AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
24,7 
18C9-] 
—- mgr- 
Ways at hand or so easily obtained that the suggestion is 
valuable:—" One or two applications of kerosene, rubbed 
on with the hand, will entirely restore the udders to a 
healthy and natural condition.. . .Some three years since 
the under jaw of a valuable cow commenced swelling, 
and in three or four days had become very large and 
painful. Some of my neighbors said it would kill her; 
they had seen many such, and never knew one to bo 
cured, and my convictions were the same. But I 
thought of my garget remedy; made two applications 
only of kerosene, which removed the swelling entirely.” 
- ■</ 4 I"II- i m - 
A Pear Blight iu Missouri. 
“Bonne tie Jersey,” Chillicothe, Mo., writes; 
“I observed the following disease last summer 
on a dwarf Louise Bonne de Jersey, four sum¬ 
mers planted, and which had made a more than 
ordinarily vigorous growth, it having been 
well cultivated and mulched. The disease com¬ 
menced at the top of the tree, extending down¬ 
ward and only on the south-west quarter of the 
tree. The outer edge, or rim, of the leaf com¬ 
menced to crisp, as if burnt, being harsh and 
brittle, and in several weeks the trouble extended 
to the centre and destroyed the leaf, which finally 
dropped off. During the attack, the crisp por¬ 
tion will readily break off from the healthy por¬ 
tion of the leaf, and by fall the brandies attacked 
are entirely leafless. In February last I cut back 
vigorously the limbs attacked, and this spring 
a very feeble effort was made by nature to put 
forth leaves ; but while the remainder of the tree 
was a mass of verdure, the limbs cut back were 
nearly bare. I discovered, also, that the bark 
began to present a rough appearance with whit¬ 
ish blotches, and was apparently dying, when I 
immediately cut off all the limbs attacked, close 
to the body of the tree. I am informed to-day 
by an old fruit grower, to whom I mentioned it, 
that lie has observed the same disease for some 
years past in this State, and says farther that it 
is very much more common to the Bonne de 
Jersey than other dwarfs, though he has seen it 
on other varieties. Ilaving a pear orchard of 
175 trees I feel interested in this matter.” 
[This seems to be a form of “ pear blight,” 
though less sudden in its action than the dis¬ 
ease usually known h}' that name. Some writ¬ 
ers have, with the probabilities in their favor, 
ascribed pear blight to a fungus, but proper ob¬ 
servations are needed to establish this. So far 
as known, severe surgery is the only help. The 
difficulty with these troubles is, that they do 
not manifest themselves until the vitality of the 
limb or tree is destroyed and the mischief is 
done, and cutting only removes what is already 
dead. Until we have some one who can devote 
a life of hard work to the investigation of these 
matters, we shall be groping in the dark. To 
say that it is a fungus does ntft help us in pre¬ 
venting the disease. AH that we are now able 
to advise is to cut and burn the affected portions, 
if it takes the whole tree, and by good cultivation 
produce a vigorous state that will go towards 
enabling the tree to resist such attacks. We 
are aware that this does not meet our cor¬ 
respondent’s case, who asks for a “remedy.” 
Will some one givejjetter advice?] 
In witii the New, Out with t he Old.— 
The heading above given expresses the spirit 
of the age, though it is sometimes misapplied, 
but in the case of climbing roses, it is the teach¬ 
ing we need. Having come into possession of 
some climbing rcses raised by another, we can 
see how the old should have been taken out and 
the new put in. At least half of each bush is 
dead wood carefully put up to the trellis, while 
last year’s shoots, which made a vigorous growth 
and would have filled the trellis, are swinging 
in the wind. Those who grow climbing roses 
should each year lay in a good stock of new 
wood and remove a correspondingamount of old. 
•-* -*—o-» 
Roads and Road-making'. 
We accept poor roads as one of the inevitable 
evils of life, and even call some of them good, 
or excellent, in comparison with those vastly 
poorer. The people of one town brag of roads 
that cost them three or four times what much 
better ones ought to cost, and are highly satis¬ 
fied with their own, and the high road tax, too, 
when they go outside their town limits aud see 
how much worse off other people are. Were 
we governed by a Louis Napoleon, Emperor, 
we would have excellent roads, for he would 
know very well that every dollar lost in the 
wear and tear of wagons and horse-flesh upon 
poor highways, leaves just so much the less for 
him to draw from the people by taxation. He 
would know that it costs vastly more to keep 
roads in passable, or poor condition, than in first- 
rate order, having reference only to the outlay 
of money and labor upon the roads. Why is it 
that wc cannot learn the same facts ? Why 
can we not see our own interests, every man’s 
interests, as well as the head of a monarchical 
form of government can see his ? The system 
of working the roads from one end of the land 
to the other, so far as wc are acquainted, is the 
most absurd that could be contrived. The 
township or the county officers set apart certain 
sums of money to be used for keeping the 
roads in order in certain districts, to each its 
allotment. This money is to be apportioned 
among the tax-payers, and either “worked out” 
at a low rate of wages per da\ r , or collected in 
money with other taxes, at the option of the 
tax-payer. The road tax is usually worked 
out. The road-master, or whatever else his 
title may be, is a resident of the district, and 
will rather follow the customary loose way of 
doing business, than see to it that his work is 
done in the best way, and with the least expend¬ 
iture. He will accept for a day’s work the 
labor of mere boj's, or of old men, and will 
have some days not a single ablebodied man 
on his whole force, except himself and his hired 
man. The result is, where ten days’ works are 
“ worked out,” three or four are done. 
