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338 
THE RURAL HEW-YORKER. 
MAY 24 
Nevertheless it is the Rural New-Yorker’ 
duly to present both sides of all questions to 
its readers, and the other side seems ably pre¬ 
sented below: 
Dr. Lyon Playfair said: The member for 
Wigtownshire (Sir Herbert Maxwell) is natu¬ 
rally alarmed at the competition which British 
dairy farmers experience by the great devel¬ 
opment in the manufacture of oleomargarine. 
This increase arises from various causes, but 
especially from two, the first being the greatly 
increased consumption of butter among 
our population, and the second, the improve¬ 
ments made by chemistry in the manufacture 
of those fatty bodies which are known to us 
under the name of butter. The increased con¬ 
sumption leads to an increased supply, and 
the augmented demand naturally stimulated 
invention as to new sources of supply. These 
alarm the baronet and others interested in 
dairy farming. Not many years ago the for¬ 
eign bntter imported was only pound per 
head of the population; now it is about six 
pounds. The exports of batter from Holland 
were 20,294 000 kilogrammes in 1869 | A kilo¬ 
gramme is somewhat less than two and a 
quarter pounds.—Eds ]; but in 1879 they had 
increased to 86,451 000 kilogrammes. During 
that time Holland has been largely importing 
oleomargarine from America. Her imports 
of fata were only 9 874,000 kilogrammes in 
1869 while in 1879 thry amounted to 87 461 000 
kilogrammes. I understand that 12 000 000 
pounds of oleomargarine were imported into 
Holland last year from America, and in all 
probability a good deal of this oleomargarine 
comes to us in the excellent butter, which we 
get from Holland. This oleomargarine, no 
doubt, comes to us directly under its own name 
as a butter substitute, thoueh also in concealed 
admixture with American, French, and Dutch 
butters. The acknowledged oleomargarine 
exported from New York is already half the 
declared value of butter, though doubtless 
there is a good deal of concealed oleomargar¬ 
ine in the butter which is imported as dairy 
produce. The declared value of butter ex¬ 
ported last year from New York was $5.179.071 
and that of oleomargarine was $2 581.8,7. 
Bat the m mufaeture is not confined to Am • r- 
ica, for France, Holland, and England are ai - 
tive'y engaged in making oleomargarine. 
Undoubtedly this artificial butter is rapidly 
pushing inferior butter out of the market. 
Oleomargarine simply consists of butter fat6 
got from an cx instead of batter fats from a 
cow, and then fore is simply one form of agri¬ 
cultural product interfering with auother agri¬ 
cultural product. The fats which constitute 
butter, for the main part at least, can be got 
from different sources, and are not even re¬ 
stricted to animals, for such fat6 are found 
abundantly in plants as well as in animals. 
The chief solid fat in butter is the principal in¬ 
gredient in palm oil, while the chief liquid fat 
of butter abounds in olive oil. Even the sol¬ 
uble aromatic fats which give to butter its pe¬ 
culiar taste and flavor are found abundantly in 
cocoanut oil. If we could extract butter fats 
economically from vegetable oil, and give a 
sound, healthv butter from them at a cheap 
rate, it would be a matter of indifference to 
the public whether the butter came from the 
cow or from the vegetable. 
Let me here give an illustration of my argu¬ 
ment. Milk contains four pounds of cheese 
for eveiy 100 pounds of milk, but peas and 
beans contain 20 pounds of cheese for every 
100 pounds. The Chinese, who are a great ex¬ 
perimental nation, actually do make cheeses 
from peas and sell them in their markets. 
