THE CULTIVATOR, 
/ 
77 
NOTICES OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 
Transactions of the New-York State Agricultural Society, 
together with an Abstract of the Proceedings of the County 
Agricultural Societies for the year 1842. 
This Report of the State Society, being the second 
volume of the Transactions, makes a volume of upwards 
of 400 pages; and we have no hesitation in saying that 
in the general value of the papers, and the extent of 
information embraced in them, it will be found superior 
to its predecessor, and equal at least to any work of a 
similar nature yet published in this country. 
It embraces the Annual Report of the Executive Com¬ 
mittee of the State Society; the Addresses of Governor 
Seward and President Wadsworth; Reports of .Commit¬ 
tees and Awards of Premiums at the October and the 
annual meetings; Prize Essays on Manures, Farm Man¬ 
agement, and Designs for Farm Buildings; papers on 
the agriculture of some fifteen of the counties of the 
State, of Indiana, and of Maryland; papers on various 
agricultural topics from J. M. Weeks, C. N. Bement, D. 
Thomas, R. Harmon, J. H. Hepburn, George Randall, 
H. S. Randall, J. J. Thomas, S. W. Jewett, W. Chap¬ 
man, T. Mellen,H. H. Hopkins, Holkham, and A.Walsh; 
and Reports and Transactions of thirly-two of the County 
Agricultural Societies of the State. We should be happy 
to make liberal extracts from many of these papers and 
reports, and shall doubtless have occasion to make fre¬ 
quent reference to them hereafter; at present, we have 
only room for the following table, which we have com¬ 
piled from the County Society returns. We regret that 
the imperfection of some of the returns has not permitted 
this abstract to be as perfect as we should have desired. 
It only embraces some of the principal premium crops, 
of which returns were made. Fractions are omitted. 
Name of Society. 
Corn- 
Barley. 
o 
Potatoes. 
Turneps. 
Carrots 
Beets. 
Chemung Co. 
Ag. Soc. 
.. 
22 
99 
.. 
S06 
.. 
.. 
.. 
Clinton 
({ 
. . 
.. 
• • 
66 
Dutchess 
H 
30 
107 
.. 
»• 
376 
700 
• • 
990 
Delaware 
it 
33 
73 
67 
402 
1232 
.* 
Erie 
if 
.. 
67 
42 
67 
.. 
1000 
1124 
1280 
Greene 
(i 
97 
87 
866 
Kings 
40 
72 
Madison 
ti 
32 
117 
Monroe 
ti 
.. 
82 
46 
91 
400 
.. 
630 
955 
Niagara 
it 
52 
107 
67 
Oneida 
a 
31 
95 
64 
112 
678 
Onondaga 
ti 
96 
•• 
•• 
419 
Orange 
it 
•• 
102 
•• 
77 
360 
Oswego 
it 
29 
89 
•• 
338 
500 
648 
•• 
Otsego 
tt 
22 
78 
65 
84 
320 
Saratoga 
(1 
29 
137 
•• 
366 
Suffolk 
(t 
. . 
80 
. . 
.. 
368 
Tompkins 
it 
26 
107 
46 
•• 
406 
•• 
1724 
Washington 
tc 
29 
80 
•• 
97 
510 
Wayne 
It 
30 
99 
•• 
67 
376 
1098 
• 
• ‘ 
This table exhibits in a striking manner what our soils 
are capable of when manured and cultivated as land 
should be. There is no mystery in the production of 
100 bushels of corn, 40 of wheat,* 50 of barley, 400 of 
potatoes, and so of other crops. Heavy manuring and 
careful cultivation are the things wanted; less land and 
better crops; or, if we will hold on to our hundreds of 
acres, more capital employed in their tillage. 
The paper on sheep breeding by Mr. Jewett will well 
repay perusal. He has accompanied it by a capital por¬ 
trait of one of his stock Merino bucks, and from which 
last June he sheared thirteen and one-fourth pounds of 
washed wool, it being his third fleece. By the way, we 
are informed in a private note from Mr. Jewett, that his 
celebrated Paular Merino buck, a portrait of which has 
appeared in a former volume of the Cultivator, is to be 
sent into one of the central counties of this state the en¬ 
suing summer, where, we doubt not, it will be properly 
appreciated. 
