76 
southern cultivator. 
could be steamed it would be best of all, as it would then 
be wholly appropriated. 
We have no doubt that it pays quite as well to pass 
hay throagh the machine, as the coarsest fodder. A root- 
cutter IS also on indispensaqle adjunct to the barn, and 
the more perfectly it comminutes the roots the better. 
The farmer who has ever experimented with these ma- 
chines, and marked the results of feeding with hay and 
roots prepared in this way, can have no doubt of their 
utility. Laziness, we apprehend, has quite as much to 
do with these machines as ignorance. It is work to turn 
the crank to cut up hay enough to feed twenty head of 
cattle; and in prospect of spending the elbow grease, it is 
very convenient to believe that it will not pay. Sloth, 
however, is a poor counsellor in this case, as in all others. 
We should as soon think of feeding them with uncut 
straw. A w*arm stable and a straw-cutter are both good 
investments. — Hovjard’s Register. 
HUNGARIAN GRASS. 
The Hungarian Grass, very nearly resembles the com- 
mon Millet and requires the same culture. It has gained 
great notoriety upon the Western prairies, where it ap- 
pears much better adapted than to the ordinary farm lands 
of Kentucky and other States. It resists drouth to an ex- 
traordinary degree, and upon the porous prairie lands it 
threatens to almost supercede timothy entirely. In other 
States in the Union, and even in its native country, the 
Pnnicum Germanicum, or Hungarian Grass, is not so 
highly appreciated. 
The usual practice in the West, with this grass, is to 
secure both a crop of seed and a crop of hay at the same 
time, and the consequence is both are inferior. V\/hen 
seed is the object, a less quantity should be sown to the 
acre, say eight quarts, either broadcast, or what is bet- 
ter, drilled in. But for hay, not less than a half bushel of 
seed should be sown to the acre, and even three pecks 
would give more and finer hay. The ordinary quantity 
sown, however, is one-third of a bushel; this, on good 
land, will give from 20 to 30 bushels of seed, and from 2 
to 3 tons, and even more, of hay to the acre. 
The ground should be rich and well prepared. The 
proper season for sowing is from the middle of May to 
the Middle of June, [first of April in the South.— Eds.] 
but it may be sown as late as the last of June and pro- 
duce a crop of hay. It may be sown on wheat or rye 
stubble, and will afford good fall pasturage. 
The proper time to cut the Millet for hay is when the 
blades begin to turn yellow, or when the seed is just pass- 
ing out of the milky state. If allowed to fully ripen the 
seed, the hay is not so rich and nutritious, but while seed 
©ommands the high price that it has since it was first in- 
troduced, it has usually been allowed to become too ripe 
to make soft, sweet hay.— Valley Farmer.. 
Yearly Food of One Man.— From the army and navy 
diet scales of France and England, which, of course, are 
based upon the recognized necessities of large numbers 
of men in active life, it is inferred that about two and one- 
fourth pounds, avoirdupois, of dry food per day, are re- 
quired tor each individual; of this, about three-fourths are 
vegetable and the rest animal. At the close of an entire 
year, the amount is upwards of eight hundred pounds. 
Enumerating under the title of water all the various 
drinks — coffee, tea, alcohol, wine, &c. — its estimated 
quantity about fifteen hundred pounds per annum. That 
for the air received by breathing may be taken at eight 
hundred pounds. The food, water, and air, therefore, 
which a man receives, amount in the aggregate to more 
than thrf e thousand pounds a year ; that is, to about a ton 
and a half, or more than twenty times his weight. 
THE WEST — L.AND FOR THE CHILDREN. 
“The West, the Great West !” is now the prevailing cry. 
Arkansas, Texas, and Louisiana are the prominent and at- 
tractive points, whither emigration is tending. The plea 
for leaving old and tried and cherished homes for new 
ones, is, “I want to procure land for my children” — “I 
cannot bear to leave them a heritage of worn out and ex- 
hausted fields.” 
That in many portions of Middle and Upper Georgia, 
the lands present a very forbidding and discouraging as- 
pect is very certain, but whose fault is this'? Certainly 
not that of the soil or the climate. And will not westera 
lands, however rich and productive, after a while, present 
the same cheerless aspect, under a similar system of 
wasteful and improvident husbandry '? 
But of what use will any lands be to children who are 
not taught practically and experimentally the lessons of 
intelligent and thrifty agriculture? So long as all lessons 
and habits of industry are virtually ignored or discarded, 
of what avail is a landed or any other heritage to children % 
Unless labor shall be dignified in the eyes of their child- 
ren— unless they study the soil and take pride in develop- 
ing and promoting its fertility — unless they shall cease to 
devolve everything upon overseers — often men without 
the intelligence or disposition to practice thrifty and skill- 
ful husbandry— how can they hope long to do better in a 
new country than they have done in the old? 
The great misfortune is, that we have too much land — 
too much for good neighborhoods, and schools and social 
advantages. It takes but comparatively a small tract of 
land to meet the actual wants of a family. We^say then 
to those who have pleasant homes in the old States, do 
not desert them hastily. Take the Southern Cultivator, 
Southern Planter, and other valuable Agricultural Jour- 
nals. Study the profession of farming. If you have sur- 
plus slaves, sell them to good masters, and put the pro- 
ceeds into railroad or other stocks, or have improvements 
and comforts. This is our advice, which may go for what 
it is worth. — Macon Journal cf* Messenger. 
THE BEST DOCTOR FOR ANIMALS. 
We have seen a great deal of doctoring for sick animals 
— some successful, and a great of deal of it unsuccessful 
— and we have long since come to the conclusion that 
the most skillful physician we have ever met with is 
Doctor Nurse. If an animal, (as well as human being) 
is not carefully taken care of— nursed — all the medicine 
in the world can do but little good. And, on the other 
hand, with good nursing, medicine is generally unneces- 
sary. Our own obseivations lead to the opinion that in 
at least nine cases out of ten, as commonly administered, 
medicine does more harm than good. 
An eminent New York physician said that taking medi- 
cine was always a choice of evils— that being poisons in 
nearly all instances they necessarily did harm to the sys- 
tem, and were never to be employed unless there was a 
strong probability that they would benefit more than in- 
jure. This is not the rule adopted in doctoring horses, by 
most horse jockies and others having care of these ani- 
mals, if we might judge from the way in which gunpow- 
der, salts, red pepper, turpentine, whiskey, corosive sub- 
limate, and other violent remedies, are administered at 
hap-hazard, increasing, in nearly all cases, the violence of 
the disease. It may be laid down as a general rule, that 
it is much safer to give too little than too much medicine; 
and that none should be given unless we know distinctly 
how it is to operate and what it is for. 
Some years ago, a valuable horse caught cold, and was 
troubled with a cough so severe that he might be heard 
halfa mile, and which appeared to be rapidly reducing 
his flesh. We had an abundance of prescriptions from 
neighbors of all frightful medicines, enough to have killed 
