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THE  RURAL  NEW-YORKER. 
Dec.  3 
THE 
Rural  New-Yorker 
TIMES  BUILDING,  NEW  YORK. 
A  Rational  Weekly  Journal  for  Country  and  Suburban  Homes. 
ELBERT  S.  CARMAN.  Editor-in-Chlef. 
HERBERT  W.  COLLINGWOOD,  Managing  Editor 
ERWIN  G.  FOWLER,  Associate  Editor. 
Copyrighted  1892. 
SATURDAY,  DECEMBER  3,  1892. 
We  regret  to  learn  of  the  death  of  Joseph  Harris — 
a  long-time  contributor  to  The  R.  N.-Y.  Mr.  Harris 
was  horn  in  England  in  1828.  He  died  at  his  home, 
More  ton  Farm,  near  Rochester,  N.  Y.,  November  18. 
Mr.  Harris  was  famous  as  a  gardener  and  seed  grower, 
while  his  writings  on  the  use  of  manures  and  fertil¬ 
izers  were  considered  standard  both  here  and  abroad. 
*  * 
The  Michigan  Board  of  Agriculture  will  this  year 
repeat  its  successful  last  year’s  plan  of  holding  a  num¬ 
ber  of  long  institutes.  There  will  be  four  of  ten  ses¬ 
sions  each,  and  12  of  five  sessions.  The  10  session  in¬ 
stitutes  last  four  days.  Regular  classes  are  organized 
and  the  institute  really  becomes  a  short  course  in 
scientific  agriculture.  This  is  a  first-rate  plan  and 
might  well  be  copied  in  other  States. 
ft  * 
A  young  man  in  Ontario  County,  N.  Y,,  wants  to 
know  if  we  think  it  would  pay  him  to  attend  the  short 
course  of  agriculture  to  open  in  January  at  Cornell.  It 
would  take  a  page  to  give  all  the“ifs”  needed  to 
answer  that  question  correctly.  We  know  Prof. 
Roberts  and  the  other  teachers  at  Cornell.  They  are 
all  good  and  true  men.  No  boy  with  half  a  mind  can 
spend  10  weeks  listening  to  them  without  getting  on 
the  track  of  investigation  and  beginning  to  climb  for 
higher  and  better  things.  The  simple  act  of  going  to 
Cornell  and  sitting  in  a  lecture  room  won’t  make  you 
a  student  or  add  a  cent  to  the  value  of  your  day’s 
work.  It  will  just  put  you  on  the  road  to  real  im¬ 
provement  and  start  you  where  you  long  to  go.  You 
boys  who  want  to  start  for  good  farming  go  to  Cornell. 
*  * 
Next  week  we  shall  put  before  our  readers  some 
facts  about  the  enforcement  of  the  black  knot  law 
passed  by  the  legislature  of  this  State.  Briefly  stated, 
this  law  decrees  that  all  trees  infected  with  the  black 
knot  disease  shall  be  declared  public  nuisances,  and 
are  to  be  moved  by  three  commissioners  who  are 
appointed  by  the  mayor  or  supervisor  of  any  city  or 
town  on  written  application  of  one  or  more  freeholders. 
In  some  localities  this  law  has  been  well  enforced  : 
while  in  others  no  commissioners  have  been  appointed 
or  even  applied  for.  The  weak  point  of  the  law  seems 
to  be  that  the  commissioners  will  not  be  appointed 
unless  some  fruit  growers  are  enterprising  enough  to 
demand  their  appointment,  and  to  insist  that  they  do 
their  work  faithfully.  Next  week  we  propose  to  be¬ 
gin  a  black  knot  campaign.  We  want  the  support  of 
all  fruit  growers. 
The  annual  convention  of  the  National  Farmers’ 
Alliance,  held  the  other  day  at  Memphis,  Tenn.,  was 
unprecedentedly  turbulent  and  acrimonious  'Hitherto 
the  Southern  element  which  originated  the  organiza¬ 
tion,  has  completely  dominated  it ;  but  it  was  utterly 
routed  at  the  Memphis  meeting.  The  sentiment  of 
the  Northern  and  Western  members  was  well  voiced 
by  Ex-Congressman  Otis  of  Kansas,  in  denouncing  the 
conduct  of  the  supporters  of  the  Southern  candidate 
for  president.  “  If  Macune  is  elected  president,”  ex¬ 
claimed  he,  “  we  of  the  West  will  withdraw  from  the 
National  order,  for  we  have  had  enough  of  the  pur¬ 
chased  allies  of  the  Southern  Democracy.”  After  the 
burst  of  wild  Western  applause  that  hailed  this  utter¬ 
ance,  Macune’s  name  was  withdrawn,  and  H.  M. 
