A 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
sacrifices which have been made to produce 
the variety and excellent qualities of the fruits 
that we now grow. But horticulturists them* 
selves should never forget the pioneers of 
American horticulture. They deserve well at 
our hands. Men live in history, and always 
will, who never did as much for the world as 
those who have improved and multiplied our 
fruits. There are those now liviDg and near¬ 
ing the end of life, whose names always com¬ 
mand our own reverence; and we have never 
heard of the deathjof a prominent horticultur¬ 
ist that we did not feel that the country had 
met with a serious loss. 
Disadvantages of Special Farming.— 
An incident of the disadvantages of special 
farming is spoken of by an Eastern farmer 
in the Massachusetts Ploughman. One of his 
neighbors had a small farm. He was entirely 
dependent on his crops for a livelihood, and 
onions had been a paying crop. He put all 
his land into onions. He had nothiug else. 
He got a good crop But it was an onion sea¬ 
son, and they were so plenty that they hardly 
paid for gathering. He did not get enough 
from them to pay his expenses, although he 
had a large crop That was a specially in 
farming. That year potatoes paid wonderfully 
well. If he had put one half of his farm in 
potatoes, he would have made money. He got 
thoroughly sick of his onions, and the next 
year he gave them up and went into potatoes 
He made them a specialty, and they proved 
that year a total failure. Bat if he had plant¬ 
ed these crops together each year and prac¬ 
tised mixed husbandry, be would have been 
successful in both years. As it was, he was 
thoroughly cleaned out. 
The New York Times says; “the Editor of 
the Rural New-Yorker has found the popu¬ 
lar Southern Grass, known as Johnson Grass, 
botanically Sorghum balapense. to be quite 
hardy upon his farm in New Jersey. As this 
grass has several good poiuts, being perennial 
Lantana. Fig. 13. 
and growing from its root-stocks, productive, 
nutritious, and easily grown, it will be a valu¬ 
able acquisition to our list of green fodders ” 
Now, we have very little doubt about it. We 
feel impressed that our introduction of this 
fodder plant to the North, having found it 
hardy , will do more good to the farming in¬ 
terests than anything else we have ever dis¬ 
tributed Farm contemporaries, tell your 
readers it is hardy as far north as Chicago 
and New York; tell them that it is very nu¬ 
tritious ; that it can be cut twice and still will 
mature its seeds. 
SHORT AND FRESH. 
Mr. Bradley, of Massachusetts, has his 
bull’s stall so arranged that, instead of lead¬ 
ing the bull out into the yard, the cow is led 
into the bull's stall for service. The cow is 
then quietly led away. 
“When my mat) began, two-tbirds of his 
corn stooks would blow down. He is now 
better trained and his stooks stand until taken 
off. It is the only way to preserve it bright 
and clean’'.,.. 
PUCK sagely remarks that “When a journal 
reduces its size and price without decreasing 
its quantity and quality, the chances are that 
its reduced price is about three times more 
than it is worth”. 
It also says that any paper that hasn’t “a 
larger circulation than any other paper” is 
owned and edited by a man whose respect for 
veracity should have induced him to enter 
some other profession. 
The Farm Journal says that not much can 
be done to change the habit of milk secretion 
in older cows, or even after the first year. It 
is therefore important to carefully train a cow 
in her first aud second years’ production—by 
green fodder and other foods which stimulate 
milk secretion... 
Mr. Phelps's advice is to save the forests 
and use them as a perpetual wood and lumber 
yard. You do not kill your cow, you keep 
her to milk; why kill your forests?. 
Prefatory to giving the disadvantages of 
the West, Mr. Phelps speaks of its advant¬ 
ages, one of which is that the Western farm¬ 
er’s holding, is so large that he can farm at 
wholesale and secure the economies of large 
transactions. The man’s arm yields to the 
horse’s legs aud to the engine’s piston.. 
The Farm Journal says that skim cheese is 
eaten only by people who have a bad taste 
and a good digestion. 
Edward E. Hale remarks, in The Critic 
and Good Literature, that virtue is one of the 
things tnat is caught by contagion. Is this 
not equally true of good farmiug? And will 
not the boys and girls learn to love the farm 
sooner aud surer by such contagion than in 
any other way? . 
J. B. Olcott expresses the opinion that 
going hungry to bed is poor business for a 
dyspeptic if be can command fresh air in a 
sleeping room, by himself, and can gtt tne 
food that always satisfies bis reasonable ap¬ 
petite. That ought to make a man sleep as 
all animals sleep when they are well fed. 
Wat. Walter Phelps, in an address before 
the annual meeting of the New Jersey State 
Board of Agriculture, recommended remov¬ 
ing the fences which cut and slash the face of 
the fair Jersey landscape like an ill-kept 
razor, and said that the wood and stone with 
which our ancestors laboriously shut up broad 
acres, which had no intention to get out, 
served no purpose outside of the pasture lot, 
except to occupy useful soil, spoil the view, 
and drain the pocket.♦. 
Don’t fool away your money on the Kieffer 
or any crosses of the Sand Pear, if you live 
near or north of the B3ud parallel, says Prof. 
Budd in the Farmers’ Review . 
Mr. A. 8. Fuller states that the two best 
seasons for pruning all kinds of fruit aud 
ornamental trees are Winter or midsummer. 
The Winter has some advantages, especially 
with fruit and deciduous ornamental trees, 
for at that season, when there is no foliage to 
hide the branches, every part of the head 
of the tree is exposed to view. 
