THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
§ 7 ® 
ing an evergeen hedge along the highway in 
front of the house, and clumps of evergreens 
here and there, and a double row of roses and 
ornamentals where I had found a row of de¬ 
caying peach trees, with burdocks and pig¬ 
weed growing around them five to six feet 
high. I also planted a row of maples on 
either side of the highway as far as the farm 
extended. Meanwhile the carpenters and 
painters had been at work at the house. I 
found the timbers of sonnd oak. and every¬ 
thing substantial,lmt there were only six inches 
of cornice on the roof. This made the house 
look like a young man wearing a stove-pipe 
hat with the brim torn off. A new roof,with 
a cornice nearly two feet wide, and two coats 
of paint of neutral color, in place of the glar¬ 
ing white, “fixed” the house beyond recogni¬ 
tion. When we began to live in it, we found 
that there were no conveniences, and hardly 
any necessaries of life. The former owner 
bad cleared the place of forest trees 50 years 
before, and had succeeded by rigid economy 
in building up a fortune. He did uot believe 
in spending rnouey for anything that he could 
possibly get along without, hut many things 
that ho did place about the premises were car¬ 
ried off or destroyed by the many tenants who 
had occupied the place subsequeutly. Thus I 
had to build chimneys, closets, piazzas, and 
make numerous other improvements that were 
somewhat expensive. The barns were no less 
dilapidated than the house. The stalls were 
broken down, the doors off from the hinges, 
no grauaries for the graiu, the roof leaked, 
and boards were missing from the sides of the 
The berries are rather short and plump, with 
a thin bran. Of course, of its milling quali 
ties we know nothing. We don’t even know 
that it is an accidental new variety. We 
only know that it is unlike any wheat we 
have ever seen, and it is so far very hardy, 
and a great yielder. We also planted it at 
the Rural Gronuds last Fall about the first of 
October, and In a manner to test its hardiness, 
and it proved among the very hardiest wheats 
there grown. We have illustrated it that we 
may learn if it is identical with any of the old, 
old varieties. If it is not, and if this year it 
sustains the very favorable opinion we have 
formed of it, we shall, next year, be happy to 
divide with our friends. At leist we will 
keep an eye on it. 
EXPERIENCE ON A RUN DOWN FARM, 
IS IT A NEW SORT? 
CHARLES A. GREEN, 
Two years ago, in passing through a field 
of Clawson Wheat, we were forcibly struck 
with a peculiar head of wheat which stood 
among the others. We tried to find some 
others like it, but, after a long search, gave it 
up. We liked the appearance of the plant 
and head so well that we decided to save and 
plant the wheat, which we did, patting the 
kernels six inches apart in the row. It grew 
nicely, stooled well, and after a hard Winter 
produced over 1,000 perfect heads of wheat. 
We again sowed the proceeds last Fall, and 
have now several bushels of fine wheat which 
we have sown on the Western New York 
Farm. It stood the last very severe Winter 
as well as the Diehl-Mediterranean by its side, 
and yields extremely well this year. Its 
growth is vigorous and upright; it stools 
largely; has large leaves, but does not grow 
as tall as the majority of wheat, and we think 
it can hardly be made to lodge. 
We show at Fig. 441) a fair sample of the 
best heads, though all are very uniformly 
good and very even in appearance. It is a 
white-chaffed, wbite-strawed and white¬ 
grained wheat, and, as will be seen, is re¬ 
markable for the manner in which the breasts, 
or spikelets, are placed upon the central stalk, 
and also for the number of kernels in a chamb¬ 
er, giving a very large number of kernels to 
FIRST PArEB. 
I was born and brought up on one of the 
best grain and fruit-produeiug farms iu West¬ 
ern New York. My early recollections of 
farming are exceedingly pleasant to recall. 
When 31 years of age my father leased me 
the beautiful homestead. I managed the 
place through two years of the highest prices 
of war times, laying by a clear profit of §1,000 
each year. At the eud of these two years, my 
brothers who were engaged in commercial pur¬ 
suits in the city, induced me to join them. 
