p 1 
t 
TWO DOLLARS FA YEAR.] 
“ PROGRESS INIIPROWHIMEINT.” 
[SINGLE INTO. EOLJK CENTS. 
YOL X. NO. 47. [ , . 
ROCHESTER, N. Y.- FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1859. 
1 WHOLE NO. 515. 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
AN ORIGINAL WEEKLY 
RURAL, LITERARY AND FAMLY NEWSPAPER. 
CONDUCTED BY D. D. T. MOORE, 
With an Able Corps of Assistants and Contributors. 
The Rural New Yorker is designed to be unsurpassed 
Jn Value, Purity, Usefulness and Variety of Contents, and 
unique and beautiful in Appearance. Its Conductor devotes 
bis personal attention to the supervision of its various de¬ 
partments, and earnestly labors to render the Rural an 
eminently Reliable Guide on all the important Practical, 
Scientific and other Subjects intimately connected with the 
business of those whose interests it zealously advocates.— 
It embraces more Agricultural, Horticultural, Scientific, 
Educational, Literary and News Matter, interspersed with 
appropriate and beautiful Engravings, than any other jour¬ 
nal,— rendering it the most complete Agricultural, Lit¬ 
erary and Family Newspaper in America. 
2 Z&- All communications, and business letters, should be 
addressed to D. D. T. MOORE, Rochester, N. Y. 
Air-dry. 
Dried at 212° F. 
100 parts of wheat straw 
contain: 
Nitrogenized substances. 
| 1.85 
2.05 
(muscle-producing sub's!. 
Substances free (soluble in 
from nitrogen 1 potash 
\ 26.34 
35.06 
(heat and fat- ( 
producing 
matters). 1 insoluble 
41.32 
35.07 
Mineral substances. 
4.59 
6.02 
Water. 
26.00 
100.00 
100.00 
For Term 3 and other particulars, see last page. 
VALUE OF STRAW FOR FODDER. 
of straw as shown by analyses. The following 
table we take from the Cyclopedia of Agricult ure: 
Average composiion of wheat straw. 
Thus, it will be seen that 100 pounds of wheat 
straw contain over 69 pounds of muscle, heat and 
fat producing matter, and 26 pounds of the remain¬ 
ing 30 are water. 
Dr. Lyon Playfair, the Chemist of the English 
Royal Agricultural Society, gives the following 
table of the relative value of wheat straw, hay, and 
several other kinds of food : 
Composition of the principal articles used as food. 
Dry Organ 
100 lbs. of Wheat straw, 
contain. 
100 as. of linseed cake. 
Peas. 
Beans. 
Ordinary hay... 
Barley meal. 
Oatmeal. 
Bran. 
Oats. 
Potatoes. 
Red beet. 
Turnips. 
Swedes. 
White carrot.. 
wurizel. 
ic Matter, 
or Real 
Food. 
lbs. 
79 
75)4 
8014 
8214 
7 OK 
82 )4 
89 
81 
79 
27 
10 
10 
14 
12 
The Portions Subtract¬ 
ed as useless are 
Water. 
lbs. 
18 
17 
16 
14 
16 
15)4 
9 
14 
18 
72 
89 
85 
Ashes. 
Its. 
3 
7)4 
3 M 
3)4 
7)4 
2 
2 
o 
At least one autumn out of every four we hear 
sad complaints of scarcity of fodder, and of the 
anxiety of farmers as to how they can manage to 
get through the winter without suffering to their 
cattle and loss to themselves. Almost every 
farmer keeps as much stock, as, with his system 
of culture, he can furnish with feed i n a fair season. 