The grtat secret of proper pruning consists 
in knowing the nature of the subject to be 
operated upon, the future use of each shoot 
and branch . 
Some kinds of fruit trees, like the apple, 
pear, plum, and cherry, produce their fruit 
principally on spurs one or two inches in 
length, which grow from the old or at least 
well-established branches. 
The peach, apricot, and nectarine produce 
their fruit mostly upon one year-old wood, 
and It is therefore necessary to prune them 
in such a manner that a general supply of 
good bearing shoots will bo annually pro¬ 
duced. This is readily accomplished by cut¬ 
ting back the main or bearing shoots every 
year almost any lime during the winter 
months, or by carefully tbinuing out during 
the Summer the smaller and slender branches 
that are not needed . 
Pruning in Spring, at or about the time 
trees eomtueuce growth, should never be 
practiced, except ou_ those that are being 
transplanted. 
Mr. F. L. Wright says, in the Fruit Re¬ 
corder, that he obtained, last Spring, 200 plants 
of the Atlantic Strawberry, aud that of hun¬ 
dreds of different kinds, no other ever did 
better. The berries were the size of those of 
Charles Downing, very late aud of exquisite 
flavor..... 
There is very little doubt about it that the 
self-blanching kinds of celery are a success 
for early winter use. But there is already a 
choice between them. The Celeri Blanc, which 
the Rural imported from France last Spring, 
rusts badly, while the quality is necesarily 
wanting in the nutty flavor and tenderness 
which characterize the best kinds. The White 
Plume is more vigorous, while the Btalks blanch 
better. Of the later, non-blancbing kinds, 
the Golden Heartwell, seeds of which were 
disseminated in the Rural’s Free Seed Distri¬ 
bution of three years ago, is emphatically the 
best... 
Have you received the Rural New- 
Yorker posters? If not, please advise us. 
We will mail them at once.. 
Have you seen the announcement of the 
Rural's present Free Seed Distribution? 
Have you read an account of its #3,000 worth 
of gifts to subscribers alone? If not, send 
for the Seed and Premium Supplement. It 
will be sent at once without charge. 
A STRONG ARGUMENT. 
“ Take the Rural New- Yorker one yecer, my friend. 
If you do not lifoe it, I ivill pay for it.” 
Don’t you think you are safe in making this oiler to right minded, progressive 
neighbors? Try it. If the “neighbors” so induced to read the Rural for one year 
are dissatisfied, we will refund the money to our subscribers who send us the names. 
The conviction is firm upon us that the R. N.-Y. is worth far more to good farmers 
than its cost, and that it they could be induced to read it for a year , they would never 
rest content without it. 
Another good way is to give them a copy every week for several weeks, and then 
ask them if they will not subscribe. We will gladly furnish the copies for this pur¬ 
pose without charge. Give them the Supplement containing the Free Seed Distri¬ 
bution and gifts to subscribers. Let them know the liberal, unselfish manner in 
which the paper is conducted. 
Posters, Premium Lists and Speci¬ 
mens gladly and promptly sent 
to all applicants. 
$ 2 , 816 —$ 2 , 816 —$ 2 , 816 — 
WOETIOFPRESENTS. TflKBESTARTICLES OFTHEIBDM 
321 — 321 — 321 — 
in all, to our subscribers who send us the largest clubs, no matter how small they may 
be. It is probable that we have more gifts than we shall receive clubs—so 
that our subscribers may be quite well assured that there 
is a gift for each and every one sending a club. 
That these Gifts are ABSOLUTE, and will be given without reserve. 
AMONG HORTICULTURAL GIFTS, 
Some of the latest and best varieties of GRAPES, RASPBERRIES and STRAWBER¬ 
RIES are offered in quantities that, though at retail they would cost from $3 to $25, 
will be given, it may be, for a Club of Two Subscribers. 
AMONG AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS, 
Such articles as the Walter A. Wood Self-Binding Reaper, valued at $230; the Farm 
Feed Mill of Nordyke A Marmon. valued at $100; the Champion Windmill of Powell 
& Douglas, valued at $90; or the Leffell’s Improved, valued at $80; the Studebaker 
Farm Wagon, valued at $70; the Charter Oak Range, price $55; Sulky Plows, Har¬ 
rows, Corn-Drills, etc., etc., may be awarded to 
VERY SMALL CLUBS. 
The Rural hopes, of course, that the clubs which shall be entitled to the most 
valuable premiums will be large—the larger the better. But we can not expect that 
our subscribers will send us such large clubs as if they were Subscription Agents. 
If the largest club sent us BE BUT 100, OR 50, OR 25, or less, it will be entitled 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
condemns all lottery schemes, or schemes of any kind for obtaining subscribers 
that are not perfectly legitimate and liberal. None but credulous or idle people will 
be deceived by the lottery schemes of many unprincipled publishers who, through 
showy announcements, induce farmers to subscribe for 
Worthless, Treacherous Journals, 
that are worse than worthless in themselves, while the articles advertised to be dis¬ 
tributed or drawn by numbers are simply of no intrinsic value whatever. 
We address ourselves to the good rural people of our country to aid in extending 
the circulation of a journal that 
Exerts its Best Efforts Now and Alwavs 
to help the farmer and to elevate the agricultural interests of America. We do not 
want subscribers who are of the class that encourage gambling, or who do not care 
what kind of reading matter is placed before their wives, sons aud daughters. 
SUBSCRIBE FOR THE BEST. 
A rlrl rPCQ 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
34 PARK ROW, N. Y. 
