- • 
■IMS: •' ,•:» 
t'CULTURE-^ 
EXCELSIOR 
@3.00 PEB YEAR. 
Siugle No., Ei«l»t Cents. 
NEW YORK CITY AND ROCHESTER, N. Y 
!) I*nrk Row 
S 2 numuo st. 
FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, JAN. U, 1869 
EvTEnED, according to Act of Confess, hi tho year 1863, by P. P. 
T. Moork, in r.h<» CI«mV* Office of the District Court of the 
Unitoi States for U»« Southern District of Nt*vv Yorlr. 
4. Two years from the date of planting 
will give you some trees large enough to 
transplant or to sell, though your locusts will 
still be very small. You ought, now to have 
at least 5,000 young trees, worth, at ten 
cents each, five hundred dollars. Hcf a few 
of them around the district school house at 
your own cost, and offer a. dozen to each of 
the churches in your township, if the mem¬ 
bers will agree to plant them well, fence 
them thoroughly, ami take good care of them. 
Offer the first mail who will set not less than 
live hundred trees in your township, an as¬ 
sortment at half price. Get tree-planting 
along the highways once started, and every 
one who is of any account, with some who 
are of none, will embark in it. You will 
soon sell t,000 trees more easily and quickly 
than your first hundred. 
5. Mo fast as you sell, plant again ; and ex¬ 
tend your nursery if encouraged by the de¬ 
mand to do so. Very soon, farmers who 
have steep-banked ravines, or protruding or 
thinly-covered rocks, will want to cover their 
nakedness with a ehecpier work of yonr no¬ 
blest trees. Though it is not yet, generally 
comprehended, it soon must be, that to allow 
any poof sort ot tree to grow on a. fanner’s 
wood lc/ is just as thriftless and wasteful as 
to grow an orchard of ungraded apple-tree . 
KxIitk! your nursery in due lime to an acre; 
keep replanting it so fast as it is thinned out 
by sales; and you will, while doing a good 
work tor your neighbors and the public, re¬ 
alize more profit from that acre than many 
farmers do from their entire farms. 
PROGRESS AND IMPROVEMENT.” 
AX ORIGINAL WBKKljY 
RURAL, LITERARY AND FAMILY NEWSPAPER. 
d. d. t. moons, 
Courtnotiixg Bdiloi- utirl Proprietor. 
CHAS. D. BRAGDON, G. F. WILCOX, A. A. HOPKINS, 
Associate Kdito ns. 
HENRY S. RANDALL, LL. D., 
Editor or this Drr'AUTMrvr or Sump Husbasduy. 
X. A. WILLARD, 
Editor of TTir DKPARTMItTit or Dimv Husbandry. 
DANIEL LEE M. D., 
Or Tbysrshbh, South buy Corresponding Editor. 
Special Contributors 
P. HA HUY, 
H. T. BROOKS, 
J. K. DODGE, 
F. It. EI.LliYrr, 
.1. II. GUIS) OK, M. D. 
.1. STANTON nOIM.I), 
“ NOW AND THEN," 
T. C. PETERS, 
CHAS. V. RICKY, 
E. W. STEWART, 
JAMES VICK, 
J. WILKINSON, 
MRS. K. F. EI.LET, 
MARY A. E. WAGER, 
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ARTIFICIAL ROCK-WORK FOUNTAIN. 
. DESIGNED AND CONSTRUCTED (AT “ DUN.MORE,” IN BALTIMORE CO., MD.,) BY J. WILKINSON, OF BALTIMORE, 
Tiie Fountain at “ Dunmore,” illustrated 
above, is acknowledged to be one. of the 
most beautiful private fountains in this coun¬ 
try. It is delightfully located among scat¬ 
tering gigantic, forest trees, interspersed with 
smaller ones in great variety, yet sufficiently 
open to admit the genial influence of the 
sun, so essential in maintaining over the en¬ 
tire surface of the lawn a rich, fine, green 
turf. As it, would be inappropriate to sur- 
THE SYCAMORE FOR SHADE. 
ter, and the grass margin, all blend in the 
bounds of the pool, producing a beautiful 
effect. In the recesses, under the projections 
of the rock-work, are wrought pockets, 
which are tilled wit h suitable soil and planted 
with water lilies and a variety of other 
aquatic plants, on the foliage of which the 
jet falls irregularly, being varied by the most 
gentle breeze. [Our illustration is from a fine 
photograph of the scene represented.] 
In Rural of Jan. 2, I860, “A Citizen” 
recommends “sycamore trees” as “ the best 
shade trees for the city of New York.” lie 
is supposed to refer to the tree commonly 
known as the buttonwood. That may thrive 
much better in that city than in this; but 
hereabouts it is a most despicable production. 
