1863.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
333 
And then, what, an erect, military carriage! 
what a lordly step ! For the table, what could 
be in better keeping than a Shanghai cock and 
a cup of Souchong tea ? Both from the same 
country, they would harmonize well in the 
stomach, and make pleasant digestion also. 
Well Sir, the high-bred birds were bought— 
at rather a high figure, my neighbors hinted— 
but I thought them cheap at any price. I con¬ 
fess it troubled me somewhat to see how vora¬ 
ciously they ate up my corn, but would it not 
surely come back again fourfold in mammoth 
eggs, and in the broods of imperial chickens ? 
But Sir, after a pretty fair trial of this fancy 
stock, I acknowledge myself a little tired of it. 
They are lazy, they won’t scratch for a living, 
as my former hens did, but prefer being fed 
from the granary. Nor do they lay so very 
freely either, after all my care in feeding and 
nursing, and making enticing nests with glass 
eggs in the middle. “ So much for trying to 
have ‘ blood stock says my wife, who wants 
eggs for her puddings and cake. Nor have they 
proved good setters, while some of them have 
shown themselves bad mothers. I knew that 
the rascally sow would sometimes devour her 
squeaklings, but that the hen, the very image of 
maternal tenderness, should destroy her brood, 
was a new and sad thing to learn ! One old 
biddy killed six chicks as soon as born, and 
raised only three, out of a nest of twelve eggs. 
Do you, Sir, like the looks of these fowls ? It 
grieved me at first, to wring the necks of my 
beautiful Polands, in order to make room for 
these awkward fellows ; but I hoped I should 
learn to admire them; and if not, their utility 
would certainly atone for their ungainliness. 
But their beauty does not yet appear, nor their 
utility. Their huge carcasses roll and tumble 
about without anything like “ the poetry of mo¬ 
tion,” and their feathers seem stuck on wrong 
end foremost. I have often wished their tails 
and wings were better furnished with feathers, 
for looks’ sake; but I now remember that the 
man of whom I bought them said they were 
eminently domestic, had no filibustering pro¬ 
pensities, would not try to fly over a fence, and 
could not; they preferred to stay at home in 
dignified retirement and be fed, and Nature had 
given them a plumage suited to their desires. 
“ Their sober wishes never learned to stray.” 
And then, as to their crowing, did you ever 
hear the like ! They go it strong, but it is of 
the Chinese gong style of music—a most dolo¬ 
rous, unearthly howling, long drawn out. The 
editor of a paper out here, whom my cocks have 
disturbed with their bass solos, says: “ Their 
crow is not the honest Saxon crow, expressive 
of day-break, love, war and animal spirits, but 
a horrid, guttural ejaculation, between a Chi¬ 
nese sentence, as described by missionaries, and 
a badly blown dinner horn.” The editor is re¬ 
garded here as a good judge of music. 
Well Sir, to cut this matter short, let me say 
that I am convinced that while these fowls 
grow to about double the size of common poul¬ 
try, they have likewise double the weight of 
bones; that while the cost of a hundred pounds 
of them is more than of a hundred pounds of 
the old kind, they are less salable, and less in¬ 
viting on the table. These “ celestials ” often 
eat their heads off before fully grown and fatten¬ 
ed. I am satisfied that the more I raise of them, 
the poorer I shall be. I have seen the elephant. 
My poultry is for sale. Chanticleer. 
Those who have lost faith in the celestials, 
and still want to raise “ thorough-bred ” poultry, 
might try the Black Spanish, Black Poland, 
Irish Game, Dorking, or Dominique fowls.—E d. 
Another Wagon Jack. 
A subscriber to the Agriculturist at Pylesville, 
Md., sends a sketch and description of the im¬ 
plement illustrated below, which he thinks supe¬ 
rior to the one described on page 77. To make 
it, take a piece of hickory or white oak scantling, 
2£ inches square and 28 inches long, and rip it 
lengthwise through the center a distance of 25 
inches : saw off the shorter leg B , at this length, 
and join it again to A, by a strong hinge. In the 
upper end and on the inside of the short leg, B, 
cut 4 notches, II inches apart, 2 inches wide 
and inch deep. Procure a band made of 
1 inch iron, 2 inches wide and 4 or 5 inches 
long to fit the notches in B. A wooden wedge 
or key, G, is to be inserted in the band to hold it 
in the notch. When used, this key is to be 
placed under the axle, the jack being in the pos¬ 
ition shown at Fig. 1.; then by raising the long 
leg to an upright position, as in Fig. 2, the axle 
and wheel will be lifted from the ground, and 
the apparatus will stand without fastening. 
