31 % 
THE BUBAL 
-Y0B5CEB. 
logue for this year, and, Mr. Editor. I can show 
you a catalogue of theirs dated in 1828 which 
contains the article. x - 
New York. May, 187S. 
for all culinary, heating and other domestic 
needs and conveniences. Yet for years they 
have been so used by the MennoDites of Russia, 
and the colonists belonging to this sect, that 
have lately settled in Minitoba, Minnesota, Kan¬ 
sas, Dakota aud Nebraska, have introduced the 
practice in‘o this country. 
The Menuonite Grass-burner is a simple, easi¬ 
ly-constructed aud inexpensive device, and there 
is little doubt that it, or improvements made 
upon it by American ingenuity, will ere long be 
extensively used in many parts of the United 
States. In constructing the furnace some em¬ 
ploy brick, others stone, while others prefer a 
mixture of one part of sand with two of clay. 
Its position in the house is generally as ceutral as 
conveui ntly possible, to promote an equal diffu¬ 
sion of beat on all sides. The furnaces vary in 
size with that of the houso, bnt the principle of 
their construction is always the same, and is 
well examplified in the accompanying engravings. 
The length of the furnace here Bhown is five 
feet; its bight six ; its width two-and-a-half ; 
’ and there are COO bricks in it. It may be said 
to have six stories : first, the ash-box ; second, 
'•the fire-box; third, the oven; fourth, the smoke- 
uml used passage ; fifth, the hot-air chamber; sixth, the 
cook in g smoke passage either to a chimney or to a drum 
idling 0 r iaann PI jerroora - 
opening The length of the fire-box is four feet, its 
c3 : ’room width a,l0Ut a foot-and-a-balf, and its hight the 
1 ' same. The Mennonite-s thrust the grass in with 
a fork as one would throw fodder into a rack, 
isporta- Both for cooking and comfort, two or three 
,1 mines times iu the twenty-four hours is found to be 
rcity of quite often enough to replenish the supply, if 
■y, also, the receptacle is filled each time, 
pply of The accompanying illustrations will explain the 
fort of design and construction of this useful oontri- 
fore he gives them any books. He thinks every 
pupil should have first a few lessons in language 
before they study Botany directly—the language 
of nature. He first teaches them to be interpre¬ 
ters of this, to them, almost unknown tongue. 
It is quite astonishing how little the pupils, 
most of them, see the first time out. The true 
teacher under such circumstances does not tell 
directly what to see, hut how to look. Very 
rapid progress is usually made under this plan, 
and I have in my own experience found that not 
the least valuable feature of Ibis plan is, that 
the rapid acquirement of new facts stimulates to 
great effort to get more. 
Eor a short article this is very rambling, but I 
intend it to be pointed toward what I am now 
about to say: 
Everybody engaged in agriculture and horti¬ 
culture nowadays is putting more or lees confi¬ 
dence in experiments. Agricultural colleges are 
asked to perform thousands of experiments and 
in turn these colleges are asking the people to 
experiment. Agricultural papers are recording 
these experiments and they are all working at 
the right thing. But, I ask, how are we to ex¬ 
pect one in a thousand of these experiments to 
THE MENNONITE GRASS-BURNER. 
A great source of expense, inconvenience and 
suffering to many of the settlers in the sparsely- 
SITTING ROOM 
KITCHEN 
TWO BED ROOMS 
STORE AND WOOD ROOM 
The primary training is not iu the direction of I 
observations and how are these people, with no I 
preparation for seeing, to see anything ? This is | 
why we get such a long recoi d of experiments 
each year, with so little of real value. J he ex¬ 
pel jmenters have not been eduoattd to see. I 
feel daily Ibis defect on my own early training- 
I put iu too many hours over Brown’s Grammar, 
that I ought to have employed iu learning how to 
see. Giammar has Rh place, but it should be a 
great deal nearer the college, and a great deal 
farther from the alphabet, than it is ordinarily 
placed. The development of the powers of ob¬ 
servation can be pushed at a very early date, and I 
have often found the men best adapted to close 
experimental work who were kept at home on the 
farm when quite young, and from necessity were 
compelled to give up the privileges of school; bnt 
they learned many lessons that have proved of 
greater value than the majority of those conned 
at the student’s desk. 
My appeal, then, is to those who have the con¬ 
trol of tue common schools, to see that the kind 
of instruction and the methods pursued are cal¬ 
culated to prepare the boys and girls to become 
thirsty for now facts and more knowledge—dig¬ 
gers after information at the original mine. Ihis 
is what is needful to make thorn valuable men 
and women, to aid in the development of the 
agriculture and horticulture of our couutry, and, 
in case they go into other callings, this founda¬ 
tion training could not be improved. Whatever 
END VIEW OF THE *' MENNONITE GRASS- BURNER. 
