59S THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. SEPT. 24 
<3faun Copies. 
HINTS FOE THE SEASON. 
Each month and each week bring their own 
work. To the farmer there is no time for idling. 
Instead of allowing work to crowd, he always 
does what he can in advance, that he may be 
ready for bad weather, company, sickness or 
a holiday. 
Lumpy Ground —One of the best things to do 
for lumps is to tile the land. Instead of spend¬ 
ing so much time on the surface, begin at the 
foundation. It has always been found to pay to 
tile heavy land, especially if the soil was strong. 
Clods may bo cruohed by rolling and scraping 
and harrowing, but for the best results in seed¬ 
ing to wheat or auy other crop, it is not best 
to crush all the lumps on the surface. After a 
&in, such soil will pack aud bake hard if left too 
'ne on top. Harrow thoroughly and pulverize 
jelow the surface and leave small lumps on the 
surface. Put in some furrows for Burface drain¬ 
age, running them obliquely down the hillsides 
to prevent washing by rapid currents. 
Live Stock. —AnimalB must not be without a 
liberal supply of good water. They will suffer 
for want of it, aud will not thrive so well. Ar¬ 
range for pasture in abundance for late feeding. 
Sow some rye for pasture late in autumn aud 
early spring, when the ground may be plowed 
for other crops, Look especially after the poor 
animals. TLose which are poor in autumn 
should be disposed of in some way. Feed them up, 
sell them, or knock them on the hbad. It is bet¬ 
ter to kill tin m now than to care for. and watch 
them with anxiety for the next six months, and 
then have them wither up and die. At this sea¬ 
son of the year, an experienced eye wilt usually 
pick out moat of the sheep which are not worth 
wintering. Ic is too late in the year to begin to 
feed up poor animals, and do it most profitably. 
Roans. —The easiest way to keep them in good 
rep.ir is by frequent scraping. This tills all little 
holes, keeps the water off Ihe surface aud allows 
the travel to pack t“e ground hard. A quarter 
or more of the road tax of any district should be 
used in buying a scraper, aua in using it just at 
the light time. The best time for scraping is 
boou after a rain has nearly dried off. Evert 
neighborhood which has never tried this method 
will be surprised to see how far a little work 
will go. Once triea they will not abandon the 
plan for any other. 
Fairs —Attend the fairs, and not only attend, 
but help support them by taking something from 
your own farm. P. ople cannot all be specta¬ 
tors on such occasions. Those who are most 
active iu the support of fairs do the most good 
and are themselves the most benefited. They 
learn more by taking part than they would 
by merely locking on. Take a note-book and 
pencil and fill it with addresses of men you 
wish to visit or write to ; also get numerous 
new and valuable ideas for future use on the 
farm, or the Grange, or Farmer’s Club, or at 
a future fair. No farmer in these times can 
afford to stay away from the fair. 
Weeds —True to their nature, all weeds are 
now huriyiug on to produce flowers aud seeds. 
It is astonishing with what rapidity they will 
mature at this time of year. It is their last 
chance—now or never. As soon aB the crops 
are off iu the garden, the land should be sown to 
some other crop, or cultivated every week so as 
to prevent weeds from maturing. 
Saving Seeds. —Save a good supply of all 
sorts of good seeds of grun, vegetables, and 
flowers. It may cost more than to buy them, 
but even if it seems to cost five times as much 
as to buy of the seedsmen, it will pay to raise 
your own seed. There are many poor seeds in 
the market. Laoel them properly as collected, 
with the name, date, aud peculiarities. Have 
a place where they may be well dried, and then 
put them away free from vermin. 
Pick Apples rather early if they are expected 
to keep well. Place them in barrels or in heaps 
under the tree, or in a shed, where they should 
remain till cold weather in November or Decem¬ 
ber, when the cellar will have cooled off ready 
for fruit. Attend to assorting properly. If you 
have never attended to it, try this as an experi¬ 
ment. The same fruit, good and poor, will 
bring much more money when put up iu sepa¬ 
rate packages. Wniie picking, do not forget to 
seaich for a few of the finest of each variety to 
show at a winter meeting of your Pomological 
Society, your Club or Grange. 
