72 
FEB 2 
THE 
flURAU NEW-YORKER. 
ANTI-“ SLICKENS” VICTORY IN CALI¬ 
FORNIA. 
Conducted by 
RLBKRT 8. CARMAN. 
Address 
THE RURAL NEW YORKER, 
No. 34 Park Row. New York. 
SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1884. 
In our last issue, by an oversight, page 
52 should have been 53, and page 53 
should have been 52. We were much 
pained that this oversight should have oc¬ 
curred. _ _ 
A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR. 
I am obliged to state that owing to 
sickness for the past ten days or more, I 
have been unable to give my usual at¬ 
tention to the Rural New-Yorker, and 
that many personal letters remain unan¬ 
swered. I beg the indulgence of friends 
for a time, hoping soon to be able fully 
to resume my work. k. s. carman. 
- ♦ - 
Dr. Lawes (England) writes us, under 
date of January 8, as follows: “Unlike 
you, we are having an exceedingly mild 
Winter and Spring. Flowers are bloom¬ 
ing in the woods. My wheats are looking 
very well and the prospect of the wheat 
trade is towards lower prices. 
-- » » ♦ - 
Suppose you could have as many apples 
and oranges of the best quality as you 
wanted. Which would you eat the more 
of ? Speaking of oranges — always buy 
the rusty, nisseted or bronzed - coated 
oranges when you can fiud them. They 
sell for less than the others because there 
is a prejudice against them on account of 
the dull, soiled-looking skin. But they 
are sweeter than any others and generally 
more plump and juicy. They will soon be 
appreciated. We observe that many of 
them are without seeds. Now, note what 
we say about the ru stv-coated orange. 
MILK ASSOCIATIONS. 
Springfield, Massachusetts, has risen 
against the milk-dealers and at once sub¬ 
scribed $1,200 outof the $20,000 required 
to buy 1,000 cows for cooperative milk 
production and distribution. By this 
means the price of milk will be reduced 
to the consumer while its quality will be 
improved, yet the producers will obtain 
a larger profit for their product. There 
is nothing new in this plan. As long ago 
as 1872 a milk association was formed at 
Syracuse, New York, with a capital of 
$25,000. It now has a four-story brick 
building, with office, hall and directors’ 
room, stalls for 25 horses, a repair shop 
and 20 regular milk routes on which it 
supplies a population of 40,000. Were 
the work done as it is usually performed 
by middlemen, 70 men and horses would 
be required to do the same work. Milk, 
which here and in other large cities is re¬ 
tailed at from eight to ten cents a quart 
by middlemen, is sold direct to consumers 
at Syracuse for six cents a quart, and it is 
not watered or otherwise adulterated. 
Be tween tin- producers who supply milk for 
this market and the middlemen who dis¬ 
tribute it there is such constant danger of 
disagreement that it would lie wise in the 
former to take steps to do away with the 
necessity for the latter by supplying the 
milk direct to consumers, as it has been 
so successfully done m Syracuse. Already 
milk associations have been formed 
among the producers in Orange. Sullivan 
aud Delaware Counties, New York, and 
Sussex and Hunterdon Counties, New 
Jersey, as well as in the Housatonic re¬ 
gion of Connecticut, and on January 14 
last, representatives of these associations 
met in this city and decided the fol¬ 
lowing should be the unalterable whole¬ 
sale prices per quart for milk the coming 
year:—April, 3 1-4 cents; May, 2 1-2 
cents; June, 2 1-2 cents; July and Au¬ 
gust, 3 cents; September, 3 1-4 cents; 
October, 3 1-2 cents; November, 4 1-2 
cents; December and January, 4 cents; 
February and March, 3 1-2 cents All 
farmers who supply this market are urged 
to sustain these figures, in case the pro¬ 
ducers cxinnot obtain these reasonable 
prices from the dealers, it ought not be 
difficult for them to organize one or more, 
milk associations on the Syracuse plan. 
In Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis we 
understand that similar movements are on 
foot, and in smaller places all over the 
country such co-operation among neigh¬ 
boring farmers should be less difficult and 
more effective. 
