AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
149 
lia is therefore to be pronounced in four sylla¬ 
bles, Ehi-no-ti-a; and, when thus correctly 
spoken, sounds very differently from Rhinosia. 
No valid reason therefore exists for the rejection 
of the latter on account of its supposed resem¬ 
blance to the former. The genus Rhinosia was 
published by Treitschke in 1833, Cluetocheilus 
by Stephens in 1834. The first therefore has 
priority. The genus Anesychia of Hiibner, 
though earlier than both, is not entirely syno¬ 
nymous with either of them, Hiibner, in his 
“ Verzeichniss, printed in 1816, enumerates 
only four species of Anesychia; to wit, lithos- 
permella, echiella, sequella , vittella. The first 
tiyo of these species belong to the Yponomen- 
tad.e, and to the genus Anesychia , adopted from 
Hiibner by Mr. Curtis, in his last Catalogue, 
and by Westwood; or to Melanoleuca of Ste¬ 
phens, and AEdia of Duponchel. The last two 
species belong to the Tinead.-e, and to the genus 
Rhinosia of Treitschke and Duponchel, or 
Chastocheilus of Stephens, Curtis, and West- 
wood. It may be added that pometum , from 
which the specific name of the Palmer-worm 
Moth is derived, is not “ a synonym of pome- 
tarium." 
For the reasons above stated, I must object 
to any change of the scientific name, bestowed 
on the moth of the Palmer Worm by 
Yours respectfully, 
Thaddeus William Harris. 
THE ARAB HORSE. 
Layard, the explorer of Nineveh, who is as 
familiar with Arabs as he is with antiquities, 
gives in his late work, Assyria, some curious 
details respecting the true horse of the desert. 
Contrary to the popular notion, the real Arabian 
is celebrated less for unrivalled swiftness than 
for extraordinary powers of endurance. Its 
usual pace are but two—a quick walk, often 
averaging four or five miles an hour, and a half 
running canter; for only when pursued does a 
Bedouin put in his mare to full speed. It is the 
distance they will travel in emergency, the 
weight they will carry, and the comparative 
trifle of food they require, which render the 
Arabian horse so valuable. 
Layard says that he knew of a celebrated 
mare which had carried two men in chain armor 
beyond the reach of some Aneyza pursurers. 
This mare had rarely had more than twelve 
handfuls of barley in twenty-four hours, except¬ 
ing during tjm spring when the pastures were 
green ; and it is only the mares of the wealthy 
Bedouins that get even this allowance. The 
consequence is that, except in the spring, the 
Arab horse is lean and unsightly. They are 
never placed under cover during summer, nor 
protected from the bitter winds of the desert 
in winter. The saddle is rarely taken from their 
backs. Cleaning and grooming are strangers to 
them. They sometimes reach fifteen hands in 
height, and never fall below fourteen. In dispo¬ 
sition they are docile as lambs, requiring no 
guide but a halter ; yet in the fright or pursuit 
their nostrils become blood-red, their eyes glit¬ 
ter with fire, the neck is arched, and the mane 
and tail are raised and spread out to the wind ; 
the whole animal becomes transformed. The vast 
plains of Mesopotamia furnish the best breeds, 
and these breeds are divided into five races, of 
which the original stock was the Koheyleh. 
The most famous belong either to the Shammer 
or to the Aneyza tribes. Their pedigrees are 
kept scrupulously, and their value is so great 
that a thorough-bred mare is generally owned 
by ten or even more persons. It is not often 
that a real Arabian can be purchased. The 
reason is that on account of its fleetness and 
power of endurance it is invaluable to the Be¬ 
douin, who, once on its back, can defy any pur¬ 
suer except a Shammer or Aneyza with a swift¬ 
er mare than his own. An American racer, or 
even an English hunter, would break down in 
those pathless deserts almost before an Arabian 
became warmed up to its work. Where thorough¬ 
bred mares have been sold they have brought 
as high as six thousand dollars; but these, it is 
understood are not the best of the race. 