Celery should be kept growing and hilled up 
for blanching. In treating this delicious veg¬ 
etable, remember that it likeB a liberal allowance 
of water. Piant on damp soil or irrigate occa¬ 
sionally. 
Beets should be topped and buried before a 
hard frost. Dig trenches in a dry place a foot 
and a-half wide, and place the beets iu below the 
.surface, cover them gradually. For daily use, 
■keep beets and all vegetables which are liable to 
wiit, iu a box of damp sphagnum, iu the cellar, 
■Squashes should not be out in a frost. Cut 
the stems from the vines. Handle the squashes 
with great care and remove them to a shed 
where they should remain covered with litter till 
danger of freezing. 
Currants snd Gooseberries. —Now that cur¬ 
rant worms and borers are bo troublesome, peo¬ 
ple are likely to neglect or quit raising the 
fruits named above. Perhaps it may be best to 
increase the plants and take thorough measures 
to fight the insect pests. Cuttings should be 
made now—of young growth, six inches or more 
in length. These should be set close together 
for two-thirds of their length in the soil in a 
sheltered place. By spring they will be nicely 
callused and most of them rooted. 
-» « » — 
JOTTINGS AT KIRBY HOMESTEAD. 
COL. F. D. CURTIS. 
IVe observe that the escutcheon theory has 
assumed the importance in Pennsylvania of a 
government commission. This was the casein 
France years ago, and they reported in favor of 
the Guenon system, which gave it a prominence 
which no donbt will be renewed by t’ e gentle¬ 
men in Pennsylvania who are now gnessing how 
many quarts of milk cows will give. According 
to the report of their investigations thus far, 
they have come pretty close to the statements 
made by tho owners of the cows. Guenon wrote 
a book about the escutcheon, and claimed to be 
able to tell almost exactly how much milk a cow 
would give from the width of the upright hair 
belt belaud aud the shape and form of the curls 
alongside. A big, broad belt means, according 
to his theory, a big pail of milk. We bought a 
cow once jnst. on account of her escutcheon, as 
it was the broadest and best defined we had ever 
seen, and four quarts of milk were the most we 
could squeeze out of her. We are incredulous 
enough to suspect that if Guenon and the 
Pennsylvania commissioners, did not look at the 
uddor and milk veins, their escutcheon guesses 
would not be quite so accurate. 
For seventy-five years our cellar has been an 
unprofitable place in which to make butter. It 
would get damp and moldy, and the cream 
would not rise, and the batter would not come. 
Iu our day the house has beeD raised and more 
windows put in to get more circulatiou of air. 
The walls have been cemented, as a last resort, 
but it was all the same. In despair, the milk 
in “ dog days " was fed to the calves Bud pigs to 
get rid of it. Two years ago it occurred to us 
what was the matter. There was too much cir¬ 
culation, The hot air rnshiag in was carried 
agaiust the cold walls and the moisture in it was 
, condensed, and this action going on all dav, 
caused the walls to drip with the accumulated 
dampness. The windows all having been shut 
and kept so, there was no more trouble. The 
cellar is uniformly cool and dry, ranging from 
64° to 66°. Wo can make good, solid, sweet 
butter all summer, and it comes quickly. Neither 
mi k nor cream breathes, hence there is no need 
of circulation. Clean the cellar thoroughly out 
and whitewash it, so that there will be uoBmells, 
and keep it shut up tight. It may be aired by 
opening the windows at night, aud closing them 
early iu the morning. Mrs. Callaghan had the 
same difficulty with her cellar, but now, since 
she keeps it closed, there is no trouble about 
making excellent butter. 