Loucks,  of  South  Dakota,  who  has  held  the  position 
since  Colonel  Polk’s  death,  was  re-elected  president. 
The  trouble  was  due  mainly  to  the  action  of  the 
Southern  Alliancemen  during  the  late  elections. 
Beforehand  they  were  loud  in  their  professions  of 
fidelity  to  the  candidates  of  the  organization,  but  at 
the  polls  they  steadily  voted  for  those  of  the  Democra¬ 
tic  party,  so  that  the  Alliance  candidates  made  no  show 
in  any  Southern  State,  except  in  Alabama,  where  three 
Congressmen  were  elected,  but  only  by  fusion  with 
the  Republicans.  Indeed,  in  no  State  in  the  Union 
has  the  party  won  any  marked  success  single-handed  ! 
All  its  triumphs  have  been  handicapped  by  fusion  with 
the  Democrats  or  Republicans,  with  the  former  exclus¬ 
ively,  except  in  Alabama.  There  always  remains, 
therefore,  a  doubt  whether  its  candidates  would  have 
achieved  anything  remarkable  as  the  party’s  candidates 
pure  and  simple,  in  opposition  to  the  candidates  of  the 
two  other  parties,  and  from  the  experiences  in  States 
where  no  fusion  occurred,  the  presumption  js  that  they 
wouldn’t.  With  regard  to  the  bitterly  reprobated 
defection  of  the  Southern  Alliancemen,  it  should  be 
remembered  that  for  generations  the  Southerner  has 
been  trained  to  believe  in  the  doctrine  of  State  rights, 
in  the  limitation  of  the  powers  of  the  General  Govern¬ 
ment  as  much  as  possible,  and  has  always  been  opposed 
to  any  National  centralization  of  power.  His  habitual 
mental  attitude  toward  the  government  has.  there¬ 
fore  been  antagonistic  to  the  nationalism  and  pater¬ 
nalism  which  are  the  dominant  features  of  the  new 
party.  Then  again,  the  personality  of  Gen.  Weaver, 
an  uncompromising  Union  soldier,  made  him  very 
vulnerable  from  a  Southern  standpoint,  as  shown  by 
the  effective  use  made  of  his  war  record  against  him. 
*  * 
Mr.  W.  A.  Freed,  of  Pennsylvania,  made  an  experi¬ 
ment  with  chemical  fertilizers  this  year  that,  certainly 
gives  radical  results.  He  used  a  ton  of  fertilizer  on  1% 
acre  of  potatoes — half  broadcast  and  half  in  drills 
above  the  potatoes.  They  yielded  300  bushels  per 
acre,  while  the  yield  on  “  natural  soil  ”  was  50  bushels. 
Now,  says  Mr.  Freed  : 
I  have  been  keeping  cows  and  shipping  milk  to  city  markets  mostly 
to  get  manure,  but  this  1  have  quit.  Had  a  public  sale  October  4  and 
sold  them.  I  get  better  results  from  complete  fertilizers.  They  act 
quicker,  are  less  bulky  to  handle  and  are  surer  In  dry  weather.  This 
has  been  a  very  hard  year  on  farmers  In  this  neighborhood,  but  I 
have  done  very  well;  had  plenty  of  stuff  to  sell  when  It  was  scarce 
and  high,  mostly  due  to  the  use  of  fertilizers. 
