356 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
MAY 28 
THE 
Rural New-Yorker, 
A National Journal for the Country and Suburban Home. 
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY. 
Conducted by 
ELBERT S. CABMAN. 
Address 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
No. 34 Park Row, New York. 
SATURDAY, MAY 28. l«sl. 
The Regular Plant and Seed Distribu¬ 
tion of the Rural New-Yorker, an¬ 
nounced in our Fair Number, is now 
closed. We can still send most of the 
kinds offered, however. 
- »♦» - 
The Rural New-Yorker begs to offer 
in articles of its own selection, for the 
longest and heaviest five heads of wheat 
from the next crop, §50.00, to be divided 
into first, second, third, fourth and fifth 
premiums. The awards will be published 
in our Special Wheat Number, and 
drawings presented of the prize heads. 
-♦♦♦-- 
The Rural New-Yorker of June 11 
will be a special cattle number. 
.. - - 
Tite attention of our farmer-readers is 
called to the article “ Notes from the 
Rural Farm” and the accompanying dia¬ 
gram in another column. Not that they 
are particularly interesting iuthemselves, 
but because they will familiarize them 
with experiments to which frequent ref¬ 
erence will probably be made in the fu¬ 
ture. 
-- 
Cotton Planters’ Convention. —We 
are glad to note the increasing interest 
in the South, iu industrial exhibitions. 
It speaks loudly of that prosperity which 
S mthern planters, farmers and mechanics 
have hoped for solongand which they are 
now, let us hope, beginning to enjoy. 
Las; week we spoke, editorially, of the 
great Cotton Exposition to be held next 
Fall at Atlanta, Georgia, and now we 
note another exhibition of a similar na¬ 
ture which is to be held at Memphis on 
the 25th inst., when all the new inven¬ 
tions aud improved machinery for culti¬ 
vating and preparing the crop for mar¬ 
ket will be practically illustrated aud 
their merits explained. Such exhibitions 
of the Southern industries will incite to 
greater enthusiasm in the great work of 
redeeming the South Irom her long per¬ 
iod of industrial adversity and will com¬ 
municate a powerful impulse to the inter¬ 
ests of agriculture. 
-»♦ » ■ 
Chestnuts. —As a remunerative crop, 
chestnuts have not received their share 
of attention and we presume it will be 
long ere the raising of chestnut trees is 
made a part of our rural industries. But 
may theie not be qioney in it ? In some 
foreign countries the chestnut crop is 
equivalent to Ihe wheat crop in America, 
both as respects its money value aud the 
uses to which P is put. Chestnut bread, a 
thing of which Americans are wholly ig- 
noraut, c institutes the principal food of 
thousands of people in Europe and Asia. 
The fruit is ground into meal, and pud¬ 
dings, cakes and bread are made from it. 
Ohio’s statistics show that her chestnut 
crop is valued at §60,000, and it could soon 
be made to reach ten times that amount. 
The tree is of quite rapid growth, attain¬ 
ing the bight of 15 or 25 feet in five years 
from the seed ; it is, as we know, valua¬ 
ble as timber j can it not be made more 
valuable here for its fruit ? 
-»-»-♦- 
There seems uo reason why we should 
not raise the Pyre thrum roseum, from 
which that most valuable insecticide 
known as Persian Insect Powder, is man¬ 
ufactured in tins country or in some parts 
of it. The p'ant is already known to 
thrive in California, and a company is es¬ 
tablished there for the manufacture of 
the powder from its flowers. It would 
seem that these flowers contain a princi¬ 
ple which, though deadly poisonous to 
nearly all kit-ds of insects, is yet harmless 
to man. It has proven as destructive to 
potato beetles, army, cotton, and cabbage 
worms us it is to b< d bugs, roaches, hen 
lice and the like. It Beams to be, in fact, 
the perfect inst ct destroyer, and we have 
now simply to ascertain where it can be 
most profitably grown and then to culti¬ 
vate it in such quantities as will admit of 
its being sold at a very low price. We 
repeat the request which we made three 
weeks ago, that those who have received 
packets of the eeeds from the Rural 
New-Yorker will give them careful treat¬ 
ment. 
» « ♦ » 
High-priced cattle. — Lately there 
has been quite a large number of auction 
sales of pure-bred ueat cattle in differ¬ 
ent parts of the country, and prices, as a 
general thing, have been high enough 
to satisfy the sellers. Probably the 
most notable sales have been thoso of 
Jerseys in this city, and of Short-horns 
at Port Hnron, Michigan. On the 5th 
inst.., the Maple-Shade herd of Jerseys, 
the property of Mr. John D, Wing, sold 
here, brought the unprecedented average 
of $517.32 on 46 head, the top price being 
for the pure Alphea bull Polonius, 
which was bought by the proprietor of 
Alma Farm for $4,500, the highest price 
ever given for a Jersey bull ; and at last 
week’s sale Leda bought $3,000, the top 
figure ever given for a Jersey cow. 
