75 $ 
the rural wew-yorker. 
B kort ears and nubbins, and the larger part of 
this grew upon that portion of the field where 
the seed was dropped five inches apart. Mort 
of the ears of this sort which grew on the rest 
of the field, were from the suckers, or wen 
second ears on stalks where one perfect ear 
grew, and on this part of the field a large pro¬ 
portion (about 25 per cent.) of all the stalks 
produced twin ears. It w-s estimated that it 
the whole 6fid had produced in proportion to 
this part, the entire yield would have been about 
100 bushels to the acre, or, iu other words, that 
tlto close planting of one third of the field re¬ 
duced the yield of the whole by 20 bushels 
per acre This reduction was caused by the 
shortening of the ears whore thick planting was 
done, for the variety was so thoroughbred that, 
as observed above, some sort of an ear was 
found on netrly every stalk. 
These facts, and they may be relied upon as 
facts, are, we think, foil of instruction to those 
who aim at growing large average crops of corn. 
—--- 
POTATOES AS A FARM CIOP. 
wai. J. FOWLER. 
for years to come the price of potatoes will not 
rule as low as it has done. The potato beetle is 
a steady factor in all calculations of the cost of 
growing. Practically the small growers of pota¬ 
toes are out of the market. An increasing pro¬ 
portion of farmers who do not make a business 
of growing potatoes for market, will not grow 
enough for their own uso. This may restrict 
cunsumption to some exteut ; but potatoes will 
still bo always largely used at higher prices than 
heretofore. 
Monroe CO., N, T. 
.—----- 
SOME MISTAKEN IDEAS. 
A New England agricultural journal, in re¬ 
ferring to the difference in the chemical constit¬ 
uents of grains, and especially of corn, mis¬ 
takes somewhat tire essential value of the fame. 
For instance, a comparative analysis of differ¬ 
ent varieties of corn was made for 1 he first an¬ 
nual fair of the Farmers’ Club of M.ssachii- 
setts. The following table tthoWB the results, 
which, we mu.t say, should he received with 
caution, for the reason that the amount of cellu¬ 
lose, or woody fiber, is remarkably small._ 
THE BEAUTY OF HEBRON POTATO. 
The following extract from a letter shows how 
the Biauty of H.brou behaved herBelf under 
moderate care last year. " I got a single tube/ 
of the B anty list spring and from it I havi 
gathered 142 tubers, together with about as many 
small ones as could he hell on the palm of tin 
hind. This must be considered a very large 
yield. The culture was (I t; tha: is, no earth 
was drawm to the plauts. The qualuy of the 
Beauty is excellent, aud I have uo doubt th»t 
the will take her place among “ the fairest Of 
the fair.” p B Mkad.\ ! 
$atm (Copies. 
MOISTURE-RETAIING POWER OF 
THE tj JIL. 
The u?e of potatoes as a common article of 
food is little more than a hundred year# old, and 
it is probable that their cultivation and use 
are yearly increasing. It is quite certain that 
the business of growing them c xtem-ively is far 
move common than formerly. The increased 
proportion of urban population would alone in¬ 
sure this. The amount of potatoes required 2 
for large cities, bke New York, Philadelphia, or 
Brooklyn, is vastly greater than can be grown by ; 
market garduuers In their vicinities. Years ago, 
potatoes were largely grown in market, gardens; 
but they were found less profitable than other 
crops and abandoned to the cheaper lands of the 
general farmer. What the market gardener 
has rejected, has proved one of the most profit¬ 
able crops that we grow. Many farmers in this 
section plant yearly from five to thirty or forty 
acres of potatoes, and, on an averago of seasons, 
they return more mom y per acre thau any other 
crop grown. It is true they require a good deal 
of work, but this ia true of alt crops that pay- 
Grains, like buckwheat and oats, which eo.-t 
least labor, are almost always a glut in the 
market. 
