AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
103* 
$20,843,385 ; the expenses $11,310,720.; 
Salt .—At Syracuse six million bushels of 
salt were made in 1855, and it is expected 
that seven millions will be manufactured in 
1850. 
That gardening by men who understand 
the business will pay very well, is a fact well 
ascertained. But that it will pay a man who 
does not know one garden tool from another, 
is a matter of much uncertainty. Many 
think they have actually demonstrated that 
it will not pay. They have hired a piece of 
ground, bought manure, and set a man at 
work, and the grand result was, that their 
potatoes cost them two dollars a bushel, and 
their peas a dollar a peck, when they could 
purchase the same articles in market at one 
fourth the price. They know that it will not 
pay. 
There are failures in gardening, no doubt, 
and the causes are so obvious that it would 
seem the bare detail of them would be 
enough to guard all future experiments 
against their repetition. They are almost 
always traceable to ignorance of the condi¬ 
tions of success. Soil, manure, and a com¬ 
mon laborer are by no means a recipe for a 
family supply of good vegetables. The con¬ 
ductor of the experiment must either have 
knowledge enough of husbandry to super¬ 
vise the operations himself, or procure a 
workman acquainted with gardening. In 
either of these cases, the cultivation of the 
soil will pay liberally. 
It is not necessary that a man should have 
been bred a farmer or a gardener, in order 
to make his garden profitable. And one of 
ordinary intelligence, if he have the leisure 
to inform himself, by reading the journals 
and hand books which treat of rural affairs, 
will soon make the garden as profitable as it 
is pleasant. His failures will be his best 
teachers, if he will pursue his investigations 
till he find out their causes. There must be 
knowledge in this business as in all others, if 
we would succeed. 
Some fail by cultivating the land with lit¬ 
tle or no manure. They grudge the expense 
of fifty dollars laid out in this article, for an 
acre of land. They get but half crops, and 
this hardly pays for the labor. A very few 
put on too much manure, and the seed is 
burnt up, and by the time they discover their 
error, the most favorable time for plant¬ 
ing has past. Of course they do not have 
full crops. More put on none too much 
manure, but it is not mixed sufficiently with 
the soil, or too much of it is put in the hill. 
An ounce of guano in the wrong place will 
destroy at least one hill of corn, and injure 
any other garden seed. Others again fail in 
tillage. When all other things are right, they 
are a little too late with the hoeing, the 
weeds get the start, and keep it through the 
season. Others have a pretty good garden, 
but think it costs about as much as it comes 
to. They keep no account of it, and can not 
tell how much they expend upon it, or how 
much the product is worth at market. We 
suspect a good many of this class would 
have their doubts removed if they would 
make an estimate of the value of all the lux¬ 
uries that come from their gardens. 
Our experience is, that gentlemen engaged 
in other pursuits may relieve the monotony 
of their vocation by gardening, not only with 
great advantage to their minds and health, 
but to their purse. Every one who lives 
out of the city, or who can command a quar¬ 
ter of an acre of soil, should grow his own 
vegetables, or supervise the labor necessary 
to grow them. He will be surprised to find 
how large a variety, and how great a 
quantity, of vegetables and fruits can be pro¬ 
duced from so small a garden. He will be 
still more surprised to see the difference 
between the products of his own garden, 
coming in the best condition to his table, 
and the stale products of the market. He 
would never be content to go back again to 
purchased vegetables. We find our own gar¬ 
den pays better every succeeding year, and 
as the larger fruits are not yet in full bear¬ 
ing, it can hardly fail to enlarge its product¬ 
iveness for years to come. 
This is, we believe, the general experience 
of our neighbors. One of them, on a spot 
hardly so big as his house and yard, has 
raised a full supply of green corn, a fine lot 
of potatoes, besides squashes, cucumbers, 
beans, and other matters. The raspberries 
and strawberries are coming, besides a few 
larger fruit trees. Another, on about an acre 
of land, which he has cultivated himself, has 
raised and sold vegetables to the amount of 
one hundred and ten dollars, besides all that 
has been consumed in his family. He had 
no hot beds for forcing, and the vegetables 
were sold at the common market price. 
Another, who has kept a gardener and culti¬ 
vated a little more land, has made sales to 
the amount of over seven hundred dollars 
the past season. 
But it seems degrading to bring so beauti¬ 
ful a calling to the test of dollars and cents. 