One of our horses had tender feet forward 
and was very lame. Mr. Yan Guyaling, who 
happened to be at the shop while we were get¬ 
ting him shod, advised having shoes put ou 
without calks, “Get the foot as near the 
ground as possible, so that a horse can step on 
to nature’s calks, the frog,” he said, “ and the 
horse will go all right.” Old Jim has not been 
lame since this valuable advice was practically 
carried out. Another horse had been lame a 
year, one blacksmith after another had tried his 
skill, but all in vain. At last a shrewd fellow 
suggested that the animal uad been shod too 
much. “These artists,” he said, “have cut 
her feet all away.” This was not literally true, 
but each one had pared and cut until the natur¬ 
ally largo feet were reduced almost to the quick. 
By preventing any more cutting away of the 
feet, this animal was cured. 
We are gomg to sow Clawson wheat on the 
damp land. Tliis variety does well here, and 
now since the millers have learned how to grind 
it right, it makes good bread. Ou the drier 
portions of the field rye will be pat, as rye does 
not do well on moist land. 
The farmers are all busy now, cutting the 
weeds and bushes along the highways, as the 
law in New York State makes it obligatory upon 
them to do so, on their own lands along the 
roads. 
Saratoga Co., N. Y. 
■ — ■ 
HINTS BY THE BOADSIDE.-No. 1. 
I am very fond of Becking for motes in the 
eyes of my neighbor farmers; and tbinkiDg they 
cannot see their opportunities as well aH an ob¬ 
server, I take this time to make suggestions. 
WELL-H3USES AND RUNNING WATER. 
My neighbor Swift has a cool, clear brook run¬ 
ning down past his house, fed from never-fail¬ 
ing springs and with fall enough to turn a grind¬ 
stone, do the churning, and, I think, saw up the 
winter’s wood pile. Besides, nothing is more 
attractive than a running stream neatly cared 
for and directed into a confined channel of stony 
bed, and yet neighbor Swift is biding that stream 
away in as blind a drain as possible, and doea 
not know the advantage of it for irrigation or 
for laving his hot forehead on a haying day. 
My neighbor Fisher has a ppring, never-fail¬ 
ing, and of a temperature of 48 degrees all sum¬ 
mer, 8nd giving & stream which will fill an inch 
pipe steadily, and yet there is neither a well- 
house upon hiB farm, nor a trout pool, both of 
which are luxuries to me, which I would not dis¬ 
pense with for half my farm. 
' LARGE AND SMALL FARMS. 
My neighbor Wing has six hundred acres of 
land and ten laborers. Hay is worth from seven 
to nine dollars a ton when delivered six miles 
away at a cost of a man and a two-horse team 
nearly all day. Cora is a paying crop; that is, 
it would be if he had plenty of manure, but my 
neighbor, Wing, has a habit of letting the waste 
and refuse of the farm he a waste around the 
buildiogs, and by the roadside, and wash into a 
stream passing by, and be has too little manure to 
keep up the fer ility of his fields while he is obliged 
to sell so much to pay his hired workmen. He 
keeps a hnudred sheep, which is a redeeming 
feature—although with stone walls for fences, 
it tskes a man and a boy to tend them. They 
are enriching his bill-tops slowly, but surely. 
My neighbor Butler has but sixty acres of land. 
Ten in woods, ten in swamp pasture, and ten 
more taken up by buildings, garden, pig pasture 
and roadway. So he has thirty acres of land 
which he and his son cultivate, and rotate the 
crops of oats, corn, potatoes, rye, and grass up¬ 
on. Now, notwithstanding this small amount of 
land, it is increasing in capacity to produce each 
year, and I am satisfied that there is one-fourth 
more growing upon the same ground this year 
than grew there five years ago. 
Neighbor Butler has time between hay and 
haivest, to carefully grub up every part of the 
farm, and has a fine compost heap each year, and 
his women folks are good-natured, and there is 
a little something coming in against a rainy day, 
besides the example of good order and taste, and 
neatness which the snug little farm affords. 