These cheeses are highly esteemed in China, 
but to our palates are insipid because they do 
not comain butter fats. Butl look forward to 
the day when cheeses will be made from beans, 
peas and lentils, and after being mixed with 
good oleomargarine may form palatable and 
and very economical cheeses. Would the hon¬ 
orable Baronet Btay the progress of chemical 
invention and prevent the manufacture of 
such cheeBes from peas simply because they 
would interfere with dairy produce ? Now, to 
come to oleomargarine. That BubBtance, by 
purifying the more fusible parts of beef suet, 
and separating from it the less fusible fats and 
cellular tissue which exist in all fats, practi¬ 
cally gives true butter fats, with the exception 
of about five per cent, of aromatic soluble fats, 
which give to good butter its delicious flavor, 
but that five per cent, makes all the difference 
as regards flavor and taste between good oleo¬ 
margarine and good butter. The two cannot 
come into competition any more than inferior 
American cheeses will compefe with our best 
Cheddar and Cheshire cheese. The American 
cheeBes do knock our bad cheeses out of the 
market, and so certainly good oleomargarine 
will and ought todrive our bad qualities of but¬ 
ter out of the market. Much of the butter sold 
to the poor is reduced in nutritive value by 
salt and water, and readily becomes rancid. 
Such inferior butter ought to be substituted by 
oleomargarine, which, if carefully prepared, 
has little tendency to rancidity. Although 
oleomargarine can’t compete with good butter, 
yet I am sure it will so thoroughly compete 
with bad butter that dairy farmers will be com¬ 
pelled to improve the quality of their butter 
Unless thorough cleanliness is observed in the 
treatment of the milk of butter, the aromatic 
fats, whioh give superiority to good butter be¬ 
come the source of rancidity to inferior butters, 
and render ibem positively unwholesome. But 
even when butter is not rank, it is so often 
brought into the market adulterated with 60 
much salt and water that its nutritive value iB 
much deteriorated. Natural butter may con¬ 
tain from 12 to 16 per cent, of water, and from 
one to two per cent, of salt. But many of the 
inferior batters contain 20 to 25 per cent, of 
water, and from five to ten per cent, of salt. 
Such butterg are a fraud upon the poor, and 
are far inferior in nutritive value to well-pre¬ 
pared oleomargarine, which rarely contains 
above 12 per cent, of salt. It is with poor bnt¬ 
ter of this kind that oleomargarine will and 
ought to compete. Bad, rancid butters are 
quite as unwholesome as bad specimens of ran¬ 
cid oleomargarine; only it is rare to see oleo¬ 
margarine rancid because it is manufactured 
on a large scale, and with the care which large 
operations receive by skilled superintendence. 
As to the relative wholesomeness of good 
butter and good oleomargarine, 1 do not think 
there is anything to choose between them. It 
has been said that, as oleomargarine is not 
heated above 120 0 Fahr. it may contain the 
the germs of disease in the animals, but so 
may the fats constituting butters which have 
not been heated above 99 ° Fahr. in the body of 
the cow, 8o far as we know, when the fatB 
derived either from the cow or the ox are not 
rancid they are equally wholesome. In both 
cases when they are rancid they are equally 
unwholesome. Surely, cavefully prepared, 
wholesome butter fats called oleomargarine 
are much better for the poor at Is. a pound than 
badly prepared and dirty butters at Is 3d. or 
Is. 6d. per pound, IIow does the Hon- Baro¬ 
net propose that Government is to carry out 
his resolution? The law already provides 
that an article of food sold under a name to 
which it i6 not entitled is punishable at law. 
Oleomargarine should certainly be sold as ar¬ 
tificial butter, and not as dairy butter. But 
how are you to enforce the law in this case, 
when the products of the cow and of the ox 
only differ in five parts out of the hundred. I 
should be veiy soriy to decide upon a sample 
of artificial butter, whether it was from the 
cow or ox ; and when it iB nBed for admixture 
with dairy butter the case is still more difficult. 
