2 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[January, 
Contents of this Number. 
[Artjcles marked with a star (*) are illustrated; the fig¬ 
ure with the star indicates the number of illustrations.! 
Among the Farmers, No. 60.—Home Building—The 
Exposure—Chimneys and Fuel.*..14-15 
Apples, About New .23 
Barometer, Explaining the, and its Uses.3*.. 7 
Boots, Water-proof .14 
Bee Notes, for January. .A*. .34 
Bees, Stingless .5*..36 
Bob Sleds, Home Made.*..15 
Boys and Girls’ Columns:— The Doctor's Talks: 
—About Your Eyes—Gigantic Water Bug—Bread 
Made of Insects’ Eggs—Pigeon Tremex—Ichneumon 
Flies. Our Puzzle Box. Tricks with Strings. A 
Wonderful Clock. Proverb Picture Puzzle. The 
Knight Templar Rock. The Doctor's Correspondence: 
—The Swiss Village of Interlaken, and View of the 
Jungfrau.8*. .26-28 
Bricks, Specimens of.36 
Castle Garden, A View of .*.. 1 
Chilblains.33 
Corn, The Cuzco, or Peruvian.4*.. 9 
Feverfew, The Marsh—“ Marguerite ”.*. .22 
Floor, Barn Strengthening.3*.. 14 
Food, Cooking, Scalding Hogs.*.. 6 
Fowls, Water for, in Winter. *.. 9 
Foxes’Skins . 15 
Furnaces, Hot-Air, the Most Useful.*..35 
Gate, “A “ Self-Opening”.*..17 
Gauge, A Rail Fence.2*.. 15 
Harrow and Smoother Combined.*.. 7 
Harrow, The Monroe Rotary.*..19-20 
Horse Clothing.4*.. 11 
Houghton Farm—Purposes and Plans ... 8 
House, A Country Cottage, Costing $1,600 .5*. .12 
Household : —Popper Freshly Ground. Home Made 
Earth Closets. To Keep and Use the Apples. Home 
Topics /—How to Treat Frost Bites—Winter Butter. 
A Water Guard. New Recipes. Cooking a Tur- 
i_ nrr_;_O A c 
key. Mixing Bread with a Machine.6*.. 24-25 
Humbugs, Sundry.35 
Ice, Loading, with a Team.*. .18 
Information, Seasonable.36 
Ivy in the House.. .*. .23 
Iiong Island, About.*..11 
Luncheon for Horses.4*..16 
Maple, Wier’s Cut-Leaved.....2*. .21 
Markets—Commercial Matters, etc .38 
Medicines, Secret.83 
Milk Tester, A New.*..16 
Milking Stool, A handy.*..15 
Notes from the Pines:—Paris Flower Market—Plants 
for House Decoration—Paris Vegetable Market. .22-23 
Notes on Orchard and Garden Work.2*..4-5 
Orchard, How to Start with little Money.4*.. 6 
Pea, New Dwarf—“American Wonder”.*..21 
Pears, Seedling.23 
Ponies, American-Bred Shetland.,.*..13 
Potato Bug and Tobacco Smoke.*..19 
Postal Items:—Lost Letters .34 
Potatoes, English, and Potato Shows.*..19 
Push, The Snow. *..17 
Rack, A Hay, for a Cart.*. .19 
Scab in Sheep: Its Remedies .. .3*.. 18 
Science Applied to Farming.5*. .10 
Seed, Vitality of.33 
Sheep, Racks and Troughs for.4*.. 18 
Sheep, The Flat-Tailed.*.. 15 
Shows, Poultry, for January.38 
Sled, How to Make a Flat-Bottom.2* . .16 
Stump-Puller, A Capstan .4..19 
Suggestions for the Work of the Month.9*. .2 
Tim Bunker on Value of Apples as Foodfor Stock. .. 8 
Wagon, A “Buck-Board”.*..17 
Wagons, Conversion of, into Sleds.4*.. 7 
Water we Need, and How we Get It.*..17 
Well, Bottom of a..2*..36 
t£ir‘ See pages 33, 3G, and 38 for Publisher’s 
Business Items,” Postage Rates, etc. 
IESP“ See page 42 for Subscription Terms, etc. 
See especially now on page 37 about 
Books and other special offers, premiums, etc., etc. 
Owing to the necessity of sending part of the 
middle pages to press in advance of the other sheets, 
considerable good reading and other matters are thrown 
over to pages 83 to 88. These pages will bo found none 
the less valuable because chancing to follow some of the 
business or advertising pages. 
The Illustrative Engravings and Sketches in the 
reading pages of this number count up over One Hundred , 
including the center and four corner sketches of the 
first Cover Page, which are new in every successive 
number. Besides the above, which belong to the reading 
pages proper, there are a great number of well printed 
engravings all through the advertising pages which are 
interesting to examine, and often instructive. 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
NEW YORK, JANUARY, 1881. 
Suggestions of and for the Season. 
