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AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
New-York, Wednesday, July 5, 1854. 
Expiring Subscriptions. —As we have before 
announced, the Agriculturist is sent no longet 
than ordered and paid for; so that any one re 
ceiving the paper need not expect to receive a 
bill for it afterwards. With the last number of 
any subscription we send a notice that the time 
is up, or what is equivalent, we generally send a 
bill for another year. The bill is made out at 
the full price $2 a year. Those belonging to 
clubs will of course remit only the club price. 
An Early Issue. —To give our Printers a 
holiday, this week, and also to allow of some re¬ 
pairs to our Steam Engine, we put our paper to 
press two days earlier than usual; and we hav< 
had less time for preparing choice matter, or 
for guarding against typographical errors. 
Letters from S. and one or two others came 
in too late for this number. 
-- 
Times of Holding State and County 
Shows. —In two or three weeks we wish to com¬ 
mence publishing a list of the times at which 
these various fairs are to be held. Will our 
friends in various parts of the county please 
send us in, at an early date, such information on 
this subject as they may be able to give. 
--• & 6 - 
GREAT BUTTER COWS. 
The Boston Cultivator states that an Alder¬ 
ney cow owned by Mr. Thomas Motley, Jr., of Ja¬ 
maica Plains, produced 51 If lbs. of butter from 
11th May, 1853, to 26th April, 1854, which is 
at the rate of about 1 lb. 7^ oz. per day. Her 
owner says, that it took exactly five quarts ol 
milk to make one pound of butter. This does 
not make the milk of the Alderney so rich as 
that of two Devon heifers belonging to the edi¬ 
tor of the Boston Plowman, Mr. Buckminster, 
which he says produced last October one pound 
of butter for every four quarts of milk. 
We do not intend to dispute the word of 
either of the above gentlemen; but when such 
extraordinary stories are told, it is so easy to 
make mistakes, that the thing should be put 
beyond a question of doubt. For example—the 
milk should be carefully measured in the pre¬ 
sence of two or more intelligent men, and the 
kind of measure, whether wine or beer measure 
be stated. It should then be put away under a 
lock and key. When ready to be skimmed, the 
same persons should be present and measure 
the cream after taken from the milk, and then 
the skimmed milk, to see if the quantity of both 
agree with the first measurement of the new 
milk. Then the cream should be weighed and 
churned in their presence; the butter carefully 
worked, then weighed; then the buttermilk 
weighed, to see if both agreed with the weight 
of the cream. No salt should be allowed to be 
worked in the butter, or if so, it should be 
weighed and recorded. The butter should then 
be taken to the market, and sold in the pres¬ 
ence of two or more market-men. They should 
then give the price at which it sold, and their 
opinion as to its quality. Nothing less than 
this will ever be entirely satisfactory in regard 
to such extraordinary productions. 
A friend of ours who has a first-rate herd of 
Alderney cows, informs us that he gets only one 
pound of butter at best, from between seven and 
eight quarts of milk. The most we ever heard 
of being produced in Great Britain, was one 
oound for six quarts of milk, and the same with 
Devons. 
No one is a greater admirer of pure bred, fine 
cows than we are, and it always gives us great 
pleasure to record evidences of their superiority 
in milk, butter, and beef; but we are heartily 
tired of seeing incredible stories of their doings 
going the rounds of the papers, unless better at¬ 
tested than usual. The standing boast of every 
mawkish speaker and writer on these subjects 
in Massachusetts, is the Oaks cow, and that she 
produced 484£ lbs. of butter in 219 days, which 
is at the rate, within a fraction, of 2 lbs. 3 oz. per 
lay. She must have keen fed on kutter to have 
done this! But what practical man of sense 
believes this statement. True it is recorded in 
the Journal of the Massachusetts Agricultural 
Society; and so it is recorded in the English 
Stud Book, or somewhere else, that the horse 
Firetail, ran a mile in a minute / What sane 
breeder, or trainer, or racer of the blood horse 
of modern days credits this record ? Not one ; 
they know it never was, nor never will be in 
he power of horse flesh to perform such a feat. 
We do not accuse Mr. Oaks of reporting wfiat 
he supposed was an untruth, we simple say, he 
was mistaken in his figures some way. The 
cow never walked that could produce so much 
butter in the time mentioned, and what is more, 
she never will—our readers may depend on 
that. Who can tell what amount of salt was 
added to this butter, or how much buttermilk 
remained in it, which ought to have been worked 
out in order to make it of good marketable 
quality ? 
