364 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
JUNE S 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
PRACTICAL Departments: 
Onr Tree Portraits (Illustrated). 3o7 
What Salary Doe* a Farmer Receive? — Pror. 
VV.J. Beal. 358 
Notes* from Maplewood Farm—Hector Bertram.. 358 
The Poetry of the Farm — 8. Q. Lent. 358 
HavllJlr ICyett, They Sen Not M. Oilkey.358 
Fallacies ub >ut Fruit -T. T. Lyon. 359 
Mistaken Notion? Vt. H, White. 359 
Edneuttonal Facte from Mississipp—P. P. 359 
Htiy-Ciips-F. ILD. .. 359 
Jersey cattle Salt*. The .359 
Fatal* >i:uo». Etc.. Received. . 59 
FraiLUidt <ii Michigan. Tlio—Lumberman.359 
Garden Talks and Walks—Mass. 360 
Plant Strawberries Early.360 
Extracts fi'api Correspotup'i/4s ’ Letters: 
Harr'* Co., Texas. 360 
Bloomington, 111. 360 
Lobelia from seed— W, C. L. Drew.360 
Hellebore ami the Currant-Worm—T. H. Hos¬ 
tile-. M D.36(1 
French Exhibition, Qpentni; of the—Threber.360 
Chautauqua County Butter Dairymen ....361 
The Citsf Threshing Mach hue Works (illustrated) .'(til 
The Ertel Hay Press tlllustraled). SCI 
The Union Churn (Illustrated).861 
Russell & CO.’S Thresher. 361 
Answers to corespondents: 
Diseases of Cattle; Stomach Ailments. Glan¬ 
ders, Heaves—D K Salmon, D. V. M.362 
Wintering I>aUl)a Bulbs. 362 
New York Steaim-hip Companies. 362 
Ice Hutiso. An.362 
Beans. 36.’ 
Bone Fertilizer... .... 362 
Miscellaneous Answers.362 
Ercryiohere. : 
Herdsmen’s Life on the Plains—N. Y. Snydor.. 362 
Crop Prospects in North Mississippi — Perle 
Perdue.362 
Cold-Snap Disasters—S. B. Peck. 362 
Keni.nekv Notes—8. E. Hampton.863 
Douglas Co-, til. 362 
Rockingham Co., N. II.;i63 
Berrien Co., Mioh.363 
Quebec. CanititH.363 
New London Co . Ct.363 
Steuben Co.. N. Y.363 
Chautauqua Co , N. Y. 363 
Dallas Co., Ala . 363 
Cambridge, Muss.363 
Domestic Economy : 
Sittings from the Kitchen Fire—Annie L, Jack 363 
Domestic Recipes. 368 
Markets .'.869 
Editorial Page: 
Fertilizer Experiments. 364 
Botanical Studies—Mr. Median’s Excellent Work 36t 
Why Is It ?. 364 
Brevities. 361 
Literary : 
Poetry..365, 368, 370 
Cora . 36 .-, 
Widow Saxe's Trip to the Centennial — L. A. 
Brock Sb»t;k. .866 
Transactions of the Cobblestone Farmers’ Club.. 366 
Our Dumb Friends. 366 
Brlo-a-Brac. 367 
The New Hampshire Miranda. . 307 
Mrs. Wutxon** Boys-Mis. .1 1C. MeCoiiangley., . 367 
Letters rrom a Country Girl ; No. 5- Margaret B. 
Harvey.367 
Items for Correspondents. 367 
News of the Week. 3 G 8 
Reading for the young: 
Pocket-Money for Yonug People: No. 5—Annie 
L. Jack.37U 
The An of Deception.370 
She Likes to Work In a Garden. 370 
The Puzzler. 370 
Sabbath Reading: 
Prayer... 370 
PerBonals.371 
Wit and Humor. 872 
Advertisements.363. 300,371, 372 
THE 
RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY. 
