552 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
AU6 40 
T H E 
RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
A National Journal ior Country and Suburban Homes. 
Conducted by 
ILBEBT B. CA.BMAH. 
Address 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
No. 84 Park Row, New York. 
SATURDAY, AUGUST 19, 1882. 
Prop. A. E. Blount writes us that 
Prof. Iugersoll has reached the college at 
Fort Collins, and that he is now ready 
for duty. “We expect,” he says, “to 
make this college one of the best in the 
land for the purpose it was established. 
We shall introduce mechanics at once, 
military tactics, etc.” Success to the col¬ 
lege ! May Prof. Blount’s hopes be speed¬ 
ily and more than realized. 
- 1 ♦ ♦- 
A personal letter from Sir J. B. 
Lawes (under date of July 26th,) informs 
us that his associate, Dr. Gilbert, took a 
bertli in the Servia which was to have left 
Liverpool on the 11th of August, and that 
he proposes to read a paper at Montreal 
“about the end of the month,” the title 
being the “Determination of Nitrogen in 
the Experimental Field at Rothamsted 
and the Bearing of the Results on the 
Question of the Sources of Nitrogen in 
our Crops.” Sir John is not aware what 
Dr. Gilbert’s plans are afterwards, but he 
is not expected to return before the end of 
October. 
-- »♦+- 
Editor Rural New-Yorker: 
I am deeply regretful to learn that the 
Rural New-Yorker is not an independ¬ 
ent, unbiased paper, as I see you insert 
Hale’s garbled extract of my letter, with 
other remarks to show you are a little 
afraid of somebody. My entire letter to 
Messrs. Hale will appear in the Massachu¬ 
setts Ploughman, Saturday, and I hope you 
will do me the justice to insert it in the 
Rural. Truly Yours, 
Aug. 5th. C. M. Hovey. 
We ask Mr. Hovey how we could have 
known or suspected that Mr. Hale’s ex¬ 
tract from his letter was “garbled?” 
There is just one thing that the Rural 
New-Yorker u “afraid of”—and that is 
of doing injustice. That the venerable 
Massachusetts horticulturist should from 
the single circumstance which he men¬ 
tions, conclude that the Rural New- 
Yorker is not “independent,” is not, it 
seems to us, in accordance with a gener¬ 
ous view of the facts. 
. - •-*-* - 
Last Fall we sowed two small plots of 
wheat beside each other, one being the 
Black-bearded Centennial, the other the 
so-called “Golden Grains.” The first had 
been raised upon the Rural Farm for 
four years «s a Winter wheat—the other 
for the first time. The Centennial yielded 
well, while but one plant of the Golden 
Grains survived the Winter. A portrait 
of the largest head from this plant will 
be shown in our Fair Number. It is hard 
to distinguish small heads of the Centen¬ 
nial from the average head of the Golden 
Grains. But the largest heads of the 
Centennial Beem to be twice as large and 
heavy as the Golden Grains, though the 
breasts of the latter are closer together. 
We have all along held the opinion the 
two kinds were identical, and in this 
opinion we have been supported by seve¬ 
ral noted wheat-growere. We think now T 
that they are different, though resembling 
each other closely in several decided 
peculiarities; as, for instance, the mon¬ 
strous size of the grain; its color; the 
falling off of the beards, etc., etc. The de¬ 
mand for this showy wheat is something 
altogether unparalleled. 
Is a heavy growth of tops an evidence 
of a heavy growth of potato tubers? Is a 
small growth of tops an evidence of alight 
growth of tubers? What is the relation 
between the growth of the tops and tu¬ 
bers? We have asked these questions sev¬ 
eral times. The Director of the New 
York Agw Ex. Station has been making 
experiments to answer these questions, 
and the following gives an inkling of the 
conclusions he is likely to arrive at: lie 
says that they found that at no time has 
there been any definite relation between 
the appearance of the tops and the tuber 
formation at the roots. At no time could 
they ever feel certain that abundance of 
top meant abundance or earliness of tu¬ 
ber, or that small tops meant a deficiency 
of tubers. The conclusion, Mr. Sturtevant 
remarks, is an interesting one, in view of 
the fact that upon the manured and un¬ 
manured portions of the field planted 
with varieties at no time has there been 
any appearance of superiority of the ma¬ 
nured over the unmanured portion. 
Judging from the tops alone, he thinks, 
as many visitors said, the unmanured 
portion of the field shows a decided su¬ 
periority over the manured portion. 
