46o 
THE  RURAL  NEW-YORKER 
July  16 
do  this,  and  the  improvement  is  so  great  that  it  pays. 
The  potato  bugs  seem  to  relish  my  egg  plants  better 
than  anything  else  on  the  place,  and  I  have  been 
obliged  to  spray  them  with  a  solution  of  Paris-green 
two  or  three  times  this  season.  My  wife  is  aware  of 
this,  and  will  see  that  the  fruits  are  all  well  washed 
before  using,  though  I  apprehend  the  danger  is  largely 
imaginary.  By  the  way,  what  cranky  things  these 
egg  plants  are.  I  have  only  six  in  my  garden.  They 
were  nice,  potted  plants,  seemingly  alike.  Five  have 
grown  splendidly,  the  other  has  never  made  a  leaf 
since  it  was  set  out.  Half  of  mine  in  other  years  have 
acted  just  as  queerly. 
I  have  been  interested  in  reading  about  male  and 
female  asparagus  plants  in  recent  issues  of  Thk 
Rural.  What  made  me  read  it  with  interest  was  the 
fact  that  in  my  bed  I  had  noticed  for  several  years  the 
greatest  variation  in  the  size  of  the  shoots,  and,  so  far 
as  I  can  judge  from  a  casual  examination,  the  large 
shoots  are  borne  by  the  same  plants  each  year.  I 
shall  examine  the  blossoms  this  year 
and  mark  the  plants  and  next  year 
T  shall  see  if  this  discrepancy  in  size 
is  due  to  sex.  It  may  be. 
I  do  not  know  what  I  would  do,  if 
I  could  have  no  garden.  It  is  my 
panacea  for  all  ills,  bodily  and  men¬ 
tal.  If  my  head  aches,  I  get  out 
among  the  vegetables  and  dig  a  lit¬ 
tle,  taking  in  the  fresh  air  and 
throwing  off  the  effete  matters  that 
make  the  trouble  in  the  head.  If 
business  cares  worry  me,  I  can  al¬ 
ways  forget  them  in  my  garden, 
where  I  find  so  many  interesting 
things  to  distract  attention.  If  my 
appetite  is  poor,  I  go  to  the  garden 
and  when  I  leave  it  I  am  hungry. 
There  is  no  better  place  for  commun¬ 
ing  with  Nature,  no  place  where 
one  can  gather  mental  and  moral 
vigor  more  readily.  Great  is  the 
garden.  G. 
How  Harvest  Wages 
Were  Set. 
Harvest  time  is  here  and,  as  is  usu¬ 
ally  the  case,  hands  are  scarce.  The 
majority  of  our  rising  young  men 
don’t  “work  out”  any  more.  They 
are  above  it.  They  have  either  “  ac¬ 
cepted  positions  ”  in  stores,  gone  to 
the  large  cities  to  make  their  for¬ 
tunes,  or  are  preparing  for  a  pro¬ 
fession.  The  few  that  are  left  want 
such  wages  as  their  importance  en¬ 
titles  them  to.  They  “want  the 
earth,”  and  before  long  they  will 
not  only  want  the  earth  with  a 
fence  around  it,  but  they  will  also 
wrant  a  potato  patch  in  the  moon 
thrown  in. 
Yesterday  evening  I  was  standing 
on  a  street  corner  chatting  with  five 
of  these  young  workingmen  when 
up  came  one  of  those  loud-mouthed, 
boisterous  young  fellows  who  are  to 
be  found  in  every  town  the  country 
over. 
“  Hello,  fels  !  ”  he  shouted.  “  All 
inter  the  harvest  I  suppose.  Lots 
o’  wheat,  and  wages  a-flying’!  Did 
you  ever  see  ’em  take  such  a  jump  ?” 
“What  are  you  offered?”  asked 
one  of  the  boys. 
“Two  dollars  and  a  half  a  day  for 
all  of  next  week,  and  more  ’n  a 
dozen  men  after  me  !  ”  Several  excla¬ 
mations  of  surprise  greeted  this  announcement,  and 
one  of  the  boys  expressed  a  doubt. 
“Oh,”  said  he,  “it’s  so.  John  C.  offered  it  to  me 
this  afternoon,  dead  sure,  and  I’m  going  right  out 
there  to  work  on  Monday.” 
I  had  heard  men  offering  $2  a  day,  but  not  one  had 
mentioned  $2.50.  While  we  were  talking  about  the 
matter  and  the  boys  were  jubilantly  capering  about 
several  more  young  men  came  along,  and  within  15 
minutes  every  workingman  in  town  had  heard  the  glad 
tidings,  and  harvest  wages  were  fixed. 
