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Vol. XLYI. No. 1935, 
NEW YOKE, FEBRUARY 26, 1887. 
PRICE FIVE CENTS. 
S2.00 PER YEAR. 
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1887, by the Rural New-Yorker, In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 
^rboricii Unveil. 
FRAUDULENT «WEET,S. 
UT few words are needed to 
complete the story told by 
the pictures on this ami page 
134. The great bulk of the 
maple sugar produced 1 u t his 
country is consumed in the 
cities. There is a delicious 
taste of the woods about it 
that charms the palate of 
the city man. Well made 
maple sirup is the most 
delicate of all liquid sweets, 
and it stands on a par with 
honey as a healthful article 
of diet. These very facts 
make it a favorite with the scoundrels who 
make their fortunes 
PETER HENDERSON. 
This is perhaps the most serious pest we 
have to encounter in the cultivation of the cab¬ 
bage crop. When an insect attacks the stems 
or foliage of a plant above ground, we usually 
have some means of checking its ravages; but 
when the attack is below the surface, as in the 
case of t he Cabbage Maggot., there seems to 
be no remedy but prevention. I had thought 
until last season that we were entirely help¬ 
less against the attacks of this pest, but a geu- 
tlouian from Charleston, S. C., Mr. Geraty, of 
Geraty & Towles (who grow nearly 1(M) acres 
of cabbages aunually for the Northern mar¬ 
kets) informed me that he thought he had 
solved the difficulty. He said that the Cab- 
there is any such thing as spontaneous gener¬ 
ation, or, in other words, that there is any 
existence without a parentage. The maggots 
found in the decomposing dog are produced 
from the eg^js of a fly attracted there by the 
odor of the carcass while decomposing. Now, 
Mr. Geraty has come to the conclusion that 
the odor from stable manure, guauo, etc., in a 
like manner, attracts the fly that produces the 
maggots so destructive to the cabbage crop, 
and in his own practice he finds it expedient 
to plow in the manure, or other fertilizer 
having odor, as rapidly as possible after it is 
spread on the soil, and owing to this practice, 
he claims his fields have been almost exempt 
from the ravages of the maggot. By the use 
of cotton-seed meal, which is largely used as a 
fertilizer in the Southern States, he claims to 
have secured entire exemption, because that 
fertilizer is odorless and therefore does not at¬ 
tract the insects at all, and consequently his 
crop where he has used this fertilizer has beeu 
chances, and they usually, in the uncertain 
climate of the South, make three or four sow¬ 
ings. so as absolutely to escape all risk of fail¬ 
ure. In a crop that, when it is a fair average, 
will net *500 per acre, the matter of $2 or *3 
extra for seed per acre is not to be considered. 
Jersey City Heights, N. J. 
R. N.-Y.—In his proposed experiments, we 
should like to have Mr. Henderson as soon as 
the plants, after setting, have begun to grow, 
sow muriate or sulphate of potash or both 
at the rate of 300 pounds of either to the acre, 
to be worked into the soil with the first culti¬ 
vation. Kainit might serve as well. 
farm (Topics. 
BUCEPHALUS BROWN’S NOTIONS AND 
IDEAS. 
I Respectable Robbery— According to the 
newspapers the New 
c 
' 
York Supreme Court 
in a case that involv¬ 
ed a “cornering of 
the market,” has de¬ 
cided that “so far as 
such a combination 
or scheme may be 
rendered successful 
it is little, if anything, 
less than respectable 
robbery, which the 
law will not permit 
or sustain.” Can the 
dictum of even such 
highly-placed law¬ 
yers as these judges, 
make any kind of 
robbery “respecta¬ 
ble”? I trow not! 
And least of all rob¬ 
beries involving such 
enormous villainies, 
such vast sums and 
such multitudes of 
honest, hard-working 
citizens. “Stealing 
the cents off a dead 
nigger’s eyes" is a far 
more “respectable” 
crime than this, 
which steals the 
profits of millions of 
hard-working farm¬ 
ers and mechanics, to 
support the luxuries 
of a horde of Wall 
Street sharks. 
by the adulteration ,r~ r-vr 
of foods, and by the 'm' 1 
dishonest business of —-vft 
endeavoring to palm ^ 
off an inferior article V jl - 
fora superior price. j m ' ii' 
Those fellows ply . 
their nefarious busi- 
ness in the cities. I’ r 
With cheap sweets, J)i 
like glucose, and.dirty 4 w-'~ . 
sweets like the dregs \ 
of molasses, the)' are Wvfcjjr j jjgfi '■’faiflfi 
able to concoct, a vil- I' ^ 
that barms tbp busi¬ 
ness of the producer J-f 
of a pure article as ; ife ; S 
completely as oleo- “V •jj.-'J cicaj 
margarine injures 
the duir) industry. 