We congratulate the public on the appearance of this 
volume of the Transactions. It contains the most ample 
evidence of the deep hold the cause of agricultural im¬ 
provement has taken, and of the benefits which are 
flowing from the well timed and well appropriated aid 
received from the state, and will form a valuable con¬ 
tribution to the permanent agricultural literature of the 
day. - 
Johnston’s Farmer’s Encyclopedia. —^We pro¬ 
cured a copy of this costly English work at the time it 
was published, and think it an excellent manual of agri¬ 
culture. We are glad, therefore, that Messrs. Carey & 
Hart have commenced its publication in a cheap form, 
and with such additions and alterations as to better adapt 
it to the wants of the American agricultural public. 
There is in some quarters a most unworthy prejudice 
against all foreign farming; but we venture to say there 
is not a farmer in the United States that cannot derive 
many useful hints and much valuable information from 
this Encyclopedia; and when we recollect that this im¬ 
proved edition costs only four dollars, or about one-thk-d 
the price of the English edition, we cannot doubt it will 
receive a liberal support. It is published in semi¬ 
monthly numbers, has numerous wood cuts, sixteen 
beautiful plates, and will be completed in 16 Nos. at 25 
cents each. - 
Trip to Oregon. —We have read with much interest 
Mr. Farnham’s account of his journey from Missouri to 
the Pacific, just published in a cheap and neat form at 
the Tribune office, New-York. If there is a country in 
which desolation runs riot, it must be in that which tra¬ 
vellers are obliged to cross in this journey to the far 
west. Still among these mountains and deserts there are 
a few spots of the most interesting and inviting kind. 
Such a one is described at page 54, in the valley of Grand 
river: “The glades that intervened were more beautiful 
than I had seen. Many were covered with a heavy 
growth of timothy or herdsgrass and red top, in blossom. 
Large tracts in the skirts of the timber were thickly set 
with sweet sicily. The mountain flax was very abun¬ 
dant. I had previously seen it in small parcels only; but 
here it covered acres as densely as it usually stands in 
fields, and presented the beautiful sheet of blue blossoms 
so grateful to the lords of the plow. I had noticed some 
days previous, a few blades of the grasses just named, 
standing in a clump of bushes, but we were riding ra¬ 
pidly, and could not stop to examine them, and I was 
disposed to think that my sight had deceived me. What! 
the tame grasses of Europe, all that are the most valua¬ 
ble for stock, the best and most sought for by every in¬ 
telligent farmer in Christendom; these indigenous to the 
vales of the Rocky Mountains? It w'as even so.” Those 
who love adventure, and those who wish for a faithful 
account of that distant part of the United States, will 
read Mr. Farnham’s book. 
“The Honey Bee.” —Messrs. Carey & Hart, Phi¬ 
ladelphia, have issued a cheap edition of “ The Honey 
Bee: its natural history, physiology and management, by 
Edward Bevan,” It is a closely printed octavo, of 128 
pages, with about thirty engravings of plans of hives, 
&c., all for 31 cents. Every bee-keeper should have a 
copy, and we particularly recommend it to our corres¬ 
pondent, Mr. Palmer of New Marlboro’. 
American Eclectic and Museum of Foreign Li¬ 
terature. —A large portion of our literature is derived 
directly or indirectly from foreign sources, and princi¬ 
pally from their periodicals. With many valuable pa¬ 
pers, they contain much that is most pernicious and 
worthless, and the separation of the wheat from the 
chaff is imperiously demanded. The most successful 
effort to perform this, is effected in the work before us, 
which is published in monthly numbers of 144 pages 
each, at $6 per annum; J. H. Agnew of New-York, ed¬ 
itor. The elevated character and high moral tone of 
the work, should insure it a large circulation. 
North American Review, April, 1843—This No. 
contains its usual supply of valuable reading articles; 
among which are papers ori the Exploring Expedition, 
Muller’s Elements of Physiology, Alison’s History of 
Europe, and the Treaty of Washington. The reasoning 
of the German physiologist on the subject of the pro¬ 
duction and organization of those singular animals, the 
Entozoa and animalculaj, will attract the attention of the 
curious. Is philosophy about to disclose the line that 
separates animal from vegetable life, or show that they 
usually blend and run into each other? 
