496 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
MAR 23 
ment upon purchasers, the price of such 
seeds, or plants should be refunded, or seeds 
and plants true to name should be furnished, 
as soon as the accident was discovered. That, 
in my opinion, is all that should be demanded 
or expected uuder such circumstances. It 
would be impossible for any man to determine 
the loss or damage resulting from such an 
accidental sending out of such seeds or plants. 
The purchaser no doubt would place his loss 
or damage at very much more than the seller, 
or than even disinterested persons. There 
might be a case where ro loss or damage 
would occur; other causes might combine to 
destroy a crop of the best aud purest seed; 
hence no person or persons would be compe¬ 
tent to assess such loss or damage on its true 
basis. 
FROM T. H. HOSKINS, M D. 
1. The fact that the seedsmen of highest 
character and repute in America all refuse to 
give any broad warranty of their seeds is, I 
think,sufficient proof that to do so is not prac¬ 
ticable; for certainly any well established and 
reputable house which would break through 
the universal custom could greatly increase its 
trade. But to do so would so surely wreck the 
best business in the country that an associa¬ 
tion, combination, or “trust” arrangement, is 
needed to insure good faith all around, in 
this matter. The tremendous risk of insuring 
a pound, or even an ounce of some kinds of 
seed, is so utterly disproportioned to any pos¬ 
sible profit, that no seed seller can undertake 
it. A careless or angry clerk might ruin the 
richest concern in a single season. In its 
practical results, this refusal to warrant leads 
rather to the selling of belter and purer seeds; 
for good houses, feeling that they must refuse 
to warrant, also feel that in every other way 
they must endeavor to satisfy their customers. 
But any seedsman or nurseryman, who by 
accident sends high-prieed seeds, or plants un¬ 
true to name, having refused to warrant 
them, must naturally feel very sharply the 
danger to his business which a “high and 
mighty’’indifference to the disappointment and 
loss entailed upon the buyer will cause. 
Every reasonable satisfaction ought to be 
made; but in the case of seeds, especially, the 
loss to the buyer in consequence of the error 
is often so very large, compared with the 
price of the seeds, that the necessities of the 
case must leave by far the greater part of that 
loss with him, and he must bear it as he bears 
other inevitable misfortunes. As a matter of 
practical experience, I think the risk of a ju¬ 
dicious buyer dealing with a house of estab¬ 
lished repute, is not great. When loss occurs, 
while the seller must have the protection 
which he gets by refusing to warrant, yet 
every effort ought, I repeat, to be used by 
him to make that loss as light as possible, con¬ 
sistent with the nature of the business. 
FROM T. B. TERRY. 
The seedsman should guarantee, first, that 
all seeds will grow. If they fail he should 
agreo to refill the order without further 
charge, or return the money paid, at the buy¬ 
er’s option. All seeds should be tested and 
the seller should know what he is selling well 
enough to be willing to make this guarantee. 
Now, on the other hand, the buyer should 
purchase all seeds in time to test them before 
planting, unless he is willing to take the risk. 
If he finds them poor he has time to get others- 
The loss, beyond disappointment, is small. 
He must put his disappointment against that 
of the seller and call it square. 
In legard to plants sent out, if they are 
manifestly unsound when received (like a 
bunch of grape-vines sent me last spring, with 
moldy, dried-up roots,) the seller should be 
willing to furnish good plants promptly, or to 
return the money, and in either case to refund 
the expenses to which the buyer has been put. 
If thrifty-looking plants are received by the 
buyer, and they seem to be in good order, but 
afterwards fail to do well, I see no way but 
for the buyer to stand the loss. How can it 
ever be decided who was to blame? The pre¬ 
sumption would be that the trouble, as a rule, 
would be at the buyer’s end, as a “ reputable 
nurseryman ” would be likely to understand 
the management of plants or trees better than 
most buyers. Then again, his reputation 
would be at stake. Plants sent out that fail¬ 
ed to grow would hurt him more than what 
he made on them would help him. 
In regard to the second question: I send my 
man out to clear up some land. He sets fire 
to a brush heap that is two or three rods from 
the line fence. Not far off stands a neighbor’s 
hay stack. The wind is blowing towards it. 
If it burn 1 must pay for it, according to Ohio 
law and justice. I am responsible for what 
my employes do in the course of their regu¬ 
lar business. Now, again, suppose the wind 
was blowing right away from the stack 
when my man set the fire but, suddenly, at just 
the wrong moment, and without warning, it 
changed and thus my neighbor’s hay is burned. 