It has not “ wonderfully thick foliage," but 
rather sparse, unsightly, and shabby, with 
much dead wood in its branches; and in¬ 
stead of being “ rarely attacked by insects,” 
as your correspondent remarks, it is the 
most filthy forest tree within my knowledge, 
breeding more worms, in the shape of hide¬ 
ous white caterpillars, than all the other 
shade trees in Ibis region. 
It is not to be tolerated near a residence or 
on pleasure grounds by anybody who is well 
acquainted with the tree. 
The sycamore of Paris, mentioned by him, 
is doubtless a different species. Your “ Citi¬ 
zen” is not probably aware of the true char¬ 
acter of our sycamore, as known here, or he 
would not thus recommend it. 
Rochester, Jan. 11,1809. It. G. Warner. 
PLANT FOREST TREES 
AN APPEAL TO FARMERS’ BOYS. 
BY HORACE GREELEY. 
Young Men, I appeal to you for aid in a 
work which is of subordinate interest to me, 
as to all the generation soon to pass off the 
scene, but of very great Importance to you 
and to all who arc just entering upon the 
stage of responsible action. I ask you to 
help me re-clothc a considerable portion of 
our country with the more valuable forest 
trees. I will first briefly indicate why this 
should be done, and next try to show ho to 
you may effectually co-operate in doing it. 
1. Our ancestors found the Atlantic slope 
of this continent mainly a forest. There 
were exceptional intervales, or nearly wood¬ 
less swamps, or naked mountain-crags; 
but hardly less than nine-tenths of either 
slope of the Aileghanies, with all the land 
between them and the Atlantic, were covered 
with timber, and in good part with a heavy 
growth of pine, oak, beech, maple, hemlock, 
&c., Ac. Of course, the pioneer settlers were 
nearly everywhere obliged to destroy timber 
in order to reach the soil whence they must 
draw most ot their subsistence. Very many 
of them spent half their days in felling and 
burning to ashes great trees which would 
now, if standing just where they grew, be 
worth far more than the farms which have 
supplanted them. It was often a good 
month’s work for an efficient chopper to de¬ 
stroy the trees which grew on an acre, leav¬ 
ing the stumps and roots to impede cultiva¬ 
tion and belittle crops for many years there¬ 
after. I aided, forty-five years ago, in cutting 
and drawing pine saw-logs from that corner 
of Vermont wldcli has New York on the 
south and Lake Champlain directly west of 
J it, when the boards then sawed from those 
.5, logs sold for nine, to fifteen dollars per thou- 
) sand feet, according to quality; now, those 
5 very boards would be worth, just where we 
% cut the timber, from thirty to forty dollars 
. per thousand feet, 1 have been told that a 
heavy growth of pine was, little more than 
V fi fty years ago, cut off the eastern half of the 
£ &ite ot ’ tlK ‘ present flourishing city of Burlimr- 
ton, Vt,, and rafted down Lake Champlain 
to the Son-I and St. Lawrence, and thence 
shipped to England; paying barely the cost 
of cutting and sawing, though that very tim¬ 
ber would this day be worth at least five 
hundred dollars per acre if standing just, 
where it gre w. Vermont, after sending most 
of her own pine to market through the Can¬ 
adas, has been obliged to import just such 
pine from the Canadas, to build her railroads 
and newer dwellings; paying for it many 
times what she received for her own squan¬ 
dered treasure. 
No doubt some valuable timber had to bo 
destroyed in order that roads should be 
opened and farms hewn out of the wilder¬ 
ness; but the best and most thrifty forests of 
pine should have been carefully preserved to 
this day; while some of those necessarily 
used should have been promptly planted to 
pine again. 
But the generation that destroys seldom 
replaces and repairs. Our ancestors fought 
the forests as they did the Indians, regarding 
the extermination of each a necessity. Their 
ruthless warfare has left ns face to face with 
the problem of restoration. We must have 
timber a great deal of it—and we cannot 
otherwise obtain it so cheaply, so surely, so 
amply, as by growing it. 
2. We need to re-clothe millions of acres 
with valuable trees, for other reasons in ad¬ 
dition to lack of timber. The general de¬ 
struction of our forests has rendered torna¬ 
does and hail-storms more frequent and de¬ 
structive, while our climate is harsher and 
more capricious than it, formerly was or need 
now be. Fifty years ago good peaches were 
grown in Southern New Hampshire; now 
they can scarcely be grown in Southern New 
York, and arc rapidly disappearing from 
New Jersey. Our piercing winds and fickle 
winters are rapidly expelling the peach cul¬ 
ture from our whole country north of the 
Potomac, save in a few narrow districts 
a long the southern shores of our great lakes. 
