THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
THE 
RURAL NLW-YORKtR, 
t l. National Journal for Country and Suburban Ho.no 
Conducted by 
E. 8. CABMAN, 
j. 8. woobWAitn, 
Associate. 
Address 
THE RURAL NKW-VORKER, 
No. 34 Pahk Row, New VTork. 
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25. 1884. 
We beg to make the request of our 
subscribers and friends that they will 
kindly place the Rubai, posters, which we 
shall send them, in a conspicuous place. 
In this way the Rurai, New-Yorker 
may attract the particular attention of 
those who might otherwise hear of it only 
in a general way. We want to extend 
the Rural’s circulation largely for an¬ 
other year, and we make bold to hope 
that our subscribers will aid us. We also 
have to request that they will make an 
effort to send us at least one new sub¬ 
scriber with their own renewals. If our 
friends would only do this, we should 
need no other assistance. 
We trust also that our very liberal list 
of presents to subscribers sending us 
clubs, will compensate many for the ad- 
tional exertions they may be pleased to 
make. The lists of presents and pre¬ 
miums will be given in a supplement 
November 8th. 
-♦ - 
Eleven of the first eggs from our Wy- 
andottes weighed exactly one pound. 
This is a small average—but the later 
eggs will no doubt increase in size. They 
are nearly the color of Black Cochin eggs. 
- -- 
Thanks to many of the advertising pa¬ 
trons of the Rural New-Yorker, we 
shall he enabled to offer our friends a list 
of presents for clubs which they may 
seud, amounting to aUeaat $2,000, besides 
our regular premium lists, which will be 
more varied and’prescnt a greater number 
of articles than ever before. Our Free- 
Sced Distribution for another year, the 
gifts to our subscribers, and the regu¬ 
lar premium list, will be published in a 
sixteen-page * supplement early next 
month. We hope our friends will be¬ 
gin now to solicit subscriptions. The 
Rural proposes a lively campaign for 
1884-5. 
-- - 
IS IT CONTAGIOUS PLEUROPNEU¬ 
MONIA? 
The proposition of the Chicago Live 
Stock Exchange to place, wholly at their 
own expense, a herd ot sound cattle with 
animals declared to be infected with con¬ 
tagious pleuro pneumonia, to test its con¬ 
tagiousness, has been accepted by Gover¬ 
nor Hamilton of Illinois, who has directed 
Dr. Paaren, State Veterinarian, to make 
arrangements for the experiment. There 
is no"'doubt that the refusal of Dr. Sal¬ 
mon to accept. the proposal and the posi¬ 
tive denial of the contagiousness of the 
disease by the Exchange, have caused 
many to* doubt the correctness of the 
diagnoses made by the official authorities. 
This doubt has been strengthened by the 
leisurely spread of the malady, and the 
fact that in the West it seems to be con¬ 
fined exclusively to Jerseys. In European 
countries where it has been known and 
dreaded for years, it is extremely con¬ 
tagious, spreading rapidly from herd to 
herd, unless the utmost precautions are 
observed. There it exhibits no prefer¬ 
ence for cattle of any breed or age; but 
attacks all indiscriminately. Here, even 
in the absence of all precautions, it 
spreads so slowly that even in the 
Atlantic States it is confined to a few 
widely separated localities, although its 
existence has been proclaimed for over 
half a dozen years. In view of the seri¬ 
ous losses incurred by individuals and 
States by the slaughtering aud quarantin¬ 
ing of ailing animals: of the injury done 
our cattle trade with Europe by the re¬ 
ports of its prevalence hero, and of the 
alarm created among the stock-owning 
public, it is highly desirable that a de¬ 
cisive test should be made/as’soon as pos- 
sible, of the nature of the malady. 
WORK FOR THE INTERNATIONAL 
EXHIBITION. 
We would again urge upon our friends 
the importance of making, at the great 
New Orleans Exposition, fine displays of 
the agricultural, horticultural, and pomo- 
logical productions of their respective 
sections. The organization of the De¬ 
partment of Horticulture is as follows: 
Chief, Parker Earle, Cobden, Ill.; Com¬ 
missioner of Foreign Exhibits, P. J- 
Berckmans, Augusta, Ga.; Superinten¬ 
dent of the Division of Pomology, W. H. 
Regan, Oreencastle, Ind.; Superintendent 
of the Division of Plants and Trees, S. M. 