This would be a pure accident. I have aright 
to clear my land with reasonable precautions 
and could not be made to pay for the hay. I 
should, of course, be very sorry, but could 
hardly be blamed. 
Again, supposing my man in driving along 
the highway with a heavy load on a good 
wagon, carelessly runs into some one and 
breaks off a wheel from his vehicle. I must 
pay for it. He is my employd. I put him 
in a position to do this damage. But suppose 
just as he was turning out, an axle broke and 
he could not go farther. The other man was 
too near to do all the turning in time. Now I 
could not be held responsible. It was purely 
an accident. 
Let us apply these rules to the seedsman or 
nurseryman who sends out by accident high- 
priced seeds or plants untrue to name, thus 
entailing loss and disappointment on the pur¬ 
chaser. 
If it was as purely accidental as the two cases 
mentioned above; if the accident was some¬ 
thing that human foresight could not have 
prevented, or foreseen, like the changing of 
the wind that caused the hay-stack to bum; 
then I should say “ no ” to the second question. 
But, as a rule, and practically always, are 
not these “accidents” caused by the careless¬ 
ness of some of the employes of the seller? If 
they are, he should certainly be held strictly 
accountable for them. He put his employes 
in a position where they could injure those 
who bought of him. 
But now comes the question: “What 
would be a fair basis for a settlement?” 
There is the rub. From the nature of the 
business, the carelessness of one man, for a 
single day, might get a seller, if he is to be 
held responsible for all damages, into no end 
of trouble and lawsuits, from one end of the 
country to the other. To enforce this seem¬ 
ingly just rule would drive every man out of 
business, for he never would know when he 
was safe. What can be done, practi¬ 
cally? The seller should be responsible, 
always, to the amount of what was 
paid him for plants or trees. This would 
insure all reasonable precautions against care¬ 
lessness. Then he might say to the buyer: 
“ In consideration of your taking all risk of 
accidents, beyond those that would be cov¬ 
ered by the cash paid me, I sell you the goods 
at such aud such prices.” The buyer buys on 
this basis, and, of course, far cheaper than 
any reliable firm could sell to him and posi¬ 
tively guarantee them all right or they would 
pay all future damage. 
Certainly little or no business would ever 
be done in this line if sellers were to be held 
for consequential damages in case of careless¬ 
ness, although when one looks only on the 
other side tnis seems but right. But the buy¬ 
er must remember he is not buying on such a 
basis of prices. He gets his trees cheaper be¬ 
cause the contract is limited; just as he buys 
a railroad ticket cheaper because it is limited, 
or sends his produce to market at a certain 
low rate, partly because the company does 
not agree to get it there in time tor any par¬ 
ticular market. He must take some risk him¬ 
self, or pay an extra .price for .sending his 
stuff on a time freight. For the extra pay 
the company takes the risk. 
FROM HENRY STEWART. 
The question of purity and freshness of 
seeds is a very serious one to farmers and 
market gardeners. Some enormous losses—in 
the aggregate—are incurred every year by 
failure of seeds, and I believe these failures 
are not so much the fault of the farmers as of 
the sellers of the seeds. Some guarantees are, 
of course, very desirable, as in other kinds of 
business, in which the seller is held responsible 
for the genuine character of his wares. But 
what guarantees are possible in this respect? 
It has been thought, that if a farmer—as 1 
have done—goes to a large expense in pre¬ 
paring and fertilizing some acres of land for 
any crop—let us say mangels—and purchases 
a lot of seed, which from its nature, (as with 
mangel or beet seed; may be apparently good 
when it is entirely worthless, only empty 
capsules being left instead of well filled ones, 
the farmer is entitled to be repaid all his loss 
by the seller of the worthless seed, who may 
be himself perfectly honest, but has made a 
mistake—perhaps through one of his salesmen. 
This, however, involves the question of in¬ 
direct damages, which I believe the law 
ignores in great and small cases, from the well- 
known Confederate cruiser case against Eng¬ 
land to the sale of an ounce of cabbage seed. 
The legal maxim, caveat emptor, “let the 
purchaser look out for himself,” applies, and 
the United States Courts have so settled cases 
brought before them. It may seem to be un¬ 
just, but looking at it impartially, it seems 
that if the purchaser will not take the trouble 
to examine the seed carefully and test it, be¬ 
fore sowing his land prepared at large ex¬ 
pense, he is not doing his share of the mutual 
duty and obligation. 
