12 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
quently ploughed between the rows, and hand hoed 
once. About half the field was a dry sand knoll, 
which suffered severely from drought; and the crop 
here was but a little more than fifty per cent of the 
other half. The product was ascertained by the 
agricultural committee, and the product stated em¬ 
braced the average of the entire acre. 
EXPENSE OF EXPERIMENT I. 
Man and team 1| days, ploughing in seed,... $2 00 
Two men and boy planting same, .. 2 00 
25 loads manure, at 75 cents,. 18 75 
25 bushels seed, at 50 cents,. 12 50 
Rolling, harrowing and ploughing,. 1 00 
Hand hoeing once,. 1 50 
15 days taking up crop, (a long time,). 11 25 
Rent,. 5 00 
PRODUCT. 
359 bushels large potatoes, at 50 cents,... $179 50 
71 do small, at 12J cents,. 8 88 
Deduct charges, 
$54 00 
$188 38 
54 00 
Nett profits in experiment 1,. $134 62 
At 2s. a bushel the nett profitwould have been.... $45 25 
EXPERIMENT II. 
Culture .—This crop had been preceded by wheat. 
It had 25 loads of long manure, spread and ploughed 
in. The ground was then harrowed, furrowed or 
listed with two and a half feet intervals, the seed 
dropped at eight inches, covered with a plough, 
a furrow on each side, and the ridgelets rolled. The 
after culture consisted of two horse and hand hoe- 
ings. The crop was harvested with the plough and 
potato hooks. The product was determined by the 
agricultural committee. 
EXPENSE. 
One ploughing,... $2 00 
25 loads manure, at 75 cents,. 18 75 
25 bushels seed, at 50 cents,.... 15 50 
Harrowing, furrowing, rolling and horse hoeing, ... 3 00 
Planting and covering, 3 days,. 2 25 
11 md hoeing, 2 days,.. 1 50 
Taking up crop,... 9 00 
Rent,..... 5 00 
$53 90 
PRODUCT. 
333 bush, merchantable potatoes, at 50 cts. $191 50 
77 do small do. at 12J cents,. 9 62£ 
-$201 121 
Deduct charges,. 53 90 
Nett profits, ...$147 22J 
At 25 cents per bushel, the profit would have been 
about... $52 00 
In these estimates, the whole manure is charged 
to the crops. Deducting one-half, as is customary, 
the profits would have been $9.87£ more in each 
experim ent. _ 
Maple Sugar. 
We often neglect to profit by things within our 
reach, and are constant in our eagerness to grasp 
those which are remote and doubtful. This is par¬ 
ticularly the case in regard to our sugar giving 
maple. We have perhaps enough of this species of 
tree in our state, to furnish our whole population 
with sugar, were the business properly husbanded; 
and if not enough, they might be sufficiently mul¬ 
tiplied in time to serve the next generation. The 
sugar which this tree yields is as good, or may be 
made as good, as that which comes to us from Lou¬ 
isiana, or the West Indies, and by simple means, 
available to every sugar boiler—the means which 
give to sugar the character of white Havana. 
As there is much of this article badly manufac¬ 
tured,—and as its value may readily be doubled, 
and its quantity greatly increased—to aid in these 
desirable ends, we shall here state the whole process 
of manufacture, as given to us by a gentleman long 
practised in the business, and who makes three thou¬ 
sand pounds a year, equal, he says, to any that can 
be produced from the cane or beet. 
He first procures sap buckets equal to the number 
of trees he intends to tap, which are of course al¬ 
ways kept in a cleanly condition. These are per¬ 
forated with a hole near the upper part of a stave, 
large enough to admit freely the head of a large 
nail, upon which they are to be hung, and which 
nail is to be firmly driven into the tree, near where 
it is to be tapped, and which may be at any height 
within reach. The tree is bored, the quill or tube 
to conduct the sap into the bucket inserted, and the 
bucket hung upon the nail, and in contact with the 
tree, to catch the sap. This completes the first pro¬ 
cess. The second is to gather the sap to the boiling 
house. To do this in a cleanly manner, butts or 
large casks are placed upon a sled, with coarse 
linen strainers tied over the tops, leaving the centre 
of the strainers to sag so far into the casks as to 
form a basin large enough to hold a pailful of sap.—• 
This sled is drawn through the sap orchard, the sap 
gathered and turned upon the strainer, and then de¬ 
posited in the sap reservoir, near the boiling pans. 
The strainers keep the sap in the casks, and keep 
leaves and other foreign matters out of them. This 
completes the second process. The third is the 
boiling process. For this purpose, broad sheet iron 
pans are employed, not more than twelve inches 
deep, both because they give the greatest surface 
to the fire, and the greatest to the air, and conse¬ 
quently accelerate most the evaporating process. 
