoovursvlllc, Ml!. Rinulairs "Sheep Husbandry," and 
*'Fine Wool Husbandry," refer chieily or wholly to tho 
Merino. Mr. Randall devoted his sole attention to this 
breed, and his books are useful, allhoiigli not altogether 
recent. The only book that trrals of all the breeds of 
sheep, kept for mntton or wool in this country, or that 
might ho desirable to keep, is Stewart's " Shepherd's 
Manual." In tliis book Lincolns, Leicester.'?, Cutswolds, 
Southdowns, Hiimpshirodowns, Oxforddowns. Dursets. 
Welsh shncp, Blackfaced Scotch, Cheviotsas well as Meri- 
nos, arc treated of, as welt as several jjromising cross 
breeds siicli as Leicester-ineriuo, C<ilswold-merino, Cots- 
wold-soiithdown. and Bi'acon-dnwns, the I:ittor a na- 
tive American cross. The "SheplH-rd's ]\[anual " is ]nib- 
lished hy the Orange Judd Company, and sold for $1.50. 
1tci-;£'eiii <^o., I\.,I., T*OBiIti-y KyIiiIm- 
tion,— The first annual exhibition of the Bcrgi-n Co. 
(N. J.) Poultry Association was held at ITackrn^ack. 
Nov. iil) and :!0. It was a very creditable amiir. Over 
1,000 birds were exhlbrtod, and many of the specimens 
■were very fine. The largest exbihitor was Mr. J. J. 
Berry, of Hackensack. who took first and second pre- 
miums for Wliito Cochin.'*. Light Brahmas. Plymouth 
'Rocks, White Logh(.rna, and White Cn-sted Black Pol- 
ish. Some very fine Silvrr-Prnciled Hambu'gs. exhib- 
ited by Thns. W. White, of Pid-'MVond. took flr^t and 
second premiums. J. C. and P. Pi'iminirtou took 1ir*t 
premitmi for some splendid Black llamburgs. Some 
very excellent Plymouth Rocks were exhibited by D. 
Benedict, of Rossville, Staten Island, N. Y. Theexhibi- 
tion was well attended and was a well deserved success. 
.To be had without Money. — 
There will be found upon our Premium List (see page 
33) a large number of most useful and valuable articles, 
all of which are new and of the best manufacture, and 
any of which can be obtained without money and with but 
little well directed effort. Among these are : Beaatifal 
Silver and Gold-Plated. Articles— Magic 
Sell-Head and Cliami Pencils and Oold 
Pens— Fine Table Cutlery— Pocket Knives 
^Cliildren's Carriages and 'S'oj'^s— Swings 
—Cloclts— Table Croquet— Pianos— Micro- 
scopes — "Watclies — Guns — Se^EViiig and 
TVasIiiug Maeliines — Soolts, etc., etc.— 
Read all of page 33, and see how easy you can obtain one 
or more of these good and desirable articles. 
** Xlae Farm-Yard Caial> of Jottiaiu: 
An Account of the Families and Farms of that Famous 
Town." is the title of a work by George B. Loring, and 
published by Lockwood, Brooks & Co., Boston, Mass. 
Dr. Loring has long been prominent in agricultural mat- 
ters in Massachusetts, and being President of the N. E. 
Agricultural Society, is widely known elsewhere. This 
work had its origin in a series of articles furnished by Dr. 
L. to the " Boston Globe,"" and while it presents a view 
of New England agriculture, also gives an insight into 
the social life of the farming community. IIow far 
those works, which aim to convey solid instruction under 
the guise of fiction, succeed in accomplishing their ob- 
ject, we are not prepared to eay ; if people would not 
skip all the useful part and pick out only the thread 
of the story, there would be no doubt as to the value of 
this method of instruction. The present volume should 
go ff- to decide this question, as the narrative is well 
sustained, the characters are well individualized, and so 
far as we have examined them, the teachings according 
to the best practice. To adapt the work as one of refer- 
ence, and to suit the matter-of-fact people who do nut 
care for the story, there is a separate index to the agri- 
cultural topics. The book is abundantly illustrated, and 
in the way of paper, printing, and binding, most credit- 
able to the publishers. Pp. 603. Sent from this office 
by mail for $3 50. 
Orape i^Boiltiire. — ^Hyatt's Hand-book, by 
T. Hart Hyatt, San Francisco, Cal. : A. L. Bancroft & Co. 
Pp. 279, Price $'2. The climate of the Pacific coast being 
quite dissimilar to that of the Atlantic side of the con- 
tinent, allows of the open air culture of j:hose varieties 
of grapes that here can succeed only under glass ; hence 
a work on the culture of our hardy grapes would bo of 
little use in California, and the need of a *' Hand Book," 
especially adapted to the varieties cultivated in that very 
different climate. Mr. Hyatt, who has furnished such a 
work, lias been a g"cat traveler, and in his long sojourns 
atiroad made himself familiar with grape culture in foreign 
countries, before he engaged in the piu'suit on the shores 
of the Pacific. Tlic extent of the grai)e interest in Cali- 
fornia isi but one among the many woiulcrfnl feature.-* of 
tliat wonderful Stale. The number of bearing vines in 
1870, is eslimatcd at -10,000,000, and the number of gallons 
of wine at 10,000,000 ; besides there were 20,000 boxes of 
raisins produced in the Slate, showing that the manufac- 
ture of grapes into raisins is rapidly increasing. The 
work bears all through the impress of practical experi- 
ence, and though especially inlenilod for California, it 
contains much that will be of interest to grape growers 
in the States cast of the Rocky Mountains. 