High as are these prices, however, they 
are greatly exceeded by those given for 
Short-borns at the Port Huron sale of 
May 18, where Airdrie Duobess the 
Tenth, brought.$7,525 ; Airdrie Duchess 
the Second, $7,000; and Air-trie Duchess 
the Eleventh, a mere calf, $5,055. These 
prices may be considered fairly indica¬ 
tive of the value placed by the publio on 
the best specimens of these two breeds, 
as the Alphea family is now considered 
to embrace the best type of Jerseys, and 
the Airdrie branch of the Duchess fami¬ 
ly, owing to the decadence here of the 
pure-bred Bates Duchess tribe, is gen¬ 
erally considered Becond to no Short¬ 
horn strain among us. 
OCEAN CATTLE TRANSPORTATION. 
Last Wednesday a cablegram an¬ 
nounced the decision of the English 
Courts against the legality of carrying 
deck loads of live stock on the Atlantic 
steamers. Henceforth shippers will be 
without compensation when their stock 
are either washed overboard in stormy 
weather, or cast overboard for the safety 
of the vessel and the rest of the cargo. 
In ordinary cases, when one part of the 
load of a vessel is jettisoned to lessen or 
remove danger to the vessel and the 
rest of the freight, the loss is made good 
by levying a contribution on the gross 
value of the ship and oargo at risk, and 
saved by the sacrifice. As the carrying 
of stock on deck is now declared illegal, 
nothing can henceforth be collected, by 
this system of general average, for losses 
voluntarily incurred to lighten the ves¬ 
sel or adjust the cargo ; neither can in¬ 
surance be collected in Great Britain on 
stock accidentally washed overboard. 
The underwriters of this city have late¬ 
ly condemned the practice of carrying 
cattle on deck in the Winter months, on 
account of the great risk thus incurred, 
but except iu July and August there is 
not a month when deck loads of cattle 
are not likely to be either greviously in¬ 
jured or washed overboard during rough 
weather on the Atlantic. Humanity 
therefore, should be congratulated on 
this decision. 
A twin barbarism, however, and one 
more flagrant during the heated Sum¬ 
mer months than at other times, is the 
packing of beasts between decks in ill- 
ventilated, over-crowded quarters. An¬ 
imals weltering below in such places 
suffer as much from the heat of Summer 
as do those shivering on the weather 
deck from the cold of Winter. More¬ 
over, the flesh of animals that cross the 
Atlantic cooped up in a half-poisonous 
atmosphere, and which have to be 
slaughtered soon after landing, can hard¬ 
ly be healthful. Some of the heaviest 
losses inourred by shippers of live stock 
have been due to defective ventilation on 
steamers ill-adapted to the trade. 
- 
GAMBLING IN LIFE—A NEFARIOUS 
BUSINESS. 
Northern Maryland and Southern 
Pennsylvania are just now violently agi¬ 
tated on account of a large number of 
novel life insurance companies that have 
lately started in business there, and are 
doing a “ roaring” trade. One of these 
impecunious concerns having once ob¬ 
tained a charter, straightway floods the 
surrounding country with glib agents 
who find little difficulty, during the pres¬ 
ent “cruZ'.*,” in persuading Bharpers aud 
nincompoops alike to take out poJicit s on 
the lives of some of their acquaintances 
or even of strangers who are likely to 
die soon. The companies are gotten up 
on what their organizers term the “ mu¬ 
tual benefit” plan—a plan which must 
confer a benefit on themselves, however 
disastrous it may prove to the insured 
and the insurers. Whoever holds a 
policy in any of the concerns is assessed 
a snm proportioned to the amount cov¬ 
ered by this policy, on the death of any 
one insured in the company. From this 
contribution the amount of the policy is 
paid, leaving a snug bonus for the man¬ 
agers of the institution. As fifteen thou¬ 
sand dollars is the- greatest risk taken by 
any of the concerns on a single life, 
some persons who have risks covering 
from fifty to two hundred thousand dol¬ 
lars on one person, are policy-holders in 
quite a large number of companies, and 
as deaths must occur frequently from the 
very nature of the risks taken, tne as¬ 
sessments must be onerous in many 
cases. 
