863 
well if her grain was taken away. This man. 
1 am told, feeds only hay and straw and his 
cows are poor in the spring. Of course, they 
do poorly all summer and he is probably con¬ 
vinced that farming doesn’t pay. If such 
men would say. “My kind of farming doesn’t 
pay,’ they would be right; but when a man 
farms in such a way and then charges his 
failures on the business instead of on his way 
of conducting it, he makes a great mistake. 
Here is a man who has taken pains to get 
good cows; he feeds them well the year round, 
but especially late in the fall. A part of them, 
at least, come in in September. He feeds 
good hay and grain or their equivalents, has a 
warm, light, well ventilated stable, and warm 
water for drink, his manure is sheltered, his 
cows are in good condition in the spring, and 
do well all summer or till dry. Nobody hears 
such men grumble about farming not paying. 
The success or failure is not in the business 
but in the man—in the way the business is 
conducted. And the business of farming 
must be conducted differently from what it 
was 20 or 30 years ago or it will be a failure. 
This is one great trouble. Other things have 
changed, but the farmer clings to the old 
ways. Business men are quick to conform to 
the demands of the hour, but farmers are 
slow to change. They keep the old scrub 
stock, feed in the old way, fritter away their 
energies on a number of branches of farming 
instead of concentrating them on one or two, 
and so get behindhand, discontented, and 
sick of farming. 
But I can see hopeful signs. If one man 
makes farming pay by changed methods, 
others cannot help seeing and being influ¬ 
enced by it. Farm papers are a great help; 
the great trouble is that those who need them 
most, either don’t take them or do not grasp 
the lessons they teach. But the truth as to 
good farming makes its way slowly but sure¬ 
ly. Two years ago a neighbor said to me 
that he did not like the Jerseys, but some one 
had given him a Jersey calf and he was going 
to keep it. This summer he said, “That Jer¬ 
sey heifer has made more butter than any cow 
I have.” That man takes no agricultural 
papers, but he has learned one good lesson. 
The only young stock that will pay for win¬ 
tering here in Vermont this winter is full- 
blooded stock. A heifer or bull-calf or year, 
ling that will be worth 50 to 75 or more dollars 
in two or three years is going to pay. Com¬ 
mon stock is not. 
Stowe, Vermont. j. w. n. 
“ But never sit ye down and say 
2 here's nothing left but sorrow; 
We walk the wilderness to-day , 
The promised land to-morrow .” 
— Massey. 
WOLVERINE WISDOM. 
The Rural asks what I have done this 
year that is new and that proved successful 
as a farm operation. 
Our farm at homo—my father’s and mine— 
has been under the following rotation for 
quite a term of years: Sod was plowed for 
corn; then oats, followed by wheat, with 
which Timothy was sowed in the fall, and 
clover in the spring. The grass was cut two 
years and the sod plowed for corn. We have 
had no trouble in raising large crops of every¬ 
thing except wheat, but we have experienced 
a difficulty many times in securing a good 
seed-bed after oat stubble. Our average hay 
crop is over two tons to the acre; that of corn 
nearly 100 bushels of ears, and of oats over 
50 bushels. But wheat will average only 
about 20 bushels. I realize that the Timothy 
is of no benefit to the wheat, but our soil 
should do better. 
Our plan now is to sow clover alone with 
the oats, let it stand one year, and plow it 
under for wheat after cutting off an early 
crop for hay. This will extend the rotation, 
put in more clover, and, above all, increase 
the chances of a good wheat crop. It is use¬ 
less here to speak of the difficulties in fitting 
out stubble; neither is it necessary to enumer¬ 
ate the advantages in being able to begin 
earlier, or more than to allude to the well known 
natural advantages of clover as the immediate 
predecessor of the wheat crop. 
The only question is, can we do it? Authori¬ 
ties say it is not usually possible unless the oats 
are very thin. We adopted no half-way 
measures, but sowed both oats and clover 
thickly and let them fight it out. The oats 
yielded, by weight, f>9>£ bushels to the acre, 
all d I never saw better clover, though a severe 
drought lasted for several weeks after harvest. 
I do not know how a season could be more 
trying to young clover, except that the early 
summer was favorable. I will say that this 
pai ticular field is the best on the farm and in 
the best condition. Time only can decide 
whether it will be a safe practice. I am 
aware that in most sections it would not do 
well, but ours is a wonderful section for grass 
and clover, and nearly all the meadows are 
seeded with wheat. Grass seed is never sowed 
alone except when it is desired to get a cutting 
in the shortest time. If the plan succeeds it 
will make our rotation as nearly ideal as any 
I can conceive for this section. I will let the 
result be known. 
