EDITORS TABLE. 
261 
<£Mtors' Sable. 
The Next Annual Fair of the N. Y. State 
Agricultural Society. — At a late meeting of the 
Executive Committee of this society, the Secretary 
reported, that, since the last meeting previous, he 
had visited Syracuse, and that the citizens were tak- 
ing active measure3 to prepare the grounds and build- 
ings for the use of the society in September A con- 
tract for enclosing the grounds, and preparing the 
necessary erections, has been made with an efficient 
and thorough business man ; and everything required 
by the society, it is believed, will be in readiness. 
The Committee of Arrangements, in, behalf of the 
citizens, are making every possible effort for the 
accommodation of visitors ; and nqthing, on their 
part, will be left undone to accommodate those 
who may be in attendance. The Secretary also 
reported, that the judges who had been appointed 
for the annual exhibition had, with very few excep- 
tions, signified their acceptance, and the few vacan- 
cies had been supplied by gentlemen who had agreed 
to be present. At no former period have the indica- 
tions of a large exhibition, in all the departments, 
been so encouraging as at the present. 
Sale of Hereford Cattle and Merino Sheep. 
— We desire to call particular attention to the adver- 
tisements in this number of our paper, of Messrs. 
Bingham & Brothers. We have seen the progenitors 
of their cattle and sheep, and know them to be first- 
rate animals of their kind. From their well-known 
intelligence, we have no doubt they have bred them 
with care, and we are of opinion the public may im- 
plicitly rely on their statements in regard to them. 
Postponement of the Ohio State Fair.— In 
consequence of the prevailing epidemic, in Cincin- 
nati and its vicinity, the Ohio State Agricultural 
Fair is postponed until another year. 
Honors to an American, from Abroad. — Dr. 
Charles T. Jackson, of Boston, has lately received 
the beautiful Cross of the Legion of Honor, confer- 
red on him bjr the President of the French Republic, 
in consequence of his high scientific attainments, and 
for having made the discovery of etherization, a dis- 
tinction, it is believed, that no other American ever 
received. Bonpland, the celebrated traveller and na- 
turalist, and the associate of Baron Humboldt, in 
South -American travels, together with several other 
individuals of eminence, received the order of knight- 
hood at the same time. Dr. J. has also received from 
the king of Sweden a splendid gold medal, as a tes- 
timony of the respect in which his character and 
scientific services are held by that monarch. 
Ravages of the Army Worm.— We learn that 
the army worm is very destructive in the southern 
part of Illinois, as well as in Missouri. 
Disinfecting Agent. — The best disinfecting agent 
is nitrate of lead. One ounce, dissolved in one pint 
of water, is equal in strength, as a disinfecting agent, 
to the same quantity of concentrated solution of chlo- 
ride of lime. It is, at the same time, the cheapest 
that can be used. About a table-spoonful, poured into 
a chamber, will remove the smell instantaneously ; a 
handkerchief or towel, saturated with it, and hung 
up in a room, will remove any unpleasant odor that 
may exist at any time. 
March of Mind. — There is a farmer in this state, 
who, entertaining the opinion "that iron plows 
" pizen" the earth, and injure crops, has cast 
them off, and procured the pod-auger pattern — all 
wood — and heavy as half a shedful of the ordinary 
run of farmers' tools. The same farmer, having an 
active young man in his service, who had acquired 
some knowledge from books, peremptorily discharged 
him, because the young man stoutly persisted in 
asserting that the earth went round the sun, while 
the farmer held the contrary. He would not have 
folks with him whose heads were full of such non- 
sense. — J\T. H.. Statesman. 
Fence Posts. — A practical farmer informs the 
Hartford Times, that in taking up a fence that had 
been -set fourteen years, he noticed that some of the 
posts remained nearly sound, while others were rot- 
ted off at the bottom. On looking for tha cause, he 
found that those posts that were set limb part down, 
or inverted from the way they grew, were sound. 
Those that were set as they grew, were rotted off. 
This fact is worthy the attention of farmers. 
General Washington's Farm. — The farm of 
Gen. Washington, at Mount Vernon, contained ten 
thousand acres of land in one body, equal to about fif- 
teen square miles. . It was divided into farms of con- 
venient size,. at the distance of two, three, and five 
miles from his mansion house. These farms, he visit- 
ed every day, in pleasant weather, and was constantly 
engaged in making experiments for the improvement 
of agriculture. Some idea of the extent of his farm- 
ing operations* may be formed from the following 
facts :— 
In 1787, he had five hundred and eighty acres in 
grass ; sowed six hundred bushels of oats ; seven 
hundred acres- with wheat, and as much more in corn, 
barley, potatoes, beans, peas, &c, and one hundred and 
fifty with turnips. His stock consisted of one hundred 
and forty horses, one hundred and twelve cows, two 
hundred and thirty-six working oxen, heifers, and 
steers, and five hundred sheep. He constantly em- 
ployed two hundred and fifty hands, and kept twenty- 
four plows going during the whole year, when the 
earth and the state of the weather would permit. In 
17S6, he slaughtered one hundred and fifty hogs, fcr 
the use of his family, and provisions for his negroes, 
for whose comfort he had great regard. — Exchange. 
A Portrait of an Anti-Book Farmer.— He 
plows three inches deep, lest he should turn up the 
poison that, in his estimation, lies below; his wheat 
land is plowed so as to keep as much water on it as 
possible ; he sows two bushels to the acre and reaps 
ten, so that it takes a fifth of his crop to seed his 
ground ; his corn land never had any help from him, 
but bears just what it pleases, which is from twenty 
to twenty-five bushels, by measurement, though he 
brags that it is fifty or sixty. His hogs, if not re- 
markable for fattening qualities, would beat old Eclipse 
at a quarter race ; and were the man not prejudiced 
against deep plowing, his hogs would work the ground 
better with their prodigious snouts, than he does with 
his jack-knife plow. His meadow land yields half a 
ton to a whole ton of hay, which is regularly spoiled 
in curing, regularly left out for a month, regularly 
stacked up, and left for the cattle to pull out at their 
leisure, and half eaten and trampled under foot. His 
horses would excite the avarice of an anatomist in 
search of osteological specimens ; and returning from 
their range of pasture, they are walking herbariums, 
bearing specimens in their mane and tail of every 
weed that bears a cockle or burr. But oh ! the cows, 
if held up in a bright day to the sun, don't you think 
they would be semi-transparent ? But he tells us 
good milkers are always poor ! His cows get what 
providence sends them, and very little besides, ex- 
cept in winter ; then they have half a peck of corn, 
the ears a foot long, thrown to them, and they afford 
lively spectacles of animated corn and cob crushers. 
Never mind, they yield, on an average, three quarts of 
milk per day, and that milk yields varieties of butter 
quite astonishing ! — Buffalo Paper 