Address 
RURAL PUBLISHING CO., 
78 Duane Street, New York City. 
SATURDAY, JUNE 8, 1878 
IS ANYTHING TO BE LEARNT FROM EX¬ 
PERIMENTS WITH CHEMICAL FER¬ 
TILIZERS THE FIRST SEASON! 
Can tlie farmer ascertain from the re¬ 
sults of the first season’s experiments, 
carefully conducted, whether for a given 
crop his laud needs phosphoric acid, 
potash, nitrogen or any two or all as 
special fertilizers ? 
Professor Caldwell says in the Tri¬ 
bune that the comparative worthlessuess 
of the results of a single year’s experi¬ 
ments is very plainly indicated, in most 
instances, when these experiments come 
to be repeated. This may be true, but 
the able article to which we are alluding 
does not help us to think so. Beferring 
to a large number of experiments in pro¬ 
gress for three years on the farm at 
Cornell University with commercial fer¬ 
tilizers, Professor Caldwell says : 
“ If we had stopped with the'first year 
we might have published a number of 
very interesting and apparently useful 
results ; but when a second yearis results 
came in, it was evident that we could not 
give both series to the world unless we 
should put them in the puzzle column 
for young folks. Now, after a third year, 
we begin to see some signs of agreement 
on certain points, but even yet nothing is 
safely established, and we must keep on 
experimenting. No chemist, working in 
his laboratory with the most approved 
processes of analyses, processes that are 
in many cases known to give accurate re¬ 
sults, ever feels entire confidence in a de¬ 
termination of phosphoric acid in a ferti¬ 
lizer till he has repeated the determina¬ 
tion and gets concordant results; how 
much less confidence should a farmer 
have in the results of a single year’s trial 
of a superphosphate on wheat, when liis 
experiment is liable to be affected by so 
many adverse or favorable influences 
i which are entirely independent of the 
, action of the manure ; there are disturb- 
< ing influences in his case a hundred 
i times greater than in that of the analyti- 
j cal process in the laboratory.” 
i What parallelism is there between de- 
| termining phosphoric acid in a fertilizer 
• in the laboratory and ascertaining the 
! effect of superphosphate on wheat or any 
1 other crop in the field? S appose we 
select a field the soil of which is as nearly 
i uniform as may be and lay it oil’ in Bmall 
| plots of equal areas for corn. Upon the 
first, secoud and third of these, we sow a 
| quantity respectively of potash, nitrogen 
and phosphoric acid. Upon a fourth 
potash aud nitrogen ; upon a fifth, potash 
and phosphoric acid ; upon a sixth, phos¬ 
phoric acid and nitrogen ; upon a seventh 
all combined, leaving one plot to be 
planted without manure. 
Why cannot we obtain from this ex¬ 
periment valuable results ? Why is not 
the plot which yields the best crop proof 
that the manurial ingredient or ingredi¬ 
ents were those the soil most stands in 
need of ? Professor Caldwell says : 
“Every farmer knows that favorable 
or unfavorable features in the weather, 
alone, even during a small part of the 
growing season, may make or unmake 
a crop ; therefore, we do not know but 
that what appears to have boon a failure 
of a manure may not have been due to 
bad weather, or that a remarkably good 
crop may not have been simply the resul t 
very largely of a very favorable season 
and a fair soil.” 
This is plain enough. But does not 
the weather affect these plots the same ? 
If the weather were favorable aud the 
natural soil exhausted, the differences 
would bo more apparent than if unfavor¬ 
able. If unfavorable, either because of 
wet or drought, would uot even then the 
differences in the appearance of the 
plants of the different plots be a positive 
guide sb to which plot furnished the food 
needed by the plants which the other 
plots did not ? 
We do not wish to invite any discussion 
at all with Professor Caldwell. He 
has examined the subject studiously— 
we superficially at most. But there are 
hundreds of farmers experimenting with 
manure this season in the hopes of ob¬ 
taining practical results at its dose, and 
we hope that their hopes are not for the 
most part visionary, as Professor C at.t» yP 
well’s statements would indicate. 