When the hay crop fails, as it has done the present 
year, great difficulty is experienced in providing 
for the deficiency. Cornstalks is the first and 
generally the most available -substitute, but these 
are sometimes injured by early frosts, and when 
these two evils come upon the same season, the 
prospect for many is gloomy indeeu. This is the 
case the present year—the cornstalks being in¬ 
jured, over a large district, to at least one-half their 
value, while the hay crop is deficient almost to 
the same extent. Did our farmers grow from half 
an acre to three or four acres of roots—carrots, 
turnips, mangels, parsnips, or kohl-rabi—we 
would not be so entirely dependent upon either 
hay or cornstalks for fodder, and a short crop of 
either, or both, would not leave us in such straiten¬ 
ed circumstances. It is not our design, however, 
to discuss this subject, which was well done by 
“ H. T. B.” in our last issue, our purpose being to 
bring to the notice of readers the value of straw for 
fodder, and the opinions recently promulgated on 
this subject by both practical and scientific men. 
During the discussion at the late Fair of this 
State, a gentleman of Erie stated that he had found 
straw cut and steamed, and mixed with a handful 
of meal to give it a relish, of more value in keep¬ 
ing stock than the same weight of Timothy hay. 
This idea of steamed straw being more valuable 
than good Timothy hay was rather startling, and 
we do not think one in a score of those present 
was prepared to endorse, or willing to believe such 
a statement without further proof. Mr. Mechi, 
however, the celebrated English farmer and experi¬ 
menter, advances the same opinion, and urges its 
trial upon the attention of farmers, declaring it to 
be “ a vital question for agriculture.” He consid¬ 
ers that the present low estimate placed on straw, 
arises from the fact that farmers do not understand 
how to feed it, and unless properly prepared it is 
not available as food. In all cases straw should 
be cut and steamed, and in this condition he thinks 
it is as good as the same weight in hay. In proof 
of this he gives the result of some experiments he 
has made. In feeding ten Short-horn bullocks, 
about thirty months old, he gave a steamed mix¬ 
ture of 216 gallons of cut straw, 6 of rape cake, 3 of( 
malt combs and 5 of bran—moistened with 20 gal¬ 
lons of hot water per day. He also fed 300 pounds 
of mangel wurtzel; the whole cost, not including 
the straw and labor, is about one dollar per week. 
The animals are in a fattening and growing condi¬ 
tion, and advancing remuneratively. After feed¬ 
ing they lie down contented, free from restless¬ 
ness. He further says:—“The whole question 
may be said to hinge upon the condition in which 
the food is administered. It must be moist and 
warm. Were I to give my bullocks the same 
quantity of cut straw in a dry state, they would 
not eat one-half of it; and, besides, they would be 
restless and dissatisfied. This I know from ex¬ 
perience.” 
Now, we will ascertain how far these statements 
of practical men are sustained by the composition 
By this it will be seen that 100 pounds of wheat 
straw contain more real food than 100 pounds of 
hay, nearly as much as 100 pounds of bran, and 
precisely the same as 100 pounds of oats. We do 
not suppose that the experience of many of our 
readers will agree with this scientific estimate of 
the value of wheat straw, and we doubt if careful 
experiment would prove it so in practice. But, 
reducing the estimate one-half, and then 100 pounds 
of straw is equal in value to 50 pounds of oats, or 
50 pounds of wheat bran, for which many farmers 
willingly pay the cash, while they waste tuns of 
straw in yards and stables. But, who is prepared 
to say that this estimate will not prove correct in 
practice? Who has cut and steamed, or scalded 
straw, and fed it with a little corn or oat meal, or 
bran, and made even an attempt to ascertain its 
value ? Many, we have no doubt, have felt com¬ 
pelled to sell a portion of their stock on account 
of the scarcity of food, and to put the remainder 
on short allowance, which all know to be a most 
unprofitable practice, while they had straw enough, 
if prepared in a manner suitable for stock to eat, 
to keep all in a thriving condition. 