Farmers, Gardeners, Stock-raisers, Fruit- 
Growers and Dairymen, are no less “man¬ 
ufacturers ” than are the makers of cloth, and 
of a thousand other products resulting from 
the application of labor and skill to raw mate¬ 
rials. By mechanically preparing the soil, 
sowing seed, cultivating and gathering, we ob¬ 
tain grain, hay, cotton, grass, roots, veget¬ 
ables, fruits and flowers, from the raw materi¬ 
als in the soil and the elements supplied by 
air and water—aided by the sun’s heat and 
light. From the grass, hay, grain and roots 
we manufacture meats and daily products, 
using animals as the machines. After ob¬ 
taining the perfected results, the producers 
become merchants or traders when exchang¬ 
ing the surplus, not needed in home consump¬ 
tion, for money or other articles. Dealers, 
shippers, transporters, exporters and im¬ 
porters, increase the value of raw or manu¬ 
factured materials by taking them from 
the places where they are less wanted to 
those where they are more wanted. 
In brief, all the above classes are occupied 
in producing articles of value from those of 
no intrinsic value, as grain from mold of the 
soil; or in increasing the value of articles by 
change of form or change of location. And 
all are equally pursuing a praiseworthy occu¬ 
pation, and they and their work are alike 
honorable, if they are equally honest and in¬ 
dustrious. All the talk, or thoughts harbored, 
about the occupation of a merchant, or manu¬ 
facturer, or importer, being higher or more 
honorable or even more desirable than that 
of a farmer, are fallacious and misleading. 
The glare and glamour arising from the fact 
that now and then a merchant, not one in 
a thousand, secures large wealth by a favora¬ 
ble combination of circumstances and by ex¬ 
tensive operations, should not blind us to the 
fact that, in proportion to the numbers en¬ 
gaged, a hundred times more farmers than 
merchants advance to independence if not to 
great wealth. Ninety-five out of every hun¬ 
dred who enter upon a mercantile life fail, or 
do not rise above the condition of drudging 
employees, with a bare subsistence not one 
whit better than is enjoyed by the lowest 
farm laborer. While on the contrary few 
who earnestly follow agricultural pursuits fail 
to secure, at least comfortable food and cloth¬ 
ing and lodging, for themselves and families. 
The false notions, above indicated, are a 
great bar to the best success in farming and 
kindred pursuits. We all expect the manu¬ 
facturer and merchant to put into practice 
business habits and ideas; to study into 
the best modes and appliances, to be wide 
awake to what others are doing in the same 
line. But somehow, while not always pub¬ 
licly admitted or allowed, the farmer and his 
family harbor the idea, and unfortunately act 
upon it, that their occupation is of a lower 
grade, a sort of inferior manual labor em¬ 
ployment, endured as a necessity rather than 
from choice—a machine life, affording little 
opportunity for exercising thought, skill, en¬ 
terprise, study, improvement, or for the emi¬ 
nent success that comes to other pursuits. As 
a rule, they are secretly gratified if a son has 
an opening in a merchant’s establishment, or 
a daughter is affianced to the scion of a fam¬ 
ily in mercantile pursuits. This false feeling 
is a drag upon the energies, the self con¬ 
fidence, the cheerfulness, the ambition, the 
study, the progress, that should be mani¬ 
fested in the life and work of every cultiva¬ 
tor of the soil, whether of a few still unpaid 
for acres, or of the larger farm. 
At the beginning of this new year, let us 
start with a just appreciation of our occupa¬ 
tion, a determination to make the best of it, 
to deserve the highest success, which is the 
next best thing to actually achieving it, even 
if we fail to do so. 
In our position of farm manufacturers and 
merchants, it is well to take account of stock ; : 
to figure up and put down on paper, in some 
form however simple, a catalogue of every¬ 
thing we have, small and large, with its 
present value, indeed every implement, 
every animal, produce and cash on hand and 
dues to us, the farm itself, each field and the 
value invested in growing winter crops upon 
it, etc. On the other hand, set down every 
liability, and strike a balance. One great 
effort of the coming twelve months will be to 
increase the stock on hand, and decrease the 
liabilities. If not done hitherto, begin with 
January 1, to note down, each day, every 
transaction, the work of the day, what is 
sold or bought, of or to whom, and its price, 
whether paid for or not, etc. The writer of 
this kept such a journal, on a farm of 238 
acres, from the age of 14 years onward. At 
first it was only written on foolscap sheets. 
A rough plot of the fields was made and each, 
one numbered, and the amount of plowing 
and sowing, seed, manure, etc., expended on 
each and every field were written down at 
night. All the larger animals were named. 
The sheep, swine, and poultry, too numerous 
to name, were classified for reference. In 
brief, everything on the farm was noted 
down on paper, and everything done or trans¬ 
piring was daily entered with the pen. It 
furnished entertainment, and the sheets be¬ 
came valuable for reference in many cases. 
A simple style of farm book-keeping grew 
out of it, which was of decided utility: but 
we will leave that for the present. We 
would be exceedingly pleased to know that 
every farm reader of this, or some one in his 
family, would start such a complete memo¬ 
randum, beginning January 1, 1881. We 
know its usefulness by experience, and what 
good it leads to. 
Let one of the first plans for the year be to 
secure more knowledge about our occupation. 
Certainly we each know some things that 
others do not, and every other man knows 
some things that we do not. Writing and 
talking with others, the talks at farmers’ club 
meetings and conventions, what others think 
and say, as given in books and papers, are all 
sources of new ideas. Let the head help the 
hands by better thinking and better plans. 
One can not talk with an intelligent neigh¬ 
bor, or read a farm book, or farm paper, with¬ 
out getting some new idea, or suggestion, 
that will help his own thinking and planning.. 
Well, along with the above, we must look 
after the work in hand. The farm animals 
are the chief care at this season, generally; 
not merely to get them through winter, but 
in the best condition, and to do this at th@ 