- 
BOTANICAL STUDIES—MR. MEEHAN’S 
EXCELLENT WORK. 
Botany is now taught in many of our 
schools —in nearly all of our colleges. 
With many the study ends with their 
school days, and a bare remembrance of 
calyx, corolla, stamens and pistils is the 
most that remains through after-life. A 
real love of the stndy is rarely acquired in 
this way. In fact the constrained study 
of text-books is rather calculated to dry 
up the natural impulses than to warm 
them into the vehement thought and ac¬ 
tion that inspire all who derive much of 
either pleasure or benefit from original 
investigations. The field and woods ; the 
Btreamlet and meadow should be the 
class-room of the young botanist. There 
the captivating parts of the study reveal 
themselves; the elementary principles 
are fixed without a conscious effort of 
the mind aud the student naturally takes 
to books in order to gain as complete a 
knowledge as may be of what already 
some information has been acquired. If 
we wanted a child to grow up indifferent 
to play we think it might be effected by 
providing him with text-books on plays 
which should define in the usual explicit 
terms their technicalities, philosophy and 
methods. By the time all this had been 
committed to memory probably the child 
would have concluded that he preferred 
to amuse himself in ways less stupid and 
complicated. A child who listens to in¬ 
strumental music well executed, if he 
has “au ear for music,” may be inspired 
to efforts which shall enable him to pro¬ 
duce such music for himself; while if 
without such inspiration he were obliged 
to study aud to practice the dull rudi¬ 
ments of musio for hours each day, he 
would become sickened of the weary * 
practice. Thus it may be shown that, in 
all studies and pursuits, the interest 
should first be awakened. The study 
should be presented so as to induce vol¬ 
untary research, which, being voluntary, 
is uot distastefully laborious. 
From onr own observations we are im¬ 
pressed that a fondness for botanical 
studies is generally awakened by a per¬ 
son’s being accidentally thrown among i 
flowers. He admires them. The pos- 1 
session of t a little plot of ground or a 1 
i sunny window induces him to procure his 
' first plauts or to sow his first seeds. At 
, once difficulties arise and inquiries begin, 
i He learns the nameB of his plants and 
how to cultivate them. From a knowl¬ 
edge of one or two varieties of a species 
he is the more interested in other varie¬ 
ties of the same species. Difficulties and 
inquiries multiply. The interest thus 
awakened extends to all species and gen¬ 
era until a book on botany becomes indis¬ 
pensable. Then botany is appreciated 
because it gives the information one zeal¬ 
ously seeks. We understand the im¬ 
portance of a study of the structure of 
plauts — we understand the importance 
of a systematic arrangement, and of 
names so determined that plants may be 
designated by the same name as well in 
one country as another. As one progress¬ 
es in botany he finds himself again at¬ 
tracted to the wild flowers of the fields 
and woods. Not, perhaps, that he values 
less the flowers that have beeu changed 
by cultivation—but he values the others 
more. He is delighted with the botanical 
learning which enables him to determine 
the name aud entire history of a plant 
taken from the woods which he had nev¬ 
er before seen, and he is as much pleased 
with a herbarium or with accurate 
drawings or paintiugs of plauts as is auy 
other specialist with specimens or designs 
illustrative of his specialty. 
These thoughts were called forth by 
the first two numbers of a work by Mr. 
Thomas Meehan entitled “The Native 
Flowers and Ferns of the United States,” 
that more than any other similar work 
that we have ever seen, is calculated to 
subserve the object-toaching whereof we 
have been speaking. It will appear in 
series, each series complete in itself, afld 
to consist of twenty-four parts. Each 
part will consist of four colored plates 
aud sixteen pages of text. The size is 
large octavo, aud the work will be Bold by 
subscription only, and delivered to sub¬ 
scribers by agents, one part to be issued 
every two weeks, and to cost fifty cents! 