In nearly all the English estimates of the value 
of the wheat crop, which we have seen, the straw 
is reckoned at §10 per ton. This may be consid¬ 
ered a high estimate, with our present notions 
and experience, but the gentleman of Erie County, 
to whom we above referred, informed us that he 
considered wheat straw worth that price, and that 
by its use, in the last two years, he had saved in 
feeding over §500. This is the experience of an 
American farmer. We hope our readers will not 
only take care of their straw, this season, but 
institute such experiments as will enable them to 
form a reliable estimate of its true value for food. 
HORACE GREELEY AT THE WYOMING FAIR. 
In reading the discussions at the State Fair in a 
late Rural, I am reminded of my intention to re¬ 
view Mr. Horace Greeley’s address at the Wyom¬ 
ing Co. Fair. It was his first public appearance 
after his celebrated visit to Salt Lake, the “salted 
claims,” and the salt border of our Western do¬ 
main. We should expect him to be well seasoned, 
as indeed he was, with facts and illustrations; but 
I apprehend that neither the matter nor the man¬ 
ner of his agricultural addresses explains the “im 
mense sensation” which his announcement as a 
speaker on such occasions creates. The early part 
of the day was dreary, yet the mere chance of hear¬ 
ing “Greeley” set all the plebian, and some of 
the better vehicles of the county in motion at an 
early hour. No body much expected he would be 
there, which prevented many from coming, as it 
was not known that he had returned from his 
western trip. He arrived, however, in New York 
the day previous, and came on at once to fill an 
appointment made months before, without stop¬ 
ping to salute his New York friends — emphatic 
testimony that promises are binding on lecturers ! 
He announced Water as the subject of his dis¬ 
course, treating it agriculturally and not in the 
light of the “ Maine Law.” While he did not 
exactly endorse the complaint of the crusty Yan¬ 
kee who thought water, “ take one year with an 
other, did about as much hurt as good,” he showed 
great leanings to that side of the question in his 
advocacy of extreme measures for draining it out 
of the land. His arguments and illustrations 
under this head the public are acquainted with. 
I cheerfully concede, '.ay, I insist, that every 
farmer should have a garden, an orchard and a 
corn field made dry by ditching, if needs be, but I 
protest against the wholesale advocacy of draining 
which of late forms the staple of most of our 
agricultural addresses and essays. Mr. Greeley 
stated the annual fall of rain at from three to five 
feet; he had witnessed great damage from the 
washing away of the banks of streams and the 
best part of the soil from the hill-sides. “No 
man” said he, “can afford to let his fertilizers go 
off in the rivers, and you must guard against this 
sapping out of the life-blood of the land. Plow 
deep and your soil will not wash. I plowed my 
steep hill-sides in Westchester Co., so deep that 
nothing had washed off from them. The first step 
in good agriculture is deep plowing. Two thou¬ 
sand years ago men took a sharp stick and tried to 
plow with it by jabbng it into the ground.— 
Within this century iron plows have been intro¬ 
duced. Six inches depth of plowing may do for 
England with her moist atmosphere, but eighteen 
inches is none too much for our climate. In 
Belgium they plow deeper than in any other coun¬ 
try, and with decided advantage. Keep plowing 
deeper till you get deep enough, if you have to go 
twenty-four inches. Tue sojl would then defy all 
drouth. This is the cheapest way of getting 
more land. It is better than ever so many acres 
in a new country. T 1 _ui will be less distance to 
send t.ue cV-i'.iren t- >' 
O-.T ra- mer 5 a-, o 
though they owned only six inches deep, instead 
of to the centre of the earth.” * * * “Ameri¬ 
can implements are better than ail others.— 
We know how to make the least possible amount 
of weight in an implement and yet give it all 
needful strength. 
“I went to see a farm in California which had 
been plowed three times, on which corn was raised 
without a boe ever having been put to it. Every 
other crop was grown in the same way, without 
any weeds. We haven’t yet begun to see what 
virtue there is in plow-handles. 