The Arab who sells his mare can do nothing 
with his gold, and cannot even keep it, for the 
next Bedouin of a hostile tribe who comes 
across his path, and who has retained his mare, 
will take it from him and defy pursuit. Layard 
thinks that no Arabian of the best blood has 
ever been seen in England. If this is so, we 
can scarcely suppose that any have come to 
America, but must believe the so-called Arabi¬ 
ans given to our Government at various times, 
to be of inferior breeds. Rarely, indeed, are 
the thorough-breeds found beyond the desert. 
It will be a subject of regret, to those who ad¬ 
mire fine horses, to learn that the Arabian is 
considered to be degenerating, the consequence 
of the subjugation of Arabia, and the decline 
of the Bedouin tribe.— Phila. Bulletin. 
-1 • i- 
AGRICULTURE IN SWITZERLAND. 
Your readers may like to have a report from 
a traveller in Switzerland on the farming there, 
and of the crops in France and Germany, seen 
in going to and returning from Switzerland. 
The Rye was partly cut and the Wheat nearly 
ripe in the middle of July in the great plains 
forming the land levels of the Rhine in Belgium 
and Germany; they were so much beaten down 
by wind and rain that it was difficult to judge 
of the quantity; no doubt the crop was injured 
by it, and it was weedy. The crop, therefore, 
must be deficient. In the end of August the 
only corn out in the undulating plains south-east 
of Paris was Oats, a scanty crop, not 16 bushels 
to the acre. The Wheat and Rye were all car¬ 
ried, and the stubbles ploughed. 
The great power of the sun, the less skill of 
the husbandman, and the want of sufficient capi¬ 
tal, combine to render the average produce of 
corn small in this great district. Excepting near 
the large towns, little manure is procured. No 
stock is kept on the land. Water is seldom to 
be met with, excepting in the river valleys ; so 
that fertility is confined to the vicinity of towns 
and to the valleys. The produce must, therefore, 
be strictly natural, such as the experiments of 
Dr. Daubeney showed land capable of by simple 
tillage without manure, which this district of 
light soil ploughed in August gets ; the sun not 
only destroying weeds, but also separating those 
elements which the crop requires from the soil. 
This district is a perfect contrast to green Eng¬ 
land, with her flocks and herds, her store of 
Turnips, rich natural Grasses, and Clover, with 
the assistance of farm implements and artificial 
manures, with abundant capital, and skill to ap¬ 
ply it. About the great towns, as Strasbourg, 
fine crops of Carrots, Poppies, Hemp, Tobacco, 
and Clover are met with, and on the slopes the 
Vine is cultivated. The capital and the manure 
of the towns alter the face of things ; but these 
favored districts form small part of the whole. 
Poor proprietors are generally the occupiers, 
often working and living as laborers. 
Switzerland. —We must know the climate, 
the soil, and the elevation above the sea, before 
we can understand the agriculture of this coun¬ 
try. The mountains and their glaciers are the 
chief attractions to travellers, but the valleys 
are the most important to the natives. These 
valleys vary from 1200 to 2000 feet above the 
level of the sea ; such elevations in England 
and Wales would be almost unproductive—arid, 
rocky, or boggy; but there are few arid spots 
in Switzerland, and very little bog. The slopes 
of the mountains are generally too steep for bog. 
The valleys are fertilized by irrigation, and the 
deposits of glacier sand (a very fertile material 
derived from the granite which their artificial 
water-courses spread over a large extent of pas¬ 
ture land, and to which we must attribute the 
large produce in Grass, and the great size of 
their timber and fruit trees.) The Walnut and 
the Cherry, and, in North Italy, the Spanish 
Chestnut, arc found in great numbers, and grow¬ 
ing to a large size in their valleys. 
We have nothing in England to equal the fer¬ 
tility of some of their valleys; for, in addition 
to the moisture of their perpetual streams, Swit¬ 
zerland has a greater summer heat than Eng¬ 
land. Were it not for the greater elevation of 
the whole land, and cooling influence of snow 
and ice, it would possess the heat of Italy. The 
soil is light; you never sec clay ; and in south¬ 
ern exposures, and where the valleys admit the 
sun, corn is grown, and occasionally the Vine. 