If  Mr.  Freed  kept  his  cows  “  mostly  to  get  manure,” 
he  did  one  of  the  best  acts  of  his  life  in  getting  rid  of 
them.  A  cow  as  a  “manure  maker  ”  is  a  hanger-on, 
a  parasite  that  will  ruin  you  sooner  or  later.  Keep  a 
cow  that  will  pay  you  something  besides  manure  for 
your  labor  and  time,  or  don’t  keep  any  !  No  man  can 
say  there  is  a  word  in  that  statement  that  insults  a 
good  cow  !  #  # 
The  propensity  of  American  farmers,  as  a  class,  to 
pay  interest,  often  at  exorbitant  rates,  upon  mortgages 
year  after  year,  is  phenomenal.  The  burden  is  often¬ 
times  so  heavy  that  it  seems  almost  impossible  to  lift 
it.  Yet  there  are  many  instances  in  which  a  little  ex¬ 
tra  exertion,  a  little  more  self-denial,  a  little  closer 
figuring  and  better  planning  would  have  removed  the 
incubus,  and  cut  off  the  interest  that  is  eating  the 
very  life  out  of  all  that  is  best  and  noblest  in  the 
farmer’s  existence.  An  illustration  of  this,  and  a  most 
vivid  one  it  seems  to  us,  is  afforded  by  a  mortgage 
foreclosure  just  consummated  in  Saratoga  County, 
N.  Y.  In  the  year  1808,  a  mortgage  for  $55  was  ex¬ 
ecuted  upon  91  acres  of  land.  Interest  has  been  paid 
upon  this  for  83  years,  amounting  in  all  to  $314.10,  or 
nearly  six  times  the  face  of  the  mortgage.  This  year, 
the  owner  is  unable  to  pay  the  interest,  and  the  mort¬ 
gage  will  be  foreclosed.  One  of  two  things  is  certain; 
this  must  be  an  extremely  poor  farm,  or  the  owners 
must  have  been  sadly  deficient  in  that  quality  known 
as  gumption.  It  seems  that  the  farm  was  considered 
worth  paying  interest  on,  so  what  are  we  to  conclude 
as  to  the  enterprise  of  men  who  would  go  on  paying 
interest  on  such  a  ridiculously  small  sum  for  such  a 
long  term  of  years?  To  be  sure  this  is  an  extreme 
case,  but  it  only  presents  the  case  of  thousands  of 
farmers,  in  a  stronger  light. 
*  # 
There  are  two  classes  of  laws  protecting  birds — one 
includes  those  protecting  game  birds  ;  the  other  those 
protecting  song  birds,  and  both  need  thorough  and 
judicious  revision.  Our  game  laws,  based  on  those  of 
Europe,  are  made,  not  for  the  “  common  people”  ;  but 
for  “  gentlemen  sportsmen,”  the  owners  of  game  pre¬ 
serves.  The  gentleman  sportsman  of  olden  days  was  in¬ 
structed  in  true  woodcraft,  in  the  knowledge  of  nature 
and  the  habits  of  animals,  and  in  the  best  methods  of 
taking  them  with  traps  and  snares.  When  the  ruth¬ 
less  shot  gun  superseded  the  old  devices,  the  latter 
were  looked  upon  as  criminal,  because  while  the  owner 
and  his  friends  could  make  all  the  noise  they  choose, 
the  poacher  could  use  only  noiseless  means  in  accom¬ 
plishing  the  same  end,  but  only  in  a  comparatively 
small  way.  Hence  to-day  the  farmer’s  boy  is  for¬ 
bidden  to  snare  game  birds  on  his  own  father’s  land, 
and  he  naturally  comes  to  regard  the  law  as  forbidding 
him  to  get  birds  for  the  home  table,  while  preserving 
them  for  the  amusement  of  the  city  sportsman.  The  old 
principle  that  there  is  no  property  in  wild  birds  or  fish, 
must  be  got  rid  of,  and  land  owners  must  be  given  the 
right  not  only  to  forbid  hunting,  trapping  and  fishing 
on  their  land  ;  but  also  a  property  interest  in  the 
birds  on  it — an  interest  that  will  justify  them  in  pro¬ 
tecting,  preserving,  and  propagating  them  as  they 
may  choose.  That  the  laws  protecting  song  and  or¬ 
namental  birds  need  revision,  is  plainly  shown  by  two 
examples.  Sentimental  people,  confounding  the 
ungainly  brown  thrush  of  America  with  the  little 
“  robin  red-breast”  of  story,  tradition  and  superstition 
in  the  Old  Country,  have  secured  legislation  protect¬ 
ing  him  at  all  seasons,  thus  guarding  a  baneful  de¬ 
stroyer  of  cherries  and  strawberries,  and  an  excellent 
food  bird  from  the  fate  he  richly  deserves.  True,  he 
destroys  a  few  noxious  insects,  but  he  also  devours 
useful  insects,  and  eats  and  injures  many  times 
as  much  fruit  as  would  be  damaged  by  the  insects 
he  dispatches.  His  chief  value  is  on  the  table. 
Another  falsely  protected  bird  is  the  jolly,  rollicking 
bobolink.  The  flashing  black  and  gold  male  only  at¬ 
tracts  public  notice  and  admiration,  and  this  only  in 
the  Northern  States,  and  in  the  early  months  of  the 
season.  In  August  the  male  assumes  the  yellowish 
gray  plumage  of  the  female,  and  is  known  as  the  reed 
bird  of  the  Delaware  river  country,  and  farther  south,  as 
the  destructive  rice  bird  of  the  Carol inas  and  Georgia. 
