1880.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
A71 
Some Items in Farm Economy. 
The arrangement of the buildings and the divi¬ 
sion of the farm into fields depends so much upon 
the character of the farm, the kind of farming, in¬ 
dividual taste, etc., that it is out of the question 
to have a fixed plan that is the best one for all 
farms of any given size. There are certain general 
Fig. 1.—METHOD OF TYING A FIG. 
principles which should serve as a foundation for 
the arrangement, but the details must necessarily 
vary greatly. For example, if possible the barns 
should be upon a rise of ground where a cellar can 
be built opening to the lower ground at the rear. 
The fields should be so arranged that there shall be 
as little fencing as possible, and so located that all 
the fields can be easily reached from the lane. A 
long field has considerable advantage over one of 
the same area that is square—in the longer “bouts,” 
^and therefore less time spent in turning, plowing, 
harrowing, sowing, harvesting, etc. A pasture 
close to the stables is always handy, and other 
things being equal, the orchard should not be put 
at the rear of the farm, where the 
wood lot had best be located. There 
Is much labor to be saved in having 
every thing so placed—and this ap¬ 
plies to the various details that seem 
trivial at first sight—that there will 
be no extra steps or turns in doing 
the every-day work of the farm. For 
example, many days’ work can be 
saved by having the pump in a handy 
corner of the barn-yard, where the 
stock from a number of yards may 
■come to the troughs. If the matters 
of the farm are not already economi¬ 
cally arranged, it would be well to make such 
charges of fences, buildings, etc., as to finally se¬ 
cure the desired end. By degrees the thoughtful 
farmer will improve his farm until it approximates 
to a model and therefore an economical farm. 
!The New York Agricultural Experiment 
Station. 
The Legislature of the State of New York, at its 
last session, chartered “ an Institution to be known 
as the New York Agricultural Experiment Station,” 
for the purpose of “promoting” Agriculture in its 
■various branches. Its management will be entrusted 
"to a Board, and this Board is to be selected by one 
member being appointed by prominent Agricul¬ 
tural and Horticultural Societies and Clubs, to the 
■number of seven, specified by name—two others to 
ibe appointed by the Board itself, and when the 
dairy interests of the State shall be represented by 
one Society, then, it may appoint one member. 
The Governor of the State and the Director of the 
Station are ex-officio members of the Board. The 
law provides for filling vacancies, for the officers, 
for meetings, etc., defines the powers of the Direc¬ 
tor and of the Board, and appropriates §20,000 for 
two years—as we understand it, §40,000 in all, for 
carrying out the objects—at least, for making a 
beginning. 
There are several provisions in this act which 
seem to indicate that this Institution, intended as it 
obviously is for the good of the whole State, ought 
not to be so centralized as it would be were the 
money to be expended in securing land, fitting up 
experiment fields, stables, dairy rooms, etc., a chemi¬ 
cal laboratory and rooms for scientific men to do 
their work. At the end of two years the results 
would be very meagre, and we can hardly doubt 
that a renewal of the appropriation, or, indeed, any 
appropriation, would be secured with difficulty. 
The fact is, there are now within the State several 
“experiment stations,” so to speak, already under 
way. There is one at Cornell University; and there 
are private farms where accurate experiments have 
been conducted, or where preparation is being care¬ 
fully made for this purpose. We hesitate not to 
say that there are competent men, gentlemen of 
wealth, education, and responsibility, in every 
section of the State who would gladly undertake to 
conduct series of experiments under the inspection 
and direction of the Director of the Experiment 
Station. Furthermore—every large cheese factory, 
every large butter dairy, and every considerable 
nursery are experiment stations, ready furnished 
and manned to do the bidding of the Experiment 
Station, if approached in the right way, and given 
credit for their work. So that a little money spent 
for the actual outlay in case expensive experiments 
are made, would be the only cost that would be 
incurred in this sort of experimental work. 
