REVIEW OF THE MARCH NUMBER OF THE AGRICULTURIST. 
159 
more " scientific reasons" than these, I should 
like to read them. 
Tower's Improved Grain Dryer. — As to this ar- 
ticle, it looks as though it would do: though I 
fear it works too slow, and perhaps takes too 
much fuel. Is it any better, or so good as a 
steam dryer ? One of the advantages staled in 
favor of kiln-dried corn is controvertible. That 
is, that the meal is sweeter. Now, everbody who 
knows enough to tell a pot of mush from a meet- 
ing house, knows that the greener the corn, the 
sweeter the meal. That it will keep better, if 
dried, is indisputable. Corn meal, though, to be 
good, must never be ground long before it is 
used, and never be ground fine. Remember 
that. 
Pumpkins for Milch Cows. — What! Are our 
ancient thanksgiving privileges to be encroach- 
ed upon ? Do you seriously recommend us to 
give the cows our great, rich, yellow pumpkins ? 
Forbid it ! Both mo-lasses and lasses, of Yankee 
birth, and " broughten-up !" And further, are all 
our time-honored customs of pumpkins in the 
corn field, to give place to this new-fangled no- 
tion of book farming? And shall we see our 
best land planted with pumpkins alone \ What 
if the crop should be more profitable ? What if 
the corn should be better alone, and the pump- 
kins alone ? Do you think they would stand it % 
No sir. You would soon see them creeping 
through the fence, and claiming protection of 
their old friends, the corn stalks, saying, as 
plain as pumpkin vines could say, " What has 
been so long joined together, let no man put 
asunder." Be a little careful, Messrs. Editors, how 
you recommend innovations upon our time-hon- 
ored customs. Why, the next thing that I shall 
expect to see, will be a recommendation to plant 
our white beans in a field by themselves, and 
not stick them in among the corn hills. We 
honor the memory of our fathers too much to 
make any changes in our modes of farming, sir. 
Iron Railing, Grating, (%-c. — " Woodman spare 
that tree !" need not be sung any longer. Down 
with it. We have no use for wood any more. 
Iron houses, iron ships, iron fences, iron furni- 
ture, and stone fuel, and the latter about to be 
thrown into the shade ; that is, if there are any 
trees left by that time, by burning water. And 
you may even kill the old grey goose, for we 
write with iron pens now, or gold ones; and 
even if it is the goose that lays the golden egg, 
off with her head ; for since the discovery of 
California gold mines, nobody can wait periodi- 
cally, for. a goose to lay. This is the age of 
gold and iron. 
Building and Building Materials. — The author 
of this article is in love with stone houses. I 
do not exactly believe in the transmigration of 
souls ; but I do most firmly believe in the in- 
fluence exerted over men's souls by surrounding 
circumstances, and that men are, more or less, 
like the houses they live in. That is, if a fam- 
ily has lived for several generations, in a gloomy, 
cold-looking, prison-like, old, stone house, they 
partake of the character of the dwelling they 
live in. This is one objection I have to stone 
houses. Next, I doubt their economy. I be- 
lieve it will be conceded that a substantial stone 
house, even in a stony country, will cost double 
that of a wooden one. But I will take the cost 
of the stone one at $3,000, and the wooden one at 
$2,000, for the sake of the argument, and give 
the stone one all the advantage it is entitled to. 
Now, here are two farmers, one is living in a 
stone house, at an annual rent, (interest at ten 
per cent.,) of $300, and the other one in a wooden 
house, at $200 a-year. Now, I contend, that any 
improving farmer can make his money worth 
ten per cent, to him, and that five per cent, will 
keep his house in repair forever ; so that I care 
not how long the stone one lasts, the man in the 
wooden one will always have a house more 
comfortable, more healthy, and certainly more 
cheerful, and in every way more pleasant, upon 
an average, through all seasons of wet and dry, 
cold and hot, than in the stone one. Talk not 
to me of stone, either in hearts or houses. Give 
me the light, airy, cheerful dwellings of Amer- 
ica, in preference to those gloomy old things of 
Europe and Asia. I have been chilled through 
in them a little too often for my comfort, or any 
agreeable, and especially romantic notions con- 
nected with them. I sometimes think a child 
will partake of the character of the house as well 
as the country in which it is born. No country on 
earth has so many comfortable and beautiful 
residences for the mass of the people, as ours ; 
and no country has so much beauty of face and 
intellect, among the same masses, as this. Look 
at our lovely, light-hearted country girls, born 
in wooden houses, and talk not to me of stone 
ones — cold, gloomy, heart-hardening stone 
houses. 
[We do not agree with our friend Reviewer, 
altogether in his eulogium of our countrymen 
and countrywomen. We will grant that the 
great mass are better educated, and are more 
intelligent, and smarter, (to use an expressive 
Yankecism,) than Europeans; but we have not 
equalled them yet, at least in some departments. 
Where is our Shakspear, Milton, Byron, Goethe, 
Schiller, Dante, Camoens, Bacon, Newton, La- 
Place, &c. 1 In point of fine, rosy complexion, 
good constitution, and enduring beauty, our women 
but poorly compare with those of Great Britain, 
and other portions of Europe. Nor have we yet 
produced a De Stael, De Genlis, Sevigne, Moore, 
Hemans, Opie, Edgeworth, Montague, and a host 
of others that might be named. — Eds.] 
As to brick houses upon the farm, the very 
sight of them, in a hot day, is enough to drive a 
man mad. They are only fit for bake ovens, 
and never will be used for dwellings by a man 
that is " half baked." Unburnt bricks are only 
fit for such a country, and such a people, as 
Mexico. There is nothing to recommend them 
in this latitude. As for roofing, I agree with 
the writer, that we are none the wiser for our 
folly of using poor pine shingles, fastened on 
with cast-iron nails. 
Agricultural Geology, No. 1. — Strange how 
much good sense, and valuable practical in- 
formation can be put into so small an article. 
I am glad we are to have more of it from the 
same source. I cannot comment upon it, and 
