AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
11 
I approve of the editorial remarks on agricultu¬ 
ral exhibitions in thy last number, and our coun¬ 
ty exhibitions are fast declining into the same 
evil practice, insomuch that the sober thoughtful 
portion of community are withdrawing from them, 
notwithstanding “ Quakers” are found among the 
managers. An Old Plowboy. 
Bucks County, Pa., 12th month, 1856. 
A FARMER’S RAIN Y DAY RAMBLES—NO. II. 
To the Editor of the American Agriculturist: 
According to invitation I called on neighbor 
Thomas on another rainy day, and, without fur¬ 
ther preface, I will relate something about his 
garden and fruit trees. His fruit garden contains 
about an acre, the greater part filled with trees. 
He said he could not afford time nor money to 
attend to flowers, except rose bushes and flower¬ 
ing shrubs around the house, that required little 
care. “ Instead of these, I line my walks with 
currants and gooseberries, and those @f the best 
kinds, for I find I cannot afford to raise poor fruit. 
They very often require more attention with not 
half the profit. Here I have a small stock of 
young trees, for, as I said the other day, I like to 
be independent. They require very little atten¬ 
tion ; and when a tree decays, or an ornamental 
shade tree is required, here they are. Any one 
who has a garden can, by collecting seeds and 
nuts, or transplanting small trees that we find in 
the woods and along the fences, raise his own 
trees either for ornament or use. To those that 
have no trees to begin with, I advise to go to the 
nurseries and procure the best. But where they 
cannot afford the expense, then, I say there is no 
excuse, for in every part of this country seeds and 
young trees or cuttings can be obtained of some 
good kind. 
“ When I see a man, for a succession of years, 
live on in a house unadorned by fruit or shade 
trees, I think something is wrong about him.” 
In the other part of the garden are pear trees. “I 
find,” said he, “ that by manuring liberally, and 
planting my vegetables between the rows, good 
crops can be raised of both. We can have a pear 
orchard in bearing sooner than apples, if we get 
the early bearing kinds, and everybody must ad¬ 
mit they are far better.” The trees are about 14 
feet apart, and of many different kinds, ripening 
in succession eight months of the year, and they 
are more profitable in every sense than apples, 
either for the desert or cooking purposes. With 
him, pears are a pretty sure crop every year, 
while apples often fail of bearing. He finds he 
can ripen them in the winter, and have as 
good pears as in autumn. They require to be ex¬ 
cluded from light, and the temperature kept as 
regular as may be. They are put in a dry cellar 
or room, in boxes or barrels, and covered in suc¬ 
cessive layers with oats. He has found nothing 
better. By this process they are excluded from 
light, and the heat varies but little, and if the early 
ripening kinds are placed on the top, and the last 
at the bottom, they need not be disturbed. 
As to the kinds selected, he said “ many make 
a greater ado about the kinds of fruit, than the 
care they take of them after they have them. 
Make the tree good by proper attention to its 
wants, and in most cases the fruit will be good 
too. You must not believe all the fruit-books ad¬ 
vocate, for the experiences of the writers are oft¬ 
en limited. A particular variety of fruit may be 
successful in one place, but the soil and climate 
may vary so much that it will be worthless in an¬ 
other, and then the author or compiler will be 
blamed. Go to the fairs in your vicinity, and see 
the specimens there; ask the exhibitors and every 
one else that has had experience with different 
kinds in the section of country where they reside, 
and you run but little risk. If a new and untried 
sort is desired, the better plan is to procure one 
and take grafts from it, and insert them on thrifty 
bearing trees. Then if it proves a good purchase, 
you can continue grafting or procure new supplies. 
If not good after two or three years’ trial, graft 
the trial trees over again with some other kind. 
But don’t be discouraged the first or sometimes 
the second year it bears, for some of the best I 
have were poor at first fruiting. I consider the 
man that plants pear trees in sward ground, and 
allows the grass to grow around them, does worse 
than throw his money away, for he loses his time 
and labor too, besides discouraging others from 
making the attempt. 
Another object of importance with me is, to 
make home attractive to myself and family. We 
know how pleasant it is, after a day’s labor, to 
find comfort and plenty in the house when we re¬ 
turn, and equally so is it to me to have trees 
of beauty, loaded with ripening fruit, around my 
homestead. As we look around our dwellings, 
and see the different kind of fruit trees, covered 
with blossoms, or luscious fruit, we forget our 
weariness, and they never taste better than then. 
This is the way to make farmers’ boys 
love home, for what boy is there that does 
not love fruit. No matter how far they are sep¬ 
arated from the old fireside, home and fruit will 
be remembered together. I give my sons the 
management of the nursery ; they like the em¬ 
ployment, and it can be attended to in those little 
odd times through the summer when we are 
ahead of our farm work. If my boys buy farms, 
and as it is nearly always the case there are not 
trees enough, here they have a supply. You will 
almost always see the boy that engages in culti¬ 
vating flowers and fruit, kind and gentle in his 
manners. You will not find him with the fast 
young man, with their fast horses, going to all the 
doings in the country, and reckless in their habits, 
but he will rather choose the company you prefer 
him to nave—the intelligent and virtuous. There 
is more in rendering homeattractive to your chil¬ 
dren, by adding to their enjoyment, than many 
are aware of.” 
