38 
of like proportions on the board of the vice-chair¬ 
man. ThoBo are rapidly backed to pieces, handed 
around, and having been washed down by tank¬ 
ards of foaming liquor, speech-making ia in order. 
In this, local and outside talent displays itself, 
and the bucolic voter has the keen gratification 
of listening to the voice of his county represen¬ 
tative. 
Then, when everybody has hurrahed himself 
hoarse, and all the steam generated by close at¬ 
tention to the table, and the other accessories of 
the occasion, 1ms been let off, the bandB strike 
up the national anthem, and the tent is cleared 
to facilitate preparations for tea. At this meal 
the ladies do all the eating and honors, and the 
gentlemen transform themselves into waiters, 
and rush up and down, carrying pitchers and 
kettles of tea, coffee, and hot water, or trays 
and baskets of edibles, many of the most tempt¬ 
ing of which surreptitiously find their way into 
the pockets of various old women of strong tea- 
drinking and, perhaps, slightly predatory dispo¬ 
sitions. 
At length, when all have eaten and are filled— 
the ladies having been denied the pleasure of 
public “ spouting,” a privilege which in England 
is accorded only to men—the center tables are 
removed, all tho holes tilled up with saw-dust, 
and as the shades of evening gather in, the vo¬ 
taries of Terpsichore commence operations, and 
as tho darkness gradually increases, so also 
grows their enthusiasm, which reaches its cul¬ 
minating point as the clock strikes twelve. 
Promptly on this, orders come for the music to 
cease, tho magic lights are extinguished, and 
the crowd disperses amid showers of mutual 
congratulations, to reassemble another day on 
another like occasion. w. u. 
-- 
CURING CLOVER HAY. 
Many errors are often committed in perform¬ 
ing very simple -works on the' farm, cither 
through want of experience, or from the force 
of pernicious tradition as to the manner in which 
each labor should bo performed. We have more 
than onco noticed Injudicious modes of curing 
Clovor Hay, lor iu this our own experience- 
agrees with that of tire N. E. Partner that the 
sooner all kinds of grass are cured after being 
cut, the smaller the risk from unfavorable 
weather. One of the advantages of a tedder, is 
tho greater speed with which green grass may 
bo converted into cured hay. In clear, dry 
weather, ono day’s sun is sulficieut for curing 
ordinary well-ripened grass, if it can ho fre¬ 
quently shaken up so that the air can come to all 
parts of it, hut clover requires different treat¬ 
ment. If dried liko other grasses, tho leaves 
quickly become brittle, break off, and are lost, 
long before tho stems are dry enough to keep in 
the mow without boating. Eor this reason, 
most farmers prefer to euro clovor more slowly, 
keeping tho loaves in the shade while tho stems 
arc being cured. This is usually done by letting 
it Htand in cocks several days, and if one could 
he sure of fair weather, this would bo a good 
method ; but storms injure clover quite as badly 
as other hay, and, unless the cocks are well 
covered by caps, there is considerable risk from 
leaving it long in the field. Another objection 
to letting it remain long in cocks is the inj ary to 
the next crop, for, where tlic cocks stand, the 
young clover is often destroyed or seriously in¬ 
jured. We always prefer to cure all kinds of 
h&y as nuickly as possible, if the work can be 
well done. 
Last year we alluded to a method for curing 
clover hay which had been adopted by one of 
our neighbors with very satisfactory results, and 
by which several days’ time may be Baved, and 
without injuring the quality of tho hay by over- 
handling. It is so simple and yet bo philosoph¬ 
ical, that the wonder is that the method is not 
generally adopted. A single trial, wc think, 
will couviuce any one. as it did us, of its advan¬ 
tages over the old methods. It is simply this: 
Cut the hay when free from dew. If mowed 
with scythes, let it he in the swarth a few hours 
to wilt. If very heavy, the ewarths may he 
turned over some time during the day, hut be¬ 
fore night, and while the air is still warm, pitch 
the clover into small cocks, no larger than will 
keep without heating. If cut by a maclfine rake 
early before tho loaves become, dry euough to 
crumble. Turning once or twice with a tedder 
early in the day will do no harm, but it should 
not be handled much after the leaves will break. 