Very few chemists would be prepared to 
swear that a butter made half from the cow 
aud half from the ox was unquestionably an 
adulterated article. It is not like chicory and 
coffee, for chicory is chicory, and coffee is 
coffee. But. oleomargarine and butter are 
practically identical, except as to their source 
and the absence of five per cent, of aromatic fat 
which probably before long may be added from 
cocoanut oil or other sources. The resolution 
goes on to say that euch artificial butters as 
are hurtful or dangerous should be prohibited 
altogether. Certainly, rancid oleomargarine is 
a nasty and hurtful compound, but uotany 
more so than nasty and rancid butter which 
abounds in many markets. Both are unfit for 
human food, although both may be purified by 
well known processes. The larmerhas a much 
better method than legislation to protect his 
dairy produce from cheap substitutes for 
butter. Let him cultivate improved methods 
of preparation, strict cleanliness, sufficient 
washing of the butter, and fair treatment. 
Let him send such butters to the market with¬ 
out being laden with salt and water to increase 
the weight, and his superior and well-flavored 
butter, with little tendency to rancidity, will 
keep its own position in the markets in spite 
of the equally salubrious but less well-flavored 
oleomargarine, which will certainly drive bad 
butters out of the field, but cannot compete 
with really good butters. 
At a recent meeting of the Western N. Y. 
Farmers’ Club, as reported iu the Rural Home, 
Mr. Fowler said that shippers were paying $1 
per bushel for Burbauks and but 90 cents for 
other potatoes. Quality fair, but not- quite 
equal to Early Rose. Mr. Wall said he could 
grow large cropB of Burbank, but couldn't eat 
them. The introduction of self- binding reap¬ 
ers, it was remarked, would work a revolution 
in harvesting wheat. Few farmers will them¬ 
selves own a Belf-binder, but men who do will 
go round the country taking jobs, as they now 
do at thrashing, with the disadvantage for har¬ 
vesting that it mostly comes all together, and 
must be done all at once or loss will follow. 
We confess to a Bort of belief in ‘'luck,” 
6ays the Agricultural Gazette (England), in 
the sense that even the most carelul managers 
are apt to suffer severe lasses, and carelesB 
managers who neglect ail the recognized rules 
are sometimes able to flaunt their good luck as 
an argument against the sound advice of expe¬ 
rienced men. B ill we may be sure that In the 
long run good management has the pull over 
bad. Liberal feeding upon cake and corn pays 
in three ways ; (1) in making our sheep worth 
more money; (2) in keeping a larger number 
of them alive; (3) by improving the land. The | 
lives saved will alone pay for a very considera¬ 
ble portion of the cake bill. 
Treatment of a Choking Cow. — Mr. 
G. W. Hoffman remarked to the Elmira Far¬ 
mers’ Club that he had that day a cow 
that got choked by a turnip that resisted the 
usual treatment—pressing upward with the 
thumb and fingers below the obstruction. He 
got a piece of inch and a quarter rope aud 
soaked it thoroughly in warm water, thou iu 
cold water to stiffen it, wound cloths at one 
end, and used that to push the turnip down. 
The trouble was soon ended and the cow re¬ 
turned to her mess. 
President McCann asked why was the rope 
better than a broom stick ? 
Mr. Hoffman replied that it was more pli¬ 
able and yielding. He prefers to effect the 
dislodgment of the offending substance by pres¬ 
sure applied externally. This is done by 
grasping the gullet just below the obstruction 
and squeezing it upward. In most cases quick 
relief may be obtained by this method and it 
has the merit of being free from risk. But in 
the case referred to it was not effectual. He 
even resorted to the harsh treatment of trying 
to mash the turnip by placing a block at one 
side and striking a blow against the turnip on 
the other side, bnt without effect, 
President McCann said there was an element 
of cruelty in that treatment—so there is in 
pushing the obstruction down with a stick; 
yet he had to employ that means with a heifer 
that got choked on au apple and was badly 
bloated in consequence. She frothed at the 
mouth, and was nearly gone, but the 6tick 
shoved the apple down, and the heifer was 
very soon ready to resume eating. 
Mr. Hoffman said he had Been that tried on 
a cow— she died. 
