1876.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
4r-45 
To Our Readers in the West. 
We have now, as for many years past, a very large cir¬ 
cle of readers all over the Western States. Every now 
and then we see a new paper starting up, (generally a 
short-lived one,) laying great claims to superiority, be¬ 
cause its proposed publication office is in some Western 
town or city, and warning everybody west of the Allegha- 
nies against taking any paper printed east of the said 
mountains, on the specious, but deceptive plea that such 
papers cannot be adapted to Western culture. The truth¬ 
fulness of this claim is well illustrated in one of these 
recent Western papers. It contained 23 pages of reading 
matter, of which two pages were filled with such claims 
and warnings against Eastern papers, and thirteen 
pages were entirely made up of articles prepared especially 
for and already published in the American Agriculturist! 
Four and one half pages were taken from other Eastern 
papers, leaving three and one half pages of local matter, 
puffs, etc. Comment is unnecessary 1—Suffice it to say, 
the American Agriculturist has, and will continue to have, 
a strong force of information gatherers all through the 
West; it will have a constant care to meet the wants and 
wishes of the large Western branch of its family ot 
readers ; its printing and publication in the great Me¬ 
tropolitan City gives it positive advantages ; it will 
continue to publish original engravings, on which it ex¬ 
pends ten times as much money as any other similar 
journal in the country; and it will guard its readers, 
■\Yest as well as East, and everywhere, against humbugs 
and swindlers. The general principles of cultivation are 
the same the world over, and this journal will not fail to 
note and discuss local differences. Our arrangements to 
meet the special wants of the great West will be superior 
to any former period. The Editors have themselves large 
personal interests in Western agriculture. We believe 
our present friends in the West will not only continue to 
value this journal for themselves, but take pleasure in in¬ 
troducing it to many of their friends and neighbors. 
Reading. Idvertisements Pays, or 
at least looking carefully through them will, even if one 
does not wish to buy anything. Different men’s methods 
of setting forth business are suggestive, and will usual¬ 
ly supply useful business hints to every other man. It is 
also always well to know what is for sale throughout the 
country, on what terms, etc. There is the added pleasure 
in reading such business notices in this journal, found in 
few other papers, viz.: that only responsible advertisers, 
those “having both the ability and intention to do what 
they promise’’are admitted. No “patent” or secret 
medicines mar our columns.—If you have occasion to 
write to any advertiser, for information, for circulars, or 
to order, it is always well to tell him where you saw his 
advertisement. Ke will be all the more anxious, and 
take special pains, to satisfy you, if he learns that you 
came to him through this journal. 
'Toys lot* Children . — Dealers, Barents, and 
the “Little People,” who are now looking forward to the 
Holidays, will find in our advertising'columns something 
to interest them. Mr. C. M. Crandall has probably done 
more than any other living man to supply useful toys, 
combining durability, with an infinite variety in single 
sets of toys. His fertile brain is constantly bringing out 
something new, and during this Centennial year he is ex¬ 
celling himself in the attractiveness of new and interest¬ 
ing things offered to the public. The “ Wide Awake 
Alphabet" (see third cover-page of this number) is one of 
his latest inventions ; and every boy and girl ought to 
have one or more of the various beautiful things of Mr. 
C. M. Crandall’s invention, which are supplied by toy 
dealers generally. 
Not the Same.—Most readers have doubt¬ 
less observed that while some letters and the border 
of our beautiful cover pages are retained, the central 
picture, and the four corner vignettes are new in every 
number. Many of these are worthy of careful stud , as 
they exhibit the skill of some of the best artists. 
