XAVO DOLLARS -A. YEAR.] 
“PROGRESS .AJSTD IMPROVEMENT." 
[SINGLE INTO. IPIVTC CENTS. 
VOL. XIV. NO. 36.S 
-FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 
[WHOLE NO. 712. 
WEAVER'S IMPROVED OKCHYARD WHIFPLETREE. 
MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
AX ORIGINAL WEEKLY 
RURAL, LITERARY AND FAMILY NEWSPAPER 
CONDUCTED BY D. D. T. MOORE, 
With n Corp* of Able A»*t>«tniit» nml Contributor*. 
CHAS. D. BRAGDON, Western Corresponding Editor. 
The Rural New-Yorker is deeicmeil to be unsurpassed 
in Value, Purity and Variety of Contents, und nnifine 
and beautiful In Appearance. Its Conductor devotes hi* 
personal attention to the supenixion of it* various 
department*, and enrm-stly labors to render the Rural an 
eminently Reliable Guido on :tU the important Practical. 
Scientific and otherSubJect* intimately connected with the 
bustm - --* of those whose interests it realuttaly advocate*. 
As a Family Journal it i* eminently Instructive and 
Entertaining—being so conducted that it can be safely 
taken to the Homes of people of intelligence, taste and 
discrimination. It embraces more Agi ultural. Horticul¬ 
tural, Scientific, Educational, Literary and News Matter, 
interspersed with appropriate Engravings, than any other 
journal,—rendering it the most complete Agricultural, 
Literary and Family Newspaper in America 
IT-For Term* and other particulars, see last page. 
FARMER GARRULOUS TALKS 
ABOUT AGRICULTURAL FAIRS, PREMIUMS, &C. 
Dm you say Peter Pixchpenny is going to 
the Fair, John? He is, eh? Well Pm glad 
of it; and yet I must say there are too many 
of ikat class oi people that do go to Fairs.— 
Why, did you ask? I’ll tell you! They don’t go 
to give; they go to receive. They are not will¬ 
ing to tell how they grow a big, crisp, juicy, 
sweet turnip, but simply to show that they do it 
and take the prize. If they do get tiny ideas 
that might benefit anybody else without in the 
least affecting their own interests, they are too 
supremely selfish to make them current. 
Now there’s Pinohpknny. What do you sup¬ 
pose he is going to the Fair for ? To take the 
premium on that sow and pigs, is he ? Well, 
they are worthy a premium, but they are not the 
result, of his skill in breeding. And he don’t go 
to show them because he has any pride in the 
matter; but because lie is morally certain that he 
can win the iwenry-tive dollars.' Now there is 
justice for you! Here is my neighbor Strug ole- 
hard, a hard-working, thinking, reading chap, 
who has skillfully bred his stock until they are 
nearly perfect. And his theories of breeding 
have been repeated again and again to his neigh¬ 
bors, and the stock of the whole neighborhood is 
better because of his study, practice and teach¬ 
ings. But here is Pixcih’envy who never hred 
a good hog in his life; but finding he could buy, 
at an administrator’s sale. » sow with pig at half 
her value, he purchased, und now he proposes to 
lake the purchase money out of the treasury of 
the Agricultural Society by exhibiting her. 
John, 1 think there ought to be some dis¬ 
tinction made in such cases. Why should I be 
allowed to go into another State and purchase an 
animal to compete with one that is the result of 
skillful breeding at home. It seems to me that 
there ought to be distinct classes made, and pre¬ 
miums given to animals bred by the person exhib¬ 
iting the some and then, if you choose, a sweep- 
stakes for the best animal, no matter where bred. 
I believe in crowding out these perambulating 
prize animals that take advantage of some little 
pretensiouB County Agricultural Society, that 
throws its premium list “open to (he world,’) 
thinking thereby to impress the world with its 
greatness, Its magnitude. I am half inclined to 
think that such a Society distrusts its ability to 
make any show at all from its own county. At 
any rate it Is the right way to prevent there being 
a fair representation of its industrial resources. 