But to return to the nursery, and his method of 
raising young trees. He said : “ We cannot have 
trees in variety or value, as nurserymen have, but 
plant one or two hundred pear seeds and if but 
half succeed there will be enough to com¬ 
mence. So with apples, plums or cherries The 
chief thing is to make the ground rich for the 
young trees, and keep it clean. Quince trees can 
be raised with great ease and certainty by cut¬ 
tings. The same is true of some kind of elms, 
willow's and poplars, and of currants, gooseber¬ 
ries and grape vines. All it wants is “perseverance 
and good culture.” He showed some old pear 
trees he had grafted over with Bartlett and other 
improved kinds. They will oear mostly in three 
years afterwards, and in a few years they will be 
loaded. If the tree is moderately thrifty, he 
grafts all the limbs that are not more than an inch 
and a half in diameter. It is not best to fake 
much larger limbs, for the wood will decay before 
the scions cover it. If the tree is not thrifty, he 
saws off the limbs of the size mentioned, and 
grafts or buds the sprouts from them. It is as¬ 
tonishing how much more thrifty in grow'th, and 
healthful in appearance, these trees are, especial¬ 
ly when covered with golden fruit, instead of the 
native or old choke-throat trees. He says he 
pities the owner who has fine trees loaded, often 
with worthless fruit, when he can so easily and 
in a short time have the best in abundance. 
As my sheet is full, I must furnish my neigh¬ 
bor’s account ofhis apples another time. S. 
North Hempstead, L. J. 
E G G S . 
How to get a large increase at little cost, and 
secure other advantages at the same time. 
It is pretty generally agreed that the best 
way to make hens lay rapidly is, to supply 
them liberally with animal food. Hens are 
not very fastidious, but will eat worms, de¬ 
caying meat, intestines of animals, and, in¬ 
deed, anything of the flesh kind, and convert 
it into nice “ hen fruit.” Now, why can not 
all the butchers’offal, and refuse animal and 
vegetable matters, so abundant in our cities 
and large villages, be profitably fed to poul¬ 
try, and thus greatly augment the produc¬ 
tion of eggs and poultry meat at little ex¬ 
pense 1 There w'ould be an additional and 
great advantage in the removal of what is 
frequently a great nuisance to our olfacto¬ 
ries, and decidedly deleterious to health. 
There is an incredible amount of these mat¬ 
ters constantly wasted, every particle of 
which, originating in the city slaughter¬ 
houses, might be saved and made useful. 
Were these located in the country, at vari¬ 
ous points on our railroads, so as to admit 
of certain and immediate transmission of 
meat to the city, extensive henneries might 
be established in connection with them, 
where the poultry could have a free range 
to insure health , while they derived their 
food mainly from the offal. With a warm 
shelter, the animal food thus fed to hens 
would insure their laying during Winter 
equally as well as during warm weather. 
Nothing so effectually secures this as the 
use of animal food, and every part of the 
butchers’ offal, when fed to hens in a form 
that they can swallow, is valuable for this 
purpose. Eggs produced in the winter, and 
near large cities to which they can be sent 
fresh, are worth from two to three dollars 
per hundred, at which rate much of the offal 
that is now thrown away will pay nearly as 
well by feeding to poultry, as the good meat 
will sell for to consumers. Here is an im¬ 
portant consideration for the thrifty and phi¬ 
lanthropic. There are inducements enough 
to bring the faculties of each of these esti¬ 
mable classes of our citizens into full play, 
as, besides filling their pockets, they will 
sweeten the atmosphere and render it more 
wholesome. 
We are glad to learn that the directors of 
the Eric Railroad propose setting apart ex¬ 
tensive accommodations, some distance be¬ 
yond Jersey City, for slaughter-houses. A 
very commendable project. But individuals 
ought to do this at various points, on every 
avenue leading to our cities, where animals 
are now kept for slaughter.— [Ed. 
UNITE!) STATES AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY 
The Fifth Annual Meeting of the United States 
Agricultural Society will open at the Smithsonian 
Institute, Washington, on January 14tli. The ex¬ 
ercises will consist of: distribution of the Journal of 
the Society for 1856 ; awarding of premiums on 
field crops ; election of officers for ensuing year ; 
action upon propositions for the next annual 
exhibition; a lecture by Professor Henry, upon 
Science applied to Agriculture ; another lecture 
upon the Grasses of the United States, by Charles 
L. Flint, Esq., Secretary of Massachusetts Board 
of Agriculture, together with other lectures, dis¬ 
cussions, &c. 