Hough Handel. 
jfann (fcoiuraj. 
COURAGE ON THE FARM, IN THE SWAMP 
AND PEAT-BED-No. 2. 
GEN. WM. H. NOBLE. OF BRIDGEPORT, CONN. 
‘‘L’Homme propose, mais Dieu dispose." 
In my first article I claimed that our text, right¬ 
ly applied to life aud luck upon the farm, held 
out no shelter to the unthrift of blundering 
cowards, but was a call for courageous thought 
aud deed ; that it breathed no timid doubt of 
God's ample disposition of all essential to man’s 
rightful doing, but pleaded for trust and trial. 
Among the things upon the farm divinely dis¬ 
posed for our needs and thrift, I claimed the 
deep, unheeded deposits of decay, stored up for 
land enrichment in the water-logged lowlands 
aud peat beds. For their development some 
simple methodB detailed, brought the system 
of such work within the wit of all. In that 
wurk I urged deep and large tiled drains, insur¬ 
ing the quick leach out of such lands through a 
century. 
After the crowding crops are garnered there 
comes a dry time, when wages are down a trifle, 
and help is plentiful- Then is the season to 
strike into this work with your might, before 
the great fall rains come to flood your job, aud 
load your muck with wetness. Having marked 
out your lines aod depths with the simple im¬ 
plements and methods detailed, begin at the 
spot marked for the outflow of your drain and 
work up on grade along its stakes. As soon as 
yon have mined well into its deep richness, push 
not your drain further towards its head till you 
have carted cut aud stored up a full year's sup¬ 
ply. Pile your toil, time aud resources into this 
work. Over your grass, plow-laud, or orchard, 
dump iu heaps or spread, just as suits you. 
Have no fear of piling on too much even of the 
raw stuff. If the sun and autumn raius do not 
drench out any ai-triugeucy or acids charged 
against the peat, the winter's frosts and thaws 
will cure its hurt and powder it to ashes. Keep 
up this work thoroughly aud largely at every 
stay of the other driving work upon the farm. 
Cart into your barn-yard deep layers to be 
trodden and puddled into its litter aud the or¬ 
dure of your Btock. 1’ile up, a few feet apart, 
great ridges of its unotious blackness to be com¬ 
posted with fish or flesh, or any matoriul of land 
enrichment at your command. Make up stout 
heaps to be seasoned well and powdered by the 
fronts. With this, when dry and fine, litter your 
sta'ls and sties, and put it to absorb fatness 
from your household wastes. It is the grandest 
disiufe taut of rottenness and decay, animal or 
vegetable. It takes kindly to. and hoards the 
offal, garbage, and manorial wastes of great 
towns and industries, and marks their allied dis¬ 
bursement by grander crops. 
Take no heed of tho wise saws and say-sos 
hummed into your ears about the sourness of 
your muck and peat, about how so-and-so tried 
it and it brought in sorrel. It is senseless lingo. 
If sorrel springs up where you dump your peat, 
it is because, before, your ground was too poor 
to grow it. All tho sourness which such depos¬ 
its average, will not hurt anything that ought to 
grow. The alcbemy of the soil and elftnents 
will take care of all undue acidity. Words are 
wasted about the manorial value of peat, on 
half who till the soil. They hug “ the dollar of 
the daddies” till it pqueals, but will not see or 
covet the riches of the peat-bed. The least 
doubt about its quality or use, disheartens all 
trial, whereas faith and works in these water¬ 
logged areas would soou throughout the North, 
summon to life in crops, their buried layers of 
decay. 
Two friends of mine mark the wisdom of 
such work, and the folly of its neglect. They 
were about equal in property, location, and gen¬ 
eral intelligence. But one believed iu peat, and 
saw through it a way to bounteous harvests. 
The other did not know ; had heard people say 
it did not pay ; it was sour, and it was this, and. 
that. 
