98 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[Makch, 
venient, should be worked square. The wheel 
may be built up of yellow pine strips, one inch 
and a half thick, for the arms, and hemlock or 
white-pine boards one inch thick for the seg¬ 
ments. Four strips are nailed together around 
the shaft. These form the arms of the wheel. 
They should be cut just as long as the 
diameter of the ivheel is intended to be. 
Then a nail should be driven into the barn-floor 
or the floor of the work-shop, and with a cord 
three feet long and a piece of chalk a circle six 
feet in diameter should be drawn on the floor. 
The boards to form the segments of the wheel 
may be marked out in this manner and fitted 
together exactly. They should then be nailed 
on to the arms on one side with wrought nails 
and clinched. The spaces between the arms 
should then be filled up with inch-and-a-half 
boards cut to fit, which should be nailed to the 
segments in such a way as to break the joints, 
if there are any, with wrought nails as before. 
Then the segments for the other side may be 
nailed on in the same way as before directed, 
and carriage-bolts may be put through at each 
arm to make the whole secure. The outer cir¬ 
cumference of the segments should be made to 
project two inches beyond the ends of the arms, 
and the edges of the boards which fill the spaces 
between them, so as to leave a groove all round 
the wheel in which the draft-rope works. A 
rope an inch and a quarter in diameter will be 
large enough for any purpose, and will be found 
easier for the hands than a smaller one. If the 
wheel is desired to be light, or good yellow pine 
is used for the segments, no filling between the 
arms need be used, but, instead, carriage-bolts 
may be passed through the segments two inches 
from their outer circumference for the rope to 
work on. The rope will not slip on them very 
easily, but of course there will not be nearly so 
much hold as when the space is filled up en¬ 
tirely. The boards and the ends of the arms 
should be dressed off smoothly, so as to prevent 
wearing the rope. If the rope be found to slip 
in hoisting very heavyweights requiring two or 
three men, some chalk should be rubbed upon 
it, which will prevent the slipping. 
A Simple Corn-Marker. 
R. N. G., Ballston Spa, N. Y., sends us a draw¬ 
ing and description of a corn-marker, which is 
or strips of stout leather may be used in place 
of the hoop-iron. These strips are fastened 
together by another cross-strip three inches 
wide, one inch thick, and of such a length 
as to bring the center of the strips three 
feet four and a half inches apart. Two stout 
pins, 10 inches long, are fixed to each end of 
the strips at an angle, as shown in the engrav¬ 
ing. This marker may be used by two men, or 
may be drawn by a horse, and lays out about 
4,000 hills to the acre, so that by counting the 
rows iu the field each way, multiplying together, 
and dividing the sum by 4,000, the exact num¬ 
ber of acres in the field may be ascertained. 
When the marker is drawn to the end of the 
field, it is turned over on the other side, and lifted 
so that the end tooth is in the last row made, 
which is the guide for the next rows. If the 
first row has been laid out perfectly straight the 
whole field will be accurately checked. 
IMPROVED CORN-MARKER. 
not patented. A round pole of white pine or oth¬ 
er light tough wood 18 feet long is procured. In 
this are cut six grooves a quarter of an inch 
deep, and three feet four and a half inches apart. 
Six strips are then made, an inch and a 
quarter thick and five feet long, and two and a 
quarter inches wide at the upper end and four 
inches at the lower. At the upper ends of the 
strips loops of light hoop-iron are nailed and 
made to embrace the grooved part of the pole, 
Improved Stock in Texas. 
I observe many notices of shipments of fine 
stock of various kinds (more particularly hogs) 
to the South, and am glad to see such items, as 
it plainly shows a fact that has been considered 
doubtful— i. e., that fine stock of all kinds will 
live, thrive, and <pay in the extreme South. 
The idea that they would not succeed has so 
often been advanced and supported (by those 
who did not know about such things), that 
many were afraid to bring in valuable animals. 
Such a notion is now a thing of the past, how¬ 
ever, and it is wonderful and gratifying to 
notice with what a vim our people are taking 
hold of good stock, once introduced, and with 
what successes they are encouraged in it. 
As an instance of what can and will be done, 
I will mention a few items coining under my ob¬ 
servation iu Collin Co., Texas. The farmers 
were first attracted to fine hogs, as they make 
quickest returns for money invested, and would 
not be so expensive in bringing out. 
