120 
Culbertson’s dry clay brick machine. 
to $10 and $15 per acre, according to its location. 
But the unhealthiness of the climate is a serious 
objection, unless he goes there with capital enough 
so that he can afford to leave in the sickly season. 
I believe that many of your northern farmers, with 
ten thousand dollars well invested in land upon 
some of those rivers, with their systems, energy, 
and industry, would, after spending all the sickly 
seasons away, have more money left at the end of 
the year than they would with the same amount 
invested at the north, at the present price of land 
there. The leaving his farm some two or three 
months in a year to the management of an overseer, 
may not at first be favorably received by your 
northern man, but when he considers that his 
wheat is harvested and probably threshed, and his 
corn crop is laid by and made before the sickly 
season commences, he will see that his services can 
be spared at that time as well as at any other in the 
year ; and furthermore, that many of the best culti¬ 
vated farms in Virginia are thus deserted by their 
owners every year. The health of this region will 
undoubtedly improve as the land is cleared and 
marled, marshes drained, &c., and perhaps your 
readers are not aware that not more than one-third 
of this whole region is cleared. 
I fear that I have taxed you and your readers’ 
patience with this long and imperfect article ; but I 
feel that I have hardly done justice to the subject, 
even with the space I have occupied. L. 
CULBERTSON’S DRY CLAY BRICK MACHINE. 
Dry Clay Brick Press. — Fig. 26 
Various efforts have been made in this and other 
countries to apply machinery to the manufacture of 
bricks, for the purpose not only of economizing 
time and labor in the process, but to secure an ex¬ 
actness of shape and edge not attainable in mould¬ 
ing by hand. In these experiments the practicability 
of making bricks by compressing clay in its crude 
state appears to have been fully tested by a machine 
recently patented by Mr. T. Culbertson, and now 
in operation in Cincinnati. This machine is driven 
by a steam-engine not exceeding six horse power, 
attended by 12 to 15 men, according to the difficulty 
of digging the clay, who can make and stack in the 
kiln, ready for burning, from the undug clay, 3,000 
bricks per hour, at a cost of 50 to 60 cents a thou¬ 
sand. These bricks may be burnt with wood, or 
by hard or soft coal with a blower attached to the 
engine, which, together with one of the machines* 
will be put in operation in or near this city early 
in May. 
NEW YORK FARMERS’ CLUB. 
Soiling of Cattle .—The most important subject 
discussed by this club since our last report was on 
the soiling of cattle. 
Dr. H. A. Field read an elaborate paper on the 
subject, after which he remarked that he felt incom¬ 
petent to express himself as he wished. He said 
that the cows on his farm were kept in warm 
stables during the winter, where, by attention to 
this circumstance, and giving them proper food, 
they afforded a continual supply of milk. He re¬ 
commended the parsnip for early spring feeding, 
which he said has great advantage over other root- 
crops, as it is not necessary to harvest it in the fall, 
for it is not destroyed by exposure to the frost, but 
is rather improved in being left all winter in the 
ground. He said, as the question of soiling, in 
reference to its attendant expenses and profits, in 
different parts of the country, is imperfectly under¬ 
stood, and as it is necessary that the subject should 
be systematically pursued, he would offer the fol¬ 
lowing resolution:— 
Resolved , That a Committee be appointed by the 
club for the purpose of making comparative esti¬ 
mates of the expenses and profits of soiling, or stall- 
feeding cows in the southern district of New York— 
with the modes of treatment, nature and application 
of food employed,—to report at the National Con¬ 
vention of Farmers, Gardeners, &c., to be held in 
this city, at the next annual Fair of the American 
Institute. 
The Resolution was unanimously adopted. 
The Committee was appointed by the Chairman, 
viz:—R. L. Pell, Dr. H. A. Field, Dr. R. T. Under¬ 
hill, Judge Van VVyck, and J. L. Hyde. 