Clan Hie Afford It ?—A farmer writes : 
“ Much as I esteem it, I fear I must suspend taking the 
American Agriculturist for a year. My farm yields less 
than §500 worth of products, all. told, this year, and 
times are hard....” Think a moment on the policy of 
this. One cent on each $3 produced is all the paper 
costs (or more if four or more club together). If crops 
are small, prices low, and the struggle severe, to make 
both ends meet, does he not all the more need every 
possible hint and suggestion he can gather, to aid him 
in his work, his plans, and calculations ? This paper is 
edited by a number of practical men. cultivators of 
farms, who themselves feel and appreciate the present 
circumstances and condition of things. They are all the 
while earnestly looking out for every item of informa¬ 
tion, every hint, every suggestion that will help them¬ 
selves and help others. They hasten to communicate to 
their readers every possible item that may be useful to 
them. They work nights and study over this matter, 
sketching down for the engraver everything that may 
be helpful to the eye and understanding. Can our 
friend afford to do without the help half a dozen such 
men can give during the year? Single hints, or new 
thoughts started-in one’s mind, often yield ten ora hun¬ 
dred times the cost of the paper. Not one man in five 
hundred can go through the thousand columns of care¬ 
fully prepared reading-matter and examine the 500 or 600 
engravings without getting some useful and profitable 
hints for his work, to say nothing of its usefulness to 
his wife and to his children, as an educator, as a diver¬ 
sion from lower thoughts. Let our friend imagine him¬ 
self without any of the information gained and the 
thoughts suggested by these pages, during a single year 
past, and then calculate whether it was not well to use 
one three-hundredth part of his farm-products in secur¬ 
ing it. The paper is supplied at just about the cost of 
making it and prepaying the postage, averaging the re¬ 
ceipts from club and single subscribers. (Advertisers 
pay the cost of editing, engravings, office, premiums, 
etc.) We mean to make the paper as much better as 
added experience and observation will aid us to do. We 
mean to make it pay every reader well. We hope our 
friend will continue with us, and get some of his hard- 
pressed neighbors to try its utility for 1877. 
Wool! Ecports from the Somfhem 
States come from many sections, showing an increased 
attention to diversity of crops, a recovery from the de¬ 
pressing effects of the war, a new life, energy, and hope¬ 
fulness in agricultural pursuits. The American Agri¬ 
culturist is finding its way into many new regions, and 
is doing a good work. Take a specimen letter from in¬ 
terior Georgia: “....I was too prejudiced to read a 
Northern paper, and too contracted in my notions to 
think anything but a Southern journal could be useful 
to me. A Northern friend sent me yours as a present. 
... .1 frankly confess I have got useful hints enough 
from it in a year, to pay for it a hundred times over. 
If you have the regard for us that some Northern poli¬ 
ticians profess, you will do our people good by pushing 
your paper into circulation all over our Southern agri¬ 
cultural districts. I see more and more that the general 
principles of cultivation, farm implements, etc., are the 
same everywhere.” 
TThis Mem tfoa* ons* ffViem«lsi.— Many 
thousands of our readers know, by personal experience, 
that the Editors are always ready, so far as it is their 
power, to respond to every reasonable request—wh- ther 
it be to answer inquiries, bunt up information, or what 
not. A multitude of private letters are written to indi¬ 
vidual readers, of which the public know nothing be¬ 
cause the subjects are personal. Hardly a day passes in 
whi h messengers are not dispatched about the city, or 
the Editors make long tours,to find out something desired 
by a distant subscriber. IVo charge is ever made for any 
such service.. We try to regard and treat our readers as 
if they were members of our own families ; and we shall 
ever continue this course towards all our readers, just 
as far as is at all practicable. 'There are, however, only 
24 hours in a day, and our readers are a vast multitude, 
literally scattered all over the world, and when we fail 
to respond to any reasonable favor asked, it is not of the 
heart or will.--(So much on one side. Now we are ready 
to enter upon a new year's work, and may we not in turn 
ask our friends to do a little favor for us? We want to 
increase our subscription list, not only for increasing 
our resources wherewith to improve the paper itself, but 
believing our work a good one, we desire to reach a still 
larger circle of readers. Those who know our journal, 
can greatly aid in this. A kind word from them to others 
will go much further than anything the Publishers can 
say or do. Suppose each present friend of this paper 
should influence one other person to become a subscriber 
at this time , it would doubl i our resources, it would 
double the number of reading, thinking people, it would 
double the extent of good done, so far as this paper does 
good. We therefore take the liberty to ask all our friends 
to do this—let us have one reader more for the coming 
volume through your influence—more than one when 
convenient. We shall value every "such favor, and he 
stimulated to new exertions in behalf of all. 
Arc yonr ChiSdreaa heina"- IPrsvsately 
HSumlmggetl, or Worse? —The Humbug Column 
of this number (page 447), hints at a growing danger. 
