MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER: 
A WEEKLY JOURNAL, DEVOTED TO 
Agriculture, Horticulture, Mechanic Arts and Sci¬ 
ence, Education, Rural and Domestic Economy, 
General Intelligence, the Markets, &o., &c. 
CONDUCTED BY D. D. T. MOORE, 
ASSISTED BY 
J. H. BIXBY, L. WETHERELL, and H. C. WHITE. 
Contributors and Correspondents: 
L. B. Langworthy, 
William Garbutt, 
S. P. Chapman, 
David Ely, 
Myron Adams, 
II. P. Norton, 
F. W. Lay, 
T. fi. Wktmore, 
R. B. Warren, 
Archibald Stone, 
Chester Dewey, li„ d., 
.1. Clement, 
W. Wallace Shaw, 
R. G. Pardee, 
Samuel Moulson, 
Jas. H. Watts, 
W. K. Wyckofp, 
W. H. Bristol, 
W. D. Allis, 
I,. D. Whiting. 
Aol numerous others—practical, scientific, and literary 
writers—whose names are necessarily omitted. 
PUOGKESS AND IMPKOVEMENT. 
SEED POTATOES. 
The season is fast approaching for plant¬ 
ing the potato,—one of our most valuable 
and indispensable crops. And the time 
has already arrived, when the farmer must 
examine his resources, as to the seed need¬ 
ed for this purpose. In regard to the 
amount used upon an acre, the practice of 
farmers may perhaps vary a little. I sup¬ 
pose from ten to fourteen bushels are com¬ 
monly used. At present prices, this amount 
is a heavy tax. An immense quantity has 
been sent to the Eastern markets from this 
region, and present prices are consequently 
very high. It is worth the inquiry, there¬ 
fore, whether any economies can be exer¬ 
cised in the matter. 
The opinion has generally obtained, that 
the best and largest should be used for 
planting. This opinion is correct, so far as 
relates to the kinds—the best sorts or k n Is 
only, should be planted. But it is not in¬ 
dispensable that they should be the best as 
to size. For two seasons past, I have 
tried the experiment, of small sized pota¬ 
toes for seed. I have planted them on the 
same patch, with the largest and best of the 
same kind that could bo obtained. I have 
planted both sorts on different soils—on 
ground enriched with manure—and on 
grounds of fair quality, not manured —have 
given both kinds the same care and culture 
in all these circumstances; and have found 
in the result, the quality and the product 
from the small seed, to be in all respects 
equal to that from the large seed. Of 
course, I should not hesitate now, to plant 
any quanity of ground, with potatoes that 
had been selected, as too small for the ta¬ 
ble and for market. If the farmer has any 
such still on hand, they will answer for 
planting, in lieu of such as are large and of 
high price. 
The long pink eye, if pure and genuine, 
is the heaviest, the most nutritious, and of 
course the most valuable sort. But it is 
not profitable to raise, not being very pro¬ 
ductive. Besides, being planted with other 
sorts, it is vitiated, loses its snow white 
flesh, and also its distinctive flavor and ex¬ 
cellence. The Mercer is also an excellent 
potato—white and mealy—of good flavor, 
an excellent producer, retaining, under ad¬ 
verse circumstances, its characteristic' good 
qualities in a great degree, and upon the 
whole is most profitable for the farmer to 
cultivate. The Carter potato, if it could 
be had pure and genuine, is one of the 
very best sorts—equal to the long pink eye 
—is white and mealy, produces well, and 
of excellent flavor. But carelessly cultiva¬ 
ted with other sorts, it becomes impaired— 
loses its snow white complexion, and except 
in shape, resembles the round pink eye, 
which I consider unfit for table use. If the 
Carter potato could be obtained and culti¬ 
vated in its purity and perfection, it would 
equal in quality and price, the best Irish 
potatoes, that have been heretofore occasion¬ 
ally* imported at a high price for special, 
private family use. e. d. 
GOOD PLOWING. 
Friend Moore : — I am not in the habit 
of writing for the perusal of the public; yet 
when I look around and see, what seem to 
me to be gross errors in the system adopted 
by many of the farmers of the present day, 
I feel called upon to try to correct them. 
And I know of no better way than through 
the columns of your valuable paper. 
