1873.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
45 
12c. per lb. The closing market for all kinds was very 
etrong, the prices obtained being ihe highest for several 
months. Drovere are counting upon good markets the 
reBt of the year, even with cheap poultry and plenty of 
game. As yet we have had no buffalo meat of importance 
to compete with beef, but there are free arrivals of 
dressed bullocks slaughtered in Chicago. 
The prices of the past 5 weeks were : 
Range. Large Sates. Aver. 
Dec. 16 6X@16Hc. HK@13^c. HHic. 
Dec. 23 7S@15 c. 11^13 c. llMC. 
Dec. SO 8 @15 c. 12 @13,^c. ll^c. 
Jan. G 8 @14){c. 11 ©13 C. Hk'c. 
Jan. 18 9 ©15 c. 12 @14 c. 12 c. 
Ulilcu Oows.- With some variations in price, as 
the supply ruled heavy or light, and as milk was scarce 
or abundant, the close varies little from the opening. 
There is a good demand for large cows with fine points, 
while ordinary milkers go off slowly. The late rise in 
beef rather helps them. The rates are $42 (a) $55 each 
for very ordinary to thinnish cows of small size, $65 (at 
$75 for fair to good milkers, and $«0 @ $85 for prime to 
extra large cows Calves.— The irregular arrivals 
ran prices up to high figures about the beginning of the 
year. Live calves sold at lie. and would have brought 
13c. fora few days if here. Some fat hog-dressed reached 
20c, but the high prices soon brought them forward more 
freely, especially dressed veals, and they are now lower. 
It should be borne in mind that at least three fourths of 
the veals now sent Here arrive dead, and are not figured 
in the tables above. Quotations for live, $10 © $14 each 
for grass-calves ; 7c. (a) lO^c. $ 5>. for ordinary to prime 
milk-veals ; Gc. @ 9c. for hog-dressed grass-calves, and 
10c. ©. 14c. for poor to fat milk-veals Sheep.— 
Lambs are now weighed in with sheep at the same price. 
Skins average about $2.25 each. Among the stock of the 
past mouth, were many lots of extra holiday Bheep, 
weighing 140 ©175 lbs., which sold at Sc. (a) 9c. All 
kinds of sheep have advanced very much, and the de- 
mand is good, helped by higher beef and pork. The 
quotations are : for sheep, 5c. @, 6!^c. for poor to medium, 
and 7c. @. 7?^c. for fair to choice, a few extras going at 
8'~c Swine.— Arrivals of "Western dressed for the 
past 5 weeks were 16,127. The market has steadily im- 
proved since last report, closing very firm with an active 
demand. QnototJono of live nogs, 4' 2 c. @ 5J£c. ; city- 
dressed WeBtern, S'jc. @ 6J4c. for heavy to medium, and 
B^c. @ 7V 4 c. for light; WeBtern dressed, 5$£C. @ 6c; 
State and Jersey, 6c © 8c. 
containing a great variety of Items* including many 
good Hints and Suggestions which we throw into smaller 
type and condensed form, for want of space elsewhere. 
Remitting Money: — Checks on 
New York City Ranks or Bankers are best 
for large sums ; make payable to the order of Orange 
.Judd Ac Co. Post-Office Money Orders, 
for $50 or less, are cheap and safe also. When these are not 
obtainable, register letters, affixing stamps for post- 
age and registry ; put in the money and seal the letter in 
the presence of the postmaster, and take his receipt for it. 
Money sent in the above three methods is safe against loss. 
Postage : Oil American Agriculturist, 3 cents 
a quarter, in advance ; on Hearth and Home, 5 cents per 
quarter. Double rates if not paid in advance at the 
office where the papers are received. For subscribers in 
British America, the postage must be sent to this office 
for prepayment here. Also 20 cents for delivery of 
Hearth, and Home in New York City. 
ISouutl Copies oi" Volume Thirty- 
one are now ready. Price, $"2, at our office ; or $2.50 
each, if sent by mail. Any of the last sixteen volumes 
(16 to 31 ) will also be forwarded at same price. Sets of 
numbers sent to our office will be neatly bound in our 
regular style, at 75 cents per vol. (50 cents extra, if return- 
ed by mail.) Missing numbers supplied at 12 cents each. 
Clu1>s can at any time be increased by remitting 
for each addition the price paid by the original members ; 
or a small club may be increased to a larger one; thus: 
a person having sent 10 subscribers and $12, may after- 
ward send 10 more subscribers with only $8 ; making a 
club of 20 at $1 each ; and so of the other club rates. 