The Chester Whites were introduced in’69, 
and being finer than anything before seen, sold 
well, and paid both buyer and seller. They 
proved too tender for our rough farm usage, 
and falling into disfavor with many, were super¬ 
seded by the Berkshires. These succeeded in 
every way, and were disseminated and crossed 
throughout the country. But at our last fair 
some Polaud-China or Magie 
pigs were shown, and immediate¬ 
ly the country was loud with 
praises of this breed. They ful¬ 
filled so many of the requisites 
of the hog that was wanted, that 
they were hailed as the coming 
hog. There are now nine very 
fine ones in the county, and they 
increase in favor. Of course we 
have the strong advocates of 
the other breeds, and we now 
have good specimens of all the 
prominent breeds of hogs, as 
well as grades and crosses of all 
kinds, and can show, I think, as 
nice stock of this kind as can be found in the 
entire South. 
In sheep a lamentable lack of interest is evi¬ 
dent, and natives are few, and fine ones wanting. 
A late introduction of a fine lot of Shorthorns 
and grades from the blue-grass region of Ken¬ 
tucky has done well, and is paying the owner 
large profits, but it is only a shadow of what is 
to do, and will be done in a few years. Our ad¬ 
vantages for cattle, when pastures come more 
into vogue, can not be overestimated, and in a 
few years the raising of fine cattle will assume 
proportions consistent with those of our former 
raising of the wild longhorn native. 
Many good stallions are now standing in the 
count}’, some of them thorough-bred and really 
fine, principally from Kentucky. 
But in draft stock our forte is mules, and I 
may say that finer mules are seldom seen any¬ 
where than are raised here. It has become 
quite a business of late years, and we have some 
excellent breeders and very fine jacks. Many 
mules are driven from here every year, and, 
selling as they do at first-rate paying prices, this 
branch of stock suffers no decline, nor will it 
under these circumstances. 
WeJiave even the busy little Italian bee fully 
at home, and working his many hours a day 
for us. They are as yet only in one apiary, but 
our people are so full of the idea of securing 
the best, that I have no doubt they will soon be 
scattered through the county. T. B. L. 
Collin Co., Texas. 
•-—.-—«.*—--- 
Tim Bunker on Dog-Laws. 
“Whose dorg did it?” asked Jake Frink ex¬ 
citedly as he looked over the fence where Seth 
Twiggs was pulling carrots and smoking—or 
smoking and pulling carrots, just as you hap¬ 
pen to look at the main business of life. The 
cloud was very thick this morning, for Seth 
was in trouble, and there was a good deal more 
dog than carrot in his meditations. His favor¬ 
ite Cotswold ram, on which he had been brag¬ 
ging for a month, had been bitten the week be¬ 
fore, and last night died of his wounds—neither 
sheep nor mutton, but a dead carcass unfit for 
human use. 
“ Guess it was yourn,” answered Seth, “but I - 
can’t prove it, for I didn’t see him bite the 
sheep. But I saw him in .the same pasture, 
the same afternoon, with his tongue out, as ef 
he had been chasing sutliin’, and an hour after¬ 
wards I found the ram badly bitten.” 
“ It couldn’t be my dorg, for lie’s a setter, and 
I never knew him to hunt anything but birds. 
He is the greatest setter you ever see.” 
“ Wal, mebbe so,” said Seth with a long puff. 
“But when I seed him that afternoon he was 
fur enough from settin’. His tail was straight 
as a string, and his tongue was out a foot long, 
as ef he was chasing a fox, and I should have 
smelt a fox ef I hadn’t found the ram bleeding 
to death. But I can’t prove anything, Jake. I 
didn’t see him bite the sheep.” 
“ There ain’t a doubt that he bit the sheep,” 
said Uncle Jotharn Sparrowgrass, “ for he killed 
two of mine last year in one night. I saw him 
eating the carcass.” 
“It is a hard case,” said Parson Spooner, 
who loved mutton, and liked to see his parish¬ 
ioners introducing better stock into Hookertown. 
“It seems to be almost impossible to raise sheep 
in this neighborhood.” 
“Well, what are you going to do about it?” 
asked Deacon Smith. “ Your buck is dead, and 
fifty dollars have gone up.” 
“ I thought they had a dog-law in Connecticut, 
and that we could get pay for sheep that the 
dogs killed?” Seth remarked inquiringly. 
“You can get pay of the owner of the dog,” 
the Deacon replied, “if you can prove the dam¬ 
age, and if the owner is a responsible man. 
The law will take his property to make your 
loss good.” 
“And if you. can’t prove it, what then?” 
asked Seth. 