Speaking for the Rural experiments of 
this year, we may say that we have never 
before on our heavily fertilized plots had 
so great a growth of vine. Up to this 
time, we have no evidence of an unusu¬ 
ally large yield of tubers. 
■ « i» ■ 
EUROPEAN CROP INFORMATION. 
The State Department at Washington 
has lately received advices from Consul 
Tanner, of Liege, Belgium, showing that 
the crops of England and Belgium have 
suffered severely through protracted wet 
weather. Belgian farmers do not hope for 
more than half a wheat crop. Irish pota¬ 
toes, we are told, are taken out of the soil 
so wet that they begin to rot a week after 
they are gathered. Large importations 
of tubers will, the Consul thinks, be ne¬ 
cessary, and American farnrers are strong¬ 
ly urged to devise means for placing their 
Irish potatoes on the markets of Brussels 
and Antwerp, where they will meet with 
a ready sale the coming Winter. In view 
of our large crop of potatoes this year, 
and of the consequent comparatively 
low priceB that are likely to prevail, it is 
to be hoped that our enterprising citizens 
will avail themselves of all profitable for¬ 
eign markets, thus raising the prices for 
the producers by lessening the pressure 
on the home markets. The Consul’s re¬ 
port agrees with our European mail ad¬ 
vices with regard to the poor condition of 
the crops; but Special Agent Moffat, late¬ 
ly sent to London by the Agricultural 
Department to collect crop statistics, 
cabled last Thursday that wheat in Eng¬ 
land promises an average crop of good 
quality; that France will have a medium 
crop, slightly damaged by rain in the 
blooming period; that in Germany recent 
heavy rains have deteriorated the quality 
of a fairly abundant harvest; that Russia 
and Austria will have average wheat 
crops, while Hungary will have one- 
fifteenth per cent, above the average. 
The European outlook Mr. Moffat con¬ 
siders favorable for a medium production 
with some deterioration in quality. This 
report is certainly somewhat more favor¬ 
able than any other we have seen. 
•-- 
OUR FOREIGN TRADE. 
As a general thing, statistics are unin¬ 
teresting reading, but there is no other 
standard by which we can measure not 
only national but even individual decline 
or growth; hence we here give place to 
a few figures culled from the vast array 
which the Treasury Department at Wash¬ 
ington has compiled to show the extent 
of our foreign commerce during the fiscal 
year ending June 30th, 1832 The total 
volume of the trade, export and import, 
between this country and the rest of the 
world amounted to the enormous sum of 
$1,566,859,456; but iD 1880-1881 it reach 
ed the still more magnificent figures of 
$1,775,024,318. Our European friends, 
and especially our English cousins, often 
complain that our tariff laws render us 
very poor customers of theirs, yet last 
year our imports of merchandise bought 
from them were far and away above those 
for any former twelve months,being $724,- 
000,000, against $667,000 in 1880, and 
$642,000,000, in 1881. On the other 
hand, the exports show a decline from 
$835,000,000 in 1880, and $902,000,000 in 
1881, to only $750,000,000 for the year 
ending with last June—$152,000,000 in a 
single year! Twenty-two years ago our 
total exports were in value only about 
double this amount; then a decrease of 
$150,000,000 in our foreign trade would 
have created a panic, now our products 
are so various, and the list of our exports 
so Jong, that this decline is hardly per¬ 
ceptible! It was due altogether to the 
short crops of last year, for compared 
with the crops of 1880, there was a de¬ 
crease of 1,200,000 bales of cotton; 118,- 
000,000 bushels of wheat, and 522,000, 000 
bushels of corn, and with such a deficit of 
production, a decrease of exports was un¬ 
avoidable, Leaving out the specie ac¬ 
count—the exports of which amounted 
to $49,000,000, and the imports to $42,- 
000,000—our exports exceeded our im¬ 
ports by only $25,727,856, against $259,- 
712,717 the previous year! Here is a 
tremendous falling off on the wrong side 
of the national ledger, due altogether to 
a mishap to the agriculture of the coun 
try 1 
---♦ ♦ ♦- 
A CATTLE SCARE. 