The grown people having been pretty carefully warned, 
largely through this journal, the more villainous swind¬ 
lers are working a new field. By specious advertisments 
in many papers, they are getting a large list of names 
and addresses of Boys and Girls—indeed they are fast 
gathering the names of all the young people throughout 
, the country, yours andoars, reader. These lists are used 
by the gatherers, or sold to other swindlers, to send 
circulars, papers, etc., offering vile things—just the kind 
to excite youth, but which we would no more allow our 
children to have thin deadly poison. The little son of 
one of our friends, 12 years old, last spring sent 10c. for 
some curious cards, worth the money doubtless, and he 
got them. Mark the result; Our friends Post-office Box 
has been crowded with the above vile sheets, directed 
to this boy. Had he not had a P. O. Box, these would have 
fallen into his son’s hands. Parents look out for what 
comes to your children through the mails. The American 
Agriculturist will aid you as much as possible, during 
the coming year. Please forward to this office, copies 
of all such matter, with particulars.—We have saved to 
our readers millions of dollars by our exposures and 
warnings, and we are ready to grapple with this new 
Satanic scheme—or any other imposition. Readers in the 
West will need to be specially careful, for these swindlers 
generally operate at distant points through the mails. 
66 llSig-ht Down 'FlaroBEg-Sa the 
martin.’ 9 — When a school boy, they used to teach 
ns that if we went straight down through the earth 
we would come out in China. And we often hear this 
said now-a-days.—Not sol — One going straight down 
from N. Y. City would pass through the center of the earth 
and come out a few hundred miles southwest of Australia. 
(Query, can you point directly towards where Pekin in 
China really is?). Speaking of Australia, in which are 
Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria, etc., there was a fine 
exhibition of products from our Antipodean friends, at 
Philadelphia. We were all the more interested in these, 
because a great number in Australia take and read the 
American Agricidturist. They write us, and tell us, this 
paper is greatly valued because it treats so much of every 
daywork; that the English journals are edited in the in¬ 
terest of large land-holders mainly, and are of less use to 
the people who cultivate their small farms or holdings. 
This paper is also largely taken all around the coast of 
Africa, where English and German speaking people have 
settled, and so it is in every other part of the world. 
One suggests that it be called the “ Cosmopolitan Agri¬ 
culturist?' instead of simply the “ American Agriculturist." 
‘•A HSAKEBS’S SMH25EN,” lor 13 
©AYS, Yet. —“Cakes at a penny each, or 13 for 12 
cents,” is the Card in some bakers’ shops ; others make 
it “ 14 for 12 cents.” So a “Baker’s Dozen ” may be 13 
or 14. When new subscribers for 1877 come in before 
Dec. 13, we will acknowledge the receipt of the subscrip¬ 
tion, by sending, at once, this December number with¬ 
out charge, giving him 13 numbers for the price of 12.— 
That is to say, we will do this as long as our extra De¬ 
cember edition, printed for this purpose, holds out; but 
we can not send the extra copy beyond the time named. 
How HSaag’raviEag's; sire M:ide.—“A 
Fifteen-year-old Boy,” who “was born and has always 
lived west of the Rocky Mountains,” where ho has not 
learned to call himself anything but a “ boy ” learuer as 
yet, (he would have signed himself “ a young man ” had 
he lived in some places we wot of), wants us to tell him 
and his fellows how our engravings are made. We will 
try. Uncolored pictures are made by marks, dots, or 
fine lines, upon a flat surface, with pen, pencil, or brush. 
Light and dark shades show the different parts of 
an object. To print such pictures, the artist takes a 
piece of very hard Turkey Boxwood, cuts off across 
the grain a piece just the thickness of the length 
of type. One side of this he polishes smooth, and colors 
it white like drawing paper. This is on the ends of the 
grain of the wood. Next he draws upon it, with a pen¬ 
cil. just the picture he wants printed. Then the engraver 
takes it, and with some sharp, fine pointed little chisels, 
he cuts away every bit of the surface of the wood that 
is not touched with the pencil in making the picture. 
To help his sight, and hand, he has a magnifying glass 
on a frame between his eye and the block, so that he can 
see and rightly cut out the finest points. Now, when 
an inked roller passes over, the points and lines not 
cut away will take off some of the ink. A paper 
pressed upon these takes up enough ink to make a pic¬ 
ture on the paper just like that first drawn upon the 
block. This block is set up in a page with the type, and 
an electrotype plate is cast from it. Then the printing 
press goes on multiplying copies of the whole page. The 
block being engraved on the end of the grain will stand 
a good deal of printing, hut will wear after a time. The 
copper plates used to print from do not wear readily ; 
and the original wood cuts are kept fresh and new, to 
cast other plates from when wanted. (We have the en¬ 
graved blocks of nearly all the pictures that have ever 
appeared in the American Agriculturist. They have cost 
nearly §200,000, or quite that sum). It takes a good 
artist, and a good engraver, and a good deal of time, and 
patience and skill, to get such fine engravings as are used 
in this paper. Sometimes a man must work two days 
on a single square inch or so. Examine now, carefully 
