the plant is cultivated. It is to be remem¬ 
bered,of course,that when a cotton seed, orany 
other oily seed germinates the oil within the 
seed serves to nourish the sprouting plant. No 
matter what may be the nature of the changes 
which the oil undergoes when a seed germi¬ 
nates, it may none the less be verv properly 
regarded as a kind of plant food at this par¬ 
ticular moment of germination and under the 
conditions in which it exists stored up in the 
seed—just as the starch or the albumen in 
seeds may be regarded as plant food; for the 
young plant, like a nursing babe, is nourished 
by the parent; but there is no evidence what¬ 
soever that a plant which has once begun to 
live independently of the seed can feed upou 
oil through its roots, or derive any benefit 
from the presence of oil in the soil. It is 
within the hounds of possibility, perhaps, that 
oil m the soil might sometimes favor a form 
of fermentation which would be advanta¬ 
geous for the growth of crops, though no such 
advantage has yet been detected. But, on 
the o f her hand, there are reasons for believ¬ 
ing that the presence of oil in the soil or in a 
manure would be detrimental since the oil 
might clog the manure which contained it, 
and the pores of the soil also. 
“ What stronger breastplate than a heart 
undaunted ? 
Thrice is he armed who hath his quarrel 
just, 
And he but naked though locked up in steel 
Whose conscience with injustice is cor¬ 
rupted.' 1 ' — Shakespeare. 
CAKE OF FRUIT STOCKS; DWARF APPLE TREES. 
E. A. T., Croton, Ohio. —I 'want to graft 
quinces on apple roots; peaches on peach 
roots, and plums on peach and plum roots; 
when should the roots be taken up and how 
should they be stored ? Which would pro¬ 
duce the largest yield of apples in 20 years 
from the time they were set out—300 dwarf 
apple trees on Doucain stock or 50 standard 
trees ? 
Ans —The seedling stocks may be taken up 
at anv time after the leaves have fallen, when 
the ground will admit of it, and should be 
stored in a cellar, whore they may be packed 
in moist sand, sawdust or moss, care being 
taken not to have them either too wet or too 
dry, or accessible to mice. Sawdust from the 
green log is best, because its degree of moisture 
is exactly right. Whatever packing is used 
should be put in firmly under, over and 
around the bundles, which should be made of 
convenient and uniform size—say, 50 to 100 in 
each. A little freezing does not hurt stocks 
so packed, but if thev are wanted for root¬ 
grafting during the winter it is best not to let 
them freeze. The boxes should be kept cov¬ 
ered. If large yields are desired use standard 
stocks. Dwarfs are useful for small gardens, 
where early bearing and fine fruit are the im¬ 
portant points; but for mercantile purposes 
they are almost universally a failure. Very 
few apples on Doucain stocks will be alive 
at the end of twenty years from planting. 
Quince on the apple is even a worse failure, 
except where, by deep planting, the grafts 
root from above the point of union. 
SHOP WORK OR FARMING—WHICH? 
H. S. M., St. Louis. Mo. —Would it be ad¬ 
visable to give up a mercantile position with 
a salary of $65 a month for homesteading a 
farm ? I have a liking for farming and can 
stand manual labor well. I have about $350 
capital, and am very economical, and so is my 
wife. I’m 28 years old. Should I go to farm¬ 
ing I would prefer a warm climate and fruit 
culture. 
Ans —We cannot answer this question. 
Too much depends upon yourself. If you go 
to farming you will doubtless have to work a 
good deal harder than you imagine in order 
to make a living. One thing that always 
troubles a man who goes from city to country 
work is the fact that there is no regularity 
about the payments of profits or wages. In 
the city you get your money at regular inter¬ 
vals, and you get in the habit of timing and 
gauging your expenses accordingly. In the 
country you get no regular wages, and when 
the returns do come in they are not all cash. 
It will be very hard to adapt yourself to the 
new condition of things. The tendency is to 
believe that the art of farming is easily mas¬ 
tered. No greater mistake could be made. 
We affirm that it will be as hard for the aver¬ 
age city clerk to so perfect himself in agricul¬ 
tural matters as to make a farm pay, as it 
will be for him to work himself to the head of 
the mercantile house in which he is employed. 
On the other hand, people with good sense 
and happy dispositions can find pleasure in 
country life that will far more than compen¬ 
sate them for any loss of city .'privileges. 
ONION SEED. 