The sap reservoir, or cistern, is placed so high, that 
tubes from it conduct the sap directly into the pans, 
so that when the boiling is started, these are opened, 
and the pans receive a constant and regular supply. 
The fourth process, that of clarifying the syrup, and 
the fifth, sugaring off, we did not particularly learn, 
and inferred that there was nothing particularly in 
them differing from the common modes of practice. 
The next and last process, claying, is the most im¬ 
portant. To perform this, a bored log, resembling 
a pump log, is placed nearly horizontal, one end in¬ 
clining towards a tub or barrel, to catch the molas¬ 
ses ; holes are made on the upper side of the log, 
and to the.centre bore, to admit moulds, of the 
shape of a sugar loaf, the lower or smaller ends of 
which being temporarily stopped, the sugar, after 
it has granulated, is put into the moulds, the latter 
set in the bored log, and a coat of the best Amboy 
clay, reduced to a paste, is then spread over the su¬ 
gar, in each mould, to the thickness of an inch or 
more, and the plugs drawn from the bottom of the 
moulds. The water in the clay percolates through 
the sugar, carrying with it the colouring matter and 
molasses, falls into the bored log, and passes off in¬ 
to the tub or cask. If the first claying does not 
suffice to render the sugar sufficiently white, when 
it becomes dry it is taken off, and a second is ap¬ 
plied, when the process is completed. 
This is the mode of producing clayed sugar in 
Cuba, where the clay is sometimes thrice repeated ; 
and it seems to be the mode now adopted in France 
with beet sugar; and a recent improvement consists 
in refining it without removing it from the moulds, 
by the aid of heat and pressure. 
We have obtained from the gentleman, whose 
process of making sugar we have been describing, 
the following description of his 
SAP BOILERS AND MODE OF SETTING THEM. 
The best vessel to boil sap in, to reduce the same 
to syrup, is made of Russia sheet iron ; and its size 
may be in proportion to the quantity to be boiled. 
The sap of a thousand trees may be easily evapora¬ 
ted in an apparatus such as I will describe. 
Make of Russia sheet iron, a pan about six feet 
long and four feet wide, with sides at right angles, 
of the same material—six inches high. Also anoth¬ 
er pan of the same material and construction, but 
ten feet long and four feet wide. 
Erect an arch of free stone or brick, with grates 
to lay the wood upon, and a good iron door to give 
a draught, so that the air passing into the arch shall 
be heated before it touches the bottom of the pan. 
The plan of the distillery arch will give the idea 
perfectly, but this is not near as expensive. Set the 
small pan nearest to the mouth of the arch—say 
within two feet of it. Let the sides of the pan rest 
on the sides of the arch about four inches, and at 
the ends and middle let it rest on three good bars of 
iron, to prevent its sagging. Let these bars be 
chamfered on the front edge, so as not to catch tfie 
wood as it is carelessly thrown into the arch, and 
let them be long enough so as to protrude over the 
arch on both sides, and be bent over at the ends, so 
as to prevent the arch from spreading, and the bars 
from sagging when heated. 
At the farther extremity of the arch set the larger 
pan, as you have set the smaller one, only let the 
arch be raised about six inches higher, so that the 
bottom of the larger pan may be a little higher than 
the top of the smaller. Set this pan a little dipping 
towards the smaller, and in the lower end, and close 
to the boiler, insert a small stop cock. Let the 
chimney of the arch be immediately beyond the 
further end of this last mentioned pan. The mason 
will of course know how to construct the arch, so 
as to have a good draught. It is desirable to set the 
arch near to some bluff, so that the sap, when col¬ 
lected in a reservoir, may flow directly into the up¬ 
per or larger pan. 
Both pans are then filled with sap, and fire is put 
under; and afterwards the sap is only let into the 
upper pan, and from that into the lower, through the 
stop-cock above described. In this manner, the 
lower pan is fed constantly with hot sap, and is con¬ 
stantly boiling. 
You syrup down only in the lower pan, and you 
do not sugar off in either. 
You cannot make these pans boil over, and when 
syruping down, cannot burn the sap, as in the caul¬ 
dron or pot ash kettle. The wood should be col¬ 
lected and prepared the season before, and kept dry. 
