290 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
cefcs: In clearing the table scrape all the 
plates as clean as possible and pile them, the 
largest at the bottom, and set them in regu¬ 
lar rank and file around the borders of the 
sink or table. Put the knives and forks in a 
mug or pitcher, with the water just up to 
the handles. Arrange the cups aud saucers 
near the dish-tub. with the spoons and all 
silver articles in a tray together. Place the 
wooden and tin dishes by themselves. Have 
two wooden dish-tubs, painted on the out¬ 
side, but not on the inside. Some people 
use milk-pans or bread-trays for washing 
dishes; but this is decidedly filthy. The 
dish-tub should be used for no other than 
its appropriate purpose, and there should be 
one for washing the dishes and one for rins¬ 
ing them. Some people fill the dish-tub with 
water when they begin, and cool it to the 
possibility of holding their hands in it, so 
before they are half through it is covered 
with a coat of grease , and unfit to Avash a 
pig’s trough. 
It is better to take a little water at first, 
and make a good suds, and keep adding as 
it cools, beth hot water and soap. Wash 
the spoons and silver articles, of all kinds, 
and glass, before anything else is put into 
the water, and wipe them on a towel which 
is never used for any thing else. Next in 
order come the covers and such earthen ar¬ 
ticles as are comparatively clean. Then 
the knives, which should have been previ¬ 
ously wiped out of the water in which they 
were first immersed. Then plates, and 
meat and vegetable dishes. By this time an 
entire new water is needed, for tin and iron 
vessels, and especially wooden ones need a 
water as clean as for silver. I have seen— 
yes, I have actually seen those, who called 
themselves good housekeepers, who never 
washed iron dishes at all. The meat was 
boiled, and baked, and fried, and broiled, in 
the same articles, week after week. You 
can judge how it tasted! 
I have heard ladies tell, too, how particu¬ 
lar they were in washing dishes, and when 
I came to assist them, they were so far from 
being nice that they were not even clean— 
and the towel upon which they wished me 
to wipe spoons, and cups and saucers, was 
so stiff I could scarcely bend it. Every 
towel should be thoroughly washed in suds 
and scalded after being once used, and the 
dish-tubs should go through the same pro¬ 
cess. And I have washed dishes after this 
fashion weeks and months and years, with¬ 
out a trace of the “ menial labors ” upon my 
hands! 
All the articles in the castor, and the salt¬ 
cellars, should be washed and filled anew 
once a week. And where oil lamps are 
used, they should be thoroughly cleansed as 
often as once a month, else the oil forms a 
glue upon the inside and upon the wick that 
prevents a clear light. 
Some housewives, too, make bread in the 
same tray months and years, without wash¬ 
ing ; and I have even seen the bread-tray 
used constantly for a dish-tub. Milk-pans 
and cream-pots, and every thing in which 
milk is set, should be thoroughly scalded 
every morning, and nothing but milk should 
ever soil their bright faces. 
Tea-pots and coffee-pots should be rinsed 
in clear hot water'and dried, every using. 
I know of ladies who are so nice that they 
have all silver in daily use and tin rubbed 
with whiting every day. But 1 think once 
a week is sufficient, if they are washed 
nieely every meal. Some rub it with soft 
deer-skin, after washing, and this keeps it 
very bright. 
I have a great aversion to scouring knives, 
and never touch brick-dust if I can help it; 
but if their brightness depends on me, I pre¬ 
fer to rub them three times a day rather than 
once, for it is less labor, and they last longer. 
The nicest article for washing windows is 
deer-skin, as no particles come off to adhere 
to the glass and make it look as if washed 
with feathers. There is no need of any 
thing larger than a hand-basin for washing 
windows. The great splashing some people 
make in the exercise of their art is entirely 
useless, and is, moreover, very deleterious. 
When the water is permitted to run down in 
great quantities upon the glass, it dissolves 
the putty and sobn loosens the panes from 
their setting, and also stains the glass. Two 
pieces of nice wash leather and a bowl of 
suds are all that are necessary. Wipe the 
glass first with the wet cloth or leather, and 
after it has become dry, with the clean cloth, 
and it will look clear, and far more so than 
if rinsed in a dozen pails of water. 