ALL for a DIME.— All our readers 
who do not now have Hearth and Home, ought to get the 
one number for January 4th, 1573. Besides its regular 
pages, fine pictures, etc., it contains a large Supplement 
with Mr. Egglcston's new Story, "The Mystery of Metro- 
polisville." Get this number without fail, from the 
newsman, or a copy will be sent from this office, post- 
paid, for ten cents. 
The German Agriculturist is mainly 
a reproduction of the English edition, with a special 
department edited by the Hon. F. Hunch. We request 
our readers to mention the German edition to their 
German friends. Many persons who employ German 
laborers, gardeners, etc., subscribe for it in order to sup- 
ply their help with useful reading matter. The price of 
the German edition is the same as the English edition. 
Clubs may be composed of either edition, or part of each. 
Subscribe for Both Papers. — The 
subscription price for the American Agriculturist and 
for Hearth and Home, when both papers are taken to- 
gether, is only $4, and $4.75 pays for both papers, and 
for both the Chromos, mounted and prepaid. 
" Flowerless " Apple-Trees.— There 
are trees in different parts of the country which bear ap- 
ples, and which have the reputation of not blooming. 
We should be very glad to get grafts of any trees of this 
character, with whatever may be known of their history. 
Tlie Farmers' CIuo.— We did not think 
that we could bo surprised at anything that might be said 
or done at any meeting of that remarkable body called 
the Farmers' Club, of the American Institute, but we did 
not know its astonishing capabilities, or rather its capa- 
bilities for astonishing. At the last session of last year, 
the chairman gave what is called an annual address, in 
which, under cover of an obituary notice of Mr. Lyman, 
he went out of his way to attack, by implication, the agri- 
cultural department of the N. Y. Tribune. The reason 
for this display of bad taste is that the present agricul- 
tural editor of the Tribune can find something batter with 
which to fill his columns than to report the nothings said 
at the Club. There are now few papers in which these 
gentlemen of the Club can read their names in print, and 
great is their vexation. We do not know that the Tri- 
bune will notice this official reading it out of meeting, 
but it is due to that paper, and to Mr. Crandell, its agri- 
cultural editor, to say that its agricultural department 
wae never so full nor bo varied as it has been during the 
four months in which it has discontinued its reports of 
the Farmers' Club. 
Premiums. — If you would know all about 
them, see page 73. 
A New Field to be Cultivated.— No 
farmer can cultivate his fields without implements. The 
plow stirs the soil, the harrow pulverizes and levels it, 
the drill deposits the seed beneath the surface, where all 
the powers of nature combine to make it start into 
growth and bring forth fruit. But there is another field 
the cultivation of which is not to be forgotten nor neglect- 
ed, the soil of which must be stirred and in which seed 
must be sown, and from which the most valuable crops 
may be gathered. The mind is this field. Let the mind 
remain untitled and uncultivated, and the labors of the 
hands are rendered unprofitable. Labor ignorantly per- 
formed is fruitless ; it is only profitably performed when 
directed by intelligence. The implements whereby the 
mind is cultivated are books. The labor which directs 
these implements is study. No farmer can be without 
books and papers any more than he can dispense with 
his plow or seed. Ho needs them for himself as well as 
for his children. But if he should think he has lived and 
roughed it long enongh to have gathered something for 
himself, let him not deny his children an ample supply of 
books. The farm and a country life are full of sugges- 
tions of things which young and old desire to under- 
stand and know. ' ' Why, and how is this ?" are questions 
occurring every day, and oftener, and every facility should 
be given for the investigation and solution of these ques- 
tions. As they are understood better, the farm Is better 
managed, the crops are heavier, the milk-pail is fuller, the 
garden is better cultivated, the poultry are more prolific, 
the hogs and beef fatter, and comfort and prosperity are 
increased. Books do this, with good papers; but books 
are indispensable. No one can afford to do without 
them, much less can a farmer, or farmer's children. 
The book-lists published in the columns of the Ameri- 
can Agriculturist contain those especially adapted to 
farmers' needs. Some of them at least should be in the 
hands of every dweller in the country, whether he culti- 
vates the ground or not. Money spent for them is better 
invested than in lands or stock. Ten or twenty dollars 
worth of books in a farmer's hou^e will be of more value 
and bring in more profit, if rightly used, than a cow ; in- 
deed, than many cows. There are none that can not afford 
this outlay. One single acre of land, a garden patch, a 
pig, or a dozen fowls should be set apart as belonging to 
the library, and the produce invested yearly in books. 
