338 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[September, 
proof against fly and the midge, and they yield well, 
and make excellent flour. A newly imported variety, 
the “Challenger,” grown this season upou Long 
Island, has done very well, and from its permanent 
reputation in England, is worthy a trial here. 
Levelling the Bottom of a Drain. 
When drains are laid so that the slope is uneven, 
they soon become useless. This is caused by the 
retention of water in the hollow portions, and by 
the deposition of sand or other sediment in these 
low spots until the tile or water channel is com¬ 
pletely closed. In making a drain, the first thing 
is to cut the ditch. If this is perfectly done, laying 
the tile is a simple matter that can hardly go wrong. 
The chief consideration is to get an even slope 
without any depressions, which is a very difficult 
matter, and however well the surveyor’s levelling 
and staking may have been, if the workman is in¬ 
competent, or not closely watched, there will almost 
certainly be hollows in the course of the drain. 
Where a stream of water is running in the ditch, it 
is not difficult to notice any deviation from a regu¬ 
lar slope; but when the ditch is dry, it is far from 
easy, especially when the slope is only a few inches 
in a hundred feet. A guide made in the following 
manner, will serve to indicate any variance from a 
proper grade. It consists of a few “cross-legs” 
made of wooden bars, 2 inches wide, H inch thick, 
and 5 feet long (fig. 1). They are fastened together 
with bolts, so that the legs can be spread or closed, 
and may be set astride the ditch. When the ditch 
has been roughly dug out, the level may be accu¬ 
rately fixed in two or more places, over each of 
which a pair of legs is 
set, and over these, a 
strong thin cord, such 
as a stout linen fishing 
line well oiled, is 
stretched and secured 
as shown. It is a mat¬ 
ter of convenience how 
many of the legs are 
used; two will be suf¬ 
ficient in most cases, al¬ 
though a number of them may be used over an ex¬ 
tended drain upon regularly sloping land, as a guide 
for the first excavation. When the line is set up, it 
may be prevented from sagging, by the use of a 
few intermediate supports as shown at a. These 
are square rods H inch thick, furnished with sharp 
iron points, and each having an arm, a foot long, as 
indicated. The bottom of the ditch may be graded 
from this line by testing it occasionally with a 
plumb-bob. By testing every foot, a perfect grade 
may be secured, and in laying the tile, the test lino 
may be again used for certainty. It is necessary in 
placing the “cross-legs,” to have them set so that 
the line supported by them is parallel with the pro¬ 
posed grade of the drain. This may be done by 
spreading the legs apart or by drawing them together. 
A correspondent sends a sketch and description of 
a method of making levels upon the surface, which 
may also be adapted to the levelling the bottom 
of a drain. The implement consists of a “pair of 
legs ” with a cross-bar, upon which is mounted a 
common builder’s spirit-level. The legs are made 
of strips 1 inch thick, 3 inches wide, and 11 feet 
long. The cross-bar is 9 feet long. The spread of 
the feet is exactly 161 feet, or 1 rod. The level 
may be temporarily used to secure the correct hang¬ 
ing of the plumb-line, and the marking of the 
notch, shown at figs. 2 and 3, and may then be laid 
aside. When the instrument is correctly marked, a 
block of wood one inch thick may be placed under¬ 
neath one foot, and a mark made where the plumb- 
line strikes the cross-bar, as shown at fig. 3. A 
scale may thus be noted upon the cross-bar, each 
mark showing a deviation of one inch in a rod, or 1 in 
198, and the scale may run each way from the mid¬ 
dle. It would be better to read thus, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0, 
1, 2, 3, 4, and so on ; the center 0 showing a level, 
and the others, 1, 2, 3, or 4 inches slope in 198 feet. 
In practice, the instrument is placed in the drain to 
be tested, and the mark beneath the plumb-line 
Fig. 3.—LEVEL IN USE. 
noted. Whatever this may be, the same inclination 
should be kept along the course of the drain, and a 
test made at every 6 or 8 feet if desired. The in¬ 
strument may be used for laying out drains in the 
first instance, by placing it upon the ground with 
the right leg at the starting point, and moving the 
left one here or there until a proper slope is found, 
when a peg may be driven in the ground dowu to 
the surface, and the right leg moved onto it, when 
the left one may be used again to find the proper 
spot. By traversing the required direction until 
the termination of the drain is reached, and count¬ 
ing the pegs, the whole inclination will be ascer¬ 
tained, when the drain may be run in a direct line, 
from the first to the last peg, avoiding the mean- 
derings. Another level which will serve to test the 
inclination, is shown at fig. 4. This is marked 
similarly to that shown at fig. 2, but is differently 
Fig. 4.— A HANDT INCLINATION LEVEL. 
constructed. The L is made at right angles, and the 
amount of divergence is shown by the swinging of 
the plumb-rod. The bottom may be exactly 100 
inches (8 ft. 4 in.), and every inch of slope can be 
marked upon the scale. The handle serves to slide 
the level along the bottom of drain. 
