THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
make the ideas of the reading lesson under¬ 
stood and fixed, like a picture, in tlie mind of 
the pupil. It will be worth a great deal of 
effort for the child to learn early to nse a dic¬ 
tionary. This habit, once formed, will be of 
lasting value through life. It will educate the 
child or prepare him to help himself. 
Spelling is best learned in connection with 
reading. To become a good speller in the 
English language, is the work of a life-time 
with most of ub. It is to be hoped that the 
long and much-talked-of spelling reform will 
soon be brought to a vote and become a reality. 
Such a reform will save much time and per¬ 
plexity to the printer, the teacher and the 
pupil. Every child can then easily become an 
accurate speller, and much more time can be 
given to other subjects. The reasons for this 
reform are good and sensible. 
Every child should learu penmanship, in¬ 
cluding the printing of letters. He should learn 
to express himself brielly and clearly. Pupils 
usually have a great dread of writing compo¬ 
sitions. Let them begin early to write as they 
would talk on any subject. Begin with some 
easy descriptions of common objects, and then 
keep writing a little every day. On the black¬ 
board should be written or printed some sen¬ 
tences containing the most common mistakes 
in our language. Below these, insert the cor¬ 
rections. Write the errors which are heard in 
the 6Chool-room. Encourage the pupils to 
collect such sentences and help to correct 
them. Keep this going persistently, and pupils 
will learu to speak quite accurately without 
knowing anything of parsing or analysis. 
Many books have been made for teaching 
the subject of arithmetic, but I think the model 
has yet to be written, though I have not seen 
all of the latest books. Writers of arithmetics 
must consult the grocer, the butcher, the bar¬ 
ber, and get all the best modes of using figures 
in actual business. It requires but very little 
knowledge of arithmetic to do moBt kinds of 
business correctly. As usually taught, there 
is a great deal of time thrown away on arith¬ 
metic. Pupils try to learn certain parts of it 
and the reasons therefor, before their minds 
can comprehend the subjects. 
Agricultural College, Lansing, Mich. 
-- 
EFFECTS OF PLASTER. 
In my article on plaster a mistake occurred 
in the printing of the formula showing the 
change of ammonia and sulphuric acid into 
sulphate of ammonia. 1 wished this to bo 
plain and simple aud free from technical nom¬ 
enclature as much as possible, so as to be 
easily understood aud yet to be correct. What 
I intended to show was as follows, viz : that 
Ammonia is H3 N 
Water is H O 
These combined are H I N 0 
Sulphuric acid is 8 03 
Water is H O 
These combined are H O, S O 3 
Tbi6 formula will show the combination in a 
way that will be plain to almost every farmer 
who uses plaster, aud who will be interested in 
knowiug just how the ammonia is acted upon 
by the plaster, aud that after the ammonia and 
sulphuric acid have combined, the lime only of 
the plaster is left. I have used in this illustra¬ 
tion the old chemical notation, which is more 
familiar to most people than the new one, and 
because it can be easily understood by those 
who know nothing about atomic notation. 
H. Stewart. 
- ■»-»■»- 
CATALOGUES, &c., RECEIVED. 
In noticing the seed catalogue of Cole and 
Bro., Pella, Iowa, in a late issue, a slip made 
the State Illinois instead of Iowa. 
E. B. Crofut «fc Co’s Price List and Cata¬ 
logue of garden, field and flower seeds, and 
agricultural implements, Syracuse N. Y. This 
Catalogue of oil pages is free to applicants. 
Maces's Manures, Fertilizers aud Chemicals, 
This pamphlet of 40 pages contains a list of the 
dozen different kinds of manures and fertiliz¬ 
ers prepared aud for sale by this company, to¬ 
gether with testimonials from practical agri¬ 
culturists of their excellent effects on various 
kinds of crops and Boils. 158 Front St., N, Y. 
John Saul’s Catalogue of new, rare and 
beautiful plants for the spring of 1879. This 
work of 112 pages contains a very full list of 
desirable flowers aud rare plants suitable for 
green-house or bedding out. Sent free to the 
numerous customers of this old-established 
firm; lOo. to others or a plaiu copy free. 
John Saul, Washington, D. C. 