Almost the entire gold product of Cali¬ 
fornia is found in the great auriferous belt 
on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada, 
extending from Fort Tejon northward 
into Oregon, and measuring about 220 
miles long by about 40 wide; though the 
deposits of the northern and southern ex¬ 
tremities of the belt are comparatively in¬ 
significant. Owing to the way gold is de¬ 
posited, three distinct modes of mining 
have arisen : namely, placer, quartz ancl 
hydraulic. In the first the metal is ob¬ 
tained by washing the auriferous gravel, 
in which process the gold, owing to its 
great specific gravity, is readily separated 
from the sand and earthy matter. Owing 
to its great simplicity this was at first the 
principal mode of mining, as any one pos¬ 
sessed of a pick, shovel ancl “cradle” 
could practice it; now, however, it has 
been almost entirely superseded by the 
other methods which require more capital, 
skill and machinery. In quartz mining 
the rock is crushed in powerful mills and 
the gold extracted by amalgamation. 
In hydraulic mining water from the 
melting snows and heavy periodical rains 
on the upper Sierras, is collected in large 
reservoirs on the sides of the mountains, 
whence it is conveyed down to the mining 
sections in huge pipes from which by 
means of powerful nozzles compact, 
continuous streams are directed with tre¬ 
mendous force upon banks, walls, lulls 
and mountain-sides in which the precious 
metal is deposited in minute scales, coarse 
grains and larger pieces more or less 
water-worn and mixed with sand and 
gravel. Some of these nozzles discharge 
185,000 cubic feet, of water au hour and 
work uninterruptedly . day and night 
throughout, the year. Under the enor¬ 
mous pressure the whole side of a hill 
may be torn out and crushed to powder 
with inconceivable rapidity, large bould- 
ders are knocked about like pebbles, and 
the gravel, detritus, etc., are enormous in 
quantity. The matter thus loosened, to¬ 
gether with the water, is received in 
sluices in which the gold having been pre¬ 
cipitated is collected, while the worthless 
debris falls like an avalanche into t he ad¬ 
joining canyons which form the beds of 
running streams. Thence it is swept down 
into the tributaries of the Sacramento 
River, raising the beds of these all the 
while, and covering the rich riparian 
bottom lands during the Winter and 
Spring floods. 
The extent to which the beds ot the 
streams may be raised and their once fer¬ 
tile banks submerged by such enormous 
and incessant discharges of dCbris may be 
illustrated by the case of the Yuba Kiver, 
a tributary of the Feather River which in 
turn flow’s into the Sacramento. Before 
hydraulic mining began, the Yuba flowed 
between steep banks 15 to 20 feet high at 
low water. On either side stretched a 
strip of black alluvial soil a mile and a 
half wide and beyond this extended a 
second terrace, of splendidly productive 
soil, both affording abundant harvests to 
the thrifty farmers who rejoiced in their 
fertility. Now the mean highf. of the Yuba 
bed is 25 feet greater than it was 15 years 
ago and in some places it has been raised 
as much as 80 feet. The rich bottom 
lands have been buried under 25 feet of 
dfibris or “ sliekena, ” and the higher lauds 
back of them have been rendered worth¬ 
less for farming purposes. In spite of 
strenuous efforts to shut out the “slick - 
ens” by levees, it isestimated that already 
35 miles of ferule farming lands have been 
irretrievably lost. The navigability of the 
upper Sacramento River and its affluents 
has been entirely ruined or greatly impair¬ 
ed by this cause; the towns ou the rivers 
have* been destroyed or nearly so owing t o 
the reduced area of the neighboring 
farming lands and the heavy taxes re¬ 
quired to maintain the high embank¬ 
ments by which they arc saved from sub¬ 
mergence under torrents of mud. The 
waters of the rivers have become so 
charged with gravel and other detritus 
that they are unfit for stock or for any do¬ 
mestic purpose, and often they are unsuit¬ 
able eveu for irrigation. 
For years a bitter and stubborn strug¬ 
gle has been going on between the far¬ 
mers of the fertile bottom lands of the 
Sacramento Valley and the gold-seeking 
corporations higher up the mountains. 
Most of the latter are composed exclu¬ 
sively of foreigners who care absolutely 
nothing for the terrible havoc wrought 
among the native agriculturists by their 
efforts to tear from American soil enor¬ 
mous wealth to be spent abroad. The 
question lias been repeatedly before the 
State Courts, and violence has often been 
threatened. A recent decision of Judge 
Sawyer of the United States Circuit Court 
at San Francisco in a test case brought 
by a landowner on the Yuba against the 
North Bloomfield Hydraulic Mining Com 
pany, has caused great public rejoicing 
among the people of the Sacramento Val¬ 
ley, by enjoining the company from deposit¬ 
ing dbbr is in any of the feeders of navigable 
streams. The case has been appealed, but 
there is little fear that the decision will be 
overruled by the U. S. Supreme Court at 
Washington. People everywhere should 
rejoice at this decision which cuts off one 
of the heads of the hydra, monopoly. 