Tracy, Columbia. Mo. In many of the 
States committees to collect exhibits have 
I already been formed, and these will fur¬ 
nish all needed information to those living 
in their respective States. Where no such 
committees have been appointed, or 
where the address of any of them is not 
known, any of the above-named gentle¬ 
men will furnish information with regard 
to matters connected with his special de¬ 
partment, The managers of the Horticul¬ 
tural Department are earnest, energetic 
men, who are exerting themselves lo the 
utmost to make their department a bril¬ 
liant success, and it is earnestly hoped 
that horticultural and pomological socie¬ 
ties, as well as farmers’ clubs and private 
individuals everywhere, will second their 
laudable efforts." Freight charges will be 
paid on exhibits, and satisfactory com¬ 
pensation will be given for the time 
occupied in making collections, and also 
for the exhibits, if desired. In addition 
to liberal premiums on “Collective Ex¬ 
hibits,” the premiums offered for “Indi¬ 
vidual Exhibits” in this Department 
amount to $'.1,500. Let all public-spirited 
citizens help the good work! 
THE WHEAT CROP OF THE UNITED 
KINGDOM. 
The area under wheat in the United 
Kingdom for the present year, as given 
in the Agricultural Returns, is 2,745,485 
acres. Sir John B. Lawes, estimating the 
general crop from the yield on his experi¬ 
mental plots at Rathamstcd, puts the 
average at 29 3-8 bushels per aCie, and 
deducting 2 1-4 bushels for seed, cal¬ 
culates the available produce will be 
9,308,010 quarters, or 74,471 280 bushels. 
The estimated number of people to be 
fed, from September 1, 1884, to August 
31, 1885, is a little over 86,250,000. 
Allowing an average consumption of 5.65 
bushels per head, the requirements would 
amount to 205,029,592 bushels, or 130,- 
568,312 bushels more than the crop fur¬ 
nishes. The average price of wheat in 
England at present is 32s. 4d. per quar¬ 
ter, or 4s. l-2d— about 96 cents—per 
bushel, the lowest price on record, more 
especially when the excellent quality of 
the produce is considered. Many be¬ 
lieve, however, that it will reach 30s. a 
quarter. These figures do not pay far¬ 
mers, and the Times says they are prepar¬ 
ing to increase largely the consumption 
of their own wheat in stock feeding in 
the form of wheat, meal or grain arti¬ 
ficially sprouted. The domestic con- 
! sumption is therefore likely to be con¬ 
siderably greater than Dr. Lawes’s 
i estimate. Although English farmers are 
■ extremely slow in changing from their 
accustomed routine in farm operations, 
still it is expected they will considerably 
lessen their usual area under wheat, and 
be more careful than ever to sow' none 
■ but the most prolific and valuable varie¬ 
ties—a precaution which our own far¬ 
mers also would do w r ell to adopt. 
ments. bv the authorities, and the “relief 
fund” nearly always figures in the yearly 
financial estimates. Men, women and 
children die, not by hundreds, but by 
thousands and tens of thousands. . Often 
whole families, sometimes whole villages, 
are swept away by starvation or diseases 
resulting from scanty or improper food, 
for all sorts of unclean animals, weeds 
and refuse are devoured by the famish¬ 
ing wretches. No doubt famines are 
fewer and less destructive now than when 
the land was under native rulers; but it 
is shameful that they should exist, at ail, 
for the only shadow of justification for 
British supremacy in India lies in the as¬ 
sumption that the British government is 
far better for the people than a native 
government could be. 
EXTORTIONATE CHARGES. 
Although, owing to improvements in 
machinery and other causes, wheat is now 
produced at considerably less cost than 
even a quarter of a century ago, still it is 
coneeded on all hands that the figures at 
which it is at present Belling are below 
the average cost of production. 1 he low 
prices are due to over-production, or 
under-consumption; the dullness of man¬ 
ufacturing industries the world over, 
which reduces the purchasing capacity of 
the masses, and the unduly high charges 
of those who handle the crop on 
its way from the producer to the 
consumer. Acting on the principle 
of charging “what the traffic will 
bear,” when prices were good the rail¬ 
roads charged high rates of transporta¬ 
tion —rates far above those that would 
have afforded a fair profit—now that 
prices are bad, they no longer apply their 
usual rule to freight charges, which are 
little if utiv less than In past years. 