There is one thing we have done in late 
years that I am satisfied is wrong. Science 
would teach it, and practice proves it—that 
is, allowing seed potatoes to sprout badly 
before planting. Since ours have been kept 
in a warm cellar they send out many long 
slender sprouts long before planting time. The 
seed is old and shriveled, and the crop is 
“small potatoes and few in the hill.” 
E. DAVENPORT. 
“ ’ Tis alone the patient ivaiters 
Who the blessing will receive , 
They who through all doubt and trial , 
Calmly, trustingly believe .” — Barnes. 
A WASHINGTON WAY OF PLANTING POTATOES. 
The most unsatisfactory piece of work done 
on the farm this year, was on a two-acre 
potato patch. The ground was new, the slash 
ing and burning had been done two years be¬ 
fore. During the winter I had grubbed the 
piece and hauled off all stones in sight. I in¬ 
tended to plow and prepare the ground 
thoroughly before planting the potatoes; but 
other work was pressing and I did not get at 
the potatoes until the middle of May. As it 
was late in the season, I concluded to plow 
them under; that is, to drop the seed in every 
third furrow and turn the next furrow on to 
the seed. This plan works well in old ground 
or in clover sod. I have seen 400 bushels to the 
acre, of sound marketable potatoes grown 
in this way, on Puget Sound; but on new 
* Let no man halloo he is safe till he is 
through the wood ; 
He who will not when he may must tarry 
when he should; 
He who laughs at crooked men should need 
walk very straight ; 
O, he who once has won a name may lie abed 
till eight." — Thornburg. 
E don’t know much 
about the history 
of this interesting 
dwarf variety of 
the Norway 
spruce, further 
than that it origi¬ 
nated in a nursery 
in England. 
,, The illustration, 
Figure 41f5, is en¬ 
graved from a 
photograph taken 
last spring before 
the leaves of de— 
_ ciduous plants had 
started. The specimen was purchased about 
14 years ago, and was then about one foot 
high and a foot In diameter. It is now six 
feet in diameter and scarcely three feet high. 
The leaves are shorter and sharper than those 
of the species; the buds, and therefore the 
shoots, are short and crowded together. It is, 
as the engraving shows, oval in form, though 
irregularly so, the surface being undulating, 
caused by a somewhat stronger growth of some 
branches than of others. It is perfectly hardy 
at the Rural Grounds. It is offered in nur- 
HOPES FOR THE NEW YEAR. Fig. 417. 
ground it was a great blunder, and I never 
will plant that way again. The “grubs” and 
stones left in the ground were constantly 
throwing the plow out, so that the potatoes 
were planted at all depths, from three to eight 
inches. Some of the deep ones never came 
up, and a great many of those planted shallow 
were sunburned and spoiled, by the potatoes 
pushing through the light shallow soil, and 
being exposed to the sun after the last 
working. But the worst trouble came 
in digging. We usually dig with a plow, 
We set the plow about an inch deeper than 
the potatoes are planted and roll them nicely 
out by turning the hills bottom up, picking 
whatever is in sight; then with a harrow we 
can rake out the rest of them, and usually 
get the field very clean. But with this patch, 
in digging with the plow I was sure to hit 
every stone or “grub” left in the ground, and 
that would jump the plow into the next two 
or three hills and slice the potatoes ready for 
Saratoga chips. 
I have tried the trench plan this summer on 
a small scale and find it works beautifully 
here; the yield was over two to one more than 
by the old plan. I shall plant no more potatoes 
with the plow unless on a clean, level clover 
sod. Then I think it pays, as the work is all 
done by horse power except dropping the seed 
and picking up the crop. 
Washington Territory. h. a. march. 
serymen’s catalogues as Abies excelsa Gregori- 
ana. 
“Brown’s Bronchial Troches.” 
For Bronchial Asthmatic and Pulmonary 
Complaints, “ Brown’s Bronchial Troches” 
have remarkable curative properties. 25c. a 
box.— Adv. 
SPECIAL TOOLS FOR POTATO 
GROWING. 
T. B. TERRY. 
The Aspinwall potato planter is all that is 
claimed for it; its excellent work-, a 
Thomas smoothing harrow an efficient im¬ 
plement ',; the Flanet, Jr., and Higganum 
the best one-horse cultivators ; the Hudson 
bicycle the best two-horse-, advantages of a 
digger, the McCallum and Hoover dig¬ 
gers-, the dewberry a very promising dig¬ 
ger-, bushel boxes for harvesting; the Cut¬ 
away harrow for fitting potato stubble 
for grain , and sod land for potatoes. 
READER of the Rural 
who has never raised 
more than an acre or 
two of potatoes in any 
one seas<&, intends to 
plant 10 acres next 
spring, and wishes the 
writer to tell him what 
special tools it will pay 
him to buy. He says 
his soil is mellow and 
free from stones, and 
that no planters or dig¬ 
gers are used in his vi¬ 
cinity. 