Besides, when spring work is pressing, or hav¬ 
ing and harvesting absorb all the labor of the 
community, no road-master will do so unpopular 
a thing as to warn out his neighbors to work the 
roads. His own farm wmrk presses besides. 
So he delays until autumn, after doing a few 
days’ work in the early spring. The roads 
are plowed up; gravel and clay are scraped 
into the middle, “hog-backs” are made, to 
keep the water from running and washing in 
the middle of the road:—then comes frost, and 
all the new work remains soft and unsettled all 
the winter and spring, except when frozen solid. 
All this is easily obviated, and we may just as 
well have good roads as poor ones. Almost 
every township has a good young engineer and 
surveyor. Appoint him road-master for the 
town, give him a fair salary, one or two yokes 
of oxen, one or two pairs of horses, with carts, 
wagons, plows, scrapers, and small tools to 
match. Let him have money enough to hire 
eight or ten good men in summer, and perhaps 
four in winter. He should understand that his 
business is to study road-making, read up on 
the subject, learn where the best materials are, 
break out of old ruts, and as soon as possible 
give the people good roads all over the town. 
There would of course be first, second, and 
third class roads, according to their import¬ 
ance, and the amount of travel upon them. 
Similar systems to the one suggested are pur¬ 
sued in many townships, and the result is inva¬ 
riably a great improvement in the roads, and 
after a little while, even at first, in some cases, 
a decided decrease in the cost. We know of 
some towns in which the road hands are not 
employed more than half their time, although 
they cut and prepare timber, make bridges, and 
do much extra work. Their services are, how¬ 
ever, constantly in demand, and by digging cel¬ 
lars, moving buildings, laying cellar walls for 
houses, etc., making side-walks in the village, 
putting down cement walks and floors on pri¬ 
vate grounds, and in many other ways, they 
earn enough to pa\ r a large part of the ex¬ 
penses of men and teams. The road-master 
inspects all the roads once a month, especially 
after storms, and needed repairs, if promptly 
made, are slight and efficient. 
Tim Bunker oil the Jerseys. 
“ Got a touch of Jersey blood in ’em, I guess,” 
said Seth Twiggs, as I drove some new cows 
and a bull home through Hookertown Street. 
“Where did you scare up them critters?” in¬ 
quired Uncle Jotham Sparrowgrass, as he 
leaned his elbow on Seth’s garden gate. “They 
look amazingly like the cows they used to have 
over on the Island forty year ago, and they 
was poor sticks, too.” 
“Wall, now, Squire, why didn’t you git 
goats and done with it?” inquired Tucker. 
“I’ll bet a shad I’ve got a gout that’ll beat any 
cow you’ve got in giving milk or eating brush.” 
“Ilave’nt had much to eat lately?” asked 
Jones, who stood at Tucker’s elbow. 
“Great on eatin’ brush, they saj',” responded 
Tucker. “Don’t need any bush scythes where 
they keep ’em.” 
“Did they come from the Jarseys?” asked 
Jake Frink, who is not very well posted as to 
the breeds of cattle. “They kinder look as if 
they had been living on pitch pine and sand.” 
“ What oxen you’ll raise out of them ani¬ 
mals!” said Tucker, in a glow of admiration. 
“I’d like to see ’em j'oked up with some 
wharf rats that lately come up from Shadtown. 
I guess they’d take the premium at the next 
fair,” said Jones, who grew facetious. 
“ The Squire’ll be exhibiting rat butter next 
fall, and git a premium on’t, too, see if he don’t,” 
said Jake Frink. 
There hasn’t been such a stir in Hookertown 
since my first subsoil plow, some dozen years 
ago, or more, as my Jerse} r cattle have made. 
The contempt, if possible, is still stronger, as 
this conversation of my neighbors last spring 
show's. But the old subsoil plow still lives, and 
keeps nosing round, and I guess the Jerseys 
will stand it. I have had visits about every day 
since they arrived. A dozen men at the barn¬ 
yard gate is nothing uncommon. The While 
Oakers stop their coal carts on their way home 
to study the new cattle. Kier Frink thinks 
there must be some deer blood about ’em. Oc¬ 
casionally a man comes along who knows the 
stock, and wants to know if it isn’t thorough¬ 
bred. Rev. Mr. Spooner, who has visited the 
Channel Islands, thinks they are about equal to 
anything he saw there. Deacon Smith has offer¬ 
ed two hundred dollars for the heifer, but the 
weight of opinion in Hookertown is decidedly 
against the Jerseys, Hookertown is not fond 