It is therefore of the first importance 
to the insurer that the “ subject” insured 
should be as short-lived as possible both 
to escape assessments and to pocket the 
insurance. Accordingly tlie whole “af¬ 
flicted” region is being ransacked for good 
subjects—tottering old men and women 
from seventy-five to eighty-five and tho 
moribund of all conditions who cannot 
possibly survive long. Many of the best 
subjects—those whose deaths have al¬ 
ready enriched the holders of policies on 
their lives—were inmates of alms’-bouses, 
decrepid wretches who for years have been 
supported by public chanty. Quite a 
large number of the “ best” people of the 
region—laymen and clergymen—are said 
to be connected with the companies as 
policy-holders, agents or organizers, and 
not a few of them must wish, if they pray 
not, for the “translation” of some poor old 
wretched stranger whose death will con¬ 
fer on them riches he never owned in life. 
This nefarious mode of gambling is 
spreading ; it is provooative of reckless¬ 
ness, thriftlessness and murder. It is 
against public policy aud the welfare of 
the community, and it is therefore the 
duty of the legislature promptly to sup¬ 
press it. 
WANTED:-A COMPLETE DICTIONARY OF 
THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. 
The question is perhaps an open one 
whether it is more or less oreditable to 
American scholarship that a discussion 
about the making of dictionaries should 
appear in the columns of an agricultural 
newspaper. The very fact of such dis¬ 
cussion points emphatically to the gen¬ 
eral intelligence of the agricultural com¬ 
munity, for most certainly the Rural 
would make no allusion to such a subject 
unless we were well assured that large 
numbers of our readers would be inter¬ 
ested in it. But on the other hand it 
must be said that if the dictionary-makers 
were fully up to the times and did their 
whole duty, there would be little need of 
criticising or discussing their work. 
This train of thought has been sug¬ 
gested to us lately while browsing iu the 
new edition of Worcester’s large diction¬ 
ary, where, without the least intention of 
seeking out imperfections, we have no¬ 
ticed the absence of several words which 
unquestionably ought to have been in¬ 
cluded. Some weeks since we objected 
to a misleading definition of the word 
ensilage. We wish now to oali the pub¬ 
lisher’s attention to certain other imper¬ 
fections which have obtruded themselves 
upon us. We note the absence of the 
words resting spore, stage fright, aud 
self-contained, (as said ol men, and, by 
the Scotch, of houses). Neither “hec¬ 
tograph” nor “ London-purple” is giv¬ 
en, though papyrograph and Paris-green 
are both mentioned. Curiously enough, 
oue of the most familiar words of Old 
England, “ rod,” is not defined in the 
English sense. For mauy generations, 
the rod with which most European chil¬ 
dren are punished is not a single switch, 
as with us, but a collection of several 
twigs. It is a small handful of twigs, as 
it were, fastened together with twine at 
the butt. It is strange, indeed, that 
Worcester makes no allusion to this mean¬ 
ing of the word. 
The term “graded,” as used with re¬ 
gard to cattle is explained, but we find 
no special reference to graded schools. 
“ Blue-joint” is defined as a kind of 
grass (etc.), and perhaps the term as thus 
corrupted, is used in some localities, but 
it should have been explained that the 
true name of Calamagrostis Canadensis, 
ib blue joint-grass, that is to say, as 
every intelligent farmer knows, it is a 
joint-grass whose purple blossoms sug¬ 
gested to our ancestors the idea of call¬ 
ing the grass blue. There is nothing 
blue about the joints of this grass. 
We infer from the foregoing examples, 
which have come to us spontaneously, 
that there is real room for improvement 
in the newest of our dictionaries. And 
it seems to us very desirable that the 
publishers of both Worcester and Web 
ster should issue frequent supplements 
and sell them by themselves, apart from 
the old stereotyped dictionaries proper. 
It would, of course, be a very expensive 
matter to prepare a new edition of a 
great lexicon, but the cost of manufactu¬ 
ring a supplement is comparatively small, 
and there is scant justice, anyway, in 
compelling the owner of the old diction¬ 
ary to buy a second example of it in order 
to obtain the supplement with which it 
has been bound up. Since the supple¬ 
ment alone contains all the new words, it 
is the only part of the “ new edition” 
which is of real value to those persons 
who already possess an example of the 
earlier issue. 
-♦ •» ♦-- 
BREVITIES. 
The “California” Privets at the Rural 
Grounds are killed to the ground. 
Now we are putting no 1 800 feet of barbed- 
wire fence at the Rural Farm just to try it. 
Cut out the blooming stalks of pie-plant. In 
this vegetable we want tender leaf-stulks—-not 
fruit 
Good tools—the most improved implements 
—do Dot rnako energetic farmers. We tbiuk 
they tend to make lazy farmers lazier. 
