266 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
[ March 30, 1893. 
■wholesome nutritious food for -which less favoured animals 
positively fight. We have had both stockmen and shepherds 
who vowed that neither sheep nor cattle would eat silage, and if 
they did, it did them more harm than good. Such men had 
quickly to alter their views or be sent to the right about. To 
the lady it will suffice, we feel assured, if we venture to point out 
that the economical feeding of farm live stock has become a 
science, under whose beneScent guidance exact knowledge is 
acquired how to feed so as to obtain the best results at the lowest 
cost, a very different thing from the costly extremes of wasteful 
extravagance or equally wasteful parsimony. 
In the matter of the comparative cost of ensilage, which we 
may explain indicates the process of making silage, and of hay¬ 
making, our fair critic has also been misled. Ensilage as now 
practised cons’sts of mowing, carting, stacking, and press¬ 
ing. There is no cutting up of the green fodder now that stacks 
have taken the place of silos. The process is simplicity itself, is 
much less expensive, and has none of the uncertainty of hay¬ 
making. In expense haymaking only bears anything approach¬ 
ing favourable comparison when the barome'er is at set fair, and 
cloudless skies prevail day after day. In such weather , hay¬ 
making is a delightful process. With grass mowed on one day, 
dried and stacked on the next, we pay very little heed to ensilage, 
and the hay made is of the highest quality provided the grass is 
mown at the right stage of growth. But, then, how seldom do 
we have such perfect summer weather ? Certainly not during 
the last three or four years, and in unsettled weather not only 
does the cost mount up, but quality declines, sometimes so 
much that the hay is little better than litter. 
We agree entirely with “A Farmer’s Wife” that there are 
farmers and farmers. We live much among them, and it is 
precisely because we see so much that is wrong that we 
endeavour to point to better things. To the men of “ new 
departures” we say heartily, Well done. To our critic 'ft’e say. 
So entirely do we agree that there are two sides to every 
question, that I have endeavoured to show cause once more for 
the side which practice and reason prove to be the right one. 
WOEK ON THE HOME FARM. 
The dry weather has been much in favour of late lambs, many of 
which came very weakly indeed, so that where they are out on bleak 
pastures many of them have but a brief existence, despite the absence 
of wet. Lambing is timed for the present month in the Midlands, and 
though it is so late in the season, flockmasters are well repaid for the 
provision of lambing folds, for March weather is proverbially fickle. 
Keep young calves confined to the hovels yet awhile, hoose is rampant 
among those which are let out in the open ; in one instance we have 
found them suffering badly from this troublesome disease when kept in. 
This was owing to the filthy condition of the floor. The tenant has no 
arable land. Wheat straw now costs in that particular locality £4 per 
ton, he cannot afford to pay such a price, and the calves have to lie down 
upon a damp filthy floor. This is one of many an instance affording 
proof of the necessity which exists on dairy farms for just a few acres of 
arable land for the cultivation of a straw crop as well as some extra 
green crops. There is then a supply of home-grown corn as well as of 
straw either for food or fodder. 
Home farmers should be on the alert to obtain bracken, sedges, or 
rushes for litter when either can be had. Mention is made of this 
because we recently saw a large quantity of bracken decaying in a wood 
near a home farm where straw was in use for litter. We know there 
are difficulties with gamekeepers about the cutting and collection of 
bracken, but these may generally be overcome by the exercise of a little 
tact and discretion. 
Much of the Barley has been sown under favourable conditions on 
autumn-tilled land. Oats, too, have been sown so far as was possible, 
but we have a considerable breadth yet to sow after late folds. We pay 
little, if any, heed to popular ideas about what is termed Oat soil. For 
this crop it is more a question of manure than anything else—store the 
soil with fertility, procure good seed, and sow' without minding about 
geological formation or other niceties of distinction. We have had 
Oat crops alike good in poor, thin, silicious soil and in very heavy land ; 
on the thin soil it was possible to see outside the headlands where the 
manure had fallen short, straw with a tiny cluster of grains not more 
than 6 inches high, and out in the field the bulk of the crop 6 feet high. 
It is for this reason -we say that no crop answers better, few so well, for 
plenty of manure as Oats. 
PRUDENCE IN EDUCATION : RURAL 
PROSPERITY. 
Prudence should be the motto of School Boards, of County 
Councils, of District Councils, and of Tillage Councils. Education 
should be to each individual only the means to the end. Education 
leading up to, and enabling the worker, be he farmer, market 
gardener, florist, or any other trade or employment, to digest 
technical knowledge as acquired through books and periodicals ; 
as teaching and discussing his individual interests is real primary 
education. 