Mr. Compton said his father had one treated 
by that plan—she died. 
Dr, J- B. Lawks, of Rothamsted, is writing 
a series of articles for the Agricultural Gazette 
of London, under the general title of “Fer- 
tilliy.” From the latest of these we quote the 
following as of special interest to our farmers 
First of all, and this is a most important 
point, the United 8t,ates farmer himself is 
usually well educated and intelligent; he is 
both owner and occupier of the soil, and does 
as much aB possible of the work of the farm 
himself, employing for the purpose the most 
improved labor-saving machinery; he is light¬ 
ly taxed, has cheap modes of transit, and, 
above all, is in possession of an almost uulim- 
ited extent of untouched fertility. These 
circumstances all combined reduce the cost of 
growing grain almost to a minimum, and the 
result enables bim to deliver his wheat at the 
doors of the owner of the land, in some parts 
of Great Britain, cheaper than it can be raised 
In the adjoining fields. In a word, they enable 
him to regulate the price of grain throughout 
the world. __ 
The idea that the fertility of these (our new) 
soils must shortly come to an end, or that 
grain crops cannot be produced at the present 
prices is altogether illusive. 
The stock of nitrogen in immense areas of 
the United States soils must be competent to 
yield crops, equal to those given in the table, 
for a long time, and even when they begin to 
fall off, the residue of nitrogen may still be 
sufficient to allow of a fresh development of 
fertilily, by the employment of some cheap 
mineral manure, 6uch as plaster or phosphate 
of lime ; if this be so, the necessity of employ¬ 
ing 60 costly a substance as nitrogen may not 
be apparent for two or three generations yet 
to come. 
Before this period arrives the United States 
farmer will have become so well acquainted 
with the action of manures, that the profit or 
loss attending their application will not be a 
question of chance, but one subject only to 
the contingency of favorable, or unfavorable 
seasons; a contingency from which it will be 
impossible to escape. 
Thus says the Nebraska Farmer'The pros¬ 
pects for a crop of Winter wheat in Kansas, 
Missouri, Iowa, Illinois and Michigan are the 
poorest for years, and the indications are that 
wheat will rule high during the next year. So 
far as Kansas and Mlsso ri are concerned 
this 1 b very decidedly oo osed to nearly all 
reports we have seen with c gard to the outlook 
for wheat from our many orrespondents there. 
Ensilage.— Bays th agricultural editor of 
the N. Y. Times:—0;e of the most conspicu¬ 
ous features about the present excitement in 
regard to ensilage is that the most prominent 
writers about it have all some private axe to 
grind in the shape of books, or seed, or plans, 
or implements connected with the proeess, to 
sell. Precisely what we think about it is this, 
that if it is a good thing it will keep, and there 
Is time enough to try it when it is known to be 
good, __ 
Wire-worms. —"I planted my corn In the 
usual way, but in one row 1 put wood ashes, 
in a second land plaster, and in a third com¬ 
mon salt,” says a correspondent of the N. Y. 
World. “There was little difference, if any, 
in the first two, and these I had done nothing 
with, but where I put the Balt about nine-tenths 
of the corn came up well. So I concluded to 
doctor the whole piece, and sowed a good coat 
of salt and stirred the ground well, and then 
sowed another coat not quite so heavy. I then 
marked out and plauted my corn and it gave 
me a good stand, something I never had on 
that piece before. It made an average yield of 
corn aud put an end to the wire-worms.” 
Dr. Kedzie says that he believes the cheap¬ 
est and easiest way to bring up a mn-down 
farm—one that any aDd every man can use—is 
by green manuring.Ho also remarks 
that some one has wisely said, “In building a 
house, build as if you expected to live forever." 
The same rule is emphatically applicable to 
farming. Manage your farm as If you expect¬ 
ed to live forever. Whatever treatment will 
injure your farm in future time, avoid in the 
present time.Can a man be rightly 
said to be “on his legs" again when he has sold 
his horses and carriagos for the sweet sake of 
his creditors and is compelled to walk ? . 
