824 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
gladly and wisely distribute the tickets. 
The “ Protective and Employment Society” 
could easily distribute the men and women. 
Let them be sent to their offices with their 
tickets, the blanks for date and destination 
to be filled by them. The distances need 
not be great. One man in central New-York, 
(Madison County,) writes that 300 could find 
employment in his town, probably 4,000 in 
his county. Should the demand not just 
now be sufficient for all who apply, let their 
existing Western agents advertise laborers 
at somewhat reduced wages, and let all 
Postmasters be made agents. v Some such 
scheme as this is simply indicated by com¬ 
mon sense. 
The object of the writer of this circular 
was a general one. to obtain some more defi 
nite and precise information which would be 
useful to himself and the public. The out¬ 
cry and visible suffering of the working peo¬ 
ple of the City have given an unexpected 
importance to the subject, and this direction 
to his thoughts and remarks upon it. He 
wishes to express his obligations to those 
who have favored him with replies. Most 
of these have been minute and explicit to a 
remarkable degree. Almost all, though 
many are written with little regard to ortho¬ 
graphy and rule, bear new testimony to the 
clearheaded sagacity characteristic of Amer¬ 
ican yeomen. Particular requests for the 
supply of laborers he has handed to the 
“ American and Foreign Emigrant Protec¬ 
tive and Employment Society ” above men¬ 
tioned, whose Offices are at Nos. 13 Astor- 
place and 27 Oreenwich-street, and through 
whom he has, on several occasions, satisfac¬ 
torily obtained workmen for his own farm. 
To such as have addressed inquiries and 
suggested further correspondence, he re¬ 
grets that want of leisure will prevent any 
other than this public reply. 
Freo. Law Olmsted. 
Southside, Staten Island, Jan. 22, 1855. 
PUNY SEBRIGHT BANTAMS- 
I beg to offer a single common-sense ob¬ 
servation on the subject of Seabright Ban¬ 
tams—r refer to the practice of getting them 
as puny as possible ; and to the awarding of 
prizes to them at exhibitions, in accordance 
with puny notions. Common sense and 
common experience tell us, that this pitiful 
dwarfing of Seabrights is but a “ delusion and 
a snare.” ’Tis a feat but worthy of the ce¬ 
lestial feet of Chinese ladies. These highly 
valuable, or rather I ought to say valued, 
dwarfish birds are truly but mere nonenti¬ 
ties—the are rendered worthless ; and did 
the continuance of the breed depend upon 
them, the whole race would vanish forth¬ 
with. I repeat, that it is a monstrous taste, 
a mere burlesque on perfection, to breed 
birds up to a state of dwarfish unproductive¬ 
ness—to puny monstrosity, which would 
render the continuance of the race impossi¬ 
ble. 
How many have been doomed to disap¬ 
pointment and finally to disgust, by Bantams 
of such perfection! Prize pens have been 
bought at a high price, delusive hopes have 
been entertained for one, or may be two 
seasons, of breeding from them a host of 
such perfect little creatures ; but the hapless 
result is—just the old story : one—two— 
nay, three hundred eggs set without a single 
chicken—for the puny dwarfs are sterile ! 
Further, have they really any peculiar claim 
to our admiration—do they show^uperiority 
of breeding—or, indeed, any peculiar excel¬ 
lence at all ?—not a whit. They are, simply, 
the weaklings of the clutch, the most puny 
chickens that can not attain their full and 
free development of growth ; they are, in¬ 
deed, but the mere accident of an accident! 
Let us hope then, that our judges will see 
to it, and that they will avoid giving a single 
point in favor of mere dwarfishness. Let 
me not, however, be misunderstood on my 
notions of reform. I would still have Ban¬ 
tams small birds, withal; and would be 
especially jealous to preserve the true/orw, 
gait, and carriage —for in these points really 
does “ Bantamism” really consist, and not in 
“ punyism.” Let the prize birds be exact in 
marking, have the true Bantam deportment, 
nay, let them be as absolute patterns of “ de¬ 
portment” as Mr. Turvy drop himself. As to 
size, let them be moderate—not puny, dwarf¬ 
ish, and, “ not to put too fine a point upon 
it,” sterile monstrosities; but joyous, de- 
bonnaire, plump and bumptious little fellows, 
“that give the world assurance of a—Ban¬ 
tam.” Such are the sentiments of 
TRISTRAM SHANDY. 
P.S.—If I am asked what I mean by 
“ moderate” size, I might refer to the smart, 
tight, high-bred game Bantam ; of which un¬ 
happily so very few true specimens are now 
to be seen. It differs much from the thick¬ 
set, and comparatively bulky bird, often 
called game Bantams (I believe Mr. Baily 
rarely omits giving a prize to the true game 
Bantam, whenever he meets with it in the 
“ promiscuous class” of poultry). Although 
many may treat these notions of mine as 
heterodox, I know that others, whose opin¬ 
ions command the highest respect, share 
them with me. ’T is indeed high time to 
protest against that namby-pambyism, 
which sees perfection but in littleness ; like 
the Almond Tumbler fancier, whose “ little 
wonders” can not feed their own young!— 
hence the system of “ shifting ;” that is, of 
placing these precious “wonders,” from 
time to time, under common pigeons, that 
they may be fed and reared. 
FARM EXPERIMENTS VALUABLE IN PROPOR¬ 
TION TO THEIR SIZE AND DURATION. 
