1875 .] 
335 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
more. Such was exactly the case here. The pota¬ 
toes in B had less albuminoids and more starch than 
those in A. In A there were 6, and in B 9 lbs. of 
carbo-hydrates to 1 of albuminoids. The less the 
nitrogen in the concentrated, the greater was the 
loss in digestion of the crude food. 
But to establish this principle firmly, one more 
proof is needed. Nitrogenous food in the place of 
potatoes ought to bring the digestion up again to 
where it was before the admixture. Fortunately 
this precise point has been tested. I have not 
space to give the experiments now. Suffice it to 
say that when bean-meal was added to hay in both 
small and large quantities, there was no decrease 
in the digestion of the hay, and when, again, part 
of the bean-meal was replaced by starch, the diges¬ 
tion of albuminoids fell once more. Just as we are 
getting fairly into this question, I find that my al¬ 
lotted space is about tilled. So I will only add a 
few words to indicate 
IIow these Principles may he Applied in 
Practice. 
1st. To make good use of poor foods, add rich 
foods to them. 
2d. To economize in feeding, see that the fodder 
contains plenty of nitrogen. And this for two rea¬ 
sons, because stock cannot digest their food com¬ 
pletely without it, and because they need albumin¬ 
oids for their nutrition. 
Wagons and Wagon Manufacture. 
A farm wagon that is ill-made, is a source of 
much annoyance, and loss of money and time. 
Unseasoned timber, and iron of poor quality, when 
put into a wagon, cause more trouble than when 
put anywhere else upon the farm. The most skill¬ 
ful workmanship is thrown away upon poor mate¬ 
rials, and putty and paint may cover but can not 
conceal them. The necessary exposure to the 
weather, and the strain of hard work, soon opens 
the joints, and admits water and air, and a poor 
wagon soou becomes a hopeless wreck. The busi¬ 
ness of wagon making is a very important one, both 
as an industry in which many workmen and large 
capital are employed, and also to the farmers and 
others who purchase the vehicles. The bulk of 
the business of building farm wagons, is done in 
large factories in the western states, in which about 
55,000 of these vehicles are made yearly. In these 
factories, which are furnished with large capital, 
and managed with extreme skill, every advantage 
as regards excellence of material and of labor is 
enjoyed. The lumber is selected with great care, 
and piled up in sheds, where it remains two or 
three years to season thoroughly. It undergoes no 
less than six inspections before it finds its place in 
the finished wagon. Equal care is taken in the 
selection of the iron. These precautions are abso¬ 
lutely necessary, to enable the wagons to sustain 
the heat and dry weather ; many of them going on 
to the plains, to the mining regions of the moun¬ 
tains, to Mexico, California, and to Texas, besides 
to thousands of farms in the west and east. Those 
wagons destined for California, are made with box¬ 
es from three to six feet deep, and with much more 
iron about them than a farm wagon. The Califor¬ 
nia people are very exacting as to the style of their 
wagons, requiring more than thirty different kinds. 
The best hubs and spokes are brought from north¬ 
ern Wisconsin ; oak and ash for other parts, from 
Michigan; and hickory from Indiana. Wagons 
made with such care and of such materials, will 
out-last inferior ones many years, and are very much 
the cheapest in the end. As might be expected, 
the manufacture conducted in this manner, grows 
very rapidly. The two largest of the western fac¬ 
tories have both grown from small beginnings in a 
few years, up to very extensive establishments. 
Of the “ Whitewater (Wis.) farm and freight wa¬ 
gon,” made by Semple, Birge & Co., of St. Louis, 
200 were made in 1860. Last year 4,500, or 15 every 
day, were made. Of the “ Mitchell ” wagons, 
made by Mitchell, Lewis & Co., of Racine, Wis., 
6 ? 0Q9 -svere gold last year, and this large business 
has grown up in twenty years. A farm wagon 
constructed of the same materials, and in the same 
manner as a freight wagon, destined to traverse the 
hot dry plains and the roughest mountain roads, 
may well be considered as the best of its kind. 
The fortunate owner of such a wagon ought cer¬ 
tainly to do it the justice of sheltering and cherish¬ 
ing it with the greatest care. 
Ogden Farm Papers.—No. 67. 
BY GEORGE E. WARING, JR., 
There is some progress to report in connection 
with the swamp that is being drained in Massachu¬ 
setts. The mill was erehted with a pump four 
inches in diameter, having a five-inch stroke. This 
worked perfectly well, even in very light winds, 
but its capacity was far too little to produce a 
sensible effect on the volume of water with which 
we had to contend, and I substituted for it a home¬ 
made wooden pump, eight inches square in the 
clear, and throwing over a gallon of water per 
stroke. I had no question but that the windmill, 
(twelve feet in diameter), would manage such a 
pump perfectly in a fair wind, and the situation 
was such that a working wind might be depended 
upon for a large part of the time. I visited it a 
few days ago, longing during the whole journey for 
a strong breeze to come up, but the ponds were 
only slightly rippled, and I had no hope of finding 
the machinery in operation. As we drove through 
the woods-toward the swamp, there was hardly 
more than a rustling of the leaves at the tops of 
the trees, and I expected to turn the wheel by hand 
to see how the pump held its water. As we came 
out into the open, I was surprised to see the mill 
turning deliberately but steadily, (making only 
twelve strokes per minute, which, for a mill of that 
size, is very slow work.) We found that every 
stroke delivered its full measure of water, and that, 
at each two revolutions of the wheel, an ordinary 
wooden bucket was filled. While we remained 
there the wind increased a little, so as to raise the 
speed, at its best, to eighteen strokes per minute. 