S^iBB»-1ig"s Aiiiea-i<»:B8i [?l4'«'li:«iai<'al 
I>irtiou:iiry, by Edward H. Knight. X. V.: Hurd & 
HoUi^htun. This work, whieli is in lln-ce large volumes, 
is a cyclopirdia rather than a dictionary. We received 
sonieof the earlier parts of th<^ work when its publica- 
ticm was begun by another house, several years ago. and 
fi>und thosr so useful that we have often wished that it 
niiuht be completed, and were ospcciallv gratified to re 
ceivt! the final portion from the present publishers. The 
author, long engaged in the Patent Oflice. has cxjieuded 
2.') years of labor upon the work, and it is one of the 
niostcom)>lete. a« it is one of the most useful ever Issued 
from tlio American press. Tt describes the tools, ma- 
chin-'fl. implements and appliances used in every art, and 
•?ivi's an account of the processes and also the histories 
of the arts thems-lvcs. Its method of indexing and 
crn;js-referenci' is v<Ty complete, and adds greatly to its 
usefulness; oni- nft'-n misses tin- infornialion a work 
contJiins through not knowing just where to look for it, 
a difficulty that is avoided here. The work gives very 
complete lists of technical terms, such as are not to be 
fotmd in the usual dictionaries. One of the striking- fea- 
tures of this dictionary is the profuseness of its illustra- 
tions. While the publishers state that there are 7.500 
engravings, there are practically at least twice as many, 
as several forms are often given on the same block. The 
work is sold in 44 parts, or in three volumes. 
Practical Botany, by Dr. A. Koehler, 
N. Y. : Heni-y Holt & Co. After a careful examination of 
this work we are unable to discover why it was written. 
Our views in regard to such works are, the author 
should either have something new to tell, or should tell 
the old story in a better form than had been done before. 
This work does neither. 
'^ 
1, 
.^'J' 
w 
Sundry Humbugs. 
It is not necessary to set 
forth to our older readers 
the objects of this column, as 
too many of them have re- 
ceived useful warnings, or 
have been able through its 
agency to warn others. As 
the new year always brings 
its hosts of new readers, a 
word to them may not be 
out of place. The "Hum- 
bug Column" has long been 
a marked feature of the 
American Agncidtui'Ut ; 
many yeare ago it began to 
notice such frauds as need- 
ed exposure, in separate 
Items, but the number of 
ihese was found to be so 
large, and so rapidly iucreas- 
ing, that after a while these 
matters were brought to- 
gt-Liiur, and presented in a conaensed fonn under the 
title given above. Its prime, and we may say, 
ITS SOLE OB-rECT 
is to expose all designs that have for their object the de- 
frauding the community at large, but more especially that 
portion of it in which the Ain^ncan Ag7-iculturist finds 
the greater share of its readers — the farming, or rural 
community, as it is against these that a large proportion 
of these schemes are especially directed. We need not 
enumerate the many species of the genus Humbug. It 
appeals to the love of money, to the desire for health, to 
personal vanity, to the baser passions — in short, to every 
possible motive which will induce people to part with 
their money, for which they will receive in return some- 
thing, which, if not absolutely useless, is positively harm- 
ful. Every scheme of this kind that has come to our 
knowledge, which we have good reason to believe to 
be detrimental to the intents of our readers and the com- 
munity at large, has been thoroughly exposed, and held 
up as something to be avoided. Of course this cannot be 
done without resistance on the part of those implicated, 
and the suits that have been commenced against us are 
numerous. These cases liave rarely reached a trial, proba- 
bly because the lawyere of the complainants, on learning 
the particulars, have advised their clients not to appear 
in court. In a fw cases that have been prosecuted to the 
end, we have not only been acquitted, but have received 
the commendations of both conn and jury. We mention 
this to show how careful we are, while 
rnOTECTlXG THE COMMUNITY 
frwm fraud, to be sure that we arc right, and to let our 
new readers sec, what our old ones already know, that it 
is of no use to send us unsubstantiated charges. It is 
very easy for one who thinks he has been defrauded, to 
write: '* So and so is a fraud. I sent him $5 for such a 
thing, and have had no reply ; show him up in your Hum- 
bug Columns,'"— hut if such correspondents reflect upon 
the matter, they will sec how unjus-t it would be to hold 
up a man as a cheat, from one end of the country to the 
other, upon an unsubstuntiated charge like this. Every 
accusation must be accompanied by abundant evidence, 
or hy such details that w,all allow us to investigate it. be- 
f(u-e it can be made public. These columns are not to be 
used to set forth personal grieva7iccs, and unless the ex- 
posure of a case will warn others, it is of no use to make 
it public This time it is some one in Michigan, who 
is after the farmers with 
" A NBW CEREAL." 
We are told that it is of "South American origin;" 
that it has been " acclimated " in Michigan since I8?.2 ; 
that it will produce from 7.") to l.'j't bushels to the acre, 
and that it Is cnlled " Pampas or Fphnul Kice." V^Tc add 
that it was "acclimated" bef.tri* Michiianwas even a 
Territory, much less a State: it did not oriLrinate in 
South -Nmerica, and that it is not "Pampas" or any 
