AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST* 
341 
ru w >mm weaaaawBg 
common, for blackberry pudding is a favor¬ 
ite dish here.— Nantucket Inquirer, 
CURRY. 
The question is often asked, what is Cur¬ 
ry'? If one may judge from its frequency, it 
is worth answering in print. And the an¬ 
swer may be useful; for variety in the 
modes of preparing food is conducive to 
economy. 
Curry is a pungent gravy, made to eai 
with bread or boiled rice. It is prepared in 
a great variety of ways—with fowl, meat, 
fish or vegetables. Sufficient butter to form 
the basis of the gravy is taken to begin with. 
Green ginger, coriander seeds, red pepper 
turmeric, onions, mace, cinnamon, and an) 
thing else that people fancy, and in propor 
tions that they fancy or can afford, are 
ground all together fine, and browned in the 
butter. Then water is put in ; and the fowl, 
or meat, or fish, or green cucumber, or green 
beans, or whatever one likes or can get, is 
cut small and putin and fried and simmer 
ed till the water is nearly all dried away and 
the meat cooked thoroughly. The rice, when 
that is eaten with the curry, should be so 
boiled as to be light, and not a soft mass. 
Then take a plateful of it, and put two spoons 
ful of the curry on it, and eat it with a desert 
spoon, making the curry a mere seasoning 
for the rice, and not the .rice a mere mitiga¬ 
tion of the curry. It may be eaten with 
Graham bread, and renders it very palatable. 
It is a nice dish for hot weather—the smell 
of it excites appetite in dog days, and the 
excitement of the power of the stomach is 
decided. It is easly digested. It will often 
save a joint of meat; and may well be made 
from the pickings that come of yesterday’s 
mutton bone. A few mistakes will teach 
any housewife to make it exactly to her 
family’s taste, by varying the seasoning. 
Oil of mustard seed is often used in India 
instead of part of the butter—a very agree¬ 
able, and only slightly pungent article. 
Hominy is becoming decidedly and de¬ 
servedly popular in America. YVith the help 
of curry it might be made almost the whole 
dinner occasionally. 
Curry in some form is always eaten with 
his rice by the Bengalee, and with his bread 
by the Hindustanee ; and it generally forms 
p irt of English dinners in India.— Rev. J. W. 
Warren, Missionary in Agra, Northern India, 
in Pittsburg Dispatch. 
How to Mend a Chain Pump. —Chain pumps 
are.very much in use at present. They are 
very good pumps, especially in wells that are 
not protected much from the frost, as they 
seldom get frozen so as to prevent their 
operating, unless the water in the well itself 
freezes. Sometimes, however, the chain 
breaks or parts, and then it has been thought 
necessary to take up the whole pump in or- 
dsr to mend and replace it. A friend told us 
t ie other day, a method which he has adop¬ 
ted in such cases with perfect success. The 
chain with its plugs, you know, is an endless 
one, going over a pully at the top, down out¬ 
side the pump into the water in the well, then 
over the pully under the water at the lower 
end of the pump tube, thence up the tube. 
Now if the chain parts, it is difficult getting 
one end over the lower pully and up to the 
other side unless you take up the pump to 
do it. 
Take a strong string of sufficient length to 
reach from the bottom of the lower pulley to 
the surface of the water in the well; tie a 
cork to one end of it and tie the other to the 
chain. Then winding the string round the 
cork, put it into the tube and let the chain 
follow it down. As soon as it gets down 
under the pully, the cork will rise to the top 
of the water in the well, from which it may 
be hooked up. The chain will be hauled up 
by the string, and the two ends may be fas¬ 
tened together in the usual way.— Maine 
Farmer. _ 
GAS LIME. 
In the spring of 1853, a lot in this vicinity 
was filled up some two feet or more, with 
earth from a hill side, and was covered with 
grass sods, without any soil or manure ol 
any kind, being put beneath them—the'grass 
was watered occasionally, during the dry, 
hot season, but presented a very sickly ap¬ 
pearance. 
Jn the autum of that year, it was covered 
with refuse lime from the gas works, and 
■luring last summer, it produced a most lux¬ 
uriant growth of green gras, [Poa pratensis] 
and now, without any other application, is 
as pretty a sod, as any one need wish to see. 
In consequence of this experiment, I cov. 
ered my own grounds last fall with it, and 
notwithstanding the cold, backward season, 
I had on the 14th inst., a stout swarth taken 
from them, the grass being of a much deeper, 
and more healthy green than heretofore. 1 
have also tried it in compost, with sufficient 
encouragement to repeat the trial, but it is 
more difficult to form a correct judgemem 
of its effect when combined with other ma¬ 
nures, than when it is applied per se. 
I have seen no analysis of the refuse lime, 
produced by the gas works at this place, bin 
that it does contain, as suggested by the Ag¬ 
riculturist, a large per cantage of caustic 
lime, (hydrate) I think may be shown, b) 
stating the process adopted at the works. 