The bill passed by the Lower House of 
Congress on May 10th, raising the De¬ 
partment of Agriculture to the rank of 
an Executive Department, provided for 
the establishment of a Bureau of Animal 
Industry, one of whose duties would 
have been to send, wherever contagious 
disease might appear, competent officers 
who would be authorized to take summary 
measures for its suppression or confine¬ 
ment within existing limits. So soon as 
it whs foreseen by those who were inter¬ 
ested in the establishment of this Bureau, 
that the 8enate would not pass the Agri¬ 
cultural Department bill, another bill was 
straightway introduced providing for the 
establishment of the Bureau in connection 
with the present Department of Agricul¬ 
ture. We earnestly urged the necessity 
of such a measure, as did all who pay 
special attention to the stock interests of 
the country, but while Congress was 
eager to squander $20,000,000 on the “im¬ 
provement” of rivers and harbors on 
many of which nothing larger than a 
punt ever floated, it would not vote even 
$20,000 for the protection of the vast" 
cattle interests of the entire nation. 
This failure of Congre.s is likely to be 
brought prominently into notice by the 
ravages of what is termed a “Btrange dis¬ 
ease,” which has lately made its appear¬ 
ance among the cattle in Alabama, North 
Carolina, Virginia, W. Virginia and Penn¬ 
sylvania in the neighborhood of Reading. 
Wherever it has appeared “it has spread 
with alarming rapidity,” the telegrams 
tell us, in spite of a “rigid quaran¬ 
tine.” Agents of the Department of 
Agriculture have been sent to every place 
where the disease has appeared, except 
Pennsylvania, where the State Board of 
Agriculture has the matter in charge. 
A telegram from Wheeling tells us that 
in West Virginia Governor Jackson has 
established “a strict quarantine against 
all Southern cattle.” A telegram from 
Washington says the Agricultural De¬ 
partment believes the disease is splenic 
or Texas fever. Our contributor, Dr. 
Salmon, one of the Department Inspec¬ 
tors, who has been in southwestern Vir¬ 
ginia, near Abingdon, declares it to be a 
virulent form of splenic fever. A telegram 
from Chicago informs us that Dr. H. J. 
Detmers, of the Veterinary Division of 
the Agricultural Department, has been 
directed to proceed to Ft. Worth where he 
is to devote his time and attention to the 
study of Texas fever among the cattle of 
the Southwest. From a number of other 
telegrams from different points we learn 
that the disease is rapidly fatal in nearly 
every case wherever it has newly ap¬ 
peared, the stricken animals dying with¬ 
in from 24 to 48 hours after having been 
attacked. No treatment has as yet been 
successful, and a good deal of consterna¬ 
tion prevails among cattle owners in what¬ 
ever section the disease has appeared. 
Amidst the alarm it is consolatory to re¬ 
member that Texas fever can never be¬ 
come a permanent plague here, as a sharp 
frost detroys the germs of the disease. 
. -- 
A COUPLE OF POINTS IN THE OLEO¬ 
MARGARINE WAR. 
We are pleased to notice that many of 
the most influential non-agricultural pa¬ 
pers all over the country are directing 
public attention to the abuses connected 
with the manufacture and sale of oleo¬ 
margarine and kindred products. We 
are credibly informed that in this State 
alone there are nearly 100 places where 
these concoctions are turned out chiefly 
in small quantities and in a quiet way, 
while the capacity for manufacture in 
this city alone is stated to be large 
enough to turn out a greater amount of 
these products than the entire make of 
genuine butter in the whole State. At a 
low estimate two-thirds of the vast pro¬ 
duction finds its way to the table under 
a false name, and the only way to prevent 
fraud in its sale appears to be to forbid 
the mixture of coloring matter with it. 
Uncolored, the stuff can readily be recog¬ 
nized, and those who have a taste for it 
can buy it on its merits. 
The act passed by the Legislature of 
this State on May 24th, prohibiting the 
coloring of oleomargarine, butterine and 
adulterated cheese, appears to us to be 
ample to secure this end in spite of the 
proviso that “nothing in this act shall 
be so construed as to interfere with or 
abridge any right obtained, secured or 
guaranteed by law of Congress or by pa¬ 
tent duly granted by the United States 
Government.” Only two patents have 
been taken out in this country for the 
manufacture of these products. The 
Mege patent originally granted to the 
Commercial Manufacturing Company of 
this city on December 30th, 1873, >md re¬ 
issued on June 13th, 1882, is that under 
which the vast bulk of the products, that 
are not made clandestinely, is manufac¬ 
tured. The Cosine patent granted to 
Garret Cosine, of this city, on February 
15th, 1876, covers a different process of 
making artificial butter “from oleine and 
margarine as obtained from animal fatR, 
fruits, and vegetable nuts, with lactic 
acid and loppered cream or milk.” 