New  England  and  New  York  raise  bobolinks,  forbid 
their  citizens  to  eat  them,  and  generously  send  them  to 
the  Philadelphia  and  other  southern  markets  in  im¬ 
mense  flocks,  fattened  on  the  produce  of  Northern 
farms.  Certainly  our  laws  with  regard  to  bird  pro¬ 
tection  need  speedy  revision. 
•  « 
BREVITIES. 
They  gave  the  cow  a  feed-box  with  its  corners  tight  and  square; 
Her  tongue,  they  said,  could  surely  lick  the  feed  up  slick  and  fair. 
They  went  their  way  rejoicing  for  their  own  good  praise  to  speak. 
“We've  fixed  the  feed-box  question,  and  we’ve  stopped  a  mighty  leak.” 
The  old  cow’s  tongue  was  Toughened,  and  it  made  a  rasping  sound 
When  scrubbing  out  that  feed  box,  but,  alas!  sir,  it  was  round, 
And,  though  it  rasped  up  splinters,  it  could  never  quite  “get  there.” 
So  good  grain  lay  uneaten  in  the  feed-box  corner  square. 
And  there  it  lay  fermenting  for  many  a  weary  hour. 
The  round  tongue  could  not  touch  it,  and  it  turned  the  whole  feed  sour. 
And  so  the  cow,  discouraged,  just  refused  to  eat  her  feed. 
The  owner,  he  got  frightened,  and  he  thought  his  cow  must  need 
A  great  big  dose  of  physic:  then  the  old  cow  lost  her  pride. 
She  sadly  eyed  that  feed-box  and  just  laid  her  down  and  died. 
And  on  the  stone  above  her  I  would  write  In  letters  fair, 
Her  tongue  was  round!  It  would  not  fit  a  corner  that  was  square! 
Keep  the  faith— faith  in  yourself  1 
Soiling  turns  the  barn  Into  a  pasture. 
You  never  saw  such  a  thing  as  a  dainty  duck  ! 
Are  horns  on  Dorset  sheep  to  solve  the  dog  question  ? 
Why  do  orchard  insect  enemies  fight  better  on  sod  ground  ? 
A  dog  expresses  more  varied  emotions  with  its  tail  than  with  its 
tongue. 
What  do  you  think  of  Mr.  Gordon’s  experience  with  fertilizers  in  a 
dry  season  ? 
Which  were  more  to  blame— that  ”  creamery  sharp  ”  or  Mr. 
Grundy's  neighbors  ? 
Think'  think!  think!  think!  But  not  on  such  thoughts  that  they’ll 
drive  you  to  drink! 
You  were  made  into  live  clay  that  you  might  overcome  the  forces 
that  hold  your  farm  back.  You  are  better  than  dead  earth. 
Insurance  companies  arc  very  willing  to  Insure  the  lives  of  cats 
dogs  or  cows,  but  it  is  more  than  a  woman’s  life  is  worth  to  get  a 
policy. 
Mr.  Lewis  would  add  a  few  hundred  pounds  of  superphosphate  to 
that  heavily  manured  corn.  By  this  we  understand  that  he  considers 
stable  manure  unbalanced— needing  more  phosphoric  acid  to  build 
it  up. 
The  hog  has  always  been  respected.  The  Persians  will  not  eat  pork, 
but  they  like  to  keep  a  pig  in  the  stable,  believing  that' it  exercises  a 
good  Influence  over  the  horses.  The  hog  is  respected,  but  sadly  neg¬ 
lected. 
Every  one  speaks  well  of  bran  as  a  manure  food.  It  is  easy  to  see 
results  in  crops  manured  from  bran-fed  stock.  It  is  also  admitted  that 
bran  is  a  healty  food.  Does  it  give  immediate  returns  in  milk  or  meat? 
That  is  the  question. 
It  Is  stated  that  the  Sugar  Trust  has  contracted  for  5,000,000  bags 
which  are  to  take  the  place  of  sugar  barrels.  A  bag  will  weigh 
pound— a  barrel  23.  The  saving  in  freight  alone  almost  pays  for  the 
bags,  so  that  the  entire  cost  of  barrels  Is  wiped  out.  So  much  for  the 
Trust. 