As  I  am  well  acquainted  with  John  C.,  and  the  boys 
said  he  was  in  town,  I  forthwith  went  in  search  of  him 
and  soon  found  him.  He  is  a  young  farmer,  in  moder¬ 
ate  circumstances,  considerable  of  a  rusher,  and  he  is 
working  a  farm  of  140  acres  and  trying  hard  to  get 
rich. 
“  John.”  said  I,  “  did  you  offer  Joe  X,  $2.50  a  day  to 
help  you  through  harvest  ?  ” 
“  Well,”  he  answered,  thrusting  his  hands  deep 
down  into  his  pockets,  “  I  didn't  exactly  do  that.” 
Then  after  reflecting  a  few  moments,  he  said  :  “I  met 
Joe  this  afternoon,  and  as  I  know  him  to  be  a  good, 
strong  hand  I  asked  him  if  he  would  help  me  next 
week.  He  informed  me  that  about  half  a  dozen  men 
had  already  asked  him  the  same  question,  and  though 
he  had  not  promised  any  of  them  he  hardly  knew  what 
to  say  to  me.  I  had  learned  that  men  were  very  scarce, 
so  I  told  Joe  I’d  give  him  the  best  wages  going,  what¬ 
ever  they  might  be,  $2  or  $2.50,  if  he’d  help  me  through, 
and  he  said  he’d  be  on  hand.  I  had  calculated  on 
giving  about  $2,  and  thought  I  might  possibly  have  to 
give  $2.25,  but  never  thought  of  going  to  $2.50.  Who 
said  I  offered  him  $2.50  ?  ” 
“  He  himself  said  so.” 
“  Well,  I  didn’t.  But  of  course  if  other  people  pay 
that  I’ll  have  to,  because  I  told  him  I’d  give  him  the 
best  going  wages,  but  it  is  half-a-dollar  more  than  I 
had  calculated  on.” 
Thus  it  was.  John  had  offered  Joe  the  “  best  going 
wages,”  whatever  they  might  be,  and  Joe,  full  of 
“enterprise,”  had  hustled  around  among  the  boys, 
and  by  working  his  jaw  freely  and  stretching  the  facts 
until  they  almost  popped,  had  set  the  “best  going 
wages”  at  $2.50  per  day.  Verily,  there  are  no  flies  on 
the  rising  young  men  of  our  time  !  FRED.  GRUNDY. 
Christian  Co.,  Ills. 
*  *  * 
A  Trellis  for  Delawares. — In  growing  Delaware 
grapes  I  desire  to  renew  the  vines  every  year  as  near 
the  ground  as  I  possibly  can;  I  cannot  therefore  use 
the  same  style  of  trellis  as  with  vines  trained  on  the 
Kniffin  plan.  The  kind  of  trellis  Icuse  for  Delaware 
or  any  grape  I  desire  to  grow  on  this  plan  I  make  in 
the  following  manner:  I  set  a  post  between  every  two 
vines,  then  staple  the  first  wire  two  feet  and  the  second 
five  feet  from  the  ground,  place  a  stake  by  each  vine 
to  tie  the  vine  to,  staple  two  small  pickets  12  inches 
from  each  side  of  the  stake  and  two  more  15  inches 
from  the  first  two,  and  tie  the  shoots  to  the  pickets  as 
soon  as  they  are  long  enough.  I  have  practiced  this 
method  for  several  years  and  the  results  have  always 
been  completely  satisfactory,  so  that  I  can  strongly  re¬ 
commend  it  toothers  for  the  same  varieties,  h.  a.  h. 
[Every  query  must  be  accompanied  by  the  name  and  address  of  the 
writer  to  Insure  attention.  Before  asking  a  question,  please  see  If  It  Is 
not  answered  In  our  advertising  columns.  Ask  only  a  few  questions 
at  one  time.  Put  questions  on  a  separate  piece  of  paper.] 
How  Tiles  Help  to  Save  Moisture. 
LESSON  FROM  “CRAWFISH  LAND.” 