“In the way of fertilizers, snow plowed under 
in April is good for the soil. Drain this land on 
which we stand four feet, and plow three feet and 
you would get more and better crops than if cul¬ 
tivated in the usual way.” [Mr. Greeley stated 
that he had three miles of defective tile drain on 
his farm ; he now understood what to avoid in the 
way of draining.] “Get the best fertilizers — 
Gypsum is among the best. All fertilizers are 
resistants to drouth. Old leached ashes are cheap, 
if one bushel of corn will buy two bushels 
of ashes. Salt is also good. These fertilizers are 
thrown away upon swamp land. Raise corn and 
roots to use in case of a short crop of grass. To 
make it pay to raise corn, you must get near sixty 
bushels to the acre. Small farms are better than 
large ones. 
“ Begin earfy to teach agriculture to your chil¬ 
dren ; the first school book-should be a work on 
agriculture. Now, our children grow up and run 
away because they are not interested in the subject 
which they should make the object of their lives’ 
study.” 
• Mr. Greeley closed with the following very 
timely advice to young men :—“ Having recently 
passed over a great extent of wild land at the 
west, I say to you:—Get your land soon and keep 
it. There is not so much untaken land as many 
suppose. Don’t range and wander over the whole 
face of the earth. Choose your location where you 
will, and stick to it — make it a permanent home. 
Get a good, cheerful, and virtuous wife, and lead 
a steady, useful life. Don’t be a fillibuster, rov¬ 
ing over the land, but an industrious American 
Citizen.” 
These were the main points in Mr. Greeley’s 
address. I understood hitp to recommend top¬ 
dressing of grass land as a substitute for plowing. 
This may do on some soils, but I think the occa¬ 
sional turning under of turf is one of the most 
successful and cheap methods of enriching land. 
I am much in favor of deep plowing, but am not 
as confident as Mr. Greeley was that it would in 
all cases prevent the soil of side-hills from washing 
away, unless, forsooth, we should plow (which I 
did not exactly understand Mr. Greeley to re¬ 
commend,) some of our hard-pan three rods in¬ 
stead of “three feet” [(deep. The theory of 
“washing” I suppose to be this:—When the 
soil fills with water, or is very compact, so that 
it will no longer absorb what falls, if the surface 
i3 inclined the water runs off, taking the lighter 
portions of the soil with it. Underdraining and 
deep plowing enables the water to pass down 
instead of running off on the surface, and, though 
greatly serviceable, are not always quite effectual. 
I know some men that would like to swap “ two 
bushels of leached ashes for one of corn.” 
A few words upon Mr. Greeley, himself, may 
be excused. “ The philosopher of the Tribune ” 
is one of the problems of the age. The secret of 
his power over the masses is worth finding out.— 
Many people have been as negligent of dress, as 
audacious in their opinions, as profound, and as 
peculiar, without beiDg able to perform the 
greatest of human achievements, that of holding 
a large audience in breathless attention during 
the delivery of a long discourse in a prosy manner, 
on a prosy subject, unenlivened with wit, unsea¬ 
soned with humor, unaided by new facts, theories, 
or assumptions. He brought his popularity with 
him. 