Certainly if any seedsman sells, even un¬ 
knowingly, any imperfect or wrong seed the 
least he can do is to return the money paid for 
it, under certain conditions ; and these should 
be the return of the package within a time 
sufficient for the purchaser to test the seeds. 
But even this is open to objection. The pur¬ 
chasers frequently do not know how to test 
many seeds, and some ignorantly kill the seeds 
in preparing unem for sowing. I have known 
cases in which boiling water has been poured 
upon corn for the purpose of hastening the 
germination, and of other very hard seeds 
being sown without this preparation which 
would have hastened their growing. 
Every seedsman, I think, should stake his 
reputation upon these guarantees ; first, that 
the seeds have been grown by competent, 
careful and experienced persons, with every 
care to prevent mixture, and in the best man¬ 
ner to procure healthy and vigorous growth ; 
second, that all seeds sold are fresh, and no 
old stock that may have lost the power of 
germination by age or by ravages of vermin 
of any kind, is offered for sale. Similar 
guarantees should be given as regards plants, 
shrubs and trees. 
If an accident happens and loss is incurred 
by the purchaser, the seller is now held liable 
by the common law for the direct damage 
sustained, and any respectable seedsman 
would no doubt make due reparation for such 
loss, taking into account, of course, the offset 
of whatever part of the loss should fall upon 
the purchaser for his carelessness in certain 
circumstances. It is easy to test seeds and 
the purchaser ought to do this before ne sows 
them. If he fails to do this he necessarily 
waives any claim upon the seller in any way. 
If he tests them aud finds they have been dam¬ 
aged, or are old and worthless, he has a just 
claim to get his money back on return of the 
seeds at the earliest practicable moment. 
With fruit trees there is much more uncer¬ 
tainty and greater necessity for some trade 
regulation. If a man sells 100 Bartlett pears 
or Baldwin apples and the purchaser has no 
means of verifying the truth of the labels on 
the trees, and after waiting seven or eight 
years, finds he has other and inferior trees, he 
has been very seriously wronged, and has a 
just claim to compensation. The law would 
give him damages to the amount of the dif¬ 
ference in value of the trees, but no more; 
but what would be a fair basis of settlement 
is exceedingly difficult even to suggest. I 
rather think the whole business is something 
like a man trying to jump a ditch in 
the dark; he may land all right on the firm 
ground, but he may go up to his neck in the 
slush midway. He takes the risk,which,how¬ 
ever, is very small when he deals with well- 
known persons. I have been buying seeds, 
plants and trees largely for more than 30 
years, and have had only one “accident,” 
which I would have discovered had I been 
careful. 
A Buckwheat Pointer. —I prepared a 
field for sowing buckwheat. On July 7, 1888, 
I sowed half of it with “Japanese Buck¬ 
wheat,” and on July 10, I sowed the other 
half with the common buckwheat. One of 
the best farmers in this town laughed at me 
for getting it in so early. He said that July 18, 
was as early as he thought it profitable or safe 
to sow buckwheat in this section. The excep¬ 
tionally early frosts of 1888, blighted his buck¬ 
wheat, while from my Japanese I saved a 
splendid yield of first-quality grain; but the 
common kind by its side was white with 
bloom when the frost spoiled it. Only two 
farmers showed buckwheat at our town fair. 
Mine took the first prize, and richly deserved 
it. K. A. M. 
answers to correspondents. 
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one time. Put questions on a separate piece of paper. 
RAISING MANGEL-WURZELS. 
L. B. (S., East Springfield, N. Y .—I am go¬ 
ing this spring to raise two acres of mangel- 
wurzolB, on a deep limestone loam with a 
loose sub-soil. The land was plowed last 
fall to the depthjof eight inches, and manured 
at the rate of 60 two-horse loads to the acre. 