THE RESERVED POWER OF THE 
FARMERS. 
The concentration of wealth and its 
various influences into comparatively few 
hands, and the consolidation of these 
powerful influences by association into 
corporations, have become a serious mat¬ 
ter for thought and consideration by the 
farmers, who we have already shown are 
really entitled by their numbers to hold the 
balance of power in their own hands. A 
few figures may be given to show that the 
agricultural interest truly represents not 
onlv the grand leading industry in point { 
of numbers, but also the great mass of r 
the wealth of the country. The following 
figures, gathered from the returns of the 
last Census, show this to be the ease in 
the most conspicuous manner. 
The total number of persons directly 
engaged in agriculture is nearly twenty 
millions, including only the farmers and 
their families; that is, five persons, old 
and young, upon each of the four million 
farms. At least five million more are 
occupied as farm laborers, so that an 
actual majority of the population are 
directly engaged in agriculture as a means 
of support. That fact proves that the 
farmers are the leading class in the coun¬ 
try as regards numbers. 
The total value of farms amounts to 
$24,231,523,760, a sum that the mind of 
man utterly fails to comprehend. But 
we can grasp the idea more easily by con¬ 
sidering that each of the four million 
farms is worth, upon the average, for the 
land and the live stock and tools, the 
sum of six thousand dollars. The total 
value of all the yearly products of the 
farms averaged by the amount of the 
Census year of 1880, is $2,213,402,504, or 
about $500 for each farm. The reasona¬ 
bleness of this estimate is easily seen by 
this average sum, for it is wholly too 
small in fact by one-half, and taking the 
whole of the farm products and estimat¬ 
ing the full value of the farm income, 
including the support of the family and 
the actual cost of their living, which, of 
course, is derived from the faun, this 
estimate might be doubled and yet be 
reasonably within the truth. 
On the other hand, all the railroads in 
the country arc capitalized —not valued— 
at but $6,895,664,359, or less than a third 
of the value of the farms; while the 
yearly income is 1 ut $770,356,706. or less 
than one-third of the income of the farms 
at the least view taken, and but one-sixth 
if we take the more reasonable estimate 
of the true amount. At the same time 
the whole value of all the factories, work¬ 
shops and other industrial institutions in 
the aggregate is only $2,75)0,272,606, 
while the income is nearly one half of this 
amount, and less than one-half of the in¬ 
come of the farms at the lowest estimate 
of this, so that in point of actual wealth 
the farmers stand greatly ahead of all 
other classes of citizens combined, und 
very far ahead of the railroads which pre¬ 
tend to be the most important interest 
of the country, and claim the greatest 
share of the public consideration. The 
farmers produce the food and clothing 
material of the country; the railroads 
transport it; and the artisans work up a 
part of it into manufactured articles; 
while both of those classes subsist upon 
the farmers’work. How greatly superior 
then in actual industrial importance and 
in wealth are the farmers above all other 
classes combined. 
But these comparisons are made upon 
the basis of assumed truth in these figures; 
while it is a very well known fact that the 
valuation of the railroads is greatly over¬ 
estimated, and might be reduced more 
than one-half, and yet be in excess of the 
truth. For it is an actual fact, given 
without any attempt to disguise it, that in 
the three years, 1880-’8t-’82, all the rail¬ 
roads built iu the country cost $5)00,000,- 
000 only; while the capitalization was 
$2,028,646,842. The difference of more 
than eleven hundred million dollars was 
added to the actual cost, which ^whh 
more than doubled, for the sole and'dis- 
honest purpose of charging freights r and 
fares in excess of any reasonable and hon¬ 
est sum that might be required to pay a 
fair interest on the actual cost. And this 
is a mere instance in the history of the 
rail road industry of how enormous wealth 
has been created, fictitiously, in one way, 
bul actually in another, by a few men who 
monopolize control of this great interest. 