We have often urged upon farmers the 
importance of careful experiments, and have 
much yet to say on this subject. The fol¬ 
lowing communication to the Agricultural 
Gazette, though referring to a particular ex¬ 
periment, yet contains several valuable hints, 
and on this account we copy it entire. 
No one can entertain a higher regard for, 
or appreciate more thoroughly the value of 
practical experiments in agriculture than my 
self; but in my humble judgment, to be prac¬ 
tical they must be fair; to be fair they ought 
to be very minute either in size or duration. 
The greatest and most successful experi¬ 
mentalist of his day, the late Mr. Coke, of 
Norfolk, held it as a maxim, to which he 
rigidly adhered throughout his long farming 
career (a period of at least half a century), 
that no experiment could be satisfactory to 
himself, or beneficial to the community, that 
was not of three years’ duration, and of a 
magnitude in some degree proportionate to 
the extent of the farm for which it was re¬ 
quired. If, for instance, in riding over his 
extensive crops, in and around Holkham, 
any particular variety of corn, turnips, or 
what not, attracted the notice of his farm¬ 
ing friends, and he was asked his opinion 
thereon,the answer was sure to be, “ I nev¬ 
er give an opinion on this, or any other ex¬ 
periment, till after a three years’ trial. This 
is only my first or second year,” (as the 
case may be ). “ Come to see me at three 
years’ end, and I will tell you all about it.” 
Nor was this a mere lilliputian garden-pot ex¬ 
periment, but one in some sort commensu¬ 
rate with the scale of his arable occupation 
(about 2,000 acres in and around the park at 
Holkham), and probably not less than 40 or 
50 acres. There is both sense and value in 
a trial of this magnitude and duration; and 
though I do not go the length of asserting 
the necessity or even the possibility of such 
in all cases, we contend for the principle 
that the larger the experiment and the of- 
tener it is repeated, the more satisfactory 
and valuable it will be, both to the experi¬ 
mentalist and the public. I have been led to 
these remarks by the letter of Mr. William 
Dickenson, of New Park, Lymington, in a 
late number on the enormous produce he 
tells us he has obtained and expects to obtain 
from Italian rye-grass. Far be it from me 
to undervalue any experiment if fairly con¬ 
ducted ; but I beg most respectfully to sub¬ 
mit that this is not, and cannot be, a fair ex¬ 
periment ; and in a practical point of view it 
is of no value or weight whatever. The 
bare idea of selecting from a field (we are 
not told of what size) an insignificant patch 
of only a yard square, and thence deducing 
the acreabie amount of the produce, does 
appear to me to border on the ridiculous ; 
and somewhat of a piece with the land 
valuer, who produced a bag of earth as a 
sample of the soil of an estate. Where and 
how was this particular yard selected ? In 
a field of any size—say 5, 10, or whatever 
might be the number of acres—there will, 
and must be, great inequalities in the length, 
strength and thickness of the plants. Was 
it taken.from the best, the worst, or an aver¬ 
age of the general crop 1 How was it cut 1 
and, above all, how was the exact measure 
defined 1 I have a right to ask these ques¬ 
tions, because much, very much, depends 
upon the manner in which the operation is 
conducted ; one man, by a little close shav¬ 
ing, and a sort of Russian grasp at the 
boundaries of his yard, may make tons per 
acre more than another, who, from the same 
field, confines himself within the exact limits 
of his allotted patch. Do it the best way 
you can, it is not a fair experiment. The 
errors, whether of over or under weight, 
and there are sure to be some, will be multi¬ 
plied 4840 times if an English, or 6150 times 
if a Scotch acre. By-the-bye, why talk of 
Scotch acres in the New Forest?' This is 
complicating matters without any adequate 
reason. English experiments ought always 
be in English measure; and any departure 
therefrom, in England, will only lead to con¬ 
fusion, and ought be avoided. I hope Mr. 
Dickenson will not infer from what I have 
said that I mean to cast any reflection on his 
protegee, the Italian rye-grass, as a crop. 
Far from it; and if I can not go all lengths 
in his encomiums of it, I admit at once that 
it is superior in Aveight, and I think in quali¬ 
ty to the common rye-grass. I only wish 
he would let us see and hear a little more of 
it; instead of one poor solitary yard, for in¬ 
stance, 5, 10, or more acres if he likes ; the 
more the better. His proffered stake of £100 
would then, tut not till then, carry weight 
with it in the minds of practical men. Just 
in the same category, on the same page with 
Mr. Dickenson, we find Messrs. Harvey and 
Son, with their yard of land, planted with 18 
grains of Avheat, producing, as they tell us, 
after the rate of 19 quarters per statute 
acre ! Now, of what practical value is such 
a statement as this ? Suppose a field of 
clover-lea, say 20 acres—soil, light sand and 
gravel, perhaps *jn a game district—all 
ready for putting in a wheat crop; do 
Messrs. Hardy mean to say that 6 pints of 
seed are all they would advise to an acre ? 
The thing is so ridiculous that it is hardly 
worth refuting; game, rooks, larks and 
slugs, to say nothing of Avireworms, Avould 
make such havoc Avith the plant from its 
very thinness that the poor farmer would be 
very fortunate to reap as much as “ 2 quar¬ 
ters, 2 bushels, 3 pecks, and 5 quarts per 
acre,” being the result of Messrs. Hardy’s 
second experiment from the common mode 
of seeding, In practice I have no doub 