(A) Furnace Door to Fire-Box. (B) Cooking 
place or Oven. This opening sometimes omitted. 
No time is so favorable to invest in real es¬ 
tate as when everything is depressed and money 
“ tight.” The farm announced for sale in an¬ 
other column is a bargain, and the gentlemen 
who have the matter in hand are trustworthy. 
They will supply particulars. 
NOTED TROTTERS.-No. 5 
GOLDSMITH MAID. 
The famous little mare that has made the 
name of Goldsmith Maid illustrious by winning, 
beyond all doubt, the highest honors of the trot¬ 
ting turf, was foaled in 1857, and bred by Jno. 
B. Decker, of Sussex County, New Jersey. Her 
sire was Edsall’s Hambletoniau, a horse after¬ 
wards purchased by Mr. K. A. Alexander, of 
Kentucky, who renamed him Abdallah, after his 
grandsire, who was the grandson of the renowned 
imported Messenger, already several times refer¬ 
red to in these sketches. Her dam was a name¬ 
less buckskin mare got by the elder Abdallah, so 
that she iB very closely in-bred to the old grand¬ 
son of MeBseiiger, being by his grandson out of 
his daughter. Moreover, there was a great 
number of in-crosses to the Messenger blood in 
Abdallah’s son, Rysdyk’s Hambletonian, grand- 
Bire of the Maid. She is but little over fifteen 
bauds high, but is long and low, with the gener¬ 
al shape of a thoroughbred mare of good bone. 
In her youth she was remarkably independent 
and ungovernable ; no fence could keep her in 
the pasture when Bhe wished for freedom; she 
ran nearly wild until almost eight 
years old, and gave so little promise 
of her future excellence that at th® 
age of eight she was sold by Mr. 
Decker to his nephew for $350. 
On his way home with his pur¬ 
chase, the latter met William Tomp¬ 
son, who straightway bought her 
for $460, iu January 1865. In the 
following March,Thompson sold her 
for $650 aud a buggy to Mr. Alden 
Goldsmith, of Walnut Grove Farm, 
Orange County, N. Y., aud it is from 
this gentleman her name is de- 
- rived. 
Here, by the patient and skillful 
treatment of her trainer, Bhe was 
cured of her wildness aud timidity, 
while her strength and pace were 
greatly increased; and in August 
P 1865 she trotted her first race at 
Goshen, N. Y., for a purse open to 
all ages, which she won in three 
heats, the fastest being 2.36. Dur¬ 
ing the BHiue fall she was beaten at 
Newton, N. J., and again at GoBh- 
en, after winning the two first 
heats. In the next oouple of years 
she met with varying success, beat¬ 
ing, geuerslly, such flyers aB Geo 
W' Palmer, Geo. Wilkes, Gen. Butle 
and American Girl, aud beiug beaten 
ocor sionally by some one of these 
and, whenever they came in conflict, 
lay Dexter Mid Lady Thom. 
BIDE view. 
vance more fully and and clearly than a page of 
writing—one among the many advantages of an 
illustrated paper. 
--♦♦♦-- 
Your correspondent. A. E. Beadle, says he has 
never seen mentioned in American catalogues 
the “ EnglistiVegetable Marrow.” He certainly 
does not look very closely as the seed is offered 
in the catalogues of J. M. Thobbdbn & Cl. of 
He oan see it in the cata- 
many a farmer and farmer's family, but also 
considerably to the good man’s bank account. 
Yet in many of these districts ample stores 
of excellent materials for fires suitable for 
all domestic purposes, are wasted in igno¬ 
rance of the method by which they can be util¬ 
ized in this way. The thought of burning grass 
or straw is generally confined to a bonfire or 
conflagration, and it is seldom the idea occurs 
that these substances might be profitably utilized 
New York every year 
Olture, Washington. V. o.— air . u 
ake pleasure in handing yon sam¬ 
ple of tea we have made from the 
leaves we received from Bouth Car¬ 
olina on Thursday of this week. In 
the preparation of this tea we have 
discarded all manipulation that 
could not have been l etter done 
by very simple machinery. Our ap¬ 
paratus was a wire sieve, a gas get 
and a tin pan, We have produced 
a tea that we unhesitatingly pro¬ 
nounce as equal to any brought 
from China or Japan to thiB coun¬ 
try, and which in point of flavor 
(due in a measure to its freshness) 
is greatly superior. The flavor is 
between that of a Japan tea and a 