A lecturer on miscellaneous subjects, a leader in 
a great party, the head of a prominent press, he 
must necessarily be an object of interest and a 
man of influence; but when it is recollected that 
his “million readers” are the ardent, the active, 
the speculative, the inquiring, the hopeful, the 
proselyting, the agitating classes, it is seen that 
their leader is doing more to control the destiny 
of the world than any man living. Has he attain¬ 
ed to this position by the force of talent?—men of 
equal ability are not uncommon. Did he turn up 
by accident, like Taylor or Polk? —every inch of 
his progress was in the face of difficulties. He is 
laborious, husbands his strength, and applies it 
with a purpose —a good beginning always. He 
is a philosopher, studies cause and effect, and has 
a wide range of vision. He is sorry for the poor 
seamstress — sympathy and talent hard at work, is 
power always; but it rained when Wyoming 
county disgorged her thousands to “ hear Greeley ,” 
so isn’t arrived at yet. Mr. Greeley 
listens to projectors in avt, mechanics, pmran- 1 
thropy, social science, religion, and politics;—this 
makes him friends, but if he can’t go all lengths, 
or if he does, enemies a'so ! This is a gain, how¬ 
ever, in a race for notoriety, valueless in itself, 
but capable of being turned to good account;— 
three enemies will sometimes do more for a man’s 
celebrity than five friends. Still, Mr. Greeley’s 
is not accounted for. His great mental and moral 
peculiarity seems to be this: while he has the 
enthusiasm, the heroism, the intensity, the mental 
and moral activity and power, which comes from 
looking at things in the light of first principles, 
(rather than conventional usage,) he also possess¬ 
es what is very seldom found in combination, a 
worldly expediency that makes him “ fight and run 
away, that he may live to fight another day.” 
The history of “reforms and isms” will show 
that Mr. Greeley in no one of the “agitations” 
has been the originator or even the most promi¬ 
nent actor; but while his coadjutors have staked 
all upon the result, and retired from the contest 
crowned with laurels or overwhelmed by disaster 
and defeat, he, active a3 ever, still fulminates his 
anathemas from the Tribune against the enemies 
of “ free speech and free labor.” Like Tammany 
Hall, he selects the issues he would like to try. He 
feels the popular pulse as scientifically as Dr. 
Weed or Dr. Croswell in the palmiest days of 
their practice. He treads on dangerous ground. 
“ Practical” politics is a dirty pool, and if Mr. 
Greeley can dabble there without getting muddy, 
he is “the first of his line”—probably the last. 
Some of his friends think they see in his repri¬ 
mands of Gerrit Smith, who is always ready to 
u die in the cause,” evidence that the politician is 
getting the better of the reformer; certain it is 
that whoever undervalues “uncompromising and 
impracticable” adherence to convictions, knows 
not what material the world’s teachers and 
martyrs are made of. Whatever Mr. Greeley’s 
future may be—whether, in the war of moral 
elements, his enthusiasm shall lead him to a sub¬ 
limity of self-sacrifice that will quicken the hero¬ 
ism of distant centuries, or his adroitness make 
him the dispenser of the city sweepings, he is a 
historical character, at once exerting a marked in¬ 
fluence upon philosophy and fact. 
I have appended this criticism to matter designed 
for the Agricultural department of the Rural 
New-Yorker, and to forestall objections .will add 
that as Mr. Greeley has been called an “ass” it 
is meet that I should here examine his “po-ints” 
to see whether the classification is just.— h. t. b. 
EXPERIENCE IN BUILDING. 
Where Men are Raised.— The “Rural Districts” 
not only feed the nation, but produce nine-tenths of the 
most useful, enterprising and successful Men of the 
country. In his address at the recent Mich. State Fair, 
Gov. Banks pertinently asked and truthfully answered 
a question on this point, as follows“ Whence come 
the recuperating vitality, intellect and learning, that in 
each generation give nqw life to the quick-moving, 
restless and prosperous town and city population ? Do 
lawyers, divines, deacons, merchants, mechanics, edi¬ 
tors, philosophers and fops reproduce themselves? 
Never! it is from the farm that society reproduces 
itself; it is from the original sources of population and 
power, the cultivators of the soil, that advancing, recu¬ 
perative, Christian civilization seeks and finds new 
agents who work out her newer and nobler destinies.” 
Mr. Moore: — Having just completed a farm 
house which suits the presiding genius of my 
household, and is thought to be commodious and 
comfortable by others, I have thought it might be 
a benefit to some of your readers who may contem¬ 
plate buildiDg if I should relate my experience. 
And here I cannot but think what a fine medium 
your beautiful paper is for the interchange of 
thought. How low the commission, how trifling 
the expense for such a fund of experimental 
knowledge fresh from the business of every-day life! 