In my practice of growing potatoes 1 have not 
found them an exhausting crop. I never plant 
more than one eight or one-tenth of the culti¬ 
vated laud, aud alternate with grains and clover, 
feeding stock and making large quantities of 
manure. Some years ago, farmers cm sandy 
con iu this section did txhuu-t their fields by re¬ 
peatedly cropping with potatoea. Tue tempta¬ 
tion was a strong one, as iu some years the orop 
was worth more thau the price of the land on 
which it grew'. Of late ysars fewer potatoes are 
grown on the sand. Some of the new varieties are 
quite as good or better when grown on heavy soil. 
Where wo have land in potatoes not oftener | 
than once in eight or ten years, sod in the mean- i 
time manor© it twice and turn under at least two 
clover sods, there is little danger of serving the 
Boil. The exbahstiou or sandy Boils consists m 
the removal of their potash aud lime, iu which i 
such soi's are dtfioient. It is marked by the 
failure of clover after repeated croppings of 
potatoes Our heavy loamy or calcareous soils 
are usually rich iu all mineral elements of plant 
food. Clover, in my experience, catches better 
with grain bowh after potatoes than after 8tr>y 
other crop. This id probably due to the fact that 
a potato crop pulverizes and cleans the soil bet¬ 
ter than any other. 
The ravages of the potato beetle are likely to 
make au unexpected revolution iu the cultiva¬ 
tion of the potato. Tne crop will be grown and 
used as formerly, perhaps not quite so freely; 
Lut it does not follow that fanners all over the 
country will grow them ns they have done. 
Probably three fourths of all the potatoes grown j 
have been in small patches, to supply the fami¬ 
lies of the growers It is likely that this will he 
less the fact in future. Small patches of pota¬ 
toea, grown by general farmers, do not pay. 
Very few c m give them the ojtb they need, and 
without tnis the crop is a certain loss. High as 
the price of potatoes is this year, those which 
many farmers havo grown on their own land 
have cost mute than it would to buy them. 
With equsl caro in fertilizing And cultivating, a 
large field cm be planted, tended aud harvested 
at from ten to fifty per cent, less oxpenae than a 
small one. Iu » potato growing eeclion, as 
many beetles will visit a half-acre patch as a ten 
or twenty-aero field. I do not mean that it is 
possible to plant bo largely as (o get rid of the 
labor of fighting the beetles. The rapidity 
with which they increase makes diligenco always 
necessary. What I do say is that on a large 
field the labor of fightiog the enemy is pro¬ 
portionately lessened. The large growers of 
potatoes can afford to sell at prices which would 
leave no profit to those who only grow ft few. 
We are learning something new eveiy year 
about growing potatoea. Large fields have been 
grown which, iu ordinary Reasons, yielded 200 to 
350 bushels per acre, at a cost of less than 
fifteen cents per bushel Those who grow such 
cropsneed only care about the market, to loarn 
how large are their profits. It is probable that 
Water. 
14 
H 55 
fc. ■< fs. 
11.61 
4 91 10.23 
1 8.111 
S.«2 !». '.1 
11.81 
4.1) J S SI 
10. 
.i.4n ‘.1 22 
n.t<3 
„.«() 12.1) i 
tn. ns 
7.7? 11.1.9 
Varieties. 
S-r^wed Goldei 
(Mas* ) . 
Mason C<j til!-) 
Khiis .. 
From this the idea is evolved that each sec¬ 
tion should, on the discovery of the most vain-i- 
able variety of corn, grow only that; aud thus 
make a market for the product as a valuable 
merchantable article, as well as fer seed to be 
used in other localities where the corn grown is 
less valuable. Now, hero is a grand mistake. 