As the correspondent, at whose particular instance 
the above is furnished, may wish to employ kettles 
instead of pans, we will add, that the great point to 
be obtained, in constructing an arch, or furnace, is 
to expose the greatest possible surface of the boiler 
to the immediate action of the fire. To effect this, 
two rules are to be observed—first, to conform the 
brick work to the shape of the boiler, leaving an 
interval of four or five inches only between them, 
and to suspend the boiler by the flange resting upon 
a course of brick set edgeways. Second, to elevate 
the grate for the wood—an ash pit being left under 
it—three to six inches above the bottom of the boi¬ 
ler—so that the flame will surround and cling to the 
boiler on its way to the chimney—and not pass un¬ 
der the bottom and only upon one of its sides. 
Litter your Cattle Yards. 
Every farmer has, or ought to have, from the pro¬ 
duce of his farm, quantities of straw, com stalks, 
and other coarse vegetable matters, which the cattle 
reject, but which is yet good and profitable food 
for his farm crops, if properly husbanded and judi¬ 
ciously applied. In a well constructed yard, cal¬ 
culated to retain the urine of animals and other li¬ 
quids, the coarse litter should be spread at intervals 
through the winter. It thereby becomes doubly en¬ 
riching to the soil, when spread upon it, by the fer¬ 
tilizing properties of the liquids which it there im¬ 
bibes. Arthur Young understood the economy of 
enriching lands, as well as of fattening cattle. He 
says, if litter is scarce, two tons may be made to suf¬ 
fice for a fattening beast during the winter months ; 
though if plenty, or in situations where litter can be 
; purchased , he thinks an animal may convert much 
more into rich manure. The Flemings count upon 
the urine of their farm stock as nearly equal to the 
other excrementitious matter, and they save and 
apply it with care. We almost wholly lose those 
fertilizing matters, yet we can mostly save them in 
concave cattle yards, if we will frequently apply 
litter to absorb and take them up. He that wastes 
or sells his litter, is a bad economist, unless he 
brings from market a return load of dung. The 
man who rides a load of straw ten miles to market, 
barely gets pay for his time, while he robs his soil of 
that which would increase its products. Straw, ma¬ 
nufactured into dung by the farm stock, is worth more 
in the soil than it is in the market, even were the 
expense of transportation in both cases alike. But 
it is the waste, or a want of the due application of 
litter, that is most to be complained of. Let it be 
remembered, that every vegetable substance, how¬ 
ever worthless it may seem, is convertible, if buried 
in the soil, into corn, roots, hay and pulse, and ul¬ 
timately into meat, cheese, butter, wool, &c., and 
that he who would realise the interest must deposit 
the principal. 
To illustrate more forcibly the value of straw and 
other litter, in augmenting manure, we quote the 
following from the Farmer’s Calendar. 
“Mr. Moody—Forty-five fat oxen, in fatting, litter¬ 
ed with twenty wagon loads of stubble, raised two 
hundred loads, each three tons, of rotten dung, worth 7s. 
6d. ($1.65) a load. 
“Every load of hay and litter given to beasts fatting 
on oil-cake, yield seven loads of dung, each one ton and 
a half, exclusive of the weight of the cake. 
“ Mr. Arbuthnot, one hundred and thirty-four sheep 
and thirty lambs, penned six weeks in a standing fold, and 
littered with five loads and forty trusses of straw, made 
twenty-eight large loads of dung.” The straw, at 20s., 
cost £5.15. The dung was worth £10. Profit £4.5. 
($19.20.) 
“William White—Thirty-six cows and four horses 
tied up ; ate fifty tons of hay, and had twenty acres of 
straw for litter : they made two hundred loads of dung, 
in rotten order for the land.” 
Messrs. Moody and Abuthnot say it answers well 
to buy litter with a view to dung; that in feeding 
oxen with oil cake, one load of straw makes seven 
loads of dung, each a ton and a half; and that in 
feeding sheep with turnips, one load made more 
than 4| large loads, worth 7s. 6d. each. Mr. White, 
with 80 loads of straw, made 200 of manure in litter¬ 
ing cows, which is 61 of manure for one of straw. 
“ I have found,” says Mr. Young, “ by experiments 
very carefully made, that a ton of straw used in littering 
a stable kept dry, and the urine not retained, will give 
three and a half to four tons of dung; but used in lit¬ 
tering fat hogs, a ton gave seven or eight of dung.” 
Our Premiums. 
After we had awarded our premiums for 1838, and 
the sheet containing the award, had been struck off, 
(Jan. 15,) we received the two applications for the 
Indian corn premium, which appear in our paper of 
to-day. Under these circumstances, the last appli¬ 
cants must be content with the reflection, that they 
have set good examples in farming, have obtained 
profitable crops, and have deserved premiums ; and, 
as we intend to offer other premiums for the coming 
year, we hope they may yet do better, and put in 
their claims in time. 
We also received, in time, a drawing and de¬ 
scription of a farm dwelling-house. The drawing 