J. S., Ashley , Utah. —I ordered Extra- 
Early Danver onion seeds of a seedsman. I 
sowed a quarter of a pound of seed on a 
“bright red” soil, and didn’t get a dozen 
good onions; whereas if the seed were good 
there ought to be from one to six bulbs to 
each seed. Am I right ? Most of mine were 
scallions. 
Ans. —Among onions there is great variety. 
Those grown from seed are usually one-bulbed. 
Potato onions, from sets, produce several 
bulbs, and top onions produce flower-heads 
like bunches of bulbs that are used as sets. 
The Danvers onion is one-bulbed and yellow¬ 
skinned. A few scallions occur among the 
crops of the best gardeners and even of those 
who save their own seed. Some varieties un¬ 
suitable to our soil or climate have a tendency 
to produce ill-ripened or thick-necked onions, 
which bad thev been grown under favorable 
conditions would have matured properly and 
bulbed well enough. Again, some soils are 
not fitted for onion growing. 
“ ’Tis better to be lowly born and range with 
humble givers in content, 
Than to be perk'd up in a glistening grief 
and wear a golden sorrow." 
— Shakespeare. 
Miscellaneous. 
W. A. L., Leesville, Ohio. —What are the 
best six dwarf pears * I want to plant 100 
trees. 
Ans. —Angouleme, Anjou, Boussock, How¬ 
ell, Louise Bonne, Superfin. We would 
plant mostly of the first two. 
.7. H. C., Bradford , Mass.— What are the 
addresses of some nurseries in England ? 
Ans.—R ichard Smith & Co., Worcester; 
John Laing & Sons, Forest Hill, London, 
5 E ; Paul’s Nurseries, Waltham Cross. Herts.; 
Hugh Low & Sons, London, N. E.; H. Lane 
6 Son, Berkhamsted, Herts ; Little & Ballan- 
tyne, Carlisle, Cumberland County; Anthony 
Waterer, Woking, Surrey. 
O. A. Rice Co., Kan. —What kind of ever¬ 
green trees would be suitable for this part, 
Central Kansas. The soil is a black sandy 
loam underlaid with hardpan; some call it 
“gumbo,” but it is not, for it is the subsoil. 
It will readily dissolve as soon as exposed to 
to the air and weather ? 
Ans.— Professor Popenoe, of the Kansas 
Agricultural College, writes that our inquirer 
will probably h^ve no trouble in securing a 
good growth of the Red cedar and the Aus¬ 
trian pine, and may succeed with the Scotch 
pine. At Manhattan the Scotch pine proves 
to be one of the best conifers. No difficulty 
is found there also in growing the Table Moun¬ 
tain pine, the Dwarf Mountain pine, and so 
far, the Blue spruce (Picea pun° , ens) of 
Colorado. Most of these would probably be 
worth trying in Rice County. 
‘‘Happy the man, and happy he alone, 
He who can call to-day his own; 
He who, secure within , can say, 
'To-morrow, do thy worst, for I have lived 
to-day.'" —Dryden. 
DISCUSSION. 
“CORRECTING” alkali lands by the use 
OF MANURE, DRAINAGE AND GYPSUM. 
Prof. F. H. Storer.— On page 836 a sub¬ 
scriber, in Wyoming Territory, speaks of 
using manure simply to “ kill the alkali.” In 
many countries where evaporation is rapid, 
and where not enough rain falls to compel 
all the brooks, rivers and lakes to force their 
way to the sea, alkaline matters are apt to ac¬ 
cumulate in the soil, especially in low places; 
but one effect of this alkali (carbonate of soda) 
is to make clayey soils (and very fine soils) 
even more sticky, plastic and adhesive 
than they are naturally. It may be said 
of the alkali lands, even more emphat¬ 
ically than it can be said of ordinary 
stiff clays, that they are hard to cultivate. 