. . Don’t forget that the celery plant is a semi- 
aquatic. Give it moisture if you would have 
crisp, sweet stalks.It is foolish to grieve 
over what can't be helped and still more fool¬ 
ish, because needless, to grieve over what can 
be.Some conceited folk think they fill 
a large place in the public eye when in reality 
it is all in their own.The Rural New- 
Yobkkr will this year send to its subscribers 
not less than 868 pagee—all for two dollars. 
This is not “ What Others Say,” however; it is 
what we say.It is time to make the 
second planting of peas, radishes, sweet corn 
and lettuce. 
RUSAL SPECIAL REPORTS, 
Can., Emsdale, Muskoka, Ontario, May 7.— 
We have had a very fine, dry Spring, but ow¬ 
ing to the wind keepiDg in the north it has 
been cold. The rivers are very low and, unless 
we get rain, the lumbermen will have bard 
work to get their logs down. The farmers in 
this neighborhood have all their grain sown 
with the exception of barley. I planted my 
White Elephant Potato on the 25uh of April. I 
cut it to single eyes, eight sets, total weight 
two and one-quarter ounces ; planted about 10 
Inches apart. I also planted eight sets of 
Early Rose (single eyes and same weight) at 
the eame time, so as to be able to tell which 
does the best in this climate. h r. d. 
[This is an excellent way to test a new kind. 
—Eds.] 
Cal., Carpenteria, Santa Barbara Co., April 
29 ,—The weather is just now delightful, but it 
has been rather moist and gloomy for this 
country for some time, but not cold enough 
to be disagreeable or to keep vegetation back. 
Land iB in flue condition to plant corn and 
beans—never was better at this season of the 
year. Planting has commenced. Hay bus 
been cut here and there, so the wheel keeps 
rolling and there Is little rest for the farmer. 
Apricot trees are well filled with growing fruit 
and we have good promises for most other 
kinds of fruit. O. n. 0. 
Dakota Ter., Marion Junction, Turner Co., 
May 2.—Snow blockade and no trains from 
Feb. 1, to April 17. Winter and last snow 
storm ceased April 10, with snow nearly two 
feet deep. Thaw began April 18. April 18, rail¬ 
road was washed out in very many places in 
Northwestern Iowa and Dakota, and every 
water-course waB an nnfordable river. Snow 
all gone by April 25. Land now in fine condi¬ 
tion except on bottoms. Wild grass starting 
rapidly. “Dry”rnns empty,- small streams 
falling fast. Large BtreumB will require a week 
yet to get within their banks. No trains since 
April 18, and many new settlers of last season 
west of here, who depend on seed wheat to be 
brought from the East this Spring, find them¬ 
selves sadly behind. Many who went East last 
Fall to spend the Winter have not yet been 
able to return to put in their crops. Prospect 
excellent for those who were ready for seeding. 
New country. No fruit nor Winter wheat. 
Stock rather thin, owing to the extremely 
long Winter, J. b B. 
III., Holt’s Prairie, Perry Co., May 4 —We, 
here in Egypt, are now very busy planting corn, 
about one-third of which is planted. We are 
late, aB eoru should all be up now. We are 
having a cold, drizzly rain to-day, with the 
thermometer at 63°, which will rot the corn 
planted if it continues. Prospect gloomy. 
Wheat badly frozen out—a light yield inevit¬ 
able. Owing to short crops of com, hay and 
oats last year, our stock have come out of the 
long, haid Winter thlu iu flesh, and, as feed is 
very scarce, the grass on our meadows and 
pastures has come to the rescue most oppoi 
tunely. Wheat Is worth $L per busb.j corn, 
50c. to 75a.; oats, 85e. to 40c ; hay, $10 to $12 
per ton; potatoes, $1 per bush. R. m. d. 