Thus they extort au unjust share of the 
profits of the producer, but refuse not only 
to share, but even to lighten his losses. 
But the elevator monopolists, etq>ecially 
those of Chicago, are more extortinate 
than even the railroad companies. It 
costs 15 cents a bushel to carry auv kind 
of grain a year in a Chicago elevator. 
This ia a shade less than 20 per cent on 
the present price of wheat; >3 per cent 
on the average price of corn, and 60 per 
cent on the average value of oats. With 
these exorbitant charges the elevators pay 
their owncra 20 per cent annually on the 
capital invested. Capitalists are deterred 
from building competing elevators aud 
thus lowering the charges, by the com¬ 
bined power and wealth of the. present 
rapacious monopolists aud their intimate 
connection with the railroads, which 
would refuse to allow the same rates for 
the same services to outsiders as to those 
inside the ring. As the storage charges 
at Chicago are twice as great as at Detroit, 
Toledo. Buffalo, Baltimore and New 
York, it is to be hoped that a good deal 
1 of the grain trade will be diverted from 
the Lake City unless these outrageous 
rates are speedily reduced. These and 
1 other overcharges are, of course, a tax on 
1 the farmers, for there is a good deal of 
truth in the old saying “The farmer pays 
for all.” 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER THE FAR¬ 
MERS’ ORGAN. 
FAMINE IN INDIA. 
While this country and, indeed, most 
of the world are this year blessed with a 
superabundance of food products, famine, 
as we learn by a late cablegram, is reach¬ 
ing serious proportions in Bengal, and 
native authorities claim that the govern¬ 
ment relief system is inadequate to the 
emergency. * Recent reports of the East 
Indian Agricultural Department spoke of 
abundant wheat crops aud a large surplus 
available for export; but though the 
country contains nearly 1,400,000 square 
miles and a population of upwards of 250,- 
000,000, there are. only 10,000 miles of 
railroad, and the difficulties of transport¬ 
ation from the sections in which food is 
abundant to that in which it is scarce, 
are, in many cases, so great that wheat 
could be taken from California to Bengal 
more cheaply and quickly than lrom some 
parts of the Noithwesterm Provinces or 
Berar. In no other part of the world are 
famines so frequent or so terribly fatal as 
among the teeming millions of Hindoostan. 
So common, indeed, are they in one prov¬ 
ince or another, that they arc annually 
taken into account, as disturbing ele- 
We are walehlllg with great Interest Tor the 
•'promised plan** (Page ot The Kl'kal.1 We want 
to see the day when farmers shall oreanlee and ex¬ 
tricate themselves from the thraldom of monopo¬ 
lies. We need a great, honest organizer, one that 
will not, cannot, be bought, to organize and instruct 
the farmers and organize the movement and carry 
It to success. We also want the press in our inter¬ 
est, and as Tux Rubal Is already firmly established, 
aud as the editors are not politicians, we feel that 
It would make a grand national farmers’ organ. 
Beatrice, Neb. 8 - E - v - 
That is just what we have labored so 
hard and so long to accomplish; we do 
want the American farmer to feel and 
know that the Rural New-Yorker is 
his organ, devoted entirely and unreserv¬ 
edly to his interests. Our highest ambi¬ 
tion and most ardent wish are to make it 
worthy of such confidence and of such a 
high position, by keeping it pure and 
making it instructive and elevating to the 
farmer and his family, and so long as we 
shall be spared, it shall always be found 
on the side of the farmer a9 against mo¬ 
nopolies of all kinds. Is not that a 
worthy ambition, aud is not the Rural 
to-day the farmers’ ideal paper? It is the 
only agricultural paper owned and edited 
by farmers—practical farmers; it is the 
only one owning a practical experiment 
station, conducted by the editors in person, 
solely for the use and benefit of it3 read¬ 
ers. We spend most of our time on these 
grounds and among these experiments, 
and our readers get the results and prac¬ 
tical benefits, with none of the cares. 