No investment will result more satisfactorily, and there 
is none that we would more earnestly press upon the at- 
tention of the readers of the Agriculturist than this one. 
By all moans buy books, and read and study them ; and 
then buy more. If there is no money in hand just now, 
borrow it. To go in debt for books is one of the few 
cases in which debt is justifiable ; and the man who thus 
buys books will very soon be able to repay the loan. 
Concrete Houses. — " S. M. H.," Shawnee 
Co., Kan., asks if concrete houses will gather damp on 
the inside during wet or frosty weather.— No ; the con- 
crete, being very porous, and the pores containing much 
air, is a much poorer conductor of heat than brick or 
stone, and the houses built of it are warmer and drier. 
Oil-Calce.— "J. S. W.," Carlisle, Pa., asks 
what kind of feed for cows oil-cake would make, and 
whero it can be proenred. — One or two quarts of linseed 
or cotton-seed cake-meal mixed with each feed of cut- 
hay is excellent for cows in milk, or a fourth of that 
quantity will be found of great service for young stock. 
It regnla es the bowels, increases the cream, and keeps 
a fine, solt, and loose skin. It may be purchased at the 
seed-store,i in any considerable town. The use of these 
cake-meals should be encouraged, as they tend to enrich 
the manure and improve the farm, in addition to the ad- 
vantages enumerated above. 
A Boy*s Churn.— Geo. P. Williams, Madi- 
son, N. J., who is a boy, eleven years old, writes us that 
he "has got an experience on a churn, which he would 
like to put in the Agriculturist."'' He Bends Ws a very 
fair drawing of his plan, which is to connect the handle 
of the upright dasher by a crank to a handle, the turn- 
ing of which moves the dasher up and down in the 
churn. It is very good for so young a boy. By and by, 
when he gets older, he may hit upon something that 
older people have not. 
SITNDRY HUMBUGS.— Eighty-three 
(83) new names have been added to our "Index of 
Swindlers " since our January report, though a large 
part of these are only different names assumed by a few 
operators as a blind to the P. O. delivery clerks or car- 
riers. A common practice now Is to get up a plausible 
letter, multiply it by lithograph or type, and inclose with 
each copy an assumed name and address written on a 
separate slip of paper. In this way the swindler can 
change his address as often as he desires, and faster than 
he can be followed up by the P. O. detectives, without 
the trouble or expense of printing new circulars. In 
other cases, if the swindler gives his real name, and he 
is followed up, he can deny that the loose paper contain- 
ing his name was, by himself, connected with the scheme 
set forth in the accompanying circular or letter. Any 
one receiving any circular or document with the name on 
a separate slip, may set it down as proof positive that 
the whole affair is bogus Many subscribers have 
HOW TOUR NAME IS OBTAINED. 
recently written us that their names nnd address must 
have been obtained from the subscription-lists of the 
American Agriculturist or Hearth and Home, because 
they have given their address to no one else in this city. 
They are entirely mistaken. Our subscription-books 
and letters are carefully guarded, and arc never allowed 
outside the office for any purpose whatever. All letters 
are carefully preserved for many years, and when too old 
to be of any use for reference they are burned, or if sold 
to paper-makers they are so mutilated as to be of no use 
to others. So careful are we on this point, that if one 
wishes to address a correspondent, unless he is a known 
reliable party, he is required to inclose his letter or cir- 
cular, and we put on the address and mail the envelope 
from our own office. The fact is, certain parties make a 
business of collecting the names and addresses of almost 
every person in the country, including even boys and 
girls. They classify these names into lists of farmers, 
mechanics, merchants, etc., etc., and then sell copies of 
these lists at so much per 100 or 1,000 names. Fre- 
quently, one swindler gets a lot of names, and exchanges 
his list of names with another swindler who has done 
the same tiling. Some publishers, and dealers in various 
wares, buy lists of the collectors to send out specimen 
copies or circulars. Any swindler can buy a list under 
one pretense or another. These addresses are originally 
obtained from postmasters or their clerks, or from other 
parties, by paying, or offering to pay, for a list of all the 
persons residing within reach of each post-office. They 
promise from 25 cents to $5 per 100 for such names, or 
offer some premium article, sometimes sending blanks 