SiLLiM.AN’s Journal for April _This number is 
full of interesting papers. Among them is a Notice of 
the Life and Labors of De Candolle, “the Linnieus of 
our age,” whose death occurred in 1841—Superban Ge¬ 
ology, or rocks, soil, and water, about Richmond, Ind., 
by Dr. J. T. Plummer—A Catalogue of the Birds of 
Connecticut, by Rev. J. H. Linsley, together with arti¬ 
cles by Professors Gardner, Litton, Salisbury, Locke, 
and Messsrs. Lockwood, Dove, Tuomey, Owen, Hil¬ 
dreth, Taylor, Redfield, Hayden, Buckley, &c., and a 
notice of the great comet of the present season, by Prof. 
Silliman. 
AGRICULTURAL CLUBS. 
A Farmer’s Club has been formed by our friends 
near Wilmington, Del., on a somewhat novel plan. It 
consists of twelve members only, who meet on the first 
Tuesday of each month, at the house of one of the mem¬ 
bers in rotation, at 10 o’clock, A.M., when “ an exami¬ 
nation,” says the Delaware Gazette, “ is made bv the 
club of all that pertains to the farm, stock and cultivation 
of their host—his fields, his fences, farming utensils, 
mode of applying manure, rotation of crops, &c., &c. 
The conveniences and accommodations of his farm 
house, barn, piggery and poultry yard, are all matters 
of observation and discussion. At an early hour a plain 
farmer’s dinner tests the thrift and cookery of his better 
half—her bread and butter, her savory meats and pies, 
well fatted poultry, her cheese, milk and cream, rich, 
fresh and cool from the just admired dairy, all afford 
practical themes at the dinner for discussion of their 
merits, and of woman’s worth; as far as practicable, the 
products of the farm are required to be used for this part 
of the entertainment. Politics and political matters are 
at no time alluded too or admitted. After dinner, agri¬ 
cultural subjects are discussed and experiments reported; 
agricultural works and journals exchanged, noxious 
weeds noticed, and all the agricultural improvements 
and publications since the last meeting are passed upon 
and reviewed—-seeds, plants, new grains, &c., distributed 
—the entertaining member for the next month is agreed 
upon, and the club adjourns, always early to attend to the 
feeding and foddering at home, before dark. The gentle¬ 
men who compose this club, consist of Messrs. Bryan 
Jackson. C. P. Holcombe, John W. Andrews, Jesse 
Gregg, Samuel Canby, Henry Dupont, J. Boies, J. W. 
Thomson, Francis Sawden, William Boulden, George 
Lodge, and Major Joseph Carr.” 
Hot Air Furnace.—A subscriber wishes to know 
the cost of the hot air furnace, stove, drums, grates, and 
other fixtures, manufactured at Palmyra, N. Y. Will J. 
J. T. inform us? 
Mr. COLMAN’S TOUR. 
OtJR readers will be gratified to learn that Mr. Col- 
man’s proposed visit to Europe, for the purpose of mak¬ 
ing an agricultural survey, has been received with such 
favor as to warrant the undertaking. The subscription 
to his work, which now amounts to upwards of 2,000 
copies, embraces the following, the several societies hav¬ 
ing subscribed for it with the view of distributing the 
volumes as premiums: 
New-York State Ag. Society, New-York, for lOO copies. 
Massachusetts Ag Society, Massachusetts, “ 100 “ 
Worcester Ag. Soc., Worcester CO., Mass., “ 40 “ 
Philadelphia Ag. Society, Pennsylvania, “ 40 “ 
American Institute, New-York city, “ 40 “ 
Essex Ag. Society, Essex county. Mass., “ 25 “ 
Mass. Horticultural Society, Boston, “ 25 “ 
Monroe Ag. Society, Monroe co., N. Y., “ 25 
Livingston Co. Ag. Society, Geneseo, “ 10 “ 
Berkshire Co. Ag. Soc., Pittsfield, Mass., “ 10 “ 
Hampshire, Hampden, and Franklin coun¬ 
ty Agricultural Society, Northampton, “ 10 “ 
Two gentlemen have subscribed for lOO copies each. 