From Mess. L. Filing &■ Co., of Boston, 
Mass., we have received parte first aud 
second, the colored plates (chromo-litho¬ 
graphs) of which are worthy of all praise 
for their beauty and accuracy, and are 
really worth, it. seems to us, so consider¬ 
able a part of the subscription price, that 
au immense circulation alone can insure 
the publishers against loss. The plates 
of Part 1 are, first: Tradescantia Virgin¬ 
ia ; second, Geum triflormn ; third, Gil- 
semiuin sempervirens, and, fourth, Poly¬ 
podium incanum. Those of Part 2, are, 
first: Viola cucullata ; second, Anemone 
nemorosa; third, Aquilegia chrysantha, 
and, fourth, Pachysaudra procurations. 
The work appeals “ not to one class only, 
such as botanists, or gardeners, or those 
who take au interest simply in the poetry 
and beauty of the floral world, but to all 
combined.” As regards the quality of 
the reading matter, the name of Thomas 
Meehan, so well known as the editor of 
the Gardener’s Monthly, and as that of 
an honest, earnest worker in the fields of 
botany and practical horticulture, is a 
sufficient guarantee. 
-» ♦ ♦ ■ ■ ■ - 
NOTES. 
Why Is It ?—The value of labor- 
saving machinery and appliances depends 
very much upon how they are used and 
taken care of. Few things are more dis¬ 
couraging—more exasperating to the 
farmer than to see, day after day, 
that the members of his household or his 
hired hands are indifferent as to whether 
his new aud improved implements are so 
handled tliat they may pay for themselves 
or whether they are broken to pieces in a 
season. More than once we Lave been 
prevented from buying such articles 
which were really needed, because we 
knew that through ill-usuage they would 
soon be knocked to pieces aud thrown 
aside. It has often occurred to us that 
hired men do not measurably consider 
how much more valuable they might 
make themselves to their employers if 
they would aet upon the principle that 
“ what is worth buying is worth taking 
care of ” and that “ a stitch in time 
saves nine.” It is to be presumed that 
self-interest would incite laborers to pro¬ 
mote their employers’ interest in every 
way, at least when it could be done with¬ 
out unusual work or sacrifice. But we 
have known workiugmeu, exemplary in 
almost everything else, to treat their 
tools and implements as if it were a part 
of their duties to render them useless in 
the smallest possible period. Why is 
this ? 
- • 
i 
Binding Paint Brushes.—Those 
who do their own painting will find it 
economical to take good care of paint- 1 
brushes. If buying a good article ever \ 
has advantages over buying a eheap one, i 
it is certainly the case respecting paint¬ 
brushes. Before use, they should be 
carefully bound at least one-half the 
length of the bristles. How beBfc to effect 
this may not be known to all of our read¬ 
ers. We suggest the following : Wrap 
one thickness of muslin around the bris¬ 
tles, allowing a margin of six inches of 
muslin. Then bind a cord evenly and 
tightly about the brush as low as is de- 
Bired, and tie in a hard knot. Then fold 
the muslin back towards the handle where 
it may be fastened by tacking around 
the original binding. * This will retain 
the cord. 
- - 
BREVITIES. 
Me. Charles Downino, the venerable and re¬ 
spected pomologist, is in bad health. 
One of the unkindest things the microphone 
does is to magnify a maiden’s sigh so that it 
roars like the cataract of Niagara. 
We would thank onr subscribers very cordially 
if they would have money orders made out to 
the Rural Publishing Company instead of to 
individuals. 
Dr. Hoskins, on another page, in the use of 
hellebore thinks it necessary to apply it to the 
under part of the leaf for killing currant wormB. 
This greatly simplifies its use and, for aught we 
see, answers the purpose as well. 
Manv of our contemporaries appropriate arti¬ 
cles from the Domestic Economy department of 
the Rural without any credit—as if there were 
no obligation to credit them. The truth is, they 
are jus! as original, an ! are written with just as 
much care as the articles o f any other department. 
The Toronto Globe says that “the man who 
will pass by a potato-beetle at this time of the 
year without crashing it. is a public enemy.” 