“May building take you,” was the wish of a 
man to his worst enemy. No greater calamity, 
he tbpught, could overtake him. “Fools build 
houses and wise men live in them.” Well, build¬ 
ing took me, and with the above anathema fresh in 
my mind, I determined that I would build for 
myself alone. As my means were limited, the 
point was, to take time enough in order to modify 
the expense as much as possible by my own labor. 
I therefore determined to be three years in build¬ 
ing, and that I should have the workmen at such 
times as were most convenient for myself and man 
to assist them with (he least injury to my business 
as a farmer and teacher. Between the close of 
school in the spring and the commencement of 
farm work, I drew the stone and other material 
for the foundation, and also considerable of the 
lumber. After spring work, I moved into a 
temporary abode, pulled the old house down, and 
erected the cellar and walls ready for the sills. 
These I covered till after haying, when the car¬ 
penters came. When they arrived, myself and 
iritti, l aiiK.ee, uunnx 
them, doing the coarse work, such as scoring, 
shingling, sheeting, planing, &c. When the house 
was finished outside and two rooms ready for lath¬ 
ing, I turned the carpenters adrift, performed the 
lathing, had them plastered, moved in and closed 
up for the winter. In spring, after my school was 
out, I employed a first rate joiner, and working 
with him I completed the lower part of my house 
before spring work commenced,—having the plas¬ 
tering and painting done when I could most 
conveniently assist during the season. The past 
spring I worked with a joiner and got the upper 
part of my house ready for lathing, which myself 
and man performed wet days during the summer, 
and this fall the mason and painter, with my 
assistance, have finished the house. 
It is now just three years and a half since I took 
the first step in building. The expense through¬ 
out has been greatly modified by my own labor. 
My house is thirty-six feet long and twenty-six 
feet wide—such a proportion dividing up to the 
best advantage—giving large front rooms and 
good sizable bed-rooms in rear. In front there is 
a sitting-room and parlor of equal size. Between 
them the entry and stairs to chamber. In a house 
of this proportion the stairs are not winding but 
straight, the latter being not only the cheapest but 
the most scriptural. In rear of parlor is the par¬ 
lor bed-room. Next to that a small clothes press, 
then a large family bed-room, with the work-room 
adjoining. The work-room contains a sink on one 
side, shelves on two sides, with drawers and cup¬ 
boards underneath for spices, bread, &c., besides 
recesses for flour and meal barrels. In addition 
there is in the sitting-room a large cupboard for 
dishes, extending back to the stairs, with door 
same size as the others in the room. In rear of 
work-room is the wood-shed, which is floored, so 
that a portion is used for the stove in summer 
besides a corner for unusual kitchen work during 
the year. Just out of the wood-shed is the water 
which is brought to, but not in the house in pipe,—• 
so there is but a step to both wood and water. 
With the exception of the wood-shed all is under 
one roof. There are no outside works of any kind. 
— no porticos or piazzas. All is plain and paid 
for. The last is not the least important ornament 
about a house to my mind—for internal satisfaction 
is better than outside show. My first design was 
to have a piazza in front, (for I am not insensible 
to that which pleases the eye,) and the carpenter 
teased me hard, of course, and I should have had 
it but for a story I read of one boy boasting to his 
companions that his father’s house had a cupola; 
“ and,” said he, “ we are to have a mortgage on it, 
too, for I heard him telling so last night.” My 
house fronts the road, so that ourselves and 
visitors can see who is passing, and we can be 
found without half a day’s search by strangers or 
others. 
The upper part of the house divides to as good 
advantage as that below. There are four large 
sleeping apartments above, besides a recess, a 
clothes press, and a large and comfortable room 
which I have appropriated to myself for a study. 
The house is nine feet between floors, and is built 
in the most substantial manner. The outside is 
sheeted and clapboarded, and within lathed and 
plastered between the studs, so that there are four 