The seed alone is iusu t'cient to produce the 
crop; soil, fertilizers, and. above all, climate, in¬ 
fluence the product of the seed immensely, so 
that a seed rich iu fat or gluten, grown iu New 
England soils, may be sowu in a warmer c.iuiate 
upon rich alluvial soils and will produce a crop 
rich in starch and woody fiber. It is the soil 
first; the climate second; the fertility of the soil 
third; and the seed lastly, which influence the 
character of the product. Do not we fiad this 
abuutUntly shown every day in our experience 
aud in the history of agriculture? Aim tnere 
Dot dairy districts, the grasses of which give 
aroma and quality to butter and cheese pro¬ 
duced there? JLsit not thus with oats, barley, 
wheat, potatoea andfniits of all kinds? There 
are Delaware peaches, Norway and Nova Scotia 
oats, Canada barky, Colorado wheat, Michigan 
and other apples, not to forget the showy Kan¬ 
sas fruit and the brilliant specimens from Cali¬ 
fornia. Inde d. it is unless to extend the list 
heeauee everybody can add to it from his own 
knowledge, to that, to use the words of the 
journal referred to “ If it costs more to raise 
corn in New England than iu the West, the idea 
that the farmers in the first section must rsi.e 
better corn aud conduct their bininets on a 
more careful and intelligent plau thau is cus¬ 
tomary ou the prairies,” will bo found delusive, 
if the attempt is made only to grow superior 
kin is ■ f grain. Toat i? not the poiut. E ‘■“tern 
farmers must grow larger crops to m-et th*ir 
leas favorable soil and climate, and must not de¬ 
pend wholly upon their more favorable locality 
to help them iu thuir competition with the corn, 
wheat, pork, butter aud choose of the West. 
It will lead us into costly error to take a nar¬ 
row or one-sided view of things, and “ to teach 
men so ”; we must look broadly and in a com¬ 
prehensive manner ou these things, to gather the 
I "true inwardness” of tlnm. And, first of all, 
we should learn that iu this regard, it is soil, 
I climate and method of culture that produce va¬ 
rieties, and that these, with careful selection of 
our own seed year by year an! patient watching 
and waiting, will finally help us to grow larger 
and more prcfitablu crops. 
.--■*-*-*--- 
PEARL MILLET, 
A letter from a correspondent in Florida tells 
of a small experiment made there with the 
above forage plant, Tire boed was sown about 
the middle of June on now aud poor ground, and 
a iittle fertilizer was put with it into the drill. 
It was cut four times. The first time, it meas¬ 
ured over seven feet in bight. The other cut¬ 
tings were shorter, but none of tbtm was under 
four feet. For tha quantity of Beed sowu aud 
the quality of the land which reoemd it, the 
yield of forage is etated to have been enormous. 
Another correspondent, writing from Birde- 
villo, Ga., Bays that he has cultivated “Pearl ' 
Millet as a forage and Boiling plant for twenty- 
five years, and esteems it highly. It is a sure 
crop thereabouts until the advent of a killing 
frost, and its yield is always in proportion to the 
fertility of the soil. It has never yet developed 
either an enemy to itself or a pest to neighboring 
plauts. It withstands droughts well, aud readily 
reoovers from any temporary disaster. 
EFFECTS OF STIRRING THE SOU. 1 
The experiments related i i “ Notes from the 
Rural Grounds,” in the Rcual New Yoi-kru ot 
Oct. 19rii, are remarkably interesting. The re¬ 
sults are not iu the least surprising. Indeed, £ 
tnty might have been foreseen by a careful con¬ 
sideration of the behavior of water held iu sus¬ 
pension by porous bodies. A sponge or a mass 
of loose, fine soil offers an exceedingly favor- 1 
able opportuuity for the absorption of Water, 1 
because there is a very large number of particles ' 
of matter contained in these, the surface of each 
of which exerts a powerful attraction for water. ’ 
It is a well-known fact that the finer the parti¬ 
cles of a porous mass, the more rapid and the 
greater is the power of absorbing water that is 
exerted by these particles. Another well known 
fact is that the wore rapidly water is absorbed 
by a soil, the sooner it is evaporated from it. 
Bo, a soil tbit absorbs water slowly, holds more 
of it at the point of saturation and parts with it 
slowly. 