Instead of leaving cooks untouchod for a week 
as many may have remembered, they should all 
he made over tho second day, by ewe fully pitch¬ 
ing the hay, a fork-full at a time, on toj a now 
spot, putting, of course, the top fork-full at tho 
bottom, and the bottom on top of the new 
cocks. This gives every fork-full a good airing, 
the hay lies up lighter iu the new cocks and 
gives the air a cliunco to circulate, while the 
grass under the cocks is saved being killed from 
suffocation. Tho same operation may bo gone 
through on the following day, making tho cocks 
double size, if thought, desirable. If the 
weather is favorable, the hay may be well cured 
THE BUBAL 
in three days, in this way, when, if the cocks had 
been untouched, double the time might be re¬ 
quired. 
Of course no definite rule can he given as to 
the time required for curing any kind of hay, so 
much depends upon the weather, but we think 
any one will Bee, on a moments relloction, that 
the above method, well carried out, is an improve¬ 
ment over the old ways of handling clover hay 
in the field. 
Jirll) Crop, 
THE JERUSALEM ARTICHOKE. 
Editors Hcrai.: — I am not wise enough to 
decide who invented the Jerusalem Artichoke, 
but thin I can vouch for, that they arc found 
growing wild and in abundance on the hanks of 
streams iu this section, where none have ever 
been planted, where the virgin soil has never 
been touched by plow or any implement. They 
were here when tho first, white settlers ar¬ 
rived.—J. 81. Mh.i.eh , Peabody, Marion, Co., 
Kansas. 
Prof. Cl bay, in the April number of the Am. 
Agriculturist, says that he has reason to believe 
that this esculent originated in Hi© valley of the 
Mississippi, from a tspccieB of Sunflower, (called 
Lkiianihus dorOvicoUks by I.amabk) which is 
common there. The reasons he gives for this 
belief are:—1. That the foliage, flowers and 
mode of growth of this wild species arc much 
like those of tho celebrated artichoke, except 
that the tubers are long and slender—are com¬ 
monly root-stocks rather than tubers. 2. Bat 
having planted those and raised thorn in the gar¬ 
den for a dozen or fifteen years, he found that 
some tubers are long and narrow, and rather 
tongh, while others are good “ Artichokes.” It 
is possible, however, that they had got mixed 
with old cultivated plauts, some of which grew 
near by. 3. But last autumn Prof. John M. 
Coulter sent him, from Indiana, roots of the 
wild Sunflower in question ; and he noticed that., 
while some wore quite like his original stock 
from Kentucky, others were shorter and thicker, 
and a few were, to all appearances, good Arti¬ 
chokes. 
Prof. Guay goes on to show that the Huron 
Indians had Artichokes in cultivation, and that 
they went from Canada to Europe w ithin a dozen 
years after tho first settlement of Canada, viz., 
at Quebec: that the plant was received in En¬ 
gland (“Anno, 11*17") and Italy early enough to 
have got the name, “ Jerusalem Artichoke” es¬ 
tablished at the date of Johnson's edition of 
“ Gerald’s Jlerhal,'” 1033 ; for this Jiriisah in is 
doubtless an English corruption of Cl ir a sol — 
Sunflower. 
\fe need not question how our correspondent 
knows “ they were hero when the first settler 
arrived.” Will not ho take the pains to ascer¬ 
tain if the roots show the various gradations 
from llvLianthus tformicoidrs to “good Arti¬ 
chokes” mentioned by Prof. Guay? 
--♦♦♦- 
GOESE, FURZE OR WHIN. 