Both of these patents are now before us 
and neither in the “specification” nor in 
the “claim” of either is there a woid said 
about coloring the product. The above 
proviso, therefore, will not permit the 
coloring of the imitation products for¬ 
bidden by the rest of the bill, on the 
ground that the Mege or Cosine patent 
secures the right of doing so. 
But here comes another feature of the 
matter. Several patents have been issued 
for dissolving annatto and preparing 
pigments for coloring fats. Can the pre¬ 
parations covered by these patents be 
used for coloring oleomargarine, in spite 
of the law prohibiting it? If a person has 
a right to use a patented invention or 
process in defiance of State authority, 
legislative or constitutional, it seems evi¬ 
dent that all the State laws and constitu¬ 
tional amendments prohibiting the man¬ 
ufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors, 
from Maine to Iowa, may be rendered 
nugatory and void. All a distiller or a 
brewer would have to do would be to 
employ some of the multitude of process¬ 
es or devices for the manufacture of 
spirits or beer. If this rule does not ap¬ 
ply to “potables,’’why should it to “edi¬ 
bles”? 
-*-*-♦- 
BREVITIES. 
Accounts from all parts continue that ap¬ 
ples are dropping badly. 
Many of the new potatoes which are now 
describrd as best in quality are entirely taste¬ 
less. The flesh is white, cooks mealy, etc., 
but there is no flavor. Is tastelessness an es¬ 
sential constituent of the “best quality” in 
potatoes? 
After a long, an inexcusably long delay, 
the printing of the census reports is at length 
to be pushed rapidly to completion. They 
will comprise 30 quarto volumes of 900 pages 
each. Ten thousand copies of the complete 
work, and an extra 10,000 volumes on popu¬ 
lation and agriculture are to be printed, to¬ 
gether with 100,000 copies of a compendium 
in one volume. This will be the largest 
printing job ever given out in this country— 
the printing alone will cost about 11,000,000. 
Hogs are remarkably scarce in the West. 
Owing to the high price of corn, farmers have 
sold their grain instead of feeding it to the 
stock, so that now few but stock hogs are in the 
market and these are considered unfit for con¬ 
sumption. For the first time in the history of 
pork packing, all the large packing houses 
in Chicago, except Armour & Co., have tem¬ 
porarily suspended packing. The stoppage of 
the Anglo-American Packing and Provision 
Company, Atkinson A Co., the Chicago Pack¬ 
ing and Provision Company and others 
has thrown 2,500 men out of” employment, 
while Armour & Co., and the smaller con¬ 
cerns still packing, have greatly curtailed 
operations. Paekiug hogs at present pric ?s is 
considered a losing operation, and hogs are not 
expected to be cheaper before next Fall. 
The value of the cotton crop has been en¬ 
hanced 25 per cent, within a comparatively 
short time by the utilization of the seed for 
the production of oil and other products for 
which there is an increasing demand. With¬ 
in the last ten years 50 mills have been built 
for the manipulation of the seed which for¬ 
merly was permitted to lie rotting round the 
gin-house, or, at best, was drawn out on the 
plantation as a fertilizer. As brought from 
the field, the boll is one-third lint and two- 
thirdB seed, so that for every 400-pound bale 
of lint that goes to market, 800 pounds of 
seed remain behiud. Not half of this is yet 
utilized to the best advantage, but as the 
price of seed has advanced from $6 to $12 
within a year, it is probable that more atten¬ 
tion will be bestowed ou its utilization in 
future. 
From its first settlement by the w hite men 
this country haB always had a superabund¬ 
ance of indigenous insects injurious to agri¬ 
culture, but to this superabundance frequent 
additions have been made by foreign import¬ 
ations—hitherto exclusively, or uearly so, 
from the other side of the Atlantic. A cable¬ 
gram from Havaua, on the 10th, however, 
threatens us with a possible invasion from 
South America. A species of locust is now 
devastating the Republic of Columbia, and 
the President of the Central Board of Agri¬ 
culture of that State warus the captains of 
vessels trading with Cuba to take effective 
measures to prevent the larvae and the locusts 
from being introduced into the “Ever Faith¬ 
ful Island.” by vessels engaged iu the heavy 
cattle trade from Columbia to Cuba. The lo¬ 
custs are rapid travelers and of enormous fe¬ 
cundity, and after reaching Cuba it would 
not be long till they would invade this coun¬ 
try. This is a class of immigrants we want 
less even than we want the European paupers 
and criminals dumped upon our shores. 