I intend in the spring to spread on the manure 
200 pounds of Cayuga plaster, brush-harrow 
thoroughly, and then plow it ,undei\about 
four inches. I will then sow 600 pounds per 
acre of salt and 1,000 pounds per acre of Hen¬ 
derson’s rotten bone manure, harrow thor¬ 
oughly with an Acme harrow, and roll. I 
have chosen the Henderson Colossal Long 
Red mangel for planting. Now, what I want 
to find out is, whether I can raise a larger 
crop by planting in rows 30 inches apart and 
thinning to 14 inches in the row; or by plant¬ 
ing in rows 21 inches apart and thinning to 
21 inches in the row. There is little difference 
in the number of plants. In the latter case, I 
will cultivate both ways with a Planet Jr. 
hand-cultivator, and the labor will be greater 
than it would be if I could use the horse-cul¬ 
tivator. But I am willing in this case to take 
the extra trouble if I can get a larger crop. 
ANSWERED BY GEORGE AITKEN, MANAGER 
BILLINGS FARM. 
The raising of mangel-wurzel should never 
be attempted on a flat or level surface, as it is 
almost impossible to grow a profitable crop 
on such land. This is one of the reasons why 
so few farmers raise this crop in this country. 
The land being prepared as L. B. S. proposes, 
should then be thrown up into ridges about 27 
inches apart. This is done by running the 
plow moderately deep and leaving about 27 
inches between the furrows, which should be 
done by an experienced plowman, so that the 
ridges will be exactly the same distance apart 
throughout their entire length. Tne seed is 
then sown on top of the ridges and rolled 
lengthwise of the ridge with a common roller. 
Just before the plants appear, it is well to go 
over the piece with a light dressiug of nitrate 
of soda—about 100 pounds per acre—sprink¬ 
ling it only on top of the ridges, whicn will 
give the young plants a good start ahead of 
the weeds. As soon as the plants appear the 
cultivator should be started with the teeth set 
slantingly so as to leave the ridge narrow 
on top and wide at the base, and if 
the ridging has been properly done 
the cultivator may be set within an 
inch of the plants on each side leaving the 
ridge only two inches wide on top. When 
the plants are about three inches high they 
should be singled out to about 10 inches apart 
by striking a hoe across the top of the ridge. 
This is where a great many fail in growing 
roots: they are too careful not to disturb the 
plant. 1 have seen them carefully pull the 
plants away from the one left standing so as 
not to disturb the ground around the growing 
plant, which is a mistake, as the soil ought to 
be taken away to a depth of an inch and the 
plant allowed to fall over. There is no danger 
of killing it, as the root has struck down three 
or four inches by this time and by taking the 
soil away in this manner, we get rid of the 
weeds and no more hand hoeing is needed, as 
the horse cultivator will do all the rest. This 
is the method I have practiced for the last 20 
years, growing from two to five acres every 
year, and very few crops have yielded less 
than 30 tons per acre, while some have gone as 
high as 40 tons, and they have never cost 
over four cents per bushel. 
HUSKING CORN BY MACHINERY. 
E. B. S., Hydetown, Pa .—I would like to 
hear from Mr. A. C. (Hidden in regard to the 
work he had done with the corn-husner which 
he fully described in the Rural of December 
15. How about his mow of cut fodder? If it 
did not all spoil, I want to know how he 
packed it. 
ANSWERED^BY A. C. GLIDDEN. 
1 think l fully described the work of the 
busker in the article alluded to. I find occa¬ 
sionally an ear with the husks on as I am feed¬ 
ing the corn, but it is cleaner than the aver¬ 
age of husking. But I must now disclose the 
fact that the machine did not do as perfect 
work husking later on, when the husks had 
become perfectly dry, and the husking pius 
had become somewhat worn. The grasp on 
the husks was uncertain when they were dry. 
Some improvements are necessary to hold 
the ear down rather than to allow it to rest on 
the buskers by its own weight entirely. 1 am 
feeding on the last one-third of the cut fodder 
and so tar it has all been eaten except to the 
extent of a dozen bundles perhaps on the front 
side of the bay where it kept wet until it 
froze. The mow steamed some for three 
weeks, but I kept the doors shut to the 
barn. If perchance they were opened, if 
only for a few minutes, the fermentation 
would increase,in the same manner that fresh 
air adds to a blaze. The barn is battened 
tight, and some hay was placed in the bottom 
of the mow, so that no draft of air could 
come from below. I have been feeding off 
the mow everyday this winter, and find the 
fodder has kept perfect, except just in front, 
aud where I stood under the carrier to throw 
the fodder back. Here it has been somewhat 
moldy from top to bottom. I think the heavier 
parts of the fodder were left here—the piths of 
the stalks that held the most moisture. These 
were packed hard, and the water could not 
