36 
[February, 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
seldom found them profitable ; but the other 
kind pay well. Our advice then is to drive down 
the stakes a little deeper where you are. and per¬ 
severe until you conquer. Such a conquest is 
glorious. We had rather take such a man by the 
hand than the Governor of a State, or a Member 
of Congress. He has the stuff in him to rule an 
empire; for, as a successful farmer, he has al¬ 
ready conquered a small one. 
- •— ——■»«— - »-»-- 
What of the Apple Pie Melon ? 
We can hardly answer, Some unknown friend 
6ent to our office a large specimen, just as the 
Dec. No. went to press. It was taken home and 
cooked as per directions given in October. The 
pies were fair, but not quite equal to the genuine 
apple. They would pass very well, however, 
where apples could not be got, and when seed can 
be obtained without paying too much for it, we 
would not discourage planting. We attempted to 
raise a quantity the past year, but had poor suc¬ 
cess. Not more than five in a hundred came up. 
Those that did, made a good growth of vine, but 
no fruit set until too late for it to mature. An 
associate secured a large growth of vine, and a 
small yield of mature melons of fair size. Others 
tell of getting six to ten large melons from a single 
plant. This is all we can say of it yet. 
--► ----«-- 
How our Forests are being Preserved. 
In the older States it is a sad spectacle to see 
the waning of the woodlands. One can hardly 
visit the home of his youth after an absence of 
twenty years, without missing some favorite for¬ 
est haunt of his boyhood. The chestnut trees he 
used to climb, to shake down the nuts in the frosty 
mornings of Autumn, the tall walnuts from which 
he shot the squirrels, are as dead as the game he 
killed in his youth. There is a barren rocky pas¬ 
ture on the very ground once shaded with oaks 
and elms, and desolation reigns amid the scenes 
of former splendor and glory. One Gan but de¬ 
plore the fall of these forest monarchs, and the 
clearing up of lands that a wise economy would 
always keep in wood. They are too rocky for 
tillage, while other lands in the same neighbor¬ 
hood, free from alone can be had in any desira¬ 
ble quantity for a few dollars an acre. 
The introduction of steamboats and railroads, 
the increase of our population, and the wasteful 
methods of cutting and using fuel, are among the 
chief causes of this waning of our forests. The 
evil reached its bight in New-England, and in the 
middle States some fifteen years ago. There are 
now symptoms of amelio'ration, and with the dif¬ 
fusion of knowledge upon the proper treatment of 
forests, the evil we trust will be arrested, and 
these auxiliaries to good husbandry will be pre¬ 
served. If the forests in the States we have in¬ 
dicated, were properly located, it would not be 
desirable for farming purposes that they should 
ever be diminished. The land already in tillage 
would yield larger crops in a series of years, than 
the whole land would yield stripped of its forests. 
The importance of shelter from the prevailing 
winds of Winter and Spring, is beginning to be 
understood. Woods also upon the high lands are 
reservoirs of water, and have much to do with 
the equal distribution of rain and moisture through 
the Summer. Dumber is increasing in price, and 
the owners of woodland find it an object to hus¬ 
band the timber that was once devoted to the fire. 
The introduction of coal has had a very im¬ 
portant inlluence in saving the woodlands. The 
steamboats upon tide water, that once used wood 
altogether for fuel, now use coal exclusively. 
The locomotives are beginning to look in the 
same direction, and we trust the day is not dis¬ 
tant when coal will supply this want on all our 
railways. The cities and villages on navigable 
waters, and many of those on our railroads, are 
already supplied with their fuel from the coal 
mines. 
But the working of our iron mines has be¬ 
friended our forests even more than coal. Stoves 
and fire frames of all shapes and sizes to save 
fuel, have been introduced extensively into all 
parts of the union. There is hardly any depart¬ 
ment of human effort where more brain work has 
been expended, than in these contrivances for 
economizing fuel. The greatest amount of heat 
with the least expenditure of fuel, has been the 
problem that has absorbed the attention of the 
nation for the last twenty years. It has received 
the notice of men of science and practical skill, 
of reverend divines, and college professors. It 
has been often solved, and every new stove, fur¬ 
nace, or range, brought out in this time, has been, 
in the esteem of its inventor, the solution of the 
problem—the nc plus ultra of heating apparatus. 
With all the failures, and they have been many, 
there has been immense saving in the consump¬ 
tion of fuel. Au average farmer's family does not 
use one fourth the fuel consumed fifty years ago. 
Besides these sources of economy in the use 
of wood, there has been a very great improve¬ 
ment in the construction of our houses. Both in 
their arrangement,and in the thoroughness of their 
building there is a marked advance upon the 
old style of farm house. The chimney has shrunk 
into comely proportions, and no longer takes up a 
fourth part of the house.—Ventilation is no long¬ 
er provided for through the doors, windows, and 
chimney flue, but is regulated by a register. The 
joiner’s art has wonderfully improved, and win¬ 
dows let in light without air, and doors only let in 
the wind by special request when open. The heat 
is saved for in-door use, instead of passing off 
into the atmosphere. 
