FOREIGN AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 
371 
FOREIGN AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 
By the steamship Britannia we are in receipt of our 
European journals to the 5lh of November. 
Markets. — Ashes. The business in Pots has been 
comparatively trifling the past month, though at a slightly 
advanced rate; Pearls have been brisk, and consider¬ 
able transactions in them. Cotton remains the same as 
at our last, and the sales languid; if any change should 
take place, the market evidently portends a trifling 
reduction. Stock on hand at Liverpool, on the 1st of 
November, 854,000 bales, against 716,000 at same 
period last year, jFlour has advanced 6d. per barrel. 
Provisions. American Beef is in great favor in Eng¬ 
land, 2,700 tierces having been sold the past month, an 
amount considerably greater than during any similar 
period since we commenced exportations. The stock 
on hand was light. We have only to exercise a little 
more care in cutting and putting up our beef, to monop¬ 
olize the British market. Pork is less in demand. The 
reason of this simply is, our hogs packed for the English 
market are too large and too fat. They want nothing 
there to exceed 200 lbs. weight, and wish the fat on the 
sides well intermixed with lean, such as a partially 
fatted young Berkshire usually makes. Lard in good 
request, and has slightly advanced. Tallow, fair sales. 
Cheese is very active, the demand thus far exceeding the 
supply. Kentucky Hemp of a good quality is quoted 
at <£27 ($131) per ton. Indian Corn 25s. per quarter 
(75 cents per bushel). Rice without change. Tur¬ 
pentine, an important advance. Tobacco dull. 
Money was in more demand, and the rates of discount 
had advanced from 2£ to 3 per cent. 
American Stocks. Nothing doing worthy of notice. 
Trade was very active, the manufacturers having 
more orders for three months to come than they can 
supply. 
The Weather for seed sowing was propitious, and it 
is anticipated that a greater breadth of wheat will be 
sown this year than ever yet known in the British isles. 
A good growth of aftermath had followed the excessive 
drought, which has lessened the price of hay. 
Professor Liebig. —This distinguished chemist has 
been making another visit to Great Britain, and was 
hospitably received wherever he went. He made an 
admirable speech at a public dinner given him at Glas¬ 
gow, and has now returned to Germany, the duties of 
his professorship forbidding a longer stay abroad. We 
wish he might be tempted to take a trip to the United 
States another year. 
Smut in Wheat. —The opinion which now obtains 
is, that the disease is produced by the minute seeds of 
a parasitic fungus, which, being carried by the wind, 
enter the plant by the fine openings of the epidermis or 
outer skin, and are propelled by the rising juices to 
every part of it, and eventually convert the recently 
formed grain into a useless and injurious mass. 
Prairie Roses. —This is a new group of climbing 
roses, which promises to be of much interest. Mr. 
Samuel Feast, of Baltimore, U. S., has had the pleasure 
of raising the abovenamed varieties from the seed of 
the single Michigan rose, rosa rubifolia; they are all of 
vigorous habits, making shoots in one season more than 
12 feet in length. No. 3 is the most perfect and beautiful 
of the whole, giving clusters of flowers containing from 
twelve to twenty each ; at first they are finely cupped; 
in a day or two they become imbricated, like those of the 
Duke of Devonsire. It seems to resist the hottest sun¬ 
shine, and the flowers remain on the plant for a longer 
period than usual with any other rose : in wet weather, 
however, they are not at all bright in color, as was the 
case with some that bloomed the past summer; this has 
been named also Beauty of the Prairies. Rivers is that 
name given to it by Mr. Feast. No. 2 only occasionally 
gives autumnal flowers. No. 1, owing to most of the 
imported plants dying, is more scarce than the other 
varieties. AU these roses are perfectly hardy; they 
will form fine pillars and pendulous standards.— Cata¬ 
logue of Selected Roses by T. Rivers. 
Von ThaePs celebrated System of Agriculture has 
been translated by Messrs. Shaw & Johnson, and will 
soon be issued from the London press. 
Stock in Western Australia in 1842.—-Horses, 1,096; 
horned cattle, 4,122; sheep, 60,380; goats, 5,613; 
swine, 1,913; English population, 3,649. 
Horses for Germany. — Several large exportations 
have just been made to Germany, selected principally 
from Yorkshire. 
Test for Sulphate of Ammonia. —Heat a piece of 
iron to a moderately red heat, and having placed upon 
it a small quantity of the sulphate of ammonia, if the 
same be genuine, it will immediately all volatilize; if 
not genuine, the impurities will remain. This simple 
method can be easily applied by every one, and will be 
the means of saving farmers from frauds. 
Comparative Value of the Potato. —One hundred 
pounds of potatoes are equal, for nutriment, to: 
Meat without bone, - 
lbs. 
25 
Beans, - 
- 2$ 
Wheaten Bread, - 
35 
Parsnips and Carrots, - 
- 190 
Turneps, - 
- 300 
Cabbage, - 
- 400 
The experiments of Berry & Herring 
establish the 
fact that 3 lbs. of potatoes are equal for nourishment to 
12 ounces of bread and 5 ounces of meat. 
Value of Irrigation. —A small field of poor and 
almost valueless land in Scotland being irrigated, the 
second year the burthen on an imperial acre being 
weighed, it was found to have yielded 9,680 lbs. of 
well dried hay. 
Hints to Lovers of Flowers. —A most beautiful and 
easily attained show of evergreens in winter may be had 
by a very simple plan, which has been found to answer 
remarkably well on a small scale. If geranium 
branches are taken from healthy and luxuriant trees 
just before the winter sets in, cut as for slips, and im¬ 
mersed in soap and water, they will, after drooping for 
a few days, shed their leaves, put forth fresh ones, and 
continue in the finest vigor all the winter. By placing 
a number of bottles thus filled in flower baskets, with 
moss to conceal the bottles, a show of evergreens is 
easily ensured for a whole season. They require no 
fresh water. 
Earliest Known Potatoes.— Mr. Sterling of Kenmure, 
Scotland, states, that seedling potatoes were raised by 
Gerard, the English botanist, in 1590. This is 20 years 
earlier than they were introduced into Ireland by Sir 
Walter Raleigh. 
Chinese Pmltry Yards.— Immense numbers of ducks 
are reared by that part of the Chinese population who 
spend their lives in boats upon the rivers; and these 
birds, salted and dried, form one of the chief articles of 
diet in the celestial land. They are kept in large cages 
or crates, from which, in the morning, they are sent 
forth to seek their food upon the river banks. 
A Great Layer. —A small common hen, the property 
of Mr. Grierson, slater, Dunbar, has, from the com¬ 
mencement of the laying season last spring till the 
close of the present harvest, produced the wonderful 
number of two hundred and eight eggs. 