It has been said by a Grecian philoso¬ 
pher, that the first, second, and third things 
to be observed, in order to become a good 
farmer, was good 'plowing. Probably there 
is no farmer but will say “aye” to 
this. Yet, there is a great diversity of 
opinion in regard to what good plowing is. 
Some have an idea, that good plowing con¬ 
sists in taking into the field a large plow, 
and turning a broad flat furrow; and, if de¬ 
signed for a summer fallow, let it lie two 
or three months and let the weeds and grass 
grow until they become a perfect mat.— 
Then they will scratch it over with a har¬ 
row once, and turn it up again with the 
large plow, and sow on the seed,—and if 
they do not reap an abundant harvest, will 
lay it to the season. Others who think 
they have got a step in advance of the fore¬ 
going, will work with a smaller plow, but 
will not double their team, but are con¬ 
tented to run the plow about four inches 
below the surface and make the furrows 
straight, and to the eye it looks quite nice 
and fine; but its beauty is only skin deep. 
Yet by turning it over several times, they 
get tolerably good crops for several years; 
but their land soon becomes worn out, and 
they have to pull up stakes and move into 
a new country, where land is cheap and rich. 
In my opinion, there is another error in 
plowing, which is almost universally prac¬ 
ticed, namely, that of turning the land into 
narrow beds, from three to seven paces, 
raising the middle the highest, so that the 
grain grows one-third heavier in the mid¬ 
dle than at the edges, thereby losing con¬ 
siderable by this process. 
I have followed the plow more or less for 
the past 15 years, and from observation and 
actual experience, I have come to the con¬ 
clusion that the best plowing is done by 
taking a good plow, one that will turn a 
furrow not over a foot wide, and not less 
than ten inches deep. Put on a strong 
team and a good hand at the handles, and 
thus turn it up from the bottom; and into 
lands not less than 12 paces wide. As soon 
as a field is plowed, put on the roller and 
smoothe it down; and then go over it with 
the forty tooth harrow, and so on until all 
the plowing is done. After it has lain two 
or three weeks, go on with a good wheel 
cultivator and run it about two inches deep 
over the whole surface. Then wait a short 
time and go over it again, still deeper; and 
so on about four times over, during the sum¬ 
mer. The last time, by doubling the team, 
you can go six or seven inches deep. 
About the middle of September, put on 
the harrow again and sow your wheat with 
a good drill, two bushels to the acre. Clean 
out the dead furrows one way, and then cut 
cross furrows, the same distance apart the 
other way. Clean out the main water 
courses and if your land is level, clean out 
the bottom of every dead furrow, and my 
word for it, the water will not stand upon the 
surface, and you will reap a bountiful har¬ 
vest ; let the season be as it may. By this 
process of once plowing, and that deep, you 
go below the roots of most weeds and foul 
grasses. By rolling and dragging it down, 
you will be enabled to keep them there, 
and they will never rise again, only in gas 
which is caused by their decomposition, and 
comes forth for the use of the wheat plant. 
Even blue grass can be killed in this way. 
Pekin, N. Y., March, 1831. I’lowboy. 
THE STANDARD WEIGHT OF GRAIN. 
Eds. Rural :—Permit me through your 
valuable and widely circulated paper, to call 
the attention of farmers, to their practice of 
selling corn and rye 60 lbs. when the law 
requires but 56 lbs for a bushel—making a 
difference of bushels in 100. This at 
50c per bushel for the whole amount sold in 
Western New York, would be no small sum 
to be pocketed chiefly by speculators,—for 
we seldom hear of corn passing from sec¬ 
ond hands for more than 56 lbs. to the 
bushel. The average weight of corn and 
rye in this region will not exceed the legal 
standard weight. Why not sell 64 lbs. of 
wheat or 52 lbs. of barley for a bushel be¬ 
cause it has been known to weigh it? We 
are not unfrequently told by the purchaser 
that it makes no difference what we call a 
bushel, as the price paid will be in propor¬ 
tion to the weight. 
This I do not believe. I believe that 
we should get just as much for 56 lbs. as 
we now do for 60 lbs., provided farmers 
generally would come to the conclusion 
that they would sell their grain by the 
standard weight or measure, and no 
other way. Be this as it may, let us 
comply with the standard weight, and let 
the supply and demand regulate the price. 
