TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.] 
PROGRESS AND IMPROVEMENT. 
[SINGLE NO. 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
AX OBIGIXAJL WEEKLY 
Agricultural, Literary and Family Newspaper. 
CONDUCTED BY D. D. T. MOORE, 
WITH AN ABLE COUPS OP ASSISTANT EDITORS. 
Th« Rural New-Yorker is designed to be unsurpassed in 
Value, Purity, Usefulness and Variety of Contents, and uniqne and 
beautiful in Appearance. Its Condnctor devotes his personal atten¬ 
tion to the supervision of its various departments, and earnestly labors 
to render die Rural an eminently Reliable Guideon 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 Journal,— rendering it the most complete Agricultu¬ 
ral, Literary Aim Family Journal In America. 
HINTS ON FARM IMPROVEMENT. 
How can I 
improve my farm—how can I in¬ 
crease its symmetry, fertility and capacity for 
profitable cultivation?” asks the progressive farm¬ 
er, and the question receives his earnest and fre¬ 
quent consideration. He studies the condition of 
his farm, and its facilities for improvement, with 
an eye to putting it into the highest stato of pro¬ 
ductiveness within his reach. Ho looks to its 
adaptation to different products, and to the best 
means of preparing for large returns from those 
suited to its capacity; not by the twilight of tra¬ 
dition alone, but in the sunshine of modern agri¬ 
cultural literature an aid to which he gratefully 
acknowledges his obligations. Every fanner should 
study thus—should earnestly seek 
of the moans and opportunities he 
One of the first questions—to tak 
ticulars- 
AGRICULTURAL FAIRS. 
In our issue of August 14th, we gave a list of 
about three hundred National, Provincial, State, 
County and Town Agricultural Fairs, to be held 
this fall, between the first of September and last of 
October. These embrace the United States Agri- 
cultural Show at Richmond, Va., the National 
Horse Show, at Springfield, Mass., the American 
Homological Meeting, at New York, the Provincial 
Show of Canada East, at Montreal, and of Canada 
West, at Toronto, besides twenty-six State Fairs, 
and County Fairs in almost every State in the 
Union. Never before have we been able to present 
such a long array of these Farmers’ Festivals, and 
it is the earnest desire we feel that they may be 
eminently useful in furthering the agricultural in¬ 
terests of the country, that induces us to say a 
word or two on the subject. 
Hundreds of thousands of dollars, and a large 
amount of time will be expended in getting up 
these exhibitions, and whether this money and 
time is profitably laid out, or wasted, and perhaps 
worse than wasted, depends upon the action of the 
farmers, and particularly of those scores of thou¬ 
sands of intelligent farmers who read the Rural 
and other agricultural publications. Those who 
do not attend these Fairs, can, of course, derive no 
benefit; but, more than this, they do them an actual 
injury, as their presence, countenance and counsel 
is needed to make them successful. Then, there 
are in every neighborhood, those “of the baser 
Do I avail 
to increase 
manure? I)o I give care and labor to 
commensurate with its importance in 
he «nds proposed?” If so, the ground 
? farm improvement is laid. If Dot, let 
receive greater attention, resting as¬ 
sured that a reasonable amount of labor in this 
department will be well rewarded, and cannot be 
withheld without great prejudice to progress. 
The division of the farm into fields of an extent 
appropriated to the amount of manure made in 
any year, should he accomplished. Especially 
should this be the case, on all farms where a mixed 
husbandry is practiced. The true way to put a 
farm into good order is, take one or more fields, 
each year, and finish up the work. Fence it well, 
clear it of stones and stumps, underdrain if need- J 
ed, manure it heavily, and plant to 
FANCY PIGEONS.-THE GOURA VICTORIA. 