We judge it will be necessary to block the 
forward wheels to keep the wagon in place. 
A Caterpillar Burner. 
Such is the title given to the apparatus here 
illustrated, devised by a subscriber to the Amer¬ 
ican Agriculturist at Mount Yernon, N. Y. It 
consists of an inverted cone, C, made of tin or 
sheet iron, containing a wire grate, A. At B, 
small openings are made in the cone to allow a 
draft of air. The whole is received by a sock¬ 
et of suitable shape on the end of a handle of 
any desired length. Shavings or other light ma¬ 
terials are burned in the cone, which is held di¬ 
rectly under the nests, and those that drop 
singed or half roasted, are either completely 
cooked in the fire beneath, or are caught in the 
? vessel, whence they may be 
emptied and crushed. With- 
out some such provision for 
catching them when burning 
their houses, many will fall to 
the ground and ultimately 
escape. There are objections, 
however, to attacking cater¬ 
pillars in this way ; in the 
danger of injuring the small¬ 
er limbs with fire. We pre¬ 
fer a spiral brush with 
which the web, caterpillars and all, may be 
wound up and put out of the way. An oc¬ 
casional examination of trees when the leaves 
are off, will detect the clusters of eggs from 
which next year’s crop is to be hatched, and 
their destruction will prevent their further mis¬ 
chief. A small premium for each cluster, offered 
to boys for this work, would soon clear them out. 
The New Silk Worm- 
Many readers of the Agriculturist will remem¬ 
ber the account given in a former volume (1861, 
March No.,) accompanied with an illustration, 
of a new silk worm said to have been imported 
into France from China, which fed upon the 
Ailanthus. We have made repeated- efforts to 
obtain eggs of the ;insect for experiment, but 
thus far without success, and until recently have 
heard little further concerning the result of the 
trials made with it in Europe. In the report of 
the Acclimatization Society in England, we 
find an account of experiments made by Lady 
Dorothy Nevill, near Petersfield, England. One 
who visited the premises says, “ a portion of the 
garden was planted with young Ailanthus trees, 
which were covered with a light canvas-made 
building, a necessary precaution against birds, 
which pick off the young worms. The crea¬ 
tures were feeding on these trees, and were really 
beautiful to look at—not pale-looking things 
like the common silk-worm, but magnificent 
fellows, from 2i to 3 inches long, of an intense 
emerald green color, with the tubercles tipped 
with a gorgeous marine blue. Their feet have 
great adhesive power, and their bodies are cov¬ 
ered with a fine down which turns the rain 
drops like the tiny hairs on the leaf of a cab¬ 
bage, so that they are not injured by wind or rain. 
Of 500 worms placed upon the trees the previ¬ 
ous Summer, 480 yielded cocoons. A market 
was found for all she could grow, a gentleman 
in Paris taking them for French manufacture.” 
The Society above named are enthusiastic in 
the belief that the raising of the worms can be 
profitably conducted in England, so that, ulti¬ 
mately, ladies may grow their own silk dresses 
in their gardens. Speculators in this country 
will doubtless soon be on hand with great sto¬ 
ries, and eggs at marvelous prices, but the mem¬ 
ory of the silk-raising and mulberry fever that 
found so many victims here, is yet too recent, 
we trust, to allow a similar mania for the new 
silk worm. We shall continue to watch the 
the matter and report from time to time. 
Two Queen Bees in a Hive. 
R. B. Olott, Union Co., Pa., contributes to the 
American Agriculturist an account of the follow¬ 
ing singular occurrence which he noticed in his 
apiary. He says: “Some time in July last, 
having a queen bee at my disposal, and not 
wishing to destroy her myself, I put her to the 
entrance of a late second swarm in which she 
readily entered. Wishing (Sept. 1st) to use this 
colony to raise Italian queens, I removed the 
queen, and in returning the combs, to my aston¬ 
ishment I found another queen. This puzzled 
me considerably, as I never noticed oi heard of 
such a thing before. I returned the queen I liad 
removed, and then took out the combs, leaving 
the two queens and part of the bees in the hive. 
I watched them several hours to see whether the 
queens would quarrel if they should meet. 
The bees kept a constant running about the 
hive, and the queens came in contact several 
times, but apparently did not notice each other, 
with the exception that at one time one took 
hold of the other’s wing and held her for a sec¬ 
ond or so, but soon passed on. I then trans- 