Hints and Helps for Farmers. 
Tying a Pig. —“J. K.,” Coffeyville, Kansas, 
writes : “In the Nov. American Agriculturist, 1879, 
in the illustration of tying a pig, the rope is right, 
only it should come underneath the pig instead of 
along the back as shown in fig. 1. The rope from 
the neck passing through between the fore legs and 
then around the body. Take one rope out on each 
side of the pig, and stand behind the animal with the 
ropes in your hands. This way of handling a pig 
is much more valuable than it might at first appear. 
Nor is it so cruel as tying by the feet or the snout. 
Try it on your dog with a small rope, and you will 
soon learn its method, security and convenience. 
I often use this method of tying a pig.” 
A Handy Corn Sheller may be made from a 
piece of plank two feet long, two inches thick, and 
! ten inches wide. Drive eight-penny nails pretty 
thickly into the central portion, just so that they 
will not come through, and for a distance of ten 
or twelve inches along the surface of the plank. 
A small strip should be tacked across the upper 
end and on the under side to hold on to the top 
of a box when in use. The corn is shelled by rub¬ 
bing the ears upon the heads of the nails, the board 
resting in a slanting position in the box, as shown 
in fig. 2. We are indebted to a subscriber for 
this device, whose initials, even, we fail to find 
upon the letter which accompanied the sketch. 
A Gate without Hinges.— “One of the read¬ 
ers of the American Agriculturist," Charleston, S. 
Fig. 3.— A NORTH CAROLINA SWINGING GATE WITHOUT HINGES. 
C., sends the drawing of “a gate which is in use 
in Western North Carolina.” It consists of a long 
pole which rests near its middle upon the end of 
one of the posts, with the gate portion framed into 
the part of the pole which extends between the 
posts when the gate is closed. The construction 
of this pivot-gate is better understood from the 
accompanying engraving, fig. 3, than any verbal 
description that can be given. It is quickly and 
cheaply made, and opens and closes with ease. 
Candling Eggs. —Many of our western mer¬ 
chants employ a box for testing their eggs, like the 
Fig. 4.— AN EGG TESTER. 
one shown in the accompanying engraving, fig. 4. 
It is constructed of an empty plug tobacco caddy, 
with two holes for the eggs. A hole is made in the 
top, through which projects the chimney of a com¬ 
mon kerosene lamp, and the box is also provided 
with a suitable door on the back to insert the lamp. 
The egg-tester is set on the edge of a box or table 
of convenient hight. By using both hands, an egg 
in each, a gross can be tested about as fast as one 
can count. The work should be done in a dark cel¬ 
lar, or darkened room, a place being provided for 
each grade of eggs, which may be known as clear, 
cracked, specked, and worthless. J. L. T. 
Splitting Wood.— Seeing a boy trying his best 
to split a section of wood, which would not yield to 
his axe, I showed him an old method, by which 
he readily split it. He struck “ fair and square ” 
many times in the same place, but did not twist his 
helve at the moment of striking the wood. The 
secret of split¬ 
ting is simply to 
“flop” the axe, 
thus making use 
of the poll of the 
axe as a lever the 
moment it en¬ 
ters. While this 
method seems to 
be pretty gener¬ 
ally known to the 
woodsmen of the 
Central and New 
England States, 
the choppers of 
the West and 
South, and all old 
countrymen that 
have come under 
my observation, 
know nothing of 
it whatever ; fre¬ 
quently striking 
a dozen times, 
where one well 
directed blow with a “ twist of the wrist ” would 
readily part the stick. I find this motion very 
effective in splitting our western maple, cedar, 
balsam, and other tough woods. J. L. T. 
Worn-Out Soil.— The quickest and cheapest 
way to bring up a soil that is naturally poor or par¬ 
tially exhausted from over cropping, is to get some 
crop that is a “close feeder,”—one that will take 
up the scattered food rapidly—to grow upon it. 