The past Winter—the severest for years— 
has not harmed peach blossoms in the least at 
the Rural Farm. Cherry, pear and apple trees 
also bid fair lo produce a large crop. 
Wk wish to thank many friends for the seeds 
and plants which they have sent to ns to be 
tested at the Rural Ex. Grounds, and regret 
that the pressing labors of a short eeason have 
prevented us in many cases from expressing 
our thanks by letter. 
There is no difficulty In raising tea plants in 
most parts of the South. The writer has seen 
dozens of plants in Aiken, 8. C , growing un¬ 
der the shade of peaches and pears among the 
weeds with no care of any kind. The seeds 
had been planted there the year previous. It 
wa6 at first supposed that the plant required 
moist situations, shade while young and a good 
deal of fussy attention. 
As we go to press the following note is re¬ 
ceived from the Rural Farm:—“The past 
week has been cold and rainy Corn comes up 
yellow, and probably much seed is rotted in 
the ground. Clover and Timothy fields are 
looking splendid, and it would seem that a 
full hay crop is assured. Wheat is makiug a 
rapid growth, and most of our many different 
kinds that stood the Winter, look well, except 
Silver Chaff, which is rusting badly.” 
Monday. May 16th, witnessed the opening 
of a part of the new Welland Canal, conneciing 
the upper lakes with Lake Ontario. By this 
means Canada expects to secure a great pro¬ 
portion of the grain traffic of ihe West, as the 
grain, it is expected, can be shipped at lake 
ports on board ocean-gomg vessel*, which, 
sailing down the lakes, wifi pass Niagara by 
way of the canal, and then find their way to 
sea by way of Lake Ontario and the 8t. Law¬ 
rence. 
Prohibition meets many obstacles in Illi¬ 
nois. The order of the Mayor of Springfield, 
that all the saloons in the city should be closed 
on the 15th inBt (Sunday) was violeutly op¬ 
posed by a mob assembled at Lincoln Park. 
Tbe halcyon days of temperance are still in the 
future and an earnest, aggressive, unyielding 
policy, only, can advance the cause. This out- 
f-poreu opposition to legal autboriiy, in a mat¬ 
ter involving the best mierc-lB of an order-lov¬ 
ing people, should meet at once with their ear¬ 
nest protest in public aBBembly and at the 
polls. 
It is a good plan to tie about tomato aud 
cabbage plants pieces of card-board to prevent 
the cat-worm from severing the stem near the 
soil. It is easily done aud is a better protec¬ 
tion than mounds of earth which, it has been 
said, cut-worms cannot climb up This idea 
is a mistake. We last season placed 25 cut¬ 
worms in a hole about eight inches deep, 
the sides of which were nearly perpen¬ 
dicular. We watched them at inteivals during 
two hours and found that, though many at¬ 
tempts to escape were ineffectual, some were 
successful. 
Wk have forwarded Jittlegifts to those of our 
subscribers who kindly interested themselves 
iu the cn'tlvation of the mangel seed sent out 
by the Rural New-Yorker, and who have 
sent ns their addresses as we requested. We 
should have been glad to have remunerated, in 
some small way at least, all those whose names 
appeared in the list of mangel raisers published 
in the Rural of Feb 26 but, not bciug able, 
even at reiterated requests, to obtain the ad¬ 
dresses, which were at first mislaid, of all, we 
are uuable to comply with our own desires. 
George Bailey Lowing, of Salem. Massa¬ 
chusetts, who last Weduesduy was confirmed 
by the Senate a« Coram.ssioner of Agriculture 
to succeed Gen Lts Due, is in his sixty-fourth 
year, and iu one capacity or another has seen 
a good deal of public life during the past 
thirty years. He graduated at Harvard Uni¬ 
versity in 1838 and received tho degree of M. 
I)., from the Harvard Medical College in 1812. 
Woven years afterwards, in 1849, he was ap¬ 
pointed Commissioner to assist in revising the 
United ^States hospital system, und later on he 
acied as post master of Salem, In 1866 and 
1867 he was member of the lower House of the 
Massachusetts Legislature, and seiv*d as 
pre»ident of the iLbate from 1863 to 1876 in¬ 
clusive. He has been a dt lev.iue to three na¬ 
tional republican conventions, and been 
member of Congress lor his district dming 
two terms. He has for the lurt quarter of a 
century been prominently connected with ag¬ 
ricultural matters In Massachusetts, duriug 
which period he has delivered many addresses 
at agricultural meetings and conventions. 
