162 
FOREIGN AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 
JTomgn Agricultural 3fatos. 
By the steamer America, we are in receipt of our for¬ 
eign jouruals to the 5th of April. 
Markets. —Cotton has fallen }d. per lb. Grain, flour, 
and provisions, firm, at a shade of better prices. 
Salting Asparagus. —Give as much as 20 lbs. to a 
quare rod. Apply it after the plants have begun to 
grow in the spring.— Gardeners' Chronicle. 
Influence of Light on Vegetation. —Oxygen is disen¬ 
gaged rapidly in solar light, insensibly in diffused light, 
and not at all in darkness. In the latter case, no car¬ 
bonic acid gas, whatever, is given off by plants; the 
contrary is generally supposed to take place.— Comp- 
tes Rendus. 
Influence of Gypsum on Vegetation. —M. C. Mene. 
from numerous facts deduced from experiments, came 
to the following conclusion:—1st. That gypsum has by 
itself no fertilising power, and is alone useless as a 
manure; 2d. That gypsum is only useful in agriculture 
when mixed with substances containing ammonia ;, in 
which case there is a double decomposition, and the 
ammonia is stored up for the use of the plants ; 3d. 
That for gypsum may be substituted any other salt 
which will fix ammonia, and render it not volatile at 
the ordinary temperature.— Ibid. 
To Keep Birds from Picking Fruit. —As the season 
is coming on for the depredations of birds, I beg to re¬ 
port my experience of last year, when I saved my cur-, 
rants and gooseberries, by winding colored worsted 
round and across my bushes ; and my cherries, by 
hanging up several pieces of tin with strong thread in 
the different trees, two pieces being hung near enough 
together to clash with the wind, which sound, with the 
bright reflection of the tin in the sun, certainly fright¬ 
ened them away; and I had my due share of fruit, 
which, the preceding year, I was obliged to relinquish 
to them.— Agricultural Gazette. 
The Use of Salt for Domestic Animals. —At a late 
meeting of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, 
in a discussion on the use of salt in agriculture, Mr. 
Fisher Hobbs remarked that, while he preferred the 
fishy refuse for application to land, he used rock salt 
for all the live stock on his farm, excepting pigs, for 
which he employed common household salt, boiled up 
with meal and potatoes for their food. For his horses, 
cattle, and sheep, he invariably used rock salt with suc¬ 
cess ; the two former had always free access to it in 
their mangers, and the sheep in their troughs. In wet 
weather, the sheep would take a larger quantity of it 
than in dry weather. In a flock of 200, one half of 
which had access to salt, while the other half were 
debarred from it, the losses among those which had no 
salt were found to be from 3 to 5 per cent, greater than 
among those which had salt, when feeding on green 
crops, or food of too succulent a nature. Professor 
Simonds said that he could bear testimony to the legit¬ 
imate use of salt, and agreed with Mr. Hobbs that 
sheep fed on too luxuriant grasses, without being at the 
same time supplied with salt, did badly. The salt cor¬ 
rected the injurious effect of the food, and promoted 
the secretion of bile. Salt marshes, he believed, never 
rotted sheep ; while wet pastures, and their coarse 
food invariably were found to do so. In the Royal 
Veterinary College, the horses were constantly allowed 
to have a lump of salt by them; and when he was 
himself in country practice, he had salt sprinkled over 
the hay in the ricks, and found it very valuable for 
horses, sheep, and cows. He thought it a very impor¬ 
tant question for the consideration of the council. 
Flax Cotton. —In the late proceedings of the council 
of the Royal Agricultural Society of England, we per¬ 
ceive that they have turned their attention to the ex¬ 
tension of flax culture in the United Kingdom, and 
among other points of interest, have investigated the 
recent discoveries of M. Chevelier Claussen, in render¬ 
ing common flax subservient to the purposes of cotton. 
From a little shilling pamphlet, just published by Mr. 
John Wiley, of this city, we learn that the principle of 
the discovery by which flax is adapted for spinning upon 
cotton, wool, and silk, independent of flax machinery, 
consists in destroying the cylindrical or tubular char¬ 
acter of the fibre, by means of carbonic or other gas, 
the action of which splits the tubes into a number of 
ribbon-like filaments, solid in character, and of a spe¬ 
cific gravity less than cotton, the upper and under sur¬ 
faces of which are segments of circles, and the sides of 
which are ragged and serrated. This is effected by 
boiling the flax for about three hours, either in the state 
in which it comes from the field, or in a partially- 
cleaned condition, in water containing about one half 
of one per cent, of common soda. After undergoing 
this process, the flax is placed in water, slightly acidu¬ 
lated with sulphuric acid ; the proportions of acid used 
being 1 to 500 of water. This process, producing as 
it does, a complete separation of the integral fibres from 
each other, is equally adapted for the preparation of 
long fibre for the linen, or of short fibre for the other 
branches of textile manufacture. When required to be 
prepared for linen, all that is necessary, after the above 
process, is to dry and scratch it in the ordinary way. 
The advantages which this mode of preparation pos¬ 
sess over any other mode in use, are stated in the of¬ 
ficial report of the proceedings at the Royal Agricul¬ 
tural Society to be the following:— 
1. “That the preparation of long fibre for scutching 
is effected in less than one day, and is always uniform 
in strength, and entirely free from color, much facilita¬ 
ting the after process of bleaching, either in’ yarns or 
in cloth. 
2. “ That it can also be bleached in the straw at very 
little additional expense of time or money. 
3. “ That the former tedious and uncertain modes of 
steeping are superseded by one perfectly certain with 
ordinary care. 
4. “ That, in consequence of a more complete sever¬ 
ance of the fibres from each other, and also from the 
bark and boon, the process of scutching is effected with 
half the labor usually employed.” 
