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SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR 
4th. Tallow when treated as in the lard experiment to 
the curd stage, becomes quite hard and firm, and the color 
is slightly if at all injured. It makes a most excellent 
summer candle. 
5th. Tallow treated by heat with half its weight of water 
acidulated with 5 per cent ot sulphuric acid is but slightly 
hardened, if at all. 
6th. The loss of fat is notliing if carefully conducted. In 
fact my experiments show an increase of 1 to 2 per cent, 
in weight. 
7th. Expense — 100 lbs. tallow, say ST2 50; 8 1-4 lbs. 
saltpetre, at 15 cents (now 30) is Si 24; 8 1-4 alum, at 
8 cents, is 66 cents, in all $14 40 ; cost of hardened tallow 
say 14 1-2 cents per pound. 
8th. The heat should be regulated so as to prevent ex- 
cessive boiling and the whole constantly stirred. 
9th. If the process be conducted in an iron or bx'ass ket- 
tle, the liberated sulphuric acid will act upon the metal. A 
suitable vessel is the iron preserving kettle, lined with por- 
celain, or an earthen pot which will stand heat. 
10th. Some attention and skill is necessary in prepar- 
ing a suitable wick — much depends upon this in a good 
candle. 
11th. The outside of a candle may be coated with wax 
by previously filling the moulds (cold) with melted wax, 
and immediately pouring out all which is not chilled on 
the sides — then adjust the wick and pour in the tallow as 
cold as it will well run. The candies, when removed, 
will generally present a crack down the side — caused by 
the greater contraction of the wax — this should be filled 
up by means of a warm case-knife and a little wax. 
I trust the “better half” of your Texas correspondent, 
W. A. M., together with other inc|uirers, now now be 
able to make a good hard tallow candle, and for the pre- 
sent at least, give up the idea of homespun adamantines. 
R. B. 
Rome, Ga.,May, 1856. 
P. S. — I investigate this and similar little matters in my 
leisure hours for my ov/n edification and amusement. In 
sending them to you occasionally, I hope you will not al- 
low me to occupy room in the Cultivator to the exclusion 
of weightier subjects. 
“SSOOMSEDGE” HIMSELF AGAIN. 
Editors Southern Cultivator — It has been so long 
since I have made my mark in the Cultivator , that I have 
almost lost the hang of it; but the very interesting bill of 
fare in the May number is too great a temptation. 
Rape or ColzaJ’ — “more exhausting than corn, cotton or 
wheat,” that settles the question — we have C[uite exhausters | 
enough now. [ 
“T/at Florida. Potato^ — We take it to be neither more j 
nor less than the Wild Colvolvulus, found growing 
on every plantation, commonly called by the negroes, 
Indian Potato, or Hog Potato. We have very little doubt 
but it is as capable of being made as good a humhus; as 
the Chinese Yam. 
'•'•The Yopon or Southern Tea PlaM,^'‘ is the common 
Holly or one of its varieties; good, the old women say, for 
“thrash” in children, and for sweating folks. 
"Deep Plowing and Manuring.” — W. R.'s reasoning 
will go downwards as easily as upwards. The deeper 
you plow the more certainly you open a communication 
between the roots and the atmosphere. The roots gener- 
ally seek the surface because they cannot help themselves. 
If it be the “greater moisture coming from below 'which 
•makes deep plovnng profitable” why cannot the roots avail 
themselves of it by deep as well as surface running, and if 
this moisture be worth an^/thing, if it contains, in soluble 
form, the food of plants, what sense is there in cutting 
off the very mouths which nature has given the plant to 
absorb its food I Corn roots have been known to pene- 
trate the earth three feet, in time of drouth — they will go 
down just in proportion to the depth oCyour plowing and 
their necessities. Our experience of fourteen year’s ma- 
nuring has satisfied us that manuring without deep plow- 
ing is labor thrown away. 
The reasoning of W. R. leads him inevitably to the at- 
mosphere theory — that plants get their food from tpe at- 
mosphere through the leaves, for if they get it through the 
roots, why cut off the roots I 
Cutting the roots may be unavoidable — we must kill 
the grass and open the soil — but if these things can be 
done without root-cutting, we should say common sense 
would approve it. 
W. R. is the first individual we have ever heard ad- 
vance the opinion that corn and cotton produced most in 
the hill — roots cut both sides. 
"Sweet Potatoes.” — We are glad to see the old high 
land system giving way to flat culture — there is no doubt 
about it being right, provided always that deep plowing 
and thoroughly pulverization precede the planting — this 
is indispensable to success. 
"The Oal Crop cm ExhoMSterP — How doctors will dif- 
fer — we have never been able to make one good oat crop 
after another or improve the land by oat cropping. A 
man can do almost anything, with good land to back him, 
however — for a while — plow deep or shallow, and make 
crops, but it will tell one day. 
"Profession and Practice.” — “Clifton” has taken a good 
many between wind and water. A great many preach 
what they never practice— -by far too many of us. “There 
is more in the boy than in the college” is an old adage 
and a true one. Good land does not always make a good 
planter, or a good manager. Some people would gro%v 
rich anywhere — others grow poorer. 
We have found manure most profitable when put in 
drill and bedded on before thorough decomposition — manure 
of all kinds. The profits of planting depend not as much 
upon the sales of produce as the increased value of the 
property — a great many people grow rich slowly and 
surely by the accumulation of property by good manage- 
ment. 
"Shade in Agriculture and Its Effects.” — Shade is mani- 
festly an ameliorator — it prevents the escape of moisture 
and all volatile salts which may exist in the soil. It pre- 
vents in a great measure the leaching of the soil, and the 
scorching effects of the sun — we speak now of artificial 
shade — in other words, mulching. But shade, simply, 
can never make a soil rich which is naturally deficient in 
I the elements of plants — if it could, why wculdnot Spanish 
1 Oak ridges grow as rich from shade as Post Oat or Wal- 
j nutl 
j "Culture of Cotton — Close Planting, ipc.” — One of the 
best planters of our acquaintance has for many years been 
pursuing the policy of drawing his rows closer together. 
It is more easily “tended”' and more can be done by the 
plow. But this bedding upon the old water furrow with- 
out breaking it up, looks very much like an “advance 
backwards” — it is falling back on old fogyism — that “cot- 
ton never grows till the root strikes the hard ground ’ 
Why should nature give cotton a tap-root, if it is not to 
penetrate deeply I “Plow middles deep, and tiien cut 
roots of too rapid growth” — our experience is that plowing 
and cutting roots always giving more weed — pushes the 
formation of weed, but at the expense of fruit. Have 
we been chasing a delusion or asleep I 
"The Grape — Its Culture, — “A. C.” has given ns 
a very interesting chapter on this subject of growing im- 
portance, but he has run athwart many ofourprecon 
ceived opinions. We have always understood the Bui- 