But these experiments do not, to my mind, in¬ 
clude the whole question involved iu the prac¬ 
tice universally followed by good farmers, and 
recommended by well-informed agricultural writ 
ers, viz., the frequent stirring of the Hoil in dry 
weather, for the aVoWtd purpose of aiding the 
growing crop to hotter supply its roots with 
moisture. If they did, there would be a conflict 
of fact with fact. For it is a fact that the stir¬ 
ring of the soil during dry. hot weal her does 
prevent a corn crop from curling its leaves, 
turning yellow or willing ; also that pu'.verjzmg 
the kui tace o‘ a clay soil in dry weather does 
prevent it from cracking deeply, as a compact ‘ 
Boil will di; and lastly it is a fact, kuowu very 
well to many farmers this very season, that uu- 
plowed stubbles havo been so dry that it was 
impossible to plow them for fall crops, while 
those that had been once plowed oould be moss- 
plowed without d.fibulty. 
It is not a simple question whether or not a 
loose soil evaporates water more quickly than 
any other; but, does a loose Boil supply more 
water to a growing crop in dry weather, when 
evaporation is active, than a oompact Boil ? In 
the experiment referred to. the pet containing 
loose soil became saturat' d with water in the least 
time Tnis is a vital poiut, and actually proves 
the practice of “ stirring the soil,” "loosening 
it,” pulverizing it, to be really "the farmer’s 
best method of protecting his crops during ftea- 
Honauf drought." For if apulveiiz d soil has 
an increased power of absorbing moisture, that 
is the very thing that is wanted. Suppose the 
moistnro i? evaporated quickly, wiiat then ? Do 
not the roots get their share ? How do we know 
what ©mall proportion of the moisture escapes 
the roots and is wasted on the dry atmosphere ? 
In the experiments in question, there wore uo 
growing plantB and the action of the roots of a 
crop did not enter into the result. But iu prac¬ 
tice this is of the greatest importance. 
Again, this very anil that los< s the tno ftlure 
meat rapidly, most quickly regains a new sup¬ 
ply, and this now supply may come from the 
subsoil or from the condensation iu the cooler 
almoH| here during the night, when the warmer 
soil will receive greedily a large quantity of 'be 
precipitated moisture. Besides, this very quick¬ 
ened circulat ion of moisture, this rapid absorp¬ 
tion and quick evaporation, will leui to bring to 
the routs of the plant a much larger supply of 
food contained iu solution in the water and de¬ 
posited in the biufaoo soil by the prooesa ot 
evaporation, or actually carried into the roots 
1 in the increased supply of moisture. It seems 
clour to me that the conclusion ‘'that this ad¬ 
vice (to stir the soil,) is wrong in theory and 
■ wrong in prao'ioe,” is itself wrong, and tbo ro- 
• verse is actually proved to he right, hy these 
I very experiments ; and tnat iu this instance tha 
> complainant has positively proved the dt-feud- 
. ant’s case. Henux Stewart. 
retarding the evaporation of moisture, and as he 
does “not take into consideration at all the 
amount of moisture a loose soil may take from 
the air more than the compact soil,” or the dif¬ 
ference between them in thedding or absorbing 
rains, or Home other attendant questions, the 
conclusion he reaches is qnite adverse to any 
such laborious operations. He expresses this 
conclusion in the following somewhat positive 
language: 
“ From experiments which we have been con¬ 
ducting for the past three years, we have been 
forced to the conclusion that this advice [to stir 
the soil] is entirely erroneous—wrong in theory 
—wrong in practice. Stirring the soil dees not 
disconnect the capill-ry tubes—does not act as a 
mu’ch i due 3 not preserve the moisture either 
in seasons of droughts or in auy other soa-ons, 
and that, consequently, in so far as this princi¬ 
ple is concerned. the incalculable amount of la¬ 
bor performed to this end, has not only baen 
performed to no purpose, but to the accomplish¬ 
ment of results precisely the reverse of those 
intended." 
If stirrieg the soil re compared with leaving 
it hard and compact., does not enable a crop, 
either iu farm or garden, bolter to withstand 
drought,—if it does not, mother words, increase 
tbo available store of moisture for the growth 
of plants—au incalculable amount of labor has 
indeed been wasted, as our contemporary re¬ 
mark?, aud many practical farmers and gard¬ 
eners have been Badly misled iu trusting to tbo 
evideuce of their iCusas. The more rapid the 
evaporation the gruu'er ihe absorptive power, 
whether from KUbsott below, or atmosphere 
above. In one of the experiments here narrated, 
a foot of compact soil required nearly tinea 
times as long to absorb a certain amount of 
moisture, as one in which the soil was loosely 
Bitted. Place the two between a comparatively 
never-failing store of moisture beneath, and an 
intermittent supply from above, aud which 
would best sustain the constant drafts upon its 
moisturo from the immense demands of a heavy 
crop, as well as the action of the rain and wind 
upon Its own surface ? 