We would have a garden, and live in it two 
hours a day, if we had to pay for it. This we 
trust will be the experience of our inexpe¬ 
rienced friends. 
POTATO BREAD, GOOD AND PROFITABLE. 
A GOOD WAV TO MAKE IT. 
We mean just what we have written above. 
Potatoes can easily be added to flour so as 
to make the bread cheaper than that from 
flour alone. Potatoes cost only 50 to 60 
cents a bushel, in most places, where flour 
costs ten to twelve dollars per barrel. A 
bushel of potatoes contain 15 to 20 pounds 
of solid material, just as good for food as 
the same weight of dry flour. Allowing for 
the water in each, the dry potato costs, say 
three to four cents per pound, the dry flour 
six to seven cents, or nearly twice as much. 
To make potato bread : 
Pare and boil a quantity of good potatoes, 
and then mash them well, and add water 
enough to make a thick fluid. Strain this 
mixture through a sieve; add yeast, and 
stir in, previously warmed, flour enough to 
make dough of the usual consistency. Knead, 
raise, and bake, just as for pure flour bread. 
Made in this way, the bread will be light, 
“ short” or tender, easy to digest, and very 
pleasant to the taste. Try it. The method is 
simple. The quantity of potatoes may be 
very indefinite. Perhaps the best proportion 
is about one quart of potatoes for four or five 
pounds of flour. 
A SIGHT WORTH SEEING. 
Not all the shows and exhibitions of New- 
York City put together can begin to equal 
in beauty and attractiveness one we almost 
daily witness, which can be seen in a short 
ride, requiring little expense, and less time 
to reach it from Fulton Ferry than it takes 
to go to the Crystal Palace. We refer to 
the magnificent collection of Camellias now 
in bloom on the grounds of Messrs. Parsons, 
at Flushing. Just think of it—right in mid¬ 
winter you can see, in a single glass-covered 
house devoted especially to this purpose, 
some five thousand Camellias, many of which 
are in bloom. Among these are plants in ev¬ 
ery stage of growth ; the full expanded flow¬ 
ers and the buds just opening their beautiful 
petals to the sun contrast their snowy white¬ 
ness or scarlet brilliancy with the rich glossy 
green of the supporting leaf. Every body 
who has seen one Camellia flower, will long 
will long to visit the above collection, which 
is always open, without charge, to any who 
may wish to call. Mr. Cadness, who has 
charge of this and the other greenhouses, is 
generally present to wait upon any visitors. 
To reach Flushing is an easy matter. 
From the Fulton pier, adjoining Fulton Fer¬ 
ry, in New-York, the steamer Island City 
leaves for Flushing daily at 6J, 8, and 10, 
A. M., and at 2, 4, and 6 oclock, P. M., via 
the Flushing Railroad. The whole passage¬ 
time, by boat and cars, is from 50 to 55 or 
60 minutes. The cars leave Flushing for 
New-York at the same hours, viz: at 6£, 8, 
10, 1, 4, and 6.* We pass over this route 
morning and evening, and generally find it 
much more comfortable, and occupying less 
time, than the usual conveyances to our 
home when we lived in the upper part of this 
city. The fare, including boat and cars, is 
only 25 cents. We advise our friends living 
in the city, and those who may chance there 
during this month or the fore part of March, 
to spend two or three hours to see the Ca¬ 
mellias. Our office'is only a couple of blocks 
from the starting point, where any one de¬ 
siring further directions will be assisted with 
pleasure. 
Just now, and for three weeks past, the regular trips of the 
Island City have been interrupted by ice in the East River. 
This will be obviated as soon as a warm spell occurs. Within 
the memory of the “ oldest inhabitant,” there has not been so 
much obstruction from running ice. 
Catching Snails and Grubs. —The Gar¬ 
dener’s Chronicle, (Eng.,) recommends scat¬ 
tering a little oatmeal, about sundown, in 
the places where these plant pests, so trouble¬ 
some in England, most abound. About an 
hour later, a good army of them will be con¬ 
gregated together feasting upon the meal, 
when they may be gathered up and destroyed 
The best time to catch them is just after a 
rain. A correspondent who tried this meth¬ 
od states, that in a strawberry bed, he cap¬ 
tured five thousand in half an hour. Wonder 
how long it took him to count them ? 