Although I enjoyed city life very well, I could 
not entirely overcome the natural inclination 
which I have always had for rural life. 
Often would I sit at my desk in the city aud 
plan what I might do with a run-down farm. 
In my imagination, and while sitting at my 
desk, I bought munv farms that were wrecked 
and forlorn, and developed them Into great 
productiveness and beauty. It is a pleasant 
thing to dig ditches, remove stone walls, and 
grub out obuoxious shrubs aud weeds iu im¬ 
agination, but to accomplish these reforms by 
personal effort is quite another thing. 
After 13 years of city life, I decided to re¬ 
turn to the country. Our homestead having 
been sold, I looked elsewhere for a home. I 
hope the reader will not consider it an easy 
thing to select a farm 
on which he expects to 
spend the remainder of 
his life; for my experi¬ 
ence proved it was ^ 
exceedingly difficult. 
There were so many M 
circumstances and mB* 
conditions to be takeu mu 'A , 
into account that I mjtW 
spent many months wHn 
traveling over a large 
section of Western 
New York before I 
located. When i did 
select a farm, I did uot 
choose it for the reason 
that its location was 
one of great beauty or 
prominence, but be¬ 
cause the soil appeared 
to be exceedingly fer¬ 
tile,and it could lie pur¬ 
chased at a bargain, as 
it appeared to me. It 
was a run-down farm. 
The fences were run _ 
down, the soil was run ~ 
down, the buildings 
were run down, the : 
birds, the fowls, the -——_- — 
stock, aud even the 
clouds overhead had a — ~lr 
ragged, run-down ex- 
pression. Had I in- 4 — 
quired of ail ordinary ~ 
ruralist what be con¬ 
sidered the expense 
would be of fixing up 
the buildings and put¬ 
ting the farm into passable shape, *he would 
probably have estimated that about $500 
would answer the purpose, or possibly he 
might have thought $1,000 would not be too 
large an estimate. But there are few who 
can accurately estimate the cost of repairing 
buildings, replacing aud improving fences, 
digging out, rocks and stumps, subduing foul 
weeds, and building up the fertility of a run¬ 
down farm. The results show that we have 
expeuded $1,000 in improving this place, 
aud the Improvements are yet Incomplete. 
There were nine small iuclosures around the 
house, barns, sheds, and tenement bouse. 
These were apparently used for poultry-yards, 
swine-yards, calf-yards, uud various other 
purposes the nature of which we could never 
discover with certainty. They were surround¬ 
ed by fences that leaned first to one side, and 
then to the other, aud were unsightly with 
unhinged gates, broken bars, and patched up 
with burn doors and old reapers. Tho first 
thing I did was to remove every trace of all 
these inclosures, the material thus secured 
making n pile as large as a small barn. 
There was no sign of a grass plot, sufficient 
for my children to build a play bouse on with¬ 
in 100 yards of the dwelling. The front yard, 
which was about 15 feet square, had origiual- 
ly been designed for a grass plot, but the hogs 
had played havoc with grass thereou, aud it 
was now no longer a thing of beauty. I lev¬ 
eled off several acres about the house and 
seeded them dowu immediately. There was a 
peculiarly lonesome, homeless expression 
about the place, caused by the absence of 
foliap.e, 1 did my best to correct tbis byplant- 
SELECTING SEED CORN, 
L. E. BENTON. 
It is encouraging to see so many interested 
in the subject of saving seed-corn; it shows 
that fanners are beginning to think on this 
important question; but there must be years 
of experiment and study before any conclu¬ 
sive facts can be established, which we may 
use as guides in selecting for a definite result. 