Not only does such land tend to stick to the 
plowshare, but, after it has been plowed, the 
furrows, instead of crumbling down to form 
mellow earth, dry into hard lumps and clods 
which lie upon the land like so many frag¬ 
ments of rocks. All over the world, farmers 
are familiar with the fact that barn yard man¬ 
ure helps to mitigate the undue plasticity of 
clay. They urge that, besides supplying food 
to crops, manure has no small value in the 
mere mechanical sen«e, because it helps to 
make clay land mellow. Just so, I take it, 
the extreme stickiness of the alkali land may 
be corrected, in some part, by judicious dress- ( 
ings of farm-yard manure. Precisely as is 
theca°e with clavey soils, numberless patches 
of alkali land have been improved by thorough 
draining. When water flows from the drains, 
the alkaline matter is washed out from the 
soil and carried away with the water. It 
should also be said that Professor Hilgard of 
California, who has devoted no little attention 
to the alkali lands of that State, has found 
that in many cases dressings of gypsum are 
competent to destroy the alkali, by acting 
upon it chemically. Thanks to the decom¬ 
posing action of the gypsum, the excessive 
plasticity is done away with and the soil be¬ 
comes fit to be cultivated. 
A GREAT MISFORTUNE. 
MORE ABOUT “THE FARM FENCE.” 
M. B. P., Henderson, N. C.—Ninetv-nine 
per cent, of the farm fences in this vicinity 
are the “Virginia rail,” with probably no im¬ 
provement on those used by the first settlers 
in North America. When we were obliged to 
fence against the “ razor-back ” pig, the bot¬ 
tom rail was laid flat on the ground and sev¬ 
eral above this were necessarily small, for 
this mischievous little brute would turn him¬ 
self edgewise and slip through a very small 
crack. But that state of affairs has passed 
away, we hope never to return. Our present 
stock law has been in operation two years 
and seems to be as nearly perfect as a man¬ 
made law can be. Certainlv it is just. To 
sum up the whole matter: The law simply 
says, “Every owner must restrain his own 
stock;” and why shouldn’t he ? If his animal 
has a right to get its subsistence on his neigh¬ 
bor’s land unless protected by a (so-called) 
lawful fence, why has not the owner the same 
right to appropriate to his own use the vegeta¬ 
bles or fruits from the garden when there is no 
lock on the gate ? There was strong opposi¬ 
tion at first, but that has worn away, and all 
classes see the benefits secured. Stock is 
much better fed and cared for; manure 
(wasted before) is now saved; fences are fast 
disappearing ; old, unsightly hedge-rows are 
being cleared up, and are the most productive 
portions of the farm; farmers are relieved of 
a heavy tax, not only in money and labor, but 
by a saving of timber. Formerlv the annual 
cost of repairing fences was more than the 
value of all the stock in the county. The 
fence we need is a conveniently portable one. 
Our old rails are portable, but we want one 
that will not consume so much time as would 
be required to build a new one. We need one 
requiring no posts or stakes, but which can be 
set on top of the ground, with a reasonable 
assurance that it will stay there as long as 
desired. 
FEEDING POTATOES AND APPLES TO MILCH 
COWS. 
E W. T., Wyoming Co., N. Y.—Don’t be 
afraid to feed potatoes or apples to milch 
cows. I have practiced feeding my small po¬ 
tatoes to milch cows for years, and always 
with the utmost satisfaction. Care should be 
taken both as regards the time and manner of 
feeding. My practice has been to feed them 
just at the time of milking or immediately 
afterwards. Pass the potatoes through a root- 
cutter, or, if you have no cutter, procure a 
long box just the width of your scoop-shovel, 
and in it you can properly cut enough for a 
small dairy in a very short time. It is better 
to mix a small quantity of bran or meal with 
the potatoes, as the cows will eat more slowly, 
and I think the increased flow of milk will 
Rheumatism 
^ o doubt if there is, or can be, a specific 
remedy for rheumatism; but thousands who 
have suffered its pains have been greatly ben¬ 
efited by Hood’s Sarsaparilla. If you have failed 
to find relief, try this great remedy. It correct, 
the acidity of the blood which is the cause of the 
disease, and builds up the whole system. 
“ I was afflicted with rheumatism twenty years. 
Previous to 1883 I found no relief, but grew worse, 
until I was almost helpless. Hood’s SarsaparUla 
did me more good than all the other medicine 
I ever had.” H. T. Balcom, Shirley Village, Mass. 
Hood’s Sarsaparilla 
Sold by all druggists. $1; six for §5. Made 
only by C. I. HOOD & CO., Lowell, Mass. 
IOO Doses One Dollar 
MAKE HENS LAY 
OHERIDAN’S CONDITION POWDER is absolute- 
ly ? ure and hi 8hly concentrated. It is strictly 
a medicine to be given with food. Nothing on earth 
will make hens lay like it. It cures chicken chol¬ 
era and all diseases of hens. Illustrated book by 
mail free. Sold everywhere, or sent by mail for 
25 cts. in stamps. 2>(-lb. tin cans, $1; by mail, 
Slx cans by express, prepaid for $5.’ 