This business of *$P '’'iffijal 
adulterating maple g$|jj 
Sugar and sirups is a ijfo V* ' W f [?s| 
“asty fraud and .JbW 
should be stamped 1 \\i ! ’ • 
out. It Is just as ■ HI 
much a crime to mix 
up a mess of cheap r jwM 
sweets and label it j 
“Verwumt Maple * r Nb 
Sugar,” as it is to Jh 
color u quantity of | - Bf , 
grease and mark it tWl; 
“Choice Creamery 
Butter.” The maple . MS b 
sugar industry is a ^ 
very important one ! . J /r 
on many farms. It / ■ 
gives work at a time j ' ( . 
when other farm | 7 
operations are mostly | ^ u ^ /y .> 
suspended, and the j_ 
proceeds help out the 
expenses wonderful¬ 
ly. More tanners 
would go into it were it not for the scamps who 
cover the market with a bogus article. The 
progressive maple sugar maker, with his patent 
evaporators and other modern appliances may 
smile at our “sugar bush;” but his customers, 
who i>ay a high price for the pure article, have 
in mind just, such a scene as we have represent¬ 
ed here. Take the “wildness" out of their 
ideal and show them the “modern improve¬ 
ments,” and the majority of them would care 
less for the delicacy. Fig. 100 represents a 
hack-woods scene: nowadays where large 
quantities of maple sugar are made, patent, 
sap spouts and covered tin mils facilitate 
gathering and prevent taint and contamination 
from wind or rain. Gathering and receiving 
tanks are of the newest patera, and patent 
heaters and evuimratora convert the sap into 
“maple hone),” 12 hours after dropping from 
the tree. 
- The Political 
Power of Farmers. 
aS—W ith what surpris- 
mg suddenness has 
J. the agricultural in¬ 
terest asserted itself 
in the political 
arena! Up to a very 
few years ago the farmers were supposed 
to have uo political power whatever, and 
it was often asserted that they never would, 
or could have any. Now, somehow, all at 
once as it were, any law that the farmers 
are even supposed to wish for is rushed 
through Congress with an overwhelming 
vote. 1 am afraid that schemers and wire- 
panel’s arc already planning to make use of 
this newly born political force for their own 
selfish ends, and that the farmers will have to 
watch sharply and antagonize vigorously 
many uevv projects, which knaves will try to 
stampede through Congress in their name. 
bage Maggot is produced by a small fiy, some¬ 
what like the common house fly, which depos¬ 
its its eggs in the soil, and that these when 
hatched form the maggot which makes its at¬ 
tacks on the roots of the cabbage. He said 
that his observations had led him to the con¬ 
clusion that the odor arising from the use of 
guano or stable manure invited the insect, 
just as we know that the fiy is invited by the 
odor of decomposing animal matter. It is a 
popular belief (with such as do not inquire in¬ 
to such matters) that when the carcass of a 
dog or other dead animal decomposes by the 
wayside and is tilled with maggots, the decay¬ 
ing carcass “breeds” the maggots. 
Science, of course, has long ago demonstrat¬ 
ed the fallacy of this belief, and few now, who 
have investigated this subject, believe that 
entirely free from the maggot. Acting on 
his theory, which seems to me to he a reason¬ 
able one, I have obtained a supply of cotton¬ 
seed meal, and will the next season experiment 
very thoroughly on this matter, which is one 
of vast importance to all engaged in the cul¬ 
ture of the cabbage crop, which in this country 
has attained dimensions that probably few 
readers of the Rural hav e any conception of. 
Some individual growers, particularly in the 
Sou there States where the crop is grown to 
supply the markets of St. Louis, Ciuciuuati, 
Chicago, Baltimore, Philadelphia and New 
York, grow as much as 200 acres. To one 
person wo scut 80 pounds of our Early Summer 
Cabbage seed last fall for his own plantiug— 
enough for nearly 1,000 acres. But these 
large growers cannot afford to take any 
Postage on Seeds.—T he bill now before 
Congress to reduce the postage on seeds, plants, 
etc., is really oue that the farming and gard 
1 