We should like to have the editor here on the 
Rural Farm aud in haste to get to his office in 
New York. We are afraid he too would prove a 
public enemy. 
Herr R. Scijatzmann recommends the ap¬ 
plication of a decoction of ground pepper to 
cheeses as a sure protection against the attacks 
of their accustomed depredators. A couple of 
washings with such a preparation will free a 
cheese from auy number of mites, 8o says tho 
London Farmer. 
A neighbor farmer, now sixty years old, 
tells us that if corn is planted three feet apart 
each way. he prefers to plant two and three 
kernels rather than three and four. If he could 
be assured every kernel would grow, he would 
prefer one to three. If the corn is planted three 
aad a half feet apart each way, then he would 
prefer to plant three kernels. It is a mystery to 
him that any experienced farmer would manure 
in the hill. 
The Germantown Telegraph says: “The 
Rural Nkw Yorker is trying its hand at a cur- 
culio remedy. Somebody tells it that he has 
tried it and finds it answers first-rate. It is 
simply to scatter on the ground, under the trees, 
while tho fruit is forming, salt or wood ashes. 
This is as easy as falling off of a log.” That’s a 
mistake—we never dreamed of it. Our comment 
upon the article evidently referred to, was that 
the salt and wood ashes might benefit the trees. 
The Prairie Farmer thinkB it necessary to 
crush the shells of peanuts boforo planting 
them. We once tried the experiment of plant¬ 
ing tho seeds alone aud tho fruit (nuts) entire. 
The former, for the most part, rotted in the 
ground. This may have been exceptional. We 
(lo uot know with what propriety it calls the 
elongated ovaries or styles “ stolons.” They are 
not stolons, if that is meant, any more than the 
petiole of a leaf is a stolon. Peanuts will thrive 
upon a harder, more clayey soil than is generally 
supposed in the north. The power of the 
pointed style to force itself into the earth is very 
remarkable. 
The municipal authorities of certain European 
towns pay children for collecting • 1 May bugs” 
upon thoir first appoaranoe. In a few hours 
the children of Mannheim collected and sold at 
a fixed rate over 3,000 litres (2,113 American 
pints.) Suppose our town authorities were to 
pay for the (Kitatoe beetle upon its first ap¬ 
pearance in spring—say ten cents per quart 
or a remunerative price, whatever that might 
be found to be. Might not this prove au effec¬ 
tual method of exterminating tho post ? Surely 
every farmer would bo willing to pay an extra 
tax in support of any exterminatory measure 
that would do away with Farit -green. 
Mr. Gladstone of England, speaking of war, 
says : —I am very sorry to say that one of the 
calamities and misfortunes of war is that it is 
highly profitable to certain classes. I am a 
landlord. I am not a great landlord, but my in¬ 
terest in land is great relatively lo my interest in 
other things, ami T have not a doubt that to me 
as a landlord war would in the first instance be 
beneiical. War would at once add largely to the 
price of oorn, because freights would rise great¬ 
ly, and every shilling added to the freights of 
foreign corn would be equivalent to a shilling 
aided to the price of British corn. The farmers 
have had very much to contend against of late 
years, and I wish them every possible advantage 
that the order of Providence and of nature, and 
invention aud skill, industry and perseverance 
can give them : but I cannut wish that my own 
rents may be secured or their profits increased 
by burdens laid upon the nation.” 
“Rural” Weather Status and Predic¬ 
tion. —The hignest pressure is now upon a small 
grove of Pines, on tho lop of Pike's Peak. The 
leaves and younger branches are much depressed 
thereby. It extends eastward for a distance, and 
then ascends too high for auy practical observa¬ 
tions. The low pressure is universal and steady, 
concentrating for the most part in cities, in 
consequence of which there is a general ten¬ 
dency to go up. 
The probabilities are for the next week, that 
there will be some wind, some rain, and partially 
or wholly clear or cloudy weather. Storm cen¬ 
ters, of more or less magnitude, may form during 
the. week, and occasion the usual results of such 
meteorological phenomena. 