1.3. Johnson & Co., P. O. Box 2118, Boston, Mass. 
PEERLESS DYES 8oLD BY DaUGGkSTA 
The heavy rains this fall have totally ruin¬ 
ed crops in some localities, and the effect is 
now being seen in diseases among farm ani¬ 
mals. Almost every day cases of roup, 
swelled head and a distemper very disastrous 
among poultry are reported. A part of this 
is also due to improper feeding. Many per¬ 
sons think as soon as cold weather comes on 
they must begin to feed heating food to their 
hens, like corn meal, &c. The result of this 
course, is if they do not break down from the 
diseases prevalent, they soon get very fat, 
look very fine and people wonder why they do 
not lay. You cannot make a hen lay when 
everything you give her is being transformed 
into fat, and laying the foundation of disease 
same as with an over-fed child or person. 
Alfred T. Johnson, Hampton, N. H., says, 
‘ Last fall I had 80 fine-looking hens, which 
began to droop and die; I changed their food 
and began using Sheridan’s Powder: in three 
weeks they were nearly well, and had increas¬ 
ed the eggs sixteen a day. T have just bought 
six cans of it, as a preventive of disease the 
coming winter. It can’t be beat, for that 
large can saved me $40 last year.” 
Mrs. E. B. Carlin, Conklin Centre, N. Y., 
savs, “I have used Sheridan’s Powder to 
make hens lay for three years. I know it 
also keeps them healthy for I rarely lose one 
now. My neighbors are getting interested in 
Sheridan’s Powder; but they do not use half 
enough; one or two small packs is not a fair 
test. I shall send soon for six cans, as I get 
it cheaper. During an eight week’s trials, 
using Sheridan’s Powder, I got from 40 hens, 
1707 eggs.” 
I. S. Johpson & Co., 22 Custom House St., 
Boston, Mass., (the only makers of Sheridan’s 
Condition Powder to make hens lay) will 
send, postpaid, to any person, two 25-cent 
packs of powder, and a new Poultry Raising 
Guide, for 60 cents. The book alone costs 25 
cents. For $1.00 five packs of powder'and a 
book; for $1 20 a large 2 %-pound can and 
book; six cans' for §5 00, express prepaid. 
Send stamps or cash. Interesting testimoni¬ 
als sent free. 
sn< l MotU> Card*, 8cr»p Picture*. Ptizidf*. Gamm, trtolm 1* 
U M one pack of Escort Cards, and largo Sample Book of gen nine Card* 
Coot pictures, j All lor a 2 oeutatauip. Banner Card Co., Cadis, Ohio* 
FAXON’SSeed Specialties 
lA^tawr-v ' J Asters, Pansies, Sweet Peas, Nasturtiums, 
.^saRn.-t.-ViKsx g an d Danvers Onion. ESSAYS:— Annuals 
t and Their Cultivation, 10 cents. Garden 
Vegetables. 10 cents. Both, and Catalogue, 
‘S’ 1° cents, if you mention this paper. 
^ohd^ M.B.Faxon2I5o.Market5 r.BOSTON.MASS. 
NOVELTY, BEAUTY AND USEFULNESS 
are embodied in the “ Kodak ” Camera, mak¬ 
ing it a suitable and valuable Holiday gift. 
You cannot select an article that will be so 
highly appreciated. 
LICHTNING WELL-8INKINQ 
MACHINE MAKERS. 
Well-smking and prospecting tools sent 
on trial. 520 ieet has been sunk in 8 
hours. Instructions for beginners. An 
Encyclopdia of BOO Engravir»s of well 
and prospectors' tools, pumps, 
d and steam engines. A trea¬ 
tise on gas and oil. Book 
free, mailing charges 
25 cts. each. 
The American 
WellWorks. 
AURORA, ILLS., 
U. S. A. 
A Gardening Supplement 
To Rural New Yorker. 
The best and foremost 
Horticultural Magazine. 
THE AMERICAN GARDEN, $2.00 
-AND THE- 
RURAL NEW-YORKER, - 2.00 
$4.00 
Both one year for only j 
If sent before Jan. 1st. ) ^ 
Fruits, Vegetables, Flowers, 
Trees; Profit, Health. 
Address 
E. H, LIBBY, 751 Broadway, New York, 