There should be a little effort made to foster 
county pride and encourage home productions. 
But most of all, John, we want to go to these 
Fairs with the right spirit—willing to learn what 
others know, and impart what our experience 
has taught us. We should nor. go and commence 
laying pipe to secure the premium. What is a 
premium worth to an honest, conscientious man, 
when lie knows it was unworthily bestowed ? Of 
what use is it ? A real friend of progress would 
rather see the premium go to his rival, if he mer¬ 
its it, ten thousand times, than take it himself. 
And then he would like to know ichy it was so 
given. And the Committee ought to let him and 
all his competitors know. An award is good for 
nothing, it seems to me, unless some reason is 
given for the disposition of it other than that it 
is given to the best animal. A comparison should 
be made on paper. How is the animal best ? 
What are the points of superiov merit ? How 
were they obtained ? If my animal is inferior, I 
want, to be told In what respect; for my partiality 
may prevent my seeing it. 
In short, John, this Fair business needs elabo¬ 
rate study. We go to the Fair and rush around, 
and gaze at the mass of objects with mouth 
open, when we ought to study thoroughly the 
features lhat most affect our interest. We go 
away bewildered with the thousand objects that 
have passed before our vision, when we should 
have certain well developed ideas and aims 
clearly diffused in our minds, ready to bo incor¬ 
porated in practice the moment we get home. 1 
remember I asked Sarah Jane, the first time 
she attended a Fair, what she saw there? She 
replied, “ 0, I can’t tell, I saw so many things; 1 
really don't know what I did see!” And the 
thoughtless Miss told the truth. And many 
older people might have said the same thing 
with equal truth alter attending a Fair. Now it 
it is better for child and adult to see only one 
thing, and get one new and practical idea, and 
enjoy the pleasure of its acquisition, than to see 
a thousand things, and know nothing about any 
of them when one gets home. 
But I see thoRe fence-corners need cleaning 
out. You bring the scythes, and we will spend 
a half-day tidying up a little. It is a capital 
time to kill weeds—especially thistles—by cut¬ 
ting them. See that the scythes are sharp, J oun. 
THE ROLLER. 
There is no better pulverizer to follow the 
plow than the roller. We have evidence enough 
of this fact. No matter how cloddy the ground 
lifts, if the roller follows, crushing the clods as 
they are freshly turned, the action of the sun and 
air will do more towards completely pulverizing 
these clods than a thorough harrowing arid cross 
harrowing. This is of importance to farmers 
who may have occasion to turn dry stubble land 
the present and next month with a view to Heed¬ 
ing it with fall grain Let the roller follow the 
plow before seeding. It will scarcely be neces¬ 
sary to touch it with the harrow, if the rolling is 
done tiie same day the soil Is turned. The soil 
is loft with a smooth surface on which the grain 
falls and which is likely to insure its being cov¬ 
ered to an uniform depth ; or if to be drilled in, 
this work is bettor done; but more important 
than all, an excellent seed bed is secured in 
which the seed will germinate und grow quickly 
and continuously without the aid of a shower. 
For a packed surface secures moisture generally. 
If the clods are allowed to get. thoroughly dry, 
the good effect resulting from the use of the roller 
is much diminished thereafter. It cannot be Djo 
strongly urged that this work of rolling be done 
as soon after the ground is turned as possible. 
And talking of the roller, it should be here 
asserted that a farmer can just as profitably put 
in crops and cultivate his soil without a harrow 
as without a roller. Ir is gratifying to know that 
very many farmers have learned this fact; but 
there is still a large per centum who are either 
ignorant or indifferent respecting it It should 
be impressed upon them. 