i\ 0 TiiiNG looks prettier as an accessory to a rural 
home than a tasteful pigeon house, especially when 
it is inhabited with some of the more curious and 
fancy breeds. In a previous number we gave an 
engraving of the Crown Pigeon, and now we pre¬ 
sent our readers with a view of the Com-a Victoria 
/ igeons. The drawing was taken from specimens 
exhibited at an English Poultry Show. Fancy 
Pigeons form an important part of these shows, 
and some thirty or forty varieties, and several 
hundred cages, are sometimes shown at one exhi¬ 
bition. This variety, which is one of the most 
beautiful, is found wild on the large islands of the 
Indian Archipelago and New Guinea. They live 
miles away. Interesting experiments are often 
tried by carrying them off and sending them home 
with letters attached. The Jacobin is a very small 
bird, and having on the hack part of the head, 
inclining towards tho neck, a range of inverted 
feathers, bearing a resemblance to a monk’s cap. 
The Dragon is a good deal like the Horseman, but 
smaller and lighter. They surpass most other 
varieties in swiftness, in short flights of ten or 
twenty miles. The Mawmet or Mahomet is a beau¬ 
tiful cream-colored bird, with bars of black across 
the wings. The Barb was originally brought from 
Barbary, is larger than the Jacobin, with a short, 
thick beak, a small wattle, and a circle of thick, 
naked flesh around its eyes. There are several 
other fancy varieties, which we shall not now 
mention. 
tained in this country, the price varying according 
to scarcity. The Fan Tailed sort, called by this 
name from its habit of spreading out the feathers 
of its tail like a turkey cock, is quite plenty and 
cheap. Among those varieties more scarce and 
curious we will notice only a few. The Tumbler 
Pigeon soars to a great height and turn somersets 
in the air. The Pouter possesses the power to in¬ 
flate the breast with air, and swell it out to a great 
size, which gives the bird a very proud and strut¬ 
ting appearance. The Carrier Pigeon, and a variety 
somewhat similar called the Horseman, are much 
attached to their home, and will find it as soon as 
they have their freedom if carried hundreds of i 
. - - -— corn and pota¬ 
toes. These, carefully cultivated, will leave the 
[ land in good condition for a grain crop, and seed¬ 
ing to clover and other grasses, and this course 
followed from field to field, with good management 
of every crop, will put a new face on any of “our 
common run” of farms. 
Upon the amount of manure should depend the 
size of our fields at any rate, it should be our aim 
to give each field the quantity, which will enable 
it to grow a large crop. It is poor policy to at¬ 
tempt the cultivation of more land than we can 
fully fertilize and thoroughly cultivate. We men¬ 
tion corn, as a first crop, because it is one well 
suited to the place—one not injured by any amount 
of manure, fresh or fermented, which can be ap¬ 
plied—one which can receive that culture neces¬ 
sary to clear the land of weeds, and one having no 
deleterious influence on any after crop. From a 
field so treated, we took fifty bushels of shelled 
TIMOTHY SEED, 
however, is not considered an objection, but rather 
as indicating the aboriginal type. The old stock 
was considered faulty in Bhape, though fattening 
well, giving mutton of superior quality, and reach¬ 
ing an average of sixteen pounds per quarter, 
when four years old. Like all animals adapted to 
a hilly country, their fore quarters were light in 
proportion to the hind ones. This was not, 
probably, a defect, considered in reference to the 
circumstances in which the animals were naturally 
placed ; it made them more active, and enabled 
them to travel over rough pastures with mo*- 
facility. But they were often hollow at tho • ** 
with sunken and narrow loins, and an ud'’ v ' filD8 
ness of carcass for the height. jClQ ^S^t- 
The first important improve^ 
was made by John Ellma’- - 11 breed 
towards the close of ^lynde, in Sussex, 
of skillful brep ” fast century. By a course 
attracted a* iie obtained a flock which 
an d ..^hiioh frofti all parts of the kingdom, 
p ,'^t the means of improving not only the 