It happened that the latter owued a deep salt- 
inlet peat-bed. Such are made out of ages of 
decayed reeds and salt grasses, aud the washed- 
in scum and float of the ses. Out of their rich 
aud compact blackness, the tide has drenched 
all the acidity. But no assurance that trial and 
analysis had proved his peat-bed about equal, 
load for load, to stable manure, started him to 
multiply thereby his crops. So, with borrowed 
money, he paid at the livery stable, four miles 
away, four dollars per cord for their fluffy, lit¬ 
tered, fire-fanged manure. The like amount 
and better value of his peat the most slovenly 
management would have placed upon his land at 
one dollar per cord, With sharp skill, it eonld 
have hec-n dog and dumped for fifty cents. 
But such talk to him was thrown away. His 
cash soon ran ont. His land starves. His barns 
are half-filled. His interest lags. He drifts to 
ruin. The mortgage will eat up his farm and 
home. He is sorry now* he had not gone WeHt— 
wants to find somo salaried employment. He 
and his like will never learn that this deep black¬ 
ness stores God’B promise and disposal of re¬ 
pair and thrift to our rock-ribbed and gravelly 
soil. So be wends his way, murmuring that 
muffled wail of our text, about God’s disposal to 
veil the unluck of iutense blundering. 
But his brother farmer took straight into his 
head, aud “inwardly digested." this piovidence 
of God in the peat-bed. The vegetable genera¬ 
tions there entombed seemed to him awaiting a 
resurrection to life iu the waving crops of hope¬ 
ful toil. No salt muck, or other peat di posit, 
blessed his farm; but he boou found aud bought 
one close by. By the simple methods before 
detailed, ho struck his lines and gradeB, and be¬ 
gan to open up his agricultural mine. The very 
first fall after his purchase, he drained deep 
and delved into its richness with might and 
main. With greed and toil and faith untiring, 
he spread and stored and piled hugely all that 
his means made possible. Tbe nature of peat 
in all its phases aud placers, the elements of its 
ash, and its best usoiu agriculture, he made a 
study, till it was aU an open hook. 
Now mark the result: His crops were trebled. 
He is at uo loss for manure. When tho com¬ 
post in the farm-yard or great field-pile gives 
out, raw peat, right out of the deposit or that 
which has ripened in the heap, is given the 
crops with generous baud. Ilis pasture lauds 
are green aud full of feed. His stock are sleek 
aud lusty. No wail comes from him about 
God’s adverse disposal of events and things. 
He proposes to do, with lus might, what God has 
disposed him to do. He does it aud he thrives. 
He takes no stock iu “ Go WoHt, youug man,”— 
longs for no cattJe ranch, gold miuo or placer, 
and hankers for no deep rich prairie soil. 
Now, the chrnee to do aud dare just what has 
made my friend thrifty aud well-to-do, on his 
worn-out farm, is present to nearly every New 
England homestead. Right around me are hun¬ 
dreds of acres of outcast peat swamps, of all 
sizes and depths. A little engineering tact and 
cheap appliances will carry you, in dry diggings, to 
their very depths. If draining through the deep 
aud wide earth walls which enclose some, is costly, 
sink a shaft-well doep down, aud set a high-class 
wind-mill to pump out the waters ou to your 
plow or meadow land. Until those deep stores 
of enrichment along our coast and in the low 
and water-logged lauds of the interior, are 
worked into crops, let’s hear no more rnral 
grumbling, about soils and their yields. Till that 
work is done, New England farming has not 
played out its chances. 
But less hopeless drudgery on the farm and 
larger crops are not all the blessings waking 
from that peat-bed. Every shovelful prompted 
by its study aud promise, lifts us nearer that 
mental wakefulness which the farm so lacks. 
The gain to its toiler, out of God’s placers in the 
peat-bed, will quicken his slow faith in better 
methods aud better stock. The neighborhood 
gossip, which visits such doings with a thousand 
questions and endless talk, is an unmeant bless- 