Seeing this plant alluded to at page 405 of 
(lie Rural, under the heading, “ One More For¬ 
age Plant,” and haring had great, experience 
with it, I will give tho particulars, exactly as they 
occurred. In 183G I took charge of a nobleman’s 
estate lying in the Counties of Worcester and 
Gloucester, England. His lordship had an 18- 
horse power hone-mill erected the first summer, 
as we contemplated using the water-wheel for 
grinding furze, or bruising it, for the latter was 
the word used at first. 
I obtained seed to sow on fourteen acres of 
poor laud. About half I had hand-picked from 
the wild furze growing in the woods—about a 
dozen women doing it in a few days—and bought 
some French seed through Tiros. Gibbs, the 
London seedsman. 1 cultivated just as if for 
oats in the spring, and drilled the seed with a 
gram drill. It flourished from the start, except¬ 
ing that some par t of the land grew lighter crops 
in consequence of the soil varying. I had it 
mowed daily with a very strong scythe, as it was 
required, and used over two tons per day from 
about the 1st of December till the beginning of 
April—sometimes, in a mild autumn, it might be 
nearly Christmas before we began. 
I tried it first with the milch cow r s and the 
farm horses, and it was thought to be a perfect 
success. The cartel - aud the cowman approved, 
and the dairymaid said the butter was sweeter; 
but the horses became extremely costive, and 
although they liked it, as also did the cows, they 
lost lloth and required better feeding with the 
furze than if eating bay. Now, this was a fan- 
trial, for the mill was really a good one, cutting 
it up first with knivos, like a chaff-box, which 
dropped it into iron rollers with teeth, thence 
between a pair of stones, liko a cider-mill of that 
time; out from it the furze came quite as fine 
and soft as the smoking tobacco in common use, 
and excepting that it was green aud oily, every¬ 
body said it reminded them of tobacco. 1 al o 
tried it with sheep, and they eat it greedily, but 
ET 
NEW-YORKER. JULY 24 
though they did not lose flesh, they did not gain, 
and any standstill work, even in winter, will not 
do in England, 
We might have continued using this bruised, 
soft herbage, mixed w ith other food or in con¬ 
junction with it; for although it did not fatten, 
it saved a deal of other forage; but we had a 
splendid park, with upwards of 600 deer in it, 
and we tried it with them and found it exactly 
suitable for them ; and for the rest of the four¬ 
teen years I held that situation, the deer reveled 
in furze, gorsc or whin. We took them two 
loads per day, scattering it over the park with a 
fork as the horse walked along. I kept one man 
mowing, a cart with two horses hauling, taking 
a load to the mill, and loading back with the 
manufactured article. The man in the field who 
mowed haring ft fork, helped the. one with the 
cart, and tho man and boys at tho mill helped to 
load at the mill; aud tbns we proceeded all win¬ 
ter. for snow seldom inconvenienced us, and 
never stopped us aB we gave extra help on such 
occasions, and contrived by some means to ob¬ 
tain the furze wbero it was the thickest and long¬ 
est. At the end of tho season, vrhon the deer 
bad graes enough again, we had to mow all that 
was left aud make use of it in feeding other ani¬ 
mals. Sometimes we hauled it into tho woods 
or burnt it wheu dry, for it rauBt bo of only one 
Bummer’s growth, as every bit of the preceding 
year's would he hard wood. 
Mr. Stephens had been advocating the use of 
Hire plant for ten years, aud Mr. Richard fci’oon- 
er of Birmingham political renown, (called 
“ Dick SroONKR ” by political opponents) had a 
mill erected to crush it for nso. and hi-; was in 
full operation several years before ours. Mr. 
ST3HMEN8, like many agricultural writers, cannot 
be relied on in every respect, for facts would not 
bear out his statements, as 1 will defy any man 
to cut shoots from old bushes so a« to pay for 
the time, and most likely the man never bruised 
enough in a morning to feed a sheep with. Tho 
condition and coat were owing to other foods ; 
nevertheless, a small quantity, by way of a 
change, like coarse cornstalks, might do good as 
a variety. 