THE VAGARIES OF INSECT-LIFE, 
There are some strange anomalies in insect 
production for which it is impossible t.o assume 
any cause or philosophical rationale. Ono of the 
most remarkable instances is the sudden appear¬ 
ance of the Aphk or Plant Louse, that attacked 
the spring wheat and oat« during the Rummer of 
18G2—their name was legion. A bap-hazard 
head taken from a large field counted 151, 
another 1!J7, and thousands of acres were equally 
infected, reducing the crop iu many cases to five 
or six bushels per acre, and oats, iu weight, to 
twenty pounds per bushel. 
It is difficult even to imagine any reasonable 
source of their appearance in such innumerable 
hordes of strangers, so suddenly and without any 
known or apparent system or source of produc¬ 
tion. Spontaneous extra existence and creation 
cannot, in the present state of our knowledge, be 
hardly tolerated, yet there are many facts that 
render any other cause one of the mooted points 
of speculative philosophy, 
A few years since a creature, vulgarly called 
the measuring worm, which only attacked the 
ripe berry of winter wheat, was so numerous 
that the threshing machines and fanning mills 
were completely covered with an innumerable 
army of crawlers, and it was feared that they 
were to become a destructive agent of the wheat, 
Crop ever after; but they were never seen again, 
and the Aphis of’62 has not in this region made 
ils appearance in a single Instance, as can be 
discovered. 
The Grasshopper occasionally appears over 
large districts of countiy so numerous as to pass 
in swarms before any moving object, committing 
enormous depredations on graRs and grain, and 
even stopping the all-powerful engine by the 
crushing of their unctuous bodies on the rails, 
and It was a fair deduction from their number 
that their location would be again doubly over¬ 
run, by the laws of the animal economy causing 
all vitality to increase and multiply , and yet 
those situations are entirely devoid of their ex¬ 
istence for years, without any fixed period for 
their return, as far as the observations of natural¬ 
ists ha vp as yet determined. 
It is by many persons thought that, the Wheat 
Midge, or Weevil, is leaving this region and pass¬ 
ing to the prolific wheat fields of the West, an 
assumption that may he accounted for, if a fact, 
from the almost universal subsidence of wheat 
production in Eastern countries, and by the use 
of early varieties and early sowing, thereby anti¬ 
cipating their period and ability for destructive¬ 
ness. 
Let. farmers think of and observe these sugges¬ 
tions to assist in coming to some rational con¬ 
clusions on the subject, which is as legitimate 
and less abstruse a matter of inquiry as the 
transmutation of ?>/><'fee. and the turning of 
Wheat into chess. 
HARVESTING CORN. 
Corn, next to grass, is the most important of 
American crops. In every latitude and every 
longitude of the American Union, including 
Richmond and Sou’th Carolina, corn is a staple 
article—it is at lame North, South, East and 
West. Let genial France have her grasses, and 
foggy England her turnips; America boasts a 
nobler product —Indian Corn. That’s perma¬ 
nently our forte. 
“Immemorial usage” has done a great many 
mean things to be ashamed oi, and among the 
rest encouraged the American people in a loose, 
slovenly and wasteful management of corn. In 
the first place, the fodder (stalks and husks,) if 
well saved, is worth as much per acre as hay, 
and yet ns a general rule from half to the whole 
of its substance is wasted by improvident 
management. 
The way to save corn fodder, and the corn too, 
is to cut up the corn at the roots before the first 
frost hard enough to injure, the fodder. No mat¬ 
ter whether the corn is ripe or not, cutiL before 
a hard frost, for it will make no improvement 
after the leaves are killed, but grow rapidly 
worse; and in all cases cut it when three-fourths 
of the ears are hard, and, if properly put up, the 
soft ears will harden. 
If you prefer binding into bundles, lay the corn 
even at the buts, bind tight and strong, and im~ 
mediately set it up in Hiiali kooks, and bind firm 
round the tops. Or. you may set up rourul a hill, 
without binding into bundles—but set it snug 
and true and bind the tops strong. 