Our leading statesmen have told us, and are continually telling 
us, that to bring the people back to the country we must provide 
the villagers with amusements fcr their evenings. So I suppose 
the piano and the secular choir, with all other harmless amusements, 
must be fostered. But the land agent will discover that mprudence 
will lead to extravagant ideas even in these small things, and 
“ prudence ” ought to be kept continually before the young people, 
be they of the family of the land agent, the farmer, the cottager, 
or the village tradesman. 
We may be sure the hunting establishments will go on as long 
as it suits the farmer, and no longer. There is nothing to force the 
tenant farmer to join the hunt, or to keep a horse specially for hb 
own riding to hounds, unless “ prudence ” tells him it suits his 
book in the long run. He may be one of the yeomanry, and he 
may find it to his advantage to breed a few horses of the lighter 
class. Look everywhere round, the inmates of our farmhouses, 
and for matter of that land agents, and most of the people who get 
anything of income or no income from the land, are less simple 
in their habits than their predecessors were. The easy communi¬ 
cation with places away from home has partly caused the great 
change. 
The light farmer’s gig has replaced the rougher cart that helped 
to bring in the wife or daughter with the small produce of the 
homestead. Often the good old farmhouse with its ample dairy 
has had to give way to some ugly form of villa farmhouse, with 
parlour for the young ladies’ piano, and so on. 
If the mansion is let then let the owner reside in the neighbour¬ 
hood. Land agents do not take the place of the landlord. I think 
Lord Winchelsea would abolish the land agent if possible. Very, 
very, difficult is the position we all know, yet something will have 
to be done, though it maybe with as little unnecessary interference 
as can be devised. The land has its duties, and there should be a 
larger proportion of the income derived from land expended on 
the estate and in the neighbourhood than is now often the case. 
A hundred years ago things were very different as to expenditure 
of the income from landed estates. 
Lastly, “prudence” tells us that no amount of education will 
ever supply the place of practice. Experience, with education by 
books and periodicals for assistants, is the only way to arrive at 
rural prosperity.— Cotswold. 
METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
Camden Square, London. 
Lat. 51° 32' 40" N.; Long. 0° 8' 0" W.; Altitude, 111 feet. 
Date. 
9 A.M. 
In THE DAY. 
C3 
1893. 
March. 
1 Barometer 
1 at 32°, and 
1 Sea Level. 
Hygrometer. 
Direc¬ 
tion of 
Wind. 
Temp, 
of soil 
at 
1 foot. 
Shade Tem¬ 
perature. 
Radiation 
Temperature 
Dry. 
Wet. 
Max. 
Min. 
In 
Sun. 
On 
Grass. 
luchs. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
Inchs. 
Sunday .. 19 
30-483 
37-2 
31-3 
N. 
40-6 
46-7 
25-9 
79-0 
19-9 
— 
Monday .. 20 
30-476 
35-4 
33-4 
W. 
39-4 
51-8 
28-1 
78-1 
22-2 
— 
Tuesday .. 21 
30-419 
36-9 
33-0 
NE. 
39-1 
53-0 
27-8 
69-2 
23-1 
— 
Wednesday 22 
30-344 
39-9 
39-9 
N.E. 
38-9 
56-0 
32-9 
87-1 
24-1 
— 
Thursday.. 23 
30-310 
38-1 
38-0 
N.E. 
40-0 
61-2 
34-8 
88-4 
30-9 
— 
Friday .. 24 
30-391 
46 6 
42-2 
N.E. 
39-9 
62-0 
33-9 
91-3 
26-1 
— 
Saturday .. 25 
30-470 
46-5 
42-9 
N.E. 
40-3 
63-3 
33-1 
97-4 
24-7 
— 
30-413 
40-1 
37 2 
39-7 
56-3 
30-9 
84-4 
24-4 
— 
REMARKS. 
19th.—Cold, with unbroken sunshine, but slight fog after 3.30 p.M. 
20th.—Bright sunshine throughout, sharp frost early, but much warmer in afternoon. 
21st.—Sharp frost early, sun visible through fog all morning, shining brightly in 
afternoon, slightly foggy in evening. 
22nd.—Slight, but very wet, fog early, bright sunshine from 11.30 A.M. 
23rd.—More or less fog all the morning, bright sunshine after 1 P.M. 
24th.—Bright sunshine throughout. 
25th.—Unbroken sunshine. 
A fine spring week with considerable range of temperature and some sharp frosts.— 
G. J. SrJiONS. 