I will assume that our friend has his ground 
plowed, harrowed and rolled, in the spring, 
ready for planting; also that he did not per¬ 
form these operations until the ground was 
dry enough to crumble nicely. He is then 
ready for planting. The Aspinwall planter, 
or, more properly speaking, potato drill, so 
largely advertised on page 733 of the Rural 
Potato Special, is all that the manufacturers 
claim for it. It is one of the neatest and 
most perfect tools on my farm. Without any 
previous marking, one can go into a nicely 
rolled field and plant right along, after the 
seed is cut, at the rate of about an acre every 
two hours, The seed will all be put at a 
uniform depth, and covei’ed in a very perfect 
manner, and the rows can be made almost 
perfectly straight. The manner in which 
they are covered—with a ridg6 over the drill 
and the straightness of the rows help much 
in the after cultivation. The planter will 
miss dropping once in a while, and as often 
drop two pieces instead of one; but it will do 
better work than ordinary hired men, de¬ 
cidedly. Potatoes can be dropped by hand so 
perfectly as to give an evener stand than can 
be obtained by machine planting. I have 
done this, but one who plants 1(1 or 12 acres 
will be delighted with the work of the planter. 
He will be independent, as he can put in his 
crop alone. The writer has planted 24 acres 
entirely alone. In a catching time this tool 
will enable one to put all his force to cutting, 
and to rush in his crop, thus perhaps paying 
for itself in a single season. It does not re¬ 
quire any great skill to run it. Put nothing 
but cut potatoes in the hopper (no stones), and 
see that it never gets empty, and keep your 
reins away from the pickers, and you will go 
right along. My macmnehas been in use five 
years without a single break or hitch. 
After planting, our friend needs a smooth¬ 
ing harrow. I use a Thomas. This, properly 
used, will keep a field practically clean, and 
just as well when the potatoes are planted in 
di ills as if planted in hills. This I know, as we 
keep our fields very nearly clean and never 
use a hand hoe. The day of cultivating both 
ways to keep a potato field clean is passed. 
Make your fields long, to save time turning 
around, and, with straight rows, and a har- 
iow used in time, keep them clean by culti¬ 
vating only one way (the long way), and thus 
save more than half your time. 
For cultivating, the Planet, Jr., or Hig¬ 
ganum one-horse cultivators, with different 
styles of teeth (among them some not more 
than IX inch wide, to use when plants are 
very small), are the best if one prefers to 
walk. If one wants to ride and do work that 
for excellence will surprise him, he should get 
one of the Hudson bicycle cultivators, adver¬ 
tised in the Potato Special, on page 737. One 
can use any kind of teeth in it, and for sim¬ 
ply stirring the soil one can do two rows at 
once, thus working more than twice as fast 
as with a one-horse cultivator. With straight 
rows and careful setting, last season, I went 
over six acres on the bicycle in four hours, 
while my man was 10 hours going over as 
much with a one-horse cultivator. I rode, with 
almost nothing to do; he walked and worked. 
This is the first and only sulky cultivator I 
have seen that I would use in a potato field. 
I would want both a sulky and a one horse 
cultivator—the latter particularly to use after 
the tops get so large that one cannot get 
through with a wheeled tool. 
The next special too) needed will be a dig¬ 
ger. The hire of ordinary men to dig by 
hand takes too large a slice out of the gross 
receipts, and then it is often difficult to get 
help. Machinery also makes one independent. 
We had much trouble to get extra help here 
this year. Having a good digger, so that I 
could do all the digging myself, I managed to 
secure enough help to get my potatoes picked 
up and in the barn, safe, and my wheat in on 
the potato stubble in good season. The latter 
is green and promising to-day. A neighbor 
has 20 acres of potato stubble and no wheat 
has been sown on it. He finally got a digger, 
but not soon enough. We have had almost 
constant rain since the middle of September. 
By the aid of machinery I just barely escaped 
being caught. Had my neighbor had a dig¬ 
ger on hand he would be ahead—from having 
those twenty acres covered with wheat—more 
than its cost. 
I have used a McCallum digger for several 
years. The Hoover, which has since come 
out, and runs on the same principle, is much 
better made, as far as I can judge by looking 
at it and watching it work for one day. Both 
are troubled somewhat by small stones in the 
soil. On our friend’s mellow soil, free from 
stones, I can dig potatoes with either machine, 
at the rate of an acre in from two to three 
hours, if he has kept his field clean, and I do a 
perfectly satisfactory job. It will, however, 
require more experience and skill to run the 
d'KKer than the potato planter; but the 
amount of hand labor saved is much greater. 
I haven’t a tool on my place (the binder not 
excepted; that saves me as much as my potato 