Other fruits are similarly, though perhaps 
less sweepingly, affected. 
D. The dairy farming, which lias so largely 
taken possession of our Stale, has instigated 
a fresh raid upon the remnants of our forests. 
Farmers begin to say; —“Those twenty to 
forty acres which 1 have hitherto kept in 
forest, to supply mo with timber and fuel, 
will, if devoted to grass, make milk enough 
to buy all the fuel (coal) and timber 1 shall 
need.” Miserable, short-sighted miscalcula¬ 
tion ! Let our farms lie generally stripped of 
timber, and they will produce less grass than 
it one-fourth to one-third of them were left 
in. forest. Our steep hill-sides, which yield 
abundant grass while the crests above them 
are still timbered, will dry up almost every 
summer, and afford no more feed till re¬ 
freshed by the soaking rains of autumn. 
Failing springs, parched brook-beds, dwin¬ 
dling yet often inundating, devastating rivers, 
attest the monstrous impolicy of denuding 
our country of forests. We must stop, turn 
short about, and undo the evil work of two 
unthinking generations. 
Young men, I am planting trees and try¬ 
ing to restore devastated wood-lands. I 
planted thirty pounds of locust seed last 
spring; I mean to plant other trees next 
spring. Ilcre is the aid I solicit from you: 
1. I wish cucli of you to seek of his father 
the use of a small patch of fertile, easily- 
worked land, located so near the farm build¬ 
ings as not, to lie subject to robbery by squir¬ 
rels and other predatory animals. Whether 
you cultivate this yourselves the coming sea- 
son or only sec that it is well and deeply cul¬ 
tivated, is immaterial; but have it dovotecl 
to something that will leave you the ground 
clear by the 1st of October at furthest. Now 
l'low and subsoil it thoroughly, mark it off 
into rows three feet apart, and be ready to 
put down tree-seed so fast as you pan pro¬ 
cure the right sorts. To tills end, you will 
have begun to gather so soon as any valuable 
seeds were dropped, and you should keep on 
gathering till the last dropped were in your 
hands. Buy sonic, kinds, if you must; but 
those you gather will not only be far cheaper 
but far better. Chestnuts, hickory nuts, Ac., 
are said to lose their power of germination if 
allowed to become thoroughly dry; and J 
reckon that most tree-seeds do better 11 
planted soon after they drop. I hope some 
of you will try the experiment, of planting 
half your locust seed (for instance) in the 
fall, the residue in tlu? spring, when it is ne¬ 
cessary to dip your bag of seed briskly twice 
or thrico in a pot of boiling water, in order 
to soften the tough shell so that the germ 
can pierce it. I do not know, but guess that 
nature’s process is the better one, 
2. I hope many of you will soon open a 
correspondence with your cousins and school¬ 
mates living remote from you, and propose 
an exchange of seeds with several of them. 
One may thus gather hickory nuts; another, 
white oak acorns; another, black walnuts; 
one, locust seed; another, sugar maple; an¬ 
other, white pine, and so on. Now let each 
exchange with several others, by express or 
private conveyance, until every one has a 
supply of the seed of six to twelve of the 
most valued forest trees. 
8. Plant but one sort in a row, and as 
many rows of each as your seed shall suffice 
for. Have your rows so far apart that you 
can cultivate them with a subsoil plow, and 
give each seed room enough. Keep watch 
against squirrels, mice, Ac., as well as against 
barn-yard fowls, whose scratching might un¬ 
cover and thus destroy seeds that they would 
not eat. Never forget nor doubt, that what¬ 
ever is worth doing at all is worth doing 
thoroughly well. 
THE SCOTCH PINE 
The Scotch Pine (according to a writer hi 
the Western Rural,) is always raised from 
seeds, which are generally ripe in the month 
of January; but, it is more correct to state 
that, they arc not, fit to be gathered until 
after the cones or burrs have been whitened 
by frost, for, until tills takes place, it is im¬ 
possible with any moderate degree of heat 
to open them and get at the seeds. 
The seeds are sown at the end of April or 
beginning of May.wheu the Spring frosts are 
over. The soil selected should be light and 
friable, and it is necessary that it should lie 
deeply tilled and finely raked. Tin- beds are 
generally four feet wide with alleys between 
of one foot in width, and the covering should 
be to the depth of one fourth of an inch. 
The seeds are sown so as to be one fourth of 
an inch from each other, but, in places where 
there is abundance of laud, more space may 
lie given. In these beds the plants are al¬ 
lowed to remain for two years, when they 
will he fit to be finally removed. Immense 
numbers of two year old plants are sold 
from the beds, in some nurseries the plants 
are lined out in rows, one foot asumlcr, 
plants six inches apart. 