We have sent out more seeds and plants 
and more good things free to our subscri¬ 
bers. than have all the other agricultural 
papers in the world. We are continually 
hybridizing and crossing plants, and pro¬ 
ducing new varieties and testing them; 
and as good as some of the things we 
have sent out have proven to be, we firm¬ 
ly believe we have m store some things 
that will greatly surpass even the best, 
and all these and more vet coming are for 
the benefit of our subscribers. Then, are 
we not in truth doing more for the farmers 
than other farm papers? Yes, emphati¬ 
cally the Rural New-Yorker is the 
farmers’ organ. It. is equally true that we 
are not politicians faitber than that we 
arc farmers and belong with them, and 
in any issue of the farmer as against any 
and all antagonistic inteiests we shall 
always be found with ihe farmers, and 
we, too, hope to see the day when far¬ 
mers will organize and exert the influence 
which justly belongs to them. To do 
this, they must read more, study more, 
think more, be better faimers, and more 
willing to make sacrifices to advance their 
cause. ___ 
PROPOSED ANNEXATION OF THE AN- 
I TILDES TO THE DOMINION. 
The journey to England lately under- 
aken by Sir John Macdonald, the Cana- 
lian Premier, is thought to have for its 
hief object energetic action with a view 
o the speedy annexation of the British 
[Vest Indian islands to the Dominion, 
ind Lord Derby, Secretary for the Colo- 
lies, is said to have withdrawn his oppo- 
lition to the scheme, and to have ex 
pressed a willingness to consent to the 
neasure. The acquisition of the islands 
would add materially to the population 
md resources of the Dominion. Tn 1881 
Ihe Canadian Provinces contained 4,350,- 
[)00 inhabitants, while the British West 
Indies, including the Bahamas and Ber¬ 
mudas, had about 1,250,000. Tn 187H 
Jamaica alone bad 558,000 souls, and 
three years afterwards Barbadoes was 
credited with 171,000; and Trindad with 
more than 150,000; altogether, the fresh 
accession of population would be about 
equivalent to that of the Province of 
Quebec. 
Of the present productions of the 
principal islands no statistics are acces¬ 
sible to us; but they can be inferred 
from figures covering the years 1865 to 
1879. During this period the average 
annual valuation of imports into Jamaica 
was $0,735,000, against $0,790,000 of 
exports, Barbadoes imported goods to 
the value of $5,115,000, and its exports 
were appraised at $0,295,000, The ex¬ 
ports of Trinidad, the mose productive 
and self-sustaining of all the islands, 
were valued $11,325,000, and its imports 
at $11,115,000. The islands of St. 
Lucia, Antigua and Granada also ex 
ported goods to the value of $3,135,000, 
while the smaller islands added consid¬ 
erably to the total volume of trade. This 
amounted, for all, to $31,300,000 of ex¬ 
ports, against a trifle less than $29,000,- 
000 of imports, and while the revenue 
amounted to $6,850,000; the outlay was 
only $6,620,000; while during only a 
part of the period the expenditure of the 
Dominion itself exceeded its income by 
nearly $8,000,00th 
Should the proposed annexation take 
place, the Canadian tariff, which taxes 
imports trom Great Britain for the benefit 
of the colonial revenue, would, of course, 
be extended to the new territory, and the 
consequent income would more than off¬ 
set the cost of protecting the islands 
against internal disorders, now borne by 
Uritiwh Government. Representatives 
the British Government. Representatives 
from the Antilles would take their stats 
in the Parliament at Ottawa, and au ef¬ 
fort would, doubtless, be soon made to 
revise the tariff with this country, with 
a view to obtaining free markets here for 
sugar, tobacco, aud other West Indian 
products. 
---- 
brevities. 
A German woman on a neighboring farm 
manages to dig about 25 bushels of potatoes a 
day. She is paid live cents per bushel. 
Isn't it funny that while hydrogen is a par¬ 
tial supporter of combustion, aud oxygen, the 
very life of it. water—composed of hydrogen 
and oxygen—will extinguish the? 
People of Michigan and Minnesota! Do 
you believe that your laud will be stripped of 
timber, at its present rate of destruction, iu 1<J 
yeared Then, what do you propose to do* 
A number of bunches of the Victoria Grape 
were sent to us awhile ago by Mr. L. (• M. 
Smith, grown at Nyack-ou-the-Hudsou. Both 
the berries aud bunches were larger than auy 
we have ever grown, aud the quality was also 
better. 
However much the distinct aud handsome 
Souvenir du Congres Pear may differ iu dif¬ 
ferent places, a lot sent to us by Ellwaoger & 
Barry were very large and beautiful m ap 
pearance and excellent in quality. 
