300 "REPORT 4, UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 
the water directly up into the reservoir, which is already mounted, aud 
for this purpose the common sheet-metal " Bilge Pumps," used for pump- 
ing out ships and cellars, are cheapest aud effectual. 
Concerning the small haud-machines, knapsack and horseback appa- 
ratuses for sprinkling liquid by gravitational pressure very little need 
be added above what has already appeared in the earlier reports. 
Horseback Automatic Sprinklers. — To lessen the limb-labor 
in carrying hand- sprinklers or knapsack reservoirs it is preferable to 
mount on horseback with such vessels. This may be done with all 
kinds, even with common watering-pots. The watering pots and cans 
are carried thus most commonly where they are extensively used for 
poisoning Cotton Worms as obtains especially on the Mississippi of 
Louisana, Yazoo, and southern Arkansas. The cotton grows so high 
that the hand pots could not well be carried high enough except by 
being mounted. The mules accustomed to tilling the crops will walk 
between a pair of rows without being guided, hence the rider takes one 
pot in each hand, poisoning two rows at once. At short intervals he 
shakes the pot to prevent the poison from separating entirely from the 
water. This is commonly neglected, and usually the "darkie" who is 
intrusted with this work does not know or care whether it is mixed 
or not, whether the nozzle is mostly clogged, or if the spray is directed 
accurately upon the plants or largely between the rows. The cotton 
I have seen being poisoned throughout those regions was almost inva- 
riably treated very imperfectly, often in such a careless way as not to 
protect the plants from being stripped. When the pots are empty the 
rider exchanges tbem for others which are kept filled by men stationed 
at mixing- barrels which are commonly at both ends of the rows, or at 
long intervals in the rows. Sometimes the buckets are carried on a 
yoke- bar across the shoulders, and something of the kind is a necessity 
where the rows are wide apart. The bar is commonly carried across 
the sboulders, but may be supported upon the horn of the saddle, or 
otherwise upon the horse alone. A method rarely employed is the fol- 
lowing: On either side of the horse is a pole having its lower end at- 
tached to the lower part of a girth around the horse. The upper end 
of the pole or bar has a fork supporting the weight of a watering pot, 
• while the whole is sustained from falling by the hand of the same side 
grasping the handle of the pot, which can so be tilted at will. Almost 
all the single knapsack cans aud hand-sprinklers are susceptible of 
being joined in pairs to hang one on each side of a horse. 
The following description of the Willie Horseback Sprinkler, from 
the Department Keport on Cotton Insects (p. 248), will illustrate this 
subject more fully. 
u The Willie Horseback Sprinkler. — Another machine has been in- 
vented for distributing liquid poisons upon cotton, by Mr. William T. 
Willie, of BrenUain, Tex.; patent No. 158345, dated December 29, 1874. 
It consists of a frame which may be rigidly secured to a saddle, in a 
transverse position, there being cans for holding the liquid and pro- 