J.  C. ,  Antor  Park.  111. — The  theory  as  well  as  the  actual 
results  of  tile  draining  is  that  it  makes  wet  land  drier 
in  a  wet  season,  and  dry  land  wetter  in  a  dry  season.  In 
the  matter  of  making  dry  land  wetter,  my  theory  is 
that  moisture  in  the  air  is  continually  condensing  both 
in  and  out  of  the  tile  and  the  soil  is  taking  it  away  as 
fast  as  it  is  condensed.  Any  vacuum  created  by  this 
condensation  is  filled  by  the  atmospheric  pressure  of 
15  pounds  to  the  square  inch,  and 
so  the  process  continues  as  long  as 
the  tile  is  cooler  than  the  atmosphere. 
From  this  I  reason  that  if  very 
high,  dry  land  were  tiled  every  few 
feet  with  small  tiles,  there  would 
be  no  want  of  sub- irrigation  or  aera¬ 
tion.  Further,  I  believe  that  if  a 
coil  of  metallic  pipe  were  laid  18 
inches  below  the  surface,  the  pipes 
being  a  foot  apart,  similar  in  char¬ 
acter  to  the  worm  of  a  still,  with 
stand  pipes  leading  above  ground  to 
the  air,  the  ground  being  covered 
with  a  mulch,  a  stream  of  water 
could  be  started  from  the  moisture 
condensed  from  the  air.  I  am  led 
to  think  that  if  the  ground  were 
perforated  with  small  holes  every 
few  feet  to  the  depth  of  two  feet, 
the  land  would  remain  moist  in¬ 
definitely  by  the  condensation  of 
moisture  on  the  walls  of  such  holes. 
This  lesson  has  been  taught  me  by 
the  crawfish.  My  garden  of  about 
three  acres  is  low  hummock  land 
that,  before  clearing  and  ditching, 
was  covered  with  water  most  of  the 
year.  Clearing  and  ditching  have 
made  it  excellent  garden  land.  Not 
over  an  inch  of  rain  has  fallen  on  it 
since  January  25,  and  yet  it  was  drier 
six  inches  below  the  surface  two 
months  ago  than  it  is  to-day.  I  ex¬ 
plain  this  by  the  fact  that  the  craw¬ 
fish  have  literally  honeycombed  the 
ground  from  near  the  surface  to  the 
depth  of  two  feet  or  more,  and  the 
ground  at  that  depth  is  too  wet  for 
the  roots  of  such  vegetables  as  reach 
it.  This  I  think  is  caused  by  the  con¬ 
densation  of  moisture  on  the  walls  of 
these  numerous  holes,  and  the  in¬ 
stinct  of  the  crawfish  has  doubtless 
taught  them  to  do  this  in  order  to 
obtain  water  for  their  use. 
As  moisture  in  the  atmosphere 
condenses  on  the  outside  of  a  pitcher 
containing  cold  water,  so  condensa¬ 
tion  must  go  on  in  and  around  the 
drain  tile,  so  long  as  that  is  cooler 
than  the  atmosphere.  So  it  seems 
to  be  in  my  garden.  Will  not  some 
of  our  experiment  stations  or  scien¬ 
tists  tell  me  how  much  or  how  little 
there  is  in  my  theory  ? 
An  Exploded  Theory. 
When  any  question  is  to  be  settled 
it  is  always  wise  and  safe  to  revert  to  the  principle, 
and  in  almost  every  question  that  arises  in  regard  to 
agricultural  operations  there  is  a  principle  involved 
based  on  unchangeable  natural  laws. 
Now,  in  regard  to  the  alleged  condensation  of  mois¬ 
ture  in  drains  below  the  surface  of  land,  these  prin¬ 
ciples  are  to  be  considered.  Air  increases  in  density 
as  its  temperature  decreases,  and  becomes  lighter  as 
its  temperature  increases.  Air  thus  descends  when  it 
is  cooling  and  ascends  when  it  is  becoming  warmer. 
Warm  air  holds  more  moisture  in  suspension  then 
colder  air.  Thus  moisture  can  be  deposited  only  by 
condensation  when  it  is  cooling.  A  current  of  air  can 
be  established  only  by  a  change  of  temperature  in  it, 
and  if  it  is  increasing  in  temperature  the  air  rises 
making  space  for  colder  air  to  take  its  place.  Then, 
in  regard  to  the  action  of  drains,  it  is  impossible  for 
any  great  difference  in  the  moisture  in  the  soil  to 
occur  in  consequence  of  the  air  currents  that  may  at 
any  time  flow  through  them.  If  the  soil  is  warmer 
than  the  air  the  current,  if  any,  will  be  from  the  soil 
to  the  air,  and^the  entering  air  being  cooler  will  have 
Prominent  Publications.  From  King’s  Jester.  Fig.  202. 