I have never seen a book yet that was so 
good for teaching housekeeping as Miss 
Beecher’s Domestic Economy and Receipt 
Book. They contain particular instructions 
concerning everything that it is ever neces¬ 
sary to do in a house. They are the accu¬ 
mulated experience of a great many, during 
many years, in different climes ; and how¬ 
ever wise one person might be, I think it 
scarcely possible that she should not learn 
something from these books. Especially 
are the instructions useful concerning pro¬ 
viding a good and healthful variety for the 
table at little expense, and no more trouble, 
than to have the same round of dishes every 
day for weeks, which is neither agreeable 
nor healthy. 
There are many good housekeepers in the 
land, and there are yet many who are not ; 
and I have seen kitchens and pantries among 
those whom you are accustomed to consider 
heathen, that would put to shame many 
kitchens and pantries among Christian wo¬ 
men ; and those who only look on may, 
sometimes, be better judges and critics than 
those who are performing ! 
For the American Agriculturist. 
PROFIT OF COWS. 
At a meeting of the Farmers’ Club, of the 
town of Bedford, N. Y., December 29, 1854, 
the subject of discussion being the relative 
profits of butter-making and milk-selling, the 
following was presented by a member of the 
club: 
“ In the year 1853 I kept ten cows. The 
calves, butter, and buttermilk for pigs, 
amounted to $46 75 per cow. In 1854 I 
kept eight cows and two heifers in first time; 
one, two years old, the other, three. The 
calves, butter, and buttermilk of these last 
amounted to $44 06 per cow. 
“ My cows are common natives, of no par¬ 
ticular breed, and kept in the common way 
of keeping in this town, for butter-making; 
but much inferior to those kept for milk only. 
With good, first-rate keeping, as is the cus¬ 
tom with some where they sell their milk, 1 
think my cows will bring me in $60 each. 
“ J. T. H.” 
GUANO ON COTTON AND CORN. 
In a letter to us, in November last, on 
business, a highly-intelligent planter briefly 
adverted to his having used guano on corn, 
with great benefit, at the rate of only sev¬ 
enty-five pounds per acre. This quantity was 
so much less than is usually applied at the 
North, and its value so manifest, we request¬ 
ed him to furnish us his particular method of 
using it, for publication in the Agriculturist. 
This he has kindly done in the following let¬ 
ter, to which, we regret to say, that his mod¬ 
esty precludes us from appending his name. 
It may be sufficient, however to add, that the 
writer has a large plantation in Georgia and 
in Florida, to both of which he gives a close 
personal superintendance. 
For the benefit of northern readers we 
will explain, that when a crop is “laid by,” 
they have ceased working it with the plow 
and hoe. A “mud-heap” is the same as 
muck; “ cow-pen manure ” the same as 
barn-yard. A “scooter plow” we can not 
well describe, without a drawing. They 
may be seen in this city, at 191 Water-street. 
We have frequently spoken to the agent 
of the Peruvian government, of the policy of 
sending a cargo of guano direct to the South ; 
but we believe Baltimore, Charleston, 
and New-Orleans are the only southern 
ports they have yet reached. The others 
are generally supplied by coasting-vessels 
from New-York. 
Tallahassee, Fla., Jan. 1, 1855. 
In reply to your inquiries about my meth¬ 
od of applying guano, I will state : 
1. That to corn it is applied at the time of 
the first plowing. A long scooter plow is run 
as close as possible to the corn ; children, 
from twelve to sixteen years of age, follow 
with guano in their aprons or a bag, and 
with small measures or dippers of reed-cane, 
or the small end of a gourd, about the size 
of a charger for a shot-gun, deposit the guano 
in the furrow, at the side of the corn. This 
is covered by a turning-plow, which follows. 
2 . I apply the pure guano. Sometimes 
the corn has been previously manured with 
cotton-seed, frequently not; I perceive but 
little difference in the immediate result. 
When I have previously manured with cot¬ 
ton-seed, the quantity of guano applied is 
less than seventy-five pounds to the acre. 
Last year I manured in this way, with one 
tun, upward of forty acres, with decided in¬ 
crease over a corresponding piece of land 
manured with cotton-seed alone. 
When pure guano alone is applied to cot¬ 
ton, the quantity used is one hundred and 
fifty pounds, as follows : A scooter or shovel 
plow makes the furrow ; the guano is sifted 
through small hamper baskets, made of 
white oak, sufficiently open to allow it to 
pass through by a slight shaking of the hand. 
The operatives soon learn to regulate the 
quantity. Upon the guano four furrows are 
thrown with a turning-plow, which forms the 
bed for the reception of the seed. At the 
time of planting, a small scooter plow opens 