One 
do 
do 
50 
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Twelve 
do 
do 
25 
a 
Eight 
do 
do 
10 
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Forty 
do 
do 
5 
is 
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Having completed his arrangements for the publica¬ 
tion of his work, the first part of which may be expect¬ 
ed about the first of January next, Mr. Colman sailed 
from New-York on the 6th of April, in the packet ship 
Independence, Captain Nye. He contemplates an ab¬ 
sence of two or three years. In the mean time, his 
work will be published in parts, at Boston, by his gene¬ 
ral agent, Mr. Arthur D. Phelps, at intervals of two 
or three months, until the whole is completed. 
We anticipate the happiest results from this mission 
of Mr. Colman. He goes abroad under the most favor¬ 
able circumstances, having the aid and countenance of 
Mr. Webster, Secretary of State, and Mr. Evei-ett, minis¬ 
ter to St. James, both of whom are his personal friends; 
while his high character and his intimate acquaintance 
with the agriculture of his own country, will make him 
an able exponent of its interests, and every where a most 
acceptable guest. These advantages, with his happy 
tact of collecting and arranging facts, will enable him to 
give the American farmer a work of the highest value. 
That it will be waited for with impatience, and received 
with gratification, we cannot doubt. 
FAT IN ANIMALS. 
The recent demonstration by Liebig that plants fur¬ 
nish, ready formed, all the essential elements of animal 
matter, such as the fat, albumen, and fibrine, has to all 
appearance very greatly simplified the processes by which 
animals are fattened. Formerly it was necessary to sup¬ 
pose a variety of changes which the food must undergo, 
previous to its conversion into flesh or fat; now, simple 
appropriation of substances already formed, and in rea¬ 
lity requiring no change, is all that is required on the 
part of the animal. 
Messrs. Payen and Boussingault have lately been con¬ 
ducting a series of experiments to test the principles of 
the German philosopher, in which they find no cause of 
dissent, so far as the presence of the several constituents 
of flesh in the food is concerned, though they express 
some doubts as to the fact that no more fat is formed in 
the animal than is taken with the food. Messrs. P. & B. 
have endeavored to determine the fattening power of 
maize. Farmers have long known that corn contained 
fat or oil; accurate experiment proves that it amounts, 
in good^corn, to 9 per cent. A lean goose was fed 24 
lbs. of corn, when it was killed, and 3i lbs. of fat taken 
from it. Allowing it to have contained at first 1^ lbs. of 
fat, it had gained from the corn 2| lbs., which is very 
nearly the proportion the 24 lbs. of corn would have 
fui-nished. Hay is found to contain about 2 per cent, of 
fat. The fattening ox, and the milch cow, always fur¬ 
nish less fatty matter than their food contains. There is 
no process by which the fat, fibrine and albumen of 
plants, can be so fully extracted, and prepared for use, 
as is done by the milch cow. These are furnished in the 
milk; the fat given off in the butter, and the fibrine and 
albumen in the remaining milk. The French chemists 
are preparing their researches for the public, and every 
step in the progress of chemical analj’^ses will be looked 
for with interest. 
Vitality of Seeds _It is stated in some of the 
English newspapers, that in consequence of some new 
arrangement of part of Bushy Park, a parcel of ground 
which has been undisturbed since the time of Charles I., 
was plowed up last winter. In the spring, a plentiful 
growth of mignionette, pansies, and wild raspberries, 
none of which grow in the neighborhood, shot up spon¬ 
taneously. It is inferred that these seeds had remained 
in or on the ground for that term of time, retaining their 
germinating powers, and only requiring to be covered 
by the plow to vegetate. Raspberry seeds taken from an 
urn, of the age of the Roman occupation of Britain, have 
vegetated freely; and wheat from the mummies of 
Thebes, some 3,000 years old, is now flourishing in the 
Jarden des Plants. 
Wood’s^ Patent Plow Cultivator. —^AYe have been 
favored with a cut of this valuable cultivator, which will 
appear next month. It is manufactured by R. B. Doxta- 
ter, Adams, Jefferson co., N. Y., and is for sale by Messrs. 
Starbuck & Sons, Troy, and Mr. Thorburn in this city. 