Thnt'tliis is a robbery, of the farmers 
principally, done under pretence of law, 
is easily seen, when, looking back upon 
the figures above given, we find that, the 
yearly income of the railroads amounts to 
11 percent, of the given cost; equal to 
$15 per head for every individual, young 
and old. in the country or to $75 for every 
family, poor or rich; and that the actual 
percentage of income on the real honest 
cost of the roads is nearer 25 per cent, than 
11. Or to put it in another way, by more 
than doubling the cost of the roads and 
by charging rates on this doubled cost, 
every family in the land is made to con¬ 
tribute about $40 each year in excess of 
what would be a fair charge to support 
these people who have made themselves 
enormously rich at the expense of the 
public, and of course chiefly at the cost of 
the farmers. The farmers have been 
taxed in this manner by an actual govern¬ 
ing class, who have usurped the functions 
of a government, and who are reallv very 
much less in number and in wealth than 
the public—and even thau tlie agricultural 
class alone,— whom they actually govern 
and tax. A country so ruled is not, a re¬ 
public but an aristocracy, aud yet it is the 
farmers’ votes which give the power by 
which a few men rule. And if we ask 
how and why these things are tlrns, and 
the farmers are thus overpowered by a 
class that are inferior in numbers and 
wealth to them, the answer is very sim¬ 
ple: the farmers do not think; they do 
not consider; they work single-handed 
without any association or combined ef¬ 
fort and influence, while their opponents, 
in the strife for existence and for pros¬ 
perity, are active, intelligent, thoughtful, 
watchful, combined, and resolute. They 
are leaders, and are used to control and 
coerce men; aud 90 tlie farmers, as a class, 
and the general public with them, fall 
single-handed and individually into their 
power and become their bondsmen. In¬ 
deed it is time that these things should be 
thought of and spoken of, and made sub¬ 
jects for the serious consideration of farm¬ 
ers. 
BREVITIES.; 
Mr P. J. Berckmaxs. who is now in con¬ 
sultation with the officials of the prospective 
World’s Exposition at New Orleans, writes us 
that they are giving horticulture “the most 
prominent place iu the programme." T*“ , 
Twelve degrees below zero were recorded by 
the thermometer at the Rural Grounds last 
Mondav morning at sunrise, and ten degrees 
below at the same time Tnesdav. During the 
past eleven years we have had so ]nw a tem¬ 
perature but’twice. There is hut little frost 
in the ground, being protected by a foot of 
snow. 
Thk Eariv Ohio Potato is perhaps as earlv 
as anv other. But it does not vield well with 
ns unless planted in a rich, sandy or gravelly 
loam. Let it he rememliered. however, that, 
the tons are always small: that the tubers 
form closely together and that the seed pieces 
therefore may be planted very eloselv togeth¬ 
er—sav one foot, apart in drills t wo feet apart,. 
We have never known this variety to bloom 
on our own premises. 
Thk third annual Ensilage'Congress met, in 
this citv on January 28, about 75 persons be¬ 
ing in attendance. Prof Manlv Miles, of the 
Massachusetts Agricultural College, read a 
verv interesting article nnon preventing 
aciditv in eusilage. He claimed that it. was 
caused by bacteria, and that could this acidity 
bo remedied, ensilage might he grentlv Im¬ 
proved in value as a fond. He thought that 
a heatof from 115 to 129 degrees would destroy 
the bacteria germs. Several persons piesent 
testified that ensilage was fatal to horses, and 
one gentleman from Connecticut "stated that 
out. of ten horses fed on ensilage fora week, 
eight died during that period. Ho thought 
death was caused by stomach worms, which 
were driven to the throat,' by the acid and 
caused strangulation. 
Tok Canadian Pacific Railroad Company 
from whose road so much was expected in the 
wav of building up the vast, agricultural terri¬ 
tory of the Northwest, has come to the end of 
its resources and credit. The Dominion Gov¬ 
ernment made enormous concessions of land 
to it. In-sides presenting it with a gift of he- 
t.ween 500 and 800 miles of road built at the 
public expense; itgave the company a virtual 
mouopolv as to route and rates, vet the road 
is only about half completed, and t he part yet 
to be built presents the greatest obstacles in 
the way of engineering and expense. The 
company being tumble to find a market for its 
stock, now asks the Canadian Government to 
build the road by guaranteeing' interest on the 
money that tnnv lie invested in the under¬ 
taking. It wants a guarantee of six per cent. 
Interest for to years. It, is generally believed 
that the Government will, in view of the 
guarantee already given and other large ad 
vauces made, take hack a ’part, of'the 25,00*“- 
000 acres of land given theVompany." 