The  mule  colt  settled  his  long  ears  back  and  brayed  in  his  gentle 
way,  then  said  to  his  mother,  “  Now  why  was  that  like  a  poultry  breed, 
1  pray  ?  ”  Of  course  his  mother  gave  it  up;  then  the  colt  with  a  loud 
ha!  ha!  said  that  was  just  like  a  poultry  breed— because  it's  a  light 
bray,  ma ! 
Talking  about  wheat  straw  and  manure— here’s  a  question  for  you: 
Would  it  pay  you  to  haul  that  straw  to  town,  give  it  to  a  stable  man 
and  get  it  back  with  what  manure  the  horses  made?  The  straw  would 
absorb  most  of  the  liquid  manure  and  you  could  take  it  back  to  the 
farm.  Is  it  worth  enough  to  pay  the  cost  of  hauling  both  ways? 
Quite  a  number  of  Democratic  city  papers  are  shouting  for  the 
“  abolition  of  the  Department  of  Agriculture.”  This  is  one  of  the 
“  reforms”  they  advocate— a  method  of  saving  money.  The  Depart¬ 
ment  is  going  to  stand.  Our  “  reform  ”  friends  had  better  devote  their 
great  energies  to  the  selection  of  a  Secretary  of  Agriculture  who 
won’t  rattle  in  “  Uncle  Jerry  Rusk’s  ”  shoes. 
Another  big  direct  tax  has  just  been  put  on  the  sugar  planters  of 
Cuba.  Instead  of  paying  them  a  bounty,  the  Spanish  government 
makes  them  pay  for  the  privilege  of  making  sugar.  The  reason  given 
is  that  the  reciprocity  treaty  with  this  country  lowers  the  tariff  rev¬ 
enues  and  this  can  be  made  up  quickest  by  taxing  sugar  planters.  In 
this  case,  at  least,  it  is  less  tariff,  more  tax! 
The  South  Is  rejoicing  over  an  unexpected  rise  in  the  price  of  cotton 
during  the  last  two  weeks.  This  amounts  to  about  two  cents  a  pound, and 
is  due  to  the  short  crop  probabilities,  the  reports  of  the  bad  condition 
of  the  unharvested  staple  and  the  brisk  demand  from  the  other  side 
of  the  Atlantic.  This  sharp  advance  has  given  an  unusual  Impetus  to 
transactions  in  all  the  great  cotton  markets,  in  most  of  which  the  sales 
have  been  the  largest  of  a  bona  fide  character  for  several  months  and 
the  prospects  are  still  of  a  bullish  tendency. 
Henry  Stewart  writes  :  “  The  present  rush  of  farmers  into  the 
markets  with  their  wheat,  and  the  sacrifice  of  it  at  the  low  prices  now 
going,  remind  me  of  a  flock  of  sheep  I  once  saw.  They  were  going  the 
wrong  way  down  a  road,  and  the  shepherd  called  to  a  road  sweeper 
cleaning  off  the  mud  to  stop  them.  He  lifted  his  broom  and  called  out 
to  the  sheep.  An  old  ram  at  the  head  of  the  flock,  made  a  spring  and 
went  over  the  broom  and  the  rest  followed  in  single  tile,  the  man 
standing  paralyzed.  How  like  the  wheat  growers  are  to  these  sheep?’ 
But  who  held  the  stick  for  the  farmers  to  jump  over? 
Negotiations  are  afoot  for  the  consolidation  of  all  the  linseed  oil 
interests  of  the  United  States.  The  plan  of  consolidation  Includes  the 
National  Lead  and  Linseed  Oil  Companies,  as  well  as  other  concerns, 
representing,  in  all.  about  85  per  cent  of  the  industry.  The  National 
Linseed  Oil  Company  has  a’capltal  of  $18,000,000  and  52  oil  works  situ¬ 
ated  in  42  cities  throughout  the  country.  The  National  Lead  Company 
is  an  alias  for  the  Lead  Trust,  assumed  in  1891,  and  has  a  capital  stock 
consisting  of  $15,000,000  common  stock  and  $15,000,000  7-per-cent  cumu¬ 
lative  and  preferred  stock.  The  concern  owns  26  plants.  The  new 
Trust,  under  whatever  name  it  may  operate,  will  control  the  produc¬ 
tion  and  price  not  only  of  all  the  linseed  oil  made  in  the  country,  but 
of  all  the  linseed  meal  and  cake  also,  as  well  as  the  price  to  be  paid 
to  the  growers  of  flaxseed.  What’s  become  of  the  State  an<f  N^tipnaJ 
^nti-Trust  laws? 