The use of coal, of stoves, ranges, and fur¬ 
naces, and improved dwellings, all tend to save 
the forest, and the farmer, who finds his wood¬ 
land decreasing, may possibly rind a remedy in 
one or all of these expedients. Many farmers in 
the vicinity of seaports, and near navigable wa¬ 
ters, can now heat their dwellings cheaper, with 
coal, than with wood. The innovation has al¬ 
ready commenced. A good stove for the kitchen 
or parlor will often save its cost in fuel in a 
single season. The carpenter’s bill for repairing an 
old house, putting in tight windows, doors, and 
floors may be paid by the saving in fuel in a 
few years. Wood at four dollars a cord, and two 
more for tho labor of cutting and fitting for the 
fire, soon sums up to a hundred dollars. 
But there is another influence at work, more 
important than any of these, in its bearing upon 
the preservation of the forest. The great plea 
for clearing woodland has always been the 
need of more land for the purpose of tillage. 
The farmer has found his old lands under the 
skinning system of cultivation, continually run¬ 
ning down, and he has looked to the new lands, 
covered with wood, as his only resource to keep 
up the productiveness of his farm to the old 
standard. Now it has been discovered that the 
old acres, by deeper plowing and higher manuring, 
can he made to double or treble their crops at 
the farmer’s pleasure, so that he has no need to 
enlarge the surface of his plowed fields, hut only 
to deepen them. Thousands upon thousands are 
acting upon this suggestion, and thorough tillage 
is now actually doing more for the minds of our 
farmers than it is for their farms, great as the 
change is. Multitudes have waked up to a new 
existence within the last few years, and begin to 
have unbounded faith in the capacity of their acres 
to produce food for man and beast. Three tuns 
of hay to the acre, eighty bushels of corn, two 
hundred of potatoes, thirty of rye and of wheat, 
a thousand of carrots and of turnips, are the every 
day facts of improved husbandry. We do not 
want more acres under the plow, but the plow- 
more under the acres we already have. Thor¬ 
ough tillage will give us bread enough and to 
spare, and save the forests. 
For the American Agriculturist. 
Country Burying Grounds. 
“A sleeping place ” is the signification of the 
Greek word ( hoirmeterion) from which is derived 
our term Cemetery—a designation at once appro¬ 
priate and suggestive, and exhibiting the taste 
which marked that refined people. In many sec¬ 
tions, burial grounds resemble anything but sleep¬ 
ing places. Situated often in some waste corner, 
where thistles, brambles, and other foul weeds 
find a secure shelter, or upon a bleak hill side 
where nothing will grow, surrounded by dilapi¬ 
dated fences, and defaced by mutilated head¬ 
stones, they look as if contrived purposely to 
highten the gloom of the grave, and to make 
Death still more an object of terror. No wonder 
the frightened school-boy hurries past such a des¬ 
olate place, and is haunted with fear at the pros¬ 
pect of being finally deposited there. Where 
grounds are thus generally neglected, those who 
would love to adorn the graves of their kindred 
are deterred from the attempt, or if trees are set, 
and flowers planted, marauding sheep and envi¬ 
ous weeds soon destroy the tokens of affection. 
Private plots are sometimes set apart upon the 
farm, where each family may see that at least 
decent respect is shown to the memory of rela. 
tives. But farms frequently change owners, and 
these spots, once held sacred, are regarded as in¬ 
cumbrances and eye sores by the new occupant, 
who can scarcely be expected to keep them as 
they should be kept. This common neglect ot 
rural cemeteries has been called “ heathenish," 
hut i he Greeks, the Romans, and the Egyptians 
committed no such barbarism. Their cemeteries, 
where burning of the dead was not practiced, 
were beautified and made attractive, and the re¬ 
mains of their friends were in all cases preserved 
with scrupulous care. 
Latterly the subject is receiving more general 
attention. .New-York, Boston, Philadelphia, and 
most large cities in (he United States have now 
extensive grounds dedicated to this purpose, prop¬ 
erly laid out and beautified, and numerous vil¬ 
lages are doing the same thing. In rural dis¬ 
tricts, where land is comparatively cheap, it is 
easy to carry out such an enterprise—it only 
needs some one to start it. After the matter has 
been presented to individuals, let a meeting he 
called for discussion, and a committee appointed 
t,o> report upon a site, probable cost, etc. At sub¬ 
sequent meetings it. can be ascertained how many, 
and whether enough, will take plots sufficient to 
warrant purchasing land. Much difficulty will 
be avoided by having this paid for at the start; 
then the future income can be devoted to regu¬ 
lating, setting out trees, and keeping in order. In 
many instances grounds already occupied, are 
suitable, and only need improvement. There is 
no reason why the cemetery may not thus be 
made a most ornamental and attractive spot, but 
every reason in its favor. A frequent walk 
among the memorials of the loved dead will re¬ 
call lessons too often forgotlon, and the thoughts 
of the departed will be all the pleasanter when 