- 0 - 
SUBTERRANEAN AIR ESSENTIAL TO THE 
GROWTH OE VEGETATION. 
There is now on exhibition at the Crystal 
Palace from Holland, a long pointed iron socket 
attached to a wooden handle, labelled “to pro¬ 
mote the growth of fruit trees.” The mode of 
using is not specified, and we can only conjec¬ 
ture that it is for making holes and breaking up 
the earth around the roots—not a bad idea, we 
think. 
It has seldom occurred to farmers, but is a 
fact, nevertheless, worthy all due consideration, 
that air beneath the surface of the ground, is 
just as essential to the growth of the tree or 
vegetable, as air and light above it. A light or 
porous soil, or a well manured one, which is 
always porous, affords a continued ; though lim 
■ted circulation of air, and thereby secures its 
contact with t.he roots and its fibers. This is 
indispensably requisite to all healthy vegetable 
growth excepting aquatic plants. 
This principle will satisfactorily account for 
the great improvement in crops which follows 
sub-soil draining on compact soils, which seemed 
to be wholly independent of any such aid. It 
is not the quantity of wait: that is thus removed 
which makes the difference, but the augmented 
circulation of air thus introduded through the 
drains; and especially the breaking up and dis¬ 
integration of the heavy soil which is inevitably 
secured by these aerial and humid currents. 
DO KING BIRDS EAT BEES? 
The agricultural papers are discussing this 
knotty question pro and con. Some contend 
with great vehemence that they do, and others 
with equal earnestness that they do not. Now 
both are right and both are wrong, dependent 
entirely by what they understand by the word 
“ bees.” If they mean working bees, then one 
party is mistaken; for we do not believe either 
a king bird, or indeed, any other bird, could 
swallow many of them before they would inev¬ 
itably be stung to death. If they mean drone 
bees, then they are right, as drones have no 
sting, and may be swallowed with impunity. 
We have often seen king birds perch themselves 
on a tree over bee-hives, and as the bees flew 
out, dive, catch, and swallow them. An old 
bee-master informed us that he has frequently 
shot the king birds after doing so, yet never 
found any other than drone bees in their crops. 
We thought this question settled years ago, for 
we well recollect that such an understanding of 
the matter was common among farmers and 
their children when we were boys. 
■-- . 
LARGE SALE OF SHORT-HORN CATTLE. 
Lewis F. Allen, of Buffalo, N. Y., has re¬ 
cently sold his entire herd of Short-horn cattle 
into the State of Indiana. They were about 
sixty in number, of all ages, comprising many 
excellent animals. The descendents of his im¬ 
ported bull, Duke of Exeter, (10,152,) were re¬ 
markably choice. This bull unfortunately died 
last April. Had he lived, his value would pro¬ 
bably have added one thousand dollars or more 
to the amount of the sales. We learn that the 
herd sold in the aggregate for upwards of $9,000. 
We congratulate the enterprising farmers of In¬ 
diana on the acquisition of this important addi¬ 
tion to their stocks of blood cattle, and have lit¬ 
tle doubt that their fullest expectations in im¬ 
provement will be realized. 
Mr. Allen at the same time sold 13 fine 
young South-down rams, and a few Middlesex 
pigs, all which go into the same region of coun¬ 
try, the eastern counties of Indiana. Mr. A., 
having disposed of his Short-horn cattle, will 
continue to breed his Devons, of which he has 
a select herd of about twenty-five, with an im¬ 
ported bull from the herd of Mr. Quartly, one 
of the most celebrated breeders in Devonshire, 
England. He has also a flock of about 150 
choice South-down sheep, which are bred to 
imported rams from the celebrated flock of Mr. 
Webb, of Babraham, England. 
Dutchess County Agricultural Society.— 
We are indebted to Mr. Geo. W. Paine for a list 
of the premiums to be awarded at the next an¬ 
nual show of this Society, which is to be held at 
Washington Hollow, on Tuesday and Wednes¬ 
day, Sept. 2Gth and 27th. The last show we 
attended and reported somewhat at length. It 
was a very fine one, but we are glad to learn 
from several connected with the Society, that 
there is a manifest determination on the part of 
all the members to make the next show excel 
all former ones. We hope this may be the case, 
and that each member will contribute his or 
her individual share of labor and effort to make 
it so. This Society has what few other societies 
have, viz., permanent grounds and buildings al 