-no. hi. generally, but other short-wooled 
1 Weeds. Ho produced a symmetrical carcass, fit 
* for luarket in half the time usually required to* 1 
■^ Zmtaon mature old stock, raised the weight from sixteen 
-orn Great to twenty pounds a quarter; preserving the fine- 
notice those ness of the wool and somewhat increasing the 
3 likely to be, height of fleece. His flock was held in such esti- 
1 * r “’ mation that in 1798 the Emperor of Russia bought 
eats to be a two of his rams at the price of 300 guineas, the 
he ifatlfy or Duke of Bedford taking two others at the same 
tne earliest price. In 1820, when Mr. Ellmau retired from 
mneral char- business, and sold off his sheep at auction, 770 
ed in respect ewes, varying from a year old to full-aged, 
^! aD - g<if ! averaKed £3 ls - cd - each; 320 lambs 3Gs. each; 3G 
32 rams £10 each 
, lnE first of September is a good time to sow 
Timothy seed. I have tried it so often that I am 
very decided on that point. It is true that this 
year and last have been so rainy as to make spring 
seeding do well, but we may look out for dry sum¬ 
mers about half the time, and there is more than an 
even chance that next year will give us a drouth 
that would endanger seed sown in the spriDg. The 
success of Mediterranean wheat this year, when 
sown on rich, warm land, by the first week in Sep- 
tember, seems to encourage further trial of it un¬ 
der favorable circumstances. Whoever sows win¬ 
ter wheat can sow Timothy before the wheat is 
drilled in, or before the la3t dragging if the wheat 
is pat in with a drag; but if the wheat is put in 
with a cultivator or gang plow, I should prefer 
sowing the Timothy atter that operation was com¬ 
pleted, trusting to the rains to bury the seed. Win¬ 
ter rye will succeed on poorer land than wheat, and 
will bear a little later sowing, and I would recom¬ 
mend to sow grass seed with rye where there is 
doubt as to the success of wheat—rye being an 
excellent crop to seed down with. New England 
folks were raised on rye in former times, and there 
are those who think they have degenerated since 
they took to wheat flour. 
Timothy seed may be sown upon any clean land, 
and dragged in without any other crop, and if put 
in immediately it might be mowed or pastured next 
year, as it makes a better growth and frequently 
succeeds better alone than when sown in connec¬ 
tion with a grain crop. Oats especially are a poor 
crop to seed down with. 
It is now pretty generally C6flC&dhd that if we 
want to raise twice as much g ra i n , especially wheat 
we must sow only half as much ground. 'This I 
reaves it necessary to put down more land to grass 
than we have usually devoted to that crop, and 
renders it important that we nhnnlrl mWt 
ble. I have had doubt as to the propriety of sow¬ 
ing Timothy seed in the fall, upon low, wet land, 
and land greatly given to “heaving,” and have 
generally preferred spring seeding on such land; 
yet I observe this year that some places sown to 
wheat and 1 imothy last fall, which were so wet as 
to kill the wheat entirely, were covered with a 
beautiful growth of Timothy this summer big 
enough to mow—hut I think I have known fall 
sown Timothy to kill in the spring following, on 
some land, and so I give a caution in that particu¬ 
lar. However, it may be on the “ Bourbon” ques¬ 
tion, there is doubt whether there is as much Timo¬ 
thy seed “among us” as there ought to be; the 
amount may be increased next winter by throwing 
ripe Timothy hay upon a floor and pounding it a 
little before it is fed. u. t n 
SHEEP: 
CHAB.ACTEBISTIC8 OF BREEDS, 
rams £25 each; 32 rams £10 each; 241 weather 
lambs 21s. each; and one ram sold for G5 guineas. 
Following the footsteps of Ellman, and adopt¬ 
ing his stock as a foundation, other breeders have 
obtained great celebrity. A symmetrical finish 
has been given to the carcass; the chest has been 
widened and deepened; the back straightened; 
the ribs expanded, and every part given its pro¬ 
portionate fullness. At the same time something 
has been gained In tbe maturity of the animal, and 
the size, or rather the weight, still further in¬ 
creased. The carcasses frequently weigh twenty- 