In the study of the plant economy, it will be 
noticed that the use of the stalk is merely to 
afford a support for the other parts; the outer 
portion is tough and hard, to give the neces¬ 
sary strength, the inner part is composed of 
soft, thin-walled tissue, capable of holding 
water like a sponge. Neither does anything 
towards the production of grain; they live on 
work done by other parts of the plant, there¬ 
fore the less of them, 
allowing for a reason¬ 
able support for the 
leaves and ears, the 
better, whether grown 
for the grain or, in our 
Northern latitudes,for 
the fodder. 
The leaves are the 
working parts of the 
( plant. Each one of 
them prepares a por¬ 
tion of the material 
which is finally taken 
by the ear. What 
close attention, then, 
we should give them. 
They should be of that 
dark-green color 
which indicates max¬ 
imum vitality and 
health. Broad, thick 
and heavy, they give 
much greater working 
capacity than the 
light, thin, narrow 
= — ones. There is a vast 
difference in plants in 
" this respect.and. if one 
- intends to make special 
selections, it should be 
earefully considered. 
Broad, sturdy leaves 
are found on corres¬ 
pondingly low stalks 
with short internodes, 
and the proportion of 
leaf to stalk, as com¬ 
pared with taller- 
growiug plants, is 
much greater. A question here arises 
as to the quality of the work of the leaves. 
For instance, a sugar-corn plant produces 
much richer material than a plant of 
the common field corns, and there is very 
much difference in the richness of different 
field corn ears. This is one of the most diffi¬ 
cult problems we have to deal with. 
But little need be said of the ear, as it is 
only a product resulting from the work of 
the plant. Nearly every person has in his 
mind an ideal, which he follows closely in 
making selections. As a rule, the best ears 
grow on the best stalks, aad thus, in saving 
them, Nature is aided in a way not generally 
thought of. Unless your corn is as late as 
will ripen In your section, do not be so very 
particular to save ears that are fully tilled out. 
Such ears show that, in the mother plant at 
least, development lias reached its maximum 
limit. Better an ear on which there is yet a 
little more room. For the larger part of the 
corn-growing belt it is very doubtful if it will 
pay to try to develop over one ear to the stalk. 
To grow" two or more requires special care 
and culture, and not such attention as is given 
the crop in general field culture. 
Norton Co Kans. 
PRINCESS. Re-engraved from the London Live Stock Journal. Fig. 450. (See page 078.) 
barns, apparently knocked off to patch up 
wagon-boxes, or to meet other emergencies, 
admitting cbilliDg blasts. My team was con¬ 
tinually running to the lumber yard for sup¬ 
plies to replenish this run down farm. My 
bills for lumber were enormous, yet where the 
lumber all went to 1 could not explain, and 
still the demand continued. Where all im¬ 
provements on a farm—dwelling house, out¬ 
buildings and fences—have to bo repaired or 
replaced, experience alone can teach oue the 
extent of the outlay in money, time, patience, 
aud material. 
There was one buildiug 30x30 feet that had 
been used 50 years for a pig-pen beneath, aud 
a corn house above. 1 scarcely dared enter it on 
my arrival, as it appeared to be about to fall 
to the earth. I expected to tear it dowu at the 
first leisure hour, but finding that it Rid not 
fall at once as I expected, we cleared out the 
broken flooring, and rotten sleepers, and re¬ 
moved about 30 loads of most excellent ma¬ 
nure from beneath. Finding the timber in 
a better condition than I expected, I employ¬ 
ed a mechanic to raise the sunken foundation, 
put in new sills, aud re-cover numerous open¬ 
ings. The outside was then covered with two 
coats of bright red paint, the trimmings be¬ 
ing jiainted white, in hopea by the contrast in 
color to attract attention from defects. The 
building is still doing good service us a gen¬ 
eral store-house. Therefore, think twice be¬ 
fore tearing down a building. The first year 
or two 1 continued to have feai-s that every 
strong wind would lay it to the ground, but I 
have come to think that nothing less than a 
cyclone will disturb its usefulness. 
the head; it is hard to find one with less than 
60, and easy to find those with more than 100. 
The Hessian. Mulberry.—T he Stn den ts’ 
Farm Journal seconds what theRuRAL has said 