I am told the custom is, to remove the lime, 
many hours before it is saturated with the 
impurities it is intended to arrest. Is not 
the effect of this to leave a large percentage 
not saturated and consequently caustic 
Again, according to Prof. Johnson’s analy¬ 
sis, as quoted by Mr. Maxwell, more than 
one-half is carbonate of lime, about one-fifth 
is sulphate of lime, and three per cent, alum¬ 
na and oxide of iron—here then we have 
about seventy-five per cent, of vegetable 
stimulants. I think it probable, that much 
of the caustic or kiln lime used as a manure 
by our farmers, does not contain much more 
of the essential stimulants than this simple. 
The transition limestone, that abounds in 
this vicinity, contains in some localities, 
thirty-six per cent, of impurities, chiefly 
magnesia, which is obnoxious to vegetation. 
Now as I presume they use stone lime in 
the gas works at Toronto, may not the sam¬ 
ples, used by the intelligent gentlemen of 
whom you speak, have been of this charac¬ 
ter, and not rendered worthless comparative¬ 
ly, by passing through the gas works. 
The sample analysed by Prof. Johnson, as 
quoted by you, must necessarily have con¬ 
tained a large excess of water, as it is used 
by the gas manufactures, in the form of hy¬ 
drate, otherwise it would not have been one- 
half water. 
The mode of managing the lime here, I 
believe, is, to put it under cover after it has 
been used in the purification, and allow any 
excess of water it may contain to pass off, 
and so great is the demand for it, that the 
orders from the farmers are sometimes many 
months in advance of the supply, and so ful¬ 
ly are they convinced of its value, that they 
pay six and a fourth cents per bushel, and 
haul it five or six miles, when they can pur¬ 
chase the Iresh or kiln lime for ten or twelve 
cents. 
As an evidence, that they are not behind 
their neighbors in the proper management 
of their farms, their beef is much sought af¬ 
ter, and commands the highest price in the 
metropolis of New-York, as their butter 
does in the cities of Baltimore and Washing* 
ton, this I have heard them attribute to the 
superior pasture afforded by the green grass 
the growth of which appears to be much 
promoted by this “ vile refuse which should 
be buried many fathoms deep, in some bar¬ 
ren region,” Let us not, Mr. Editor, con¬ 
demn it nolens nolens as Dr. Ure appears to 
have done, but give it a fair and impartial 
trial, and if it should then be found to be 
worthless, reject it, and “ strike it from the 
list that promises well.”—M., Horticulturist. 
Ifemtllral Jeprfmi 
For the American Agriculturist. 
CULTURE OF ENDIVE OR CHICORY. 
The first or second week in August is the 
best season for sowing a full crop of Endive, 
and for this the curled green is decidedly the 
best. It should be sown in light garden 
mold, rich as possible—in fact it is difficult to 
make it too rich. 
When the plants, are sufficiently large to 
plant out, a piece of rich ground may be got 
in readiness, and drills drawn a foot apart, 
and the plants placed the same distance in 
ihe rows. They must be trimmed the same 
as celery plants,before planting; that is, the 
roots cut a little, being careful to leave all 
r.he small fibrous roots, and the leaves cut 
back. If this is not done, the plants will be 
a long time in starting into growth. 
The hoe must be well worked through 
them two or three times during their growth. 
When tney have arrived at a size fit for 
market, they may be bleached by placing 
•>mall pieces of board or tiles on the plants, 
being careful the plants are perfectly dry, 
for if they are the least damp they will rot. 
In four days from the time of putting the 
boards on, they will be fit for market, when 
' he price will be found to range according 
to the degree of whiteness. 
This when well grown, is one of the best 
of salads, and most hardy cultivated. For 
the two early crops, which should be sown 
'he first week in June and July, respectively, 
the broad-leaved or Batavian Endive, I find 
to be the best. It grows very large, and if 
tied up, will cabbage well, and be very white. 
This rind is by no means so hardy as the 
green curled ; for at the end of autumn, or 
beginning of winter, if the season is wet or 
frosty, it will soon rot, and sadly disappoint 
the grower. This rind requires to be plant* 
ed two feet each way. The drills are easily 
drawn by stretching a line one side of the 
ground to be planted, and a frame that will 
draw seven drills at a time, I find to be easi¬ 
ly drawn by one man. Shallow drills are all 
that is required W. Summersbev. 
THE CHINESE PRIMROSE. 
What more useful flower have we than 
this 1 My greenhouse at the present time is 
as gay as it well can be with well-grown 
plants of all the best varieties of it. Some 
of my sorts, all of which I raise from seeds 
every year, have flowers which measure up¬ 
wards of an inch and a half across, and in 
color are of a deep glowing crimson. The 
beauty of a fine head of such blossoms may 
therefore be better imagined than described. 
Fine blooming plants of the Chinese Prim¬ 
rose, that will continue in flower through the 
whole of the winter months, may be produced 