We have reason to believe from the great 
and growing demand for corn, that it will 
be an important crop to farmers in this re¬ 
gion. Therefore I would suggest the pro¬ 
priety of farmers, at their clubs, county 
fairs, and other icultural meetings, taking 
such action upon this subject as will work a 
reform. One or two farmers moving in 
this matter will not effect much, but should 
all that are interested move, it would be 
brought about at once. It is important 
that all (especially farmers) should be a 
law-loving and a law-abiding people. 
Phelps, March•10, 1851. A Farmer. 
POST AND RAIL FENCES. 
Mr. Editor : — A subscriber and constant 
reader of the Rural, I have been much 
gratified by the articles it has contained 
from brother farmers; especially with the 
remarks of Mr. Adams, on fences. I have 
lived, until the last few years, on the east 
end of Long Island, where we were com¬ 
pelled to import our fencing timber—our 
rails and posts costing us from 88 to $10 
per hundred. 
We made use of second-growth chest¬ 
nut, from 8 to 10 inches through, and 7 
faetin length, split in halves, for posts,—the 
rails 12£ feet long. The posts were mor¬ 
ticed with an axe made for the purpose— 
four holes in each post—and the rails sharp¬ 
ened so as to lap by each other in the mor¬ 
tice. The greatest fault of such fences in 
this part of the country, is that the holes 
are made too small, and the rails sharpened 
so thin, that in a few years the rails fall out 
—becoming rotten or broken at the ends. 
Two years since I removed to this place, 
where timber is yet plenty—but the un¬ 
sightly appearance of the common fences 
has induced me to commence putting up 
posts and rails instead. The loss of land, 
is also no small item in the use of the worm 
fence, as they generally keep some 10 or 
12 feet in width from the plow. 
I agree with Mr. Adams, that soon some 
substitute for rails will be needed, and sin¬ 
cerely hope that wire will answer the pur¬ 
pose. Some of our most experienced far¬ 
mers are in favor of board fences, saying 
the posts will last longer when not morticed. 
This I admit, as well as that they are 
stronger. But the cost of board fences ex¬ 
clusive of posts and labor, is some 40 cents 
per rod; while the cost of rails I calculate 
at 24 cents per rod. t. v. t. 
Chili, N. Y., March, 1851. 
ANOTHER FARM GATE. 
Messrs. Editors:— Deeply sympathising 
with you in your hatred of bars, and par¬ 
ticularly of farm bars, I send you the ac¬ 
companying plan of a farm gate, which I 
think equal to any yet presented, for cheap¬ 
ness, beauty, durability and all the essentials 
required. I have one that has been in use 
12 years, opening into the main passage 
from the road to the yards in the rear, ex¬ 
posed to unruly animals and all the jars 
of winds and wagons, yet it remains firm 
and true, never having sagged perceptibly 
—the greatest difficulty in most methods of 
construction. 
[Bottom board 8 inches wide—next above, 6— 
next 5, and next two 4 inches in width. Lower 
space 3 inches, next 4 or 4J, next fi, and last 7 inches 
in width. Length of gate 9 or 10 feet.] 
The situation of the braces, dividing the 
lengths into four equal triangles, gives great¬ 
er strength in supporting its own weight 
than any other form of bracing. I think 
there is some philosophy in this, but I will 
not attempt to explain it —leaving this plan 
together with all others in use, fur each to 
choose as his taste or judgment may dic¬ 
tate; only asking that every farmer will 
choose some plan and profit by it to the ex¬ 
clusion of all bars to improvement. 
The front rail is 3 by 3 inches, and the 
rear rail 3 by 4 morticed nearly through, 
leaving only sufficient wood in front and 
rear to protect the ends of the boards and 
hold them firm in their places. Boards 
seven-eighths or one inch thick, of the 
width above specified, are then inserted 
and driven together hard; pin strong 
at each end, particularly the rear—then 
brace with strips 4 inches wide on each 
side of the gate, and nail them thoroughly 
with good nails. Corner the front post 
where the gate shuts in. hang and fasten 
with a steel spring latch, and your gate is 
complete, only it should be painted to pre¬ 
serve the wood. 
I have several such now in use and am 
making more, determined to wage war 
against all such labor-making things as 
bars—having first set down and counted 
the cost, as any man may who has tried 
both. Norman J. Kellogg. 