Husk early, putting three or four stocks into 
one, Het it up in good order, and keep it up , till 
cured sufficiently to be stacked or mowed. Re¬ 
member that the buts are more juicy, and from 
their position in the stock not ns well cured as the 
tops;—so put them to the outside of the mow as 
far as possible, and if you have a shed loft, or 
hay loft, you may put in a tier of stalks quite 
green with the blits up at an angle of 46 degrees; 
the great object being to expose the fodder as 
little to the wet as possible and save it fresh and 
green. Shells may be made available to husk 
corn under, drawing the corn in when it is dry, 
and husking in wet weather, but there is danger 
of packing too close as there is little circulation 
of air. 
Corn, too, is very often injured by laying in 
heaps on the ground, getting wet, and being 
cribbed in a damp and mouldy condition. The 
width ot the crib should be adjusted to the dry¬ 
ness of the corn;—if damp and immature, the 
crib should be narrow and the cracks large. In 
all cases put your crib in a windy place, and 
never in a close or damp one. 
If you esteem yourselves, somewhat, select a 
few bushels of your choicest corn and trace it up 
and dry it as you would for seed, or spread it 
thin on a scaffold, or save it very carefully in a 
crib, and wheu dry have it made into meal, and 
. 0m;N h^e we urged upon our readers the 
importance ot culture to fruit trees, front the 
time they are planted until they become of hear- 
ing age. On this point we believe all orchardists 
are united, though there is some difference of 
opinion as to the best course to be pursued with 
well established orchards. Tens of thousands of 
trees are annually destroyed by neglect of cttl- 
turo, and many who feel its importance are de¬ 
terred from giving their trees the needed care in 
this respect by the fact that it. is almost, impossi¬ 
ble to entrust this work to the ordinary hired 
help of the farm. Scores of trees are found 
barked, broken, or otherwise mutilated, and in 
many case* it la found the lesser evil to allow 
the ground to remain untilled. Many huve been 
the rude contrivances constructed to avoid this 
evil, such as covering the ends of the whiffle- 
tree with pieces of carpet, leal her, ,tc. We have 
before us a model of a wliiflletree invented by 
J. D. Weaver, of Penfield, N. Y., designed for 
use among orchard and nursery trees, which 
seems well adapted to the purpose, and is worthy 
the attention of all fruit-growers. It is short, 
thence into johnny-cake or mush, and you have 
the greatest luxury that any age, or country, or 
clime can boast of, provided always that the 
mush and johnny-cake aforesaid are well made. 
—II. t. n. 
WESTERN EDITORIAL NOTES. 
“ DELIVER US FROM FIGURES.” 
Hugh T. Brooks’ facetious article under the 
above head, seems to demand attention. 
1. Tho second and third paragraphs of that 
article, being bused upon a mistake qf the printer, 
and not upon any calculation or figures of Mr. 
Sur.iJtvA nt's nor mine, need no further notice. 
The error is corrected in the same paper in 
which Mr. B.’s article appears. 
2d. “ Mr. Brag don’s friend,” who keeps books 
by double entry, and makes money by doing so, 
does not ignore labor. On the contrary, ho is 
enabled to apply it economically in the right 
direction, because he learns to a demonstration 
where it may' most profitably be applied. And 
I will venture to assert lhat his corn-fields- J,SI)0 
acres -will be found to be as free from weeds to¬ 
day as any equal number of acres in Mr. Brooks’ 
vicinity. 
‘j. We can grow more and bigger weeds on the 
same area of land in Illinois, and with less labor, 
than can be grown in New York, or any State 
east of that Empire; and wo can clean the same 
area of weeds in less time and with less labor, 
and do it better than it can be done by our East¬ 
ern brethren; and ice do it! 
4, “But this keeping accounts with every 
horse, and cow, and pig, aud field, and crop, 
won’t do for the majority of mankind.” So says 
Mr. Brooks. Perhaps it. will not. Doubtless it 
will not with the present generation; for not one 
in one hundred knows how to do it. But it does 
not follow, by any means, that because Mr. 