The old millstone, circular contrivance was fre¬ 
quently used, as I have often beard them spoken 
of, when 1 was n boy, but they were nothiug more 
or less than the cider nulls used, at that timo of 
day, and even in my time, for crushing apples. 
All tho other statements are correct, and 1 do not 
wish to flatly contradict, only to set the matter 
right bo far as to show that exaggerations and 
errors arc amoDg tho statements. 
i believe the crushed-up mass of herbage we 
threw out of tho cart to the deer twice daily, was 
more palatable and nutritious than any cooked 
cornstalks, and was better far than any straw, or 
hay which had been seeded before being ent. I 
believe, too, that it would bo healthy food if bran 
was fed with it. Guo. Gardner. 
EFFECT OF DAIRYING ON FERTILITY. 
In a late issue there appeared a communica¬ 
tion from a frequent contributor to these 
columns, in which were mentioned several special 
causeB for the impoverishment of lands by glaz¬ 
ing. Some of these, or others of an analogous 
nature, are applicable to nearly every farm, but 
beyond these accidental circumstances affecting 
the fertility of grass lands, there are others, 
equally operative, which are inseparable from 
the pasturage of animals of every kind. Fre¬ 
quent reference to the effects of dairying on the 
fertility of the soil, have appeared from time to 
time in these pages, and we fully agree with 
1'rof. Stewart in his address before the Ameri¬ 
can Dairymen's Association in Canada, that if 
tho product of the food eaten by the cow ia all 
returned to tho soil, it will become more fertile 
than before ; hut if the product is largely carried 
off, the soil will become impoverished to that 
extent. A thousand pounds of milk would con¬ 
tain six pounds of ash, which is composed of 
phosphate of lime, carbonate of lime, soda, sul¬ 
phur, magnesia, etc. A cow, therefore, that 
gives 4,000 pounds of milk w-hile in pasture, 
would remove from the soil 24 pounds of these 
mineral constituents. If a steer is fattened 
during the same time, and gains in live weight 
300 pounds, his flesh so put on will contain two 
per cent, of ash, or six pounds of mineral matter 
—only one-fourth as much as the cow carries off 
in her mil k alone. As to the other important 
fertilizing matters in the milk—the albuminoids 
—the casein contains 25. C pounds of pure 
nitrogeu, while the 300 pounds of flesh put on 
the steer would contain only about ten per cent, 
or 30 pounds of albuminoids, or 4.S pounds of 
pare nitrogen, or loss than one-fifth as much as 
the milk of tho cow. 
or as the cow, if not giving milk. No account 
is taken in either case of the amount of carbon- 
hydrates carried off. These being composed of 
carbon and water, may be derived from the 
atmosphere. It will thus appear that when the 
milk is sold the cow is much moro depleting to 
the soil than the beef animal. The effect of 
butter-making upon the soil is less injurious. 
While butter forms four-fifths of the marketable 
product of tho dairy, it contains no mineral 
matter. It is composed wholly of carbon and 
water, and if pnre, is entirely combustible, taking 
no valuable constituents from the soil. All its 
elements may he derived from the atmosphere. 
This kind of dairying, then, does not impoverish ; 
but when tho refuse milk is fed to animals, tho 
mineral constituents nearly all go back to the 
soil in a higher state of organization, and may 
even increase its fertility. 