South Avon, Feb. 27, 1831, 
Remarks.— We think this gate one board 
higher than it need be for any purpose, as 
five feet is all sufficient; and we prefer a 3 
by 4 scantling for the upper rail, with the 
rear brace toed in. The front brace is no 
advantage to its strength, and only adds 
weight, causing it to sag. All gates should 
bell feet to admit loads of hay and grain. 
We shall give our favorite pattern in a few 
weeks—premising that this gate and most 
others that we have seen, are preferable to 
those ever-to-be-deprecated nuisances — 
bars. 
Best Sorts of the Pea. —R. G. Pardee, 
of Palmyra, N. Y., an enterprising and skill¬ 
ful amateur cultivator, gives the following 
as the best out of ten selected kinds, of the 
pea, obtained from Thorburn, of New- 
York. The Early Emperor he regards as 
the best very early pea, and Hair's New 
Mammoth Dwarf Marrow, as the largest, 
most productive, and richest pea of alL 
NOTES BY ASMODEUS, — AT HOME. 
THE FARMER AND THE POLITICIAN. 
Being detained a witness at a certain 
court in Western New York, I sat one day 
n the court room just behind a wealthy 
farmer of some influence in his own town 
and county. Presently a man of note who 
had been high in place, now the leading 
politician in the county, left the bar and 
took a seat by our farmer. Thinks I to 
myself, now I shall listen and learn, as here 
is a sensible, practical man, about to 
interchange his experience with the theoiy 
of the man of the schools;—the one will 
give results, the other the theory of those 
laws of nature, by which these results were 
produced. 
But how miserably was I disappointed; 
the first words after shaking hands were 
from the ci devant man in place—“How 
will your town go?” The coarse volubility 
of the farmer increased just in proportion 
as he was flattered with the importance of 
his own great political influence amd exer¬ 
tions in his town and county. Alas poor 
“human natur,” how this rich farmer did 
doff his own rural dignity, to luxuiiate in a 
paroxysm of boasting on the great respect¬ 
ability of his political friends and acquaint¬ 
ances. More than once I heard him speak 
of his friend F-, then almost the 
highest man in the nation. But I could 
listen no longer; the lesson was already 
sufficiently impressive. 
Here was a politician, a statesman of 
classical acquirements, prostituting his best 
feelings, his self-respect, to descend to the 
common-place, soul-killing condition of the 
party demagogue; deluding others to be 
one day retaliated upon by the sovereign 
people, to the utter demolition of his most 
cherished hopes; falling farther even than 
he who had but one Sovereign to displease, 
but who, nevertheless, exclaimed in the ag¬ 
ony of his fall, 
-“ Oh how wretched 
Is that poor man, who hangs on princes’ favors.” 
On the other hand here was a farmer 
born on Natures luxuriant domain, the 
Eden of New York, growing rich on virgin 
bounties, without knowing, or caring to 
know, any of the minutim of nature’s laws. 
Day after day had this man worked blindly 
in the open field, the great laboratory where 
nature unfolds her mystery, without one ray 
of light dawing upon his mind, by which 
he could see or learn those transformations 
by which she produces the fruits of the 
earth. But, although thus intellectually ob¬ 
tuse to that which he very erroneously con¬ 
siders too mysterious or occult for his in¬ 
vestigation, his ever active, omnipresent 
vanity, becomes both his teacher and mys- 
tifier in the same ratio as it feeds on the 
garbage of that despicable falsifier, the po¬ 
litical party demagogue. 
What a disparity there is between the 
poor ambition of that man in place, who 
seeks the shreds and patches of fallible 
statesmen and litterateurs, or the state sta¬ 
tistics of a bygone age, to help him to make 
up a speech, that is to adorn his brief tri¬ 
umph in office,—and that honest craving of 
the scientific farmer, whose teacher is na¬ 
ture, with her lessons ever fresh, instruct¬ 
ing, all provident and immutable. 
FLAX VERSUS COTTON. 
The N. Y. Tribune says that the Editor 
of that paper will attend the Worlds’ Fair 
“ especially to learn the improvements re¬ 
cently made and now being made in the 
mode of dressing flax and hemp.” St is 
encouraging to the lovers of rural economy, 
when a man of the energy, talent and 
sleepless industry of Horace Greely, lays 
aside his isms, and embarks heart and hand 