Brooks Cannot beep accounts with each crop, 
each class of animals on his farm, so as to be 
able to know to a fraction what each crop, ani¬ 
mal, or class of animals cost him, lhat it cannot 
be done, and profitably, too. I know the science 
of guessing has been inherited by many farmers; 
but it does not follow that it is the best educa¬ 
tional inheritance the father can give his son. it 
is true an empty pocket may be felt , and will 
Certainly be an index of something wanting; 
but I cannot believe that Mr. B. would recom¬ 
mend farmers to “ go it blind” until their empty 
pocketR indicate that li it has been a bad year.” 
strong, the attachment is simple, and the trace 
passing around the rounded end of the whillle- 
tree, seems to afford all needed protection. We 
understand it has been in use constantly since 
the opening of spring, and has not - barked ” or 
injured a single tree. Its construction is shown 
in the engraving. One advantage claimed for 
this improvement In ordinary farm use, is that it 
will allow the operator to plow much nearer the 
fences than with the ordinary whiffletree, thus 
causing a saving of land, and materially curtail¬ 
ing the harbor for weeds so common around our 
fences. Farmers, and especially all who grow 
fruit, should at least give it an examination. 
The construction of this whiffletree, and the 
manner of attaching the trace thereto, may 
readily lie seen from the engraving. A, repre¬ 
sents a section of an ordinary trace, passing 
around the end of the whiffletree, to tho rear 
side, and through the clasp, B, and attached, (by 
means Of the cock-eye, 0,) to the hook, D. 
Further information relative to this aparently 
valuable invention may Im obtained by address¬ 
ing the Patenter, as above. 
Neither do I believe that “ the future is all guess 
work and cannot bo anything else,” as Mr. B. 
asserts it is. If it is, the lessons of life are of no 
value at all. It is folly to learn, or try to learn 
them. Indeed, I can see no sort of use for “ close 
habits of observation,” which Mr. B. deems so 
indispensable, if it is all guess work after all. 
Analogically, it is unfortunate that wo have any 
school systems at all—thut the child is taught by 
anything but its necessities. Now, I don’t be- 
liovo that Mr. B. would have this analogy ex¬ 
tended so far; but I think him very unfortunate 
in making that assertion. If I had made it, 1 
would take it back in the next issue of the Kura l. 
5. It hardly seems to me to be necessary that 
I should defend tny orthodoxy in the Rural. 1 
hope no one supposes that I am a “one idea” 
character—that. 1 believe a good knowledge of 
figures is a good knowledge of fanning and all 
other kinds of business under the sun. But I do 
believe that the same system essential to success 
in other kinds of business, is equally essential to 
the success of the farmer. That Malone is essen¬ 
tial, 1 have never believed nor written. Figures 
must aid the judgment, direct and stimulate ob¬ 
servation and teach discretion. I am no advo¬ 
cate of any educational system which disciplines 
all tho elasticity out of the pupil. I do not be¬ 
lieve it, at all essential that a boy should study 
Latin und Greek three or four of the best years 
of his life in order to discharge the duties of 
his tnalurcr yours faithfully and successfully. 
Neither would I educate the child’s Drain at the 
expense of the physical nature. But I do believe 
in the calve and power of brain;-). 1 believe 
they were given ns to use, and that while they 
may and should be educated to be sensitive to 
all tho beauties, lessons, and laws of Nature, they 
should receive such direction us will result iu the 
application of these lessons and luws to their 
own best uses. Experience is education; but 
education, while it is not always experience, 
should render the latter available for use—should 
teach the man how best to apply his experiences 
to the development of future success. 
Finally, I have nothing to alter in what I have 
heretofore written of the value and importance 
of a business education to the farmer. And I 
have lost no faith in the practical value of figures 
in farm operations. 
ROSIN WEED FOR HORSES. 
Dr. Dadd, Veterinary Surgeon, came into ray 
office the other day to recommend to gentlemen 
who employ a large number of horses on tho 