The effect of feeding refuse milk to pigs must 
be considered. The pig has the least weight of 
bouc in proportion to weight of carcass, aud it ia 
therefore better for the soil to feed the refuse 
milk to pigs, for then the least phosphate of 
lime is sold; hut even when the skimmed milk 
is only fed to calves, only a small proportion of 
the constituents of the milk is sold, yet it is not 
so profitable to feed calveB (except such heifer 
calves as are necessary to replenish the dairy) as 
to feed pigs ; for the sstno quantity of skimmed 
milk will make more pounds, live weight, uj>on 
pigs than calves, and the pigs are usually worth 
moro per live weight than calves. Sixteen 
pounds of skimmed milk will make a pound of 
dressed pork on pigs from -1 to 20 weeks old; 
and if worth 8 cents per pound, will pay oue-balf 
cent per pound for the refuse milk, thus yield¬ 
ing an increase of f20 per cow for the season. 
The manure mado from pigs fed upon milk is 
very rich, aiul when this is properly deodorized 
with muck, aud reapplied to the soil, there will 
bo little loss of fertility by dairying. But if the 
milk is sold, all the mineral and nitrogenous 
constituents of the milk are lost to tho soil, ex¬ 
cept the indigestible and unassimilated portions 
of the cow’s food, together with the constant 
waste of her system, and this return of food to 
the soil does not exceed one-third of the fund 
oaten by a vigorous aud largo yielding cow. 
Hence, two-thirds of what the cow- consumes is 
carried off and lost. If tho Hiecr lays on 300 
pounds of live weight during the pasturing soa- 
son, 25 per cent, of this is dry substance, and 75 
per cent water. The steer will thus store up 75 
pounds of dry substance. 
Two pounds of milk contain as much dry sub¬ 
stance us r.no pound of livo beef. If, then, a 
cow yields 4,000 pounds of milk during the 
pasturing season, it would contain 5(10 pounds of 
dry substance ; and this is, of course, obtained 
from the grass she eats. Hence the ultimate 
impoverishment of the soil must ensue. The re¬ 
lation of factory cheese-making to fertility should 
also be considered. The faetoryroan takes his 
milk to the factory and brings back only tho whey 
or milk-sugar. Whey is simple carbon aud water, 
containing no mineral elements, save the small 
amount of casein and albumen that may have 
floated off in it. When the milk contains al¬ 
bumen, this passos off iu tlic whey, aud adds so 
much to its value as a food aud as a fertilizer. 
Whey has very little mineral value. Its only 
ollice is to supply animal heat aud produce fat. 
The casoiu of the curd contains nearly all the 
mineral matter, and is sold in tho chocso—the 
soil gaining next to nothing. Cheese dairying is 
practically the same as selling milk, so far as 
loss of the fertilizing constituents of the soil are 
concerned. In the discussion which followed 
his paper, Prof. Stewart said that the sum of 
£2 per cow, expended in the purchase of German 
potash salts and of 50 pounds of ground bone, to 
tho acre, would restore all fertility lost by dairy¬ 
ing- 
. -»■»•»- 
HOW TO CHURN. 
A paper which has its thousands of readers 
among every class in the community, should fur¬ 
nish information suitable to every condition. 
The skilled dairyman is iu possession of nearly 
all the information at present attainable with re¬ 
gard to his special avocation, and no journal has 
been more prompt than this in supplying him 
with intelligence of every fresh discovery or in¬ 
vention connected, iu any way, with his business. 
There are thousands, however, of our subscrib¬ 
ers scattered throughout every State in the 
Union, who possess only a single cow or at most 
a few, and to whom hints that would be super¬ 
fluous to the regular dairyman, will often prove 
useful and profitable. Churning cream properly 
is au occupation for which every one robust 
enough, is apt to think himself entirely qualified, 
yet we fully agree with the Scientific Farmer, 
that doing this sci as to product- good butter, is 
not so simple a process as 6ome may think. 
It must be churned at the proper time and at 
t he proper temperature, and the churn should be 
stopped as soon as the cream has broken, but 
before the butter has gathered iu large balls. 
If. then, we .suppose the waste in the system 
of cow and eteei to be the same, the cow will 
cavry off iu mineral constituents four times, and 
in albuminoids five times as much as the steer, 
In warm weather it is of great importance to 
_a 