Sheltering Vehicles and Machines, 
Notwithstanding the number of carts, and mow¬ 
ing-machines, and horse-rakes, and other tools 
that we see standing by the roadside or in the field, 
the year round, most farmers believe in the econ¬ 
omy of housing all these things. They know that 
iron rusts, and that wood-work swells and shrinks 
with the changes of the atmosphere. They think 
it is only a question of time that the new carriage 
house or shed shall be built, where the scattered 
tools and vehicles will have a permanent home. 
This waiting to provide the needed shelter is 
the most expensive kind of saving. The ele¬ 
ments are all the while at work, depreciating the 
value of the wood and iron that are exposed to the 
weather. A scythe and snathe hung in a tree 
through one season, is old, warped, and rusty. 
Stored in the tool-room it is little changed in look 
or value ; no repairs are wanted, and it is ready for 
use as soon as the grass is ready. The new cart 
that is left by the roadside soon goes to pieces; 
even if painted, the paint soon wears off; the 
sun cracks paint and wood, the heat expands the 
cracks, the rain enters the openings, and decay com¬ 
mences , the joints become loose, the felloes and 
spokes shrink in the dry weather, and the tire must 
be set often to keep the vehicle in running order. 
Farmers often overestimate the expense of a tool 
or wagon house. If they have timber or building 
stone upon their farms, very little money need be 
laid out to put all running gear under cover. A 
roof and siding to keep out rain is the main thing. 
Flooring is not needed. The bare earth under all 
wooden wheels with tires, if dry, will answer instead 
of plank. Just enough moisture is absorbed from 
the earth to keep the wheel in good condition. 
The tire will not need setting so often. A shed set 
upon a bank wall makes a good shelter, and is 
within reach of most farmers. 
The Best Fertilizer. 
How to make a formula for a fertilizer for any 
particular crop or soil, which shall produce satis¬ 
factory results, and at the same time be most eco¬ 
nomical of material—wasting nothing, and using 
only so much as the special case requires—is a most 
difficult question for any one to answer, unless he 
be the best of agricultural chemists, and is 
thoroughly familiar from long experience with the 
land under treatment. Yet, just such information 
as this is what farmers in various sections are con¬ 
tinuously writing to us for. The first part of 
the problem is comparatively easy— i. e., to make 
a fertilizer which shall produce great results—but 
vihat to leave out is a difficult point to settle. Indeed 
we may say, that this is a point which never can be 
settled exactly, so great a difference is there be¬ 
tween adjacent farms and fields, and parts of the 
same field even, or further still in the composition 
of the same spot of ground at different periods. 
But wonderful progress has been made in the solu¬ 
tion of this problem—which involves so much of 
success or failure in agriculture—within the past 
few years, and for the most part has been recorded 
in the American Agriculturist. Here is a letter from 
“ J. W. L.,” of Lancaster County, Pa : 
“ Will you please give me what you consider the best 
formula for making a phosphate for wheat, also tobacco 
and corn, to be used on limestone soil. Farmers in this 
County have generally been making their own, and are 
using more every year with good effect. It is made 
according to the following formula, viz,, for one ton take 
600 lbs. Bone. I 50 lbs. Salt. 
200 “ Oil of Vitriol. | 300 “ Plaster. 
150 “ Sulphate of Soda. 7 bush. Sand or Ashes.” 
10 “ Nitrate of Soda. 
In this case the same fertilizer is used for three 
crops of quite different requirements, yet appar¬ 
ently with like “good effects” on each. Tobacco 
is a great potash feeder, containing about 27 lbs. in 
100 of ash ; while corn contains 30 lbs., and wheat 
34 lbs.; yet this fertilizer contains only what potash 
is in the 7 bushels of ashes—not over 20 lbs. But 
the Lancaster County average tobacco crop of 1,500 
lbs. per acre requires 80 lbs.; and as only 400 lbs. of 
the fertilizer are applied per acre, it only gets 4 lbs., 
and not always that, since the ashes are considered 
of so little importance as to sometimes be replaced 
by sand. Yes, the sand is even named first. The 
same is true of wheat and corn as respects potash, 
though to a less extent. If this fertilizer produces 
satisfactory harvests year after year for each of 
these crops, it is quite evident that the soil where 
it gives such results, does not need potash, for the 
present at least. Yet almost any farm in New Eng¬ 
land, or elsewhere, on which the same sandy-loam 
soil prevails, would show a very different result, 
as potash thereon is one of the essentials. And we 
are inclined to doubt whether the same showing 