In the high Alpine district, pasturage is exclu¬ 
sively found, and this in stages. The high pas¬ 
tures feed in July and August, and the lower 
slopes later in the year, until winter comes and 
the cattle are housed. Many cows are constantly 
kept in houses, on board floors ; the under por¬ 
tion or a side part of their dwelling-houses con¬ 
tain all the provender required for man or beast 
in winter. A great provision of hay is made, 
almost always secured in fine order, and stored 
in their chalets, which are strong sheds, built 
of whole timber and roofed with wood cut from 
the neighboring forest, and which are very dura¬ 
ble. Nothing can exceed the sweetness of their 
hay, in which the natural flowers form a con¬ 
siderable part, for the pastures of Switzerland 
are as gay with flowers as the gardens of Eng¬ 
land. Cheese and butter are the great produce. 
The summer is spent in haymaking and in mak¬ 
ing cheese and butter. In winter they find em¬ 
ployment in felling timber, and tending their 
housed cattle. The cheese is the gruyere, or of 
that kind, a close waxy substance with holes in 
it, all good, some of fine quality, and which 
keeps well in a hot climate ; it is made in cool 
cheese houses, often from the milk of many pro¬ 
prietors. They generally possess the power of 
preserving their milk sweet in chalets, through 
which a stream of ice-cold water flows. 
Their cows, the dun, are well-shaped animals, 
with a silky skin, and excellent milkers. Some 
spirited agriculturist should devote a summer to 
select and transport a herd of them into Eng¬ 
land. They would form a valuable breed for 
housing. 
The influx of travellers into Switzerland is 
immense, they must spend millions of Napoleons 
every summer there; it is the great source of 
the wealth of Switzerland, directly in the im¬ 
mense demand it occasions for the produce of 
the land ; and indirectly, in providing capital to 
carry on their numerous manufacturers, and 
their foreign trade. 
The present summer has been dry and warm 
for a mountain district. At Domo D’ossola on 
Sunday, the 31st July, there was a great pro¬ 
cession of priests and people with banners, the 
Virgin, &c., and prayers were chanted for rain, 
and on the same day throughout Piedmont. We 
were told the dust was 4 inches thick at Milan ; 
but amidst the mountains of northern Italy, 
there was no appearance of burnt pastures, and 
the Vine, the Chestnut, and the Walnut, were 
covered with luxuriant foliage, excepting where 
the Vine disease had committed its ravages, 
which was the case in some places, particularly 
in Italy. The horses are good, spirited, active, 
and strong.—T'nos. C. Brown, Cirencester , in 
Agricultural Gazette. 
-- 
Save toe Dead Leaves. —If every horticul¬ 
turist would reflect for a moment on the nature 
of fallen leaves, which contain not only the vege¬ 
table matter but the earthy salts, lime, potash, 
&c., needed for the next season’s growth—and 
that, too, exactly in the proportion required by 
the very tree and plant from which they fall— 
nay, more, if they would consider that it is pre¬ 
cisely in this way, by the decomposition of 
these very fallen leaves, that nature enriches the 
soil, year after year, in her great forests, it would 
scarcely be possible for such a reflecting horti¬ 
culturist to allow these leaves to be swept away 
by every wind that blows, and finally lost alto¬ 
gether. A wise horticulturist will diligently col¬ 
lect, from week to week, the leaves that fall un¬ 
der each tree, and by digging them under the 
soil about the roots, where they will decay and 
enrich that soil, provide in the cheapest manner 
the best possible food for that tree. In certain 
vineyards in France, the vines are kept in the 
highest condition by simply burying at their 
roots every leaf and branch that is pruned oft 
such vines, or that falls from them at the end oi 
the season.— Horticulturist. 
“ I’ll take your part,” as the dog said when he 
robbed the cat of her dinner. 