At these low velocities there was no appearance 
that the large quantity of water being thrown was 
in any way a tax upon the working of the mill, 
and in order to test it more thoroughly, I put my 
whole weight, (hard upon two hundred), on the 
pitman, and found that the movement was con¬ 
tinued without a sensible reduction of speed. This 
demonstrated that, with such a breeze as was then 
blowing, this twelve-foot mill and its pump would 
raise a barrel of water per minute from a depth of 
at least eight feet, and that, of course, with any 
increase of force in the wind, the depth might be 
greatly extended. It is therefore not unlikely that 
even if we have to go to a depth of fifteen feet, 
which is the worst that we have contemplated, we 
may still be able to use a pump of this size ; though 
no doubt, after the land lias once been pumped 
dry, the amount of water to be thrown could be 
handled by a much smaller pump. I have gone 
thus far into detail in this matter, and shall con¬ 
tinue to do so as the project develops, in the be¬ 
lief that more real benefit accrues to readers from 
accounts and discussions of work that is actually 
being done, than from any amount of purely theo¬ 
retical discussion of principles and processes. This 
is the first instance, (within my knowledge), in this 
country, of attempting to drain a considerable 
swamp by the use of a wind-mill. If it succeeds, 
the details of the work will have a wide interest, 
and even if it fails in any or in all respects, it must 
at least be full of valuable suggestion for others 
who have similar work to perform ; if we teach 
only what is to be avoided, we teach a great deal. 
My senior partner originated an expression, dur¬ 
ing our earlier days, when so many of our opera¬ 
tions went awry, the force of which many begin¬ 
ners will realize : “ There is nothing sure in farm¬ 
ing but disappointment.” — Although we have 
learned much patience during our eight years of 
experiment and frequent, failure, and haye survived 
the many difficulties which beset us at the outset, 
wc are constantly achieving some new surprise, and 
realizing that the fund of experimental knowledge 
that a farm supplies is not easily exhausted. Just 
as we had flattered ourselves that we had gone 
through the whole list of agricultural calamities, 
and had nothing more to learn, we were visited one 
fine day by a cloud of army worms. Judging from 
the vigor and the methodical industry with which 
they have begun their operations, we shall probably 
have occasion to remember them as long as we 
live. Almost before we knew of their coming, five 
acres of oats which were in about a week to have 
been turned into hay, (as soon as the kernel should 
develop its milk), was almost black with them, and 
before we could get the mowing-machine through 
the field, and the crop spread out to dry, nearly 
every leaf had been eaten, and only the heads and 
stalks left. The next morning another tribe were 
found at work at the edge of a patch of corn-fod¬ 
der, which was to have made us butter in August 
and September, and w T as to have given us a good 
row of stacks for forage next winter. Oddly 
enough, (though perhaps this is the way with the 
beast), they had confined their operations to the 
first row of corn, which was rather well grown, but 
they had reduced it to bare poles, ragged with the 
strings of the leaves, which had been too tough for 
their use. Six hours later the next row had fol¬ 
lowed, and by the next morning the third was being 
assailed. We then adopted the tactics of our 
neighbors, learned during the previous inroads of 
this pest, before I came here to live, and cut a 
trench a little way in from the edge of the sound 
corn, a good spade deep, and with steep sides. 
This seems to have cheeked their advance, and will, 
I hope, prove effectual; but if not, there will be 
cows sold this autumn, or a good deal of money 
spent for fodder ; for, with the months of May and 
June, very cold and very dry, our hay crop is con¬ 
siderably reduced in quantity. Not so much as the 
crops of adjacent poorer lands, but still quite se¬ 
riously. Our neighbors say that this ditch, if 
watched, and kept steep in the sides, will be effec¬ 
tual ; that the worms, in attempting to get out of 
it, divide their energies between pulling themselves 
up and pulling their neighbors down, and so keep 
themselves at the bottom. Let us hope. 
I really begin to feel as though whenever I take 
up the subject of the deep setting of milk, I were 
entering upon the career of a confirmed bore. Ev¬ 
ery time I touch it I determine never to speak of it 
again, yet there is always something developing 
that seems to add to the importance of the topic. 
I had been quiet about deep cans for some months, 
and had contented myself with publishing the re¬ 
ports of its success that so frequently reached me, 
when suddenly there burst upon me a violent arti¬ 
cle, (in the Country Gentleman), from the pen of 
Mr. O. S. Bliss, Secretary of the very prominent 
Dairymen’s Association of Vermont. Mr. Bliss 
courteously intimated that I and those who believe 
with me, were either humbugged ourselves or were 
humbugging others ; or, in plain English, that we 
were either knaves or fools. Not supposing that he 
meant it, I wrote a mild reply, to which he retorts, 
saying, in effect, that I am not only either a knave 
or a fool, but that I prefer opinions to facts, and 
that I avoid making a comparative trial for fear of 
exposing myself. While I was considering how to 
repel this onset, Mr. F. D. Douglass, of Whiting, 
Vermont, a man well known in the dairy world, 
takes up the cudgel against Mr. Bliss, and makes it 
quite unnecessary to say any more. He points to 
the fact that we who advocate deep-setting have no 
pecuniary interest in the general adoption of our 
ideas, and have not a solitary patent-right to sell. 
In the course of his remarks he delivers the follow¬ 
ing : “ With regard to the arraignment of the ad¬ 
vocates of deep-setting in general, I have nothing 
to say. These gentlemen will doubtless continue 
to practice their abominations in spite of this, and 
stubbornly refuse to profit by his profound lessons 
of wisdom drawn from his great experience in con¬ 
ducting his dairy of one cow.”—Mr. Douglass goes 
on to that his pecuniary success depends largely 