As we write, an associate states that once in 
cutting a culvert four feet iu depth from a cul¬ 
tivated field across a Country road, iu a vety 
dry lime, ho found the Boil in the field moist 
up to within twelve inches of the surface, whils 
that under the closely compacted road was dry 
downtotho full depth of digging. Aud yet wo 
do not doubt that evaporation took place much 
more rap.dly in the field thau in the road. 
CULTURE AS AFFECTIXB THE MCIOTURE OF THE SOIL. 
U.npeh the above heading, the O mo try Gen¬ 
tleman Bays:— “A writer iu the Bubal Nkw- 
Youker has made the curious discovery that it 
is a great mistake to keep the soil mellow with 
a view to retain iu it a supply of moisture for 
growing crops. He is surprised to find that 
Btirriug and loosening and pulverizing the soil— 
its culture, in point of fact—facilitate# instead of 
A MOTE F.10M PROFESSOR S. W. JOHNSON. 
We hrve rtoTved from Professor 3 W. John¬ 
son. of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment 
Station, a note in which ho says : 
“I read witu much interest in the Bubal of 
Oot. 19, the ortifie in 1 Moisture retaining Pow¬ 
er of Boils ’ and am dcatruns of obtaining a sara- 
p!o of soil exactly similar to that there used, for 
making some o mpariacn in the apparatus used 
here iu similar trials. Oar re.-ults (see report 
for 1877. p 79, note,) show or indicate that the 
greatest power of cipillary transmission of 
water occurs in Boil, or soil-like media, of a 
certain grade of fineness of particle and pore, 
and that either coarser or finer pores transmit 
water more Blowly. 
—--*~*~*~- 
FARMING IN KANSAS. 
h. J, TEMPLIN. 
This 3;ato has lately attracted a great deal of 
attention as an agricultural region, »nd people 
in great numbers havo been flocking hero, not 
ouly from all the States cast of the Misbisrippt 
River, but from every country in Europe. The 
equable and healthy climate, and the generally 
fertile soil, make it probably the most desirable 
pLce for the em grant to be found on the glebe. 
Bat it should not bo forgotten that there arc 
DRAWBACKS IN KANSAS. 
Mauy come hero apparently under the con¬ 
viction that if they c.iu but reach this laud, all 
their troubles will bo oven-; th. ir “bread ai d 
their wrier will t© sure." whetbei they work or 
-not. Some have an idea that if they e in but 
get a title to a piece of laud, their fortunes are 
made. Now, it should bo borne in mind that 
thiB country, like all other parts of this conti¬ 
nent, is liable to an occasional drought, and 
with our hot sunshine at‘d diyiug winds, there 
droughts aro apt to prove quite damaging to 
crops. Ag-.iu, an occasional visitation of the 
R ,cky Mountain Locusts causes a wide discrep¬ 
ancy between the expectations of spring and the 
realizations of the uutiunu. 
Nor is all the laud of this fitato first cla?« 
agricultural land. Au occasional bluff or hill is 
found so fuU of rock aud so steep that it cannot 
be brought into cultivation. Then, a ridge o 
sand hills will he seen extouding for mi ee. 
These areont/ fit for grazing. Iu smmi fow 10 ‘ 
ditties salt marshes will bo found tnat ate 
utterly useless, except for th© manufacture or 
tialt. But all of these together do not occupy 
probably more than one aero to a hunt red oi 
rich, tiliablo soil. People come hero to ingi'ge 
in farming, and the State has a fiu« olnuato an 
PLENTY OF LAND FOR PEW-COMERS, 
of a good, rich nature, to meet their wants 