Proceedings of the American Poultry Asso¬ 
ciation at the Sixth Annual Meeting held at 
Buffalo, N. Y., commencing February 3d, 1879. 
Also constitution and by-laws and list of offi¬ 
cers and members. We notice that at this 
meeting several changes iu the standards of 
various brcedH of fowls were made. An ap¬ 
pendix containing these changes will be mailed 
to applicants who inclose a three-cent stamp 
to Geo. S. Josselyn, Secretary and Treasurer: 
Fredonia, N. Y. 
i These combined are 
Sulphate of Am- 
! wonia, wnich is 
I Hi N O plus H O 
J 8 03 
OUR BEE HINTS. 
Do not be in too great a hurry to remove the 
bees from their winter-quarters to their places 
in the apiary on the first mild day of spring. 
Provided they are healthy and do not need 
feeding, it is best to keep them packed up and 
cool till the spring showers have abated, for 
otherwise many bees will he lost. Nor is the fear 
of their loss the only reason for keeping them 
in. It is important that they should commence 
breeding as soon as they begin to fly out; if 
they do not, they will dwindle away, and the 
strength of the colonies will be reduced, whiehit 
will take a long time to regain. But they cannot 
rear brood until they can gather pollen enough 
from which to make “ bee-bread” to feed the 
young; hence, iu northern latitudes where the 
chill of winter still suppresses vegetation, bees 
will be most secure in their winter-quarters 
for some time longer. Feeding, if necessary, 
must be attended to. 
Those who venture into bee-keeping for the 
first time this spring, should make up their 
minds what hive to use aud use no other. It 
is a great advantage to have every hive, board, 
frame aud cleat equal in size and shape to 
every other, so as to avoid the trouble iu trans¬ 
ferring, changing of frames, etc., that con¬ 
stantly must arise where hives of different 
sizes and shapes are used. Of course, we talk 
of noue but movable frame hives, but of these 
a very copious list of patterns might be enu¬ 
merated, each claiming to have some distin¬ 
guishing feature that makes it superior to all 
othors. We shall not discuss the merits and 
demerits of these, but simply give some of the 
points most essential to a good hive, and 
then let each purchaser suit himself. 
The hive should be simple; a number of 
strips, bits and pieces, that require to be ac¬ 
companied by a descriptive catalogue in order 
to learu where each oue belongs and what it 
is good for, are of no advantage whatever, but, 
on the contrary, serve to form Hiding-places 
for bee-enemies, to confuse the apiarist aud 
retard his work. 
It should be cheap; numerous patents on 
movable frame hives have now expired, and 
no hive made of the best materials and 
painted, ought to exceed two dollars in price, 
aud if the beginner is mechanic enough to 
make his own hives, they can be had much 
cheaper. 
It should he compact in form; if any one 
dimension much exceeds the others, in being 
either too long, too broad or too shallow, the 
bees are spread over too large an area aud are 
therefore more likely to perish from cold and 
the attack of enemies than if their home were 
of a more cubical form. 
It should be tight and of exact workmanship 
The reasons are obvious. A hive full of cracks 
and ope.niugs that admit moths, ants and other 
insects, as well as rain, cold and heat alike, or 
which is made in so slip-shod a manner as to 
weaken the durability of the whole hive aud 
render its parts uuflt for use iu other hives, 
cannot be profitably employed. 
A hive we have used with good results con¬ 
sists of a simple box without top or bottom, 
made of inch lumber aud measuring one foot 
deep, one foot wide aud oue and a half foot 
long, inside measure. The ends and sides may 
be joined by tongues aud grooves, or simply 
by nailing, if carefully done. All around this 
box and two inches from the top is nailed a 
cleat which supports a similar box that forms 
the second story aud which is made large 
enough just to slip over the first one, or lower 
story, but only ten inches high. This is cov¬ 
ered with a tight-fitting lid aud provided with 
a loose bottom board. The upper story gives 
room for storing honey in boxes or frames, the 
lower, for brood chamber. 
®j}f Ijerisiuiiit. 
THE HISTORY OF A POOR FARM.- 
No. 6. 
What Cows Shall he Kept. 
Which is the best cow for a milk dairy? 
This is an important question for those farmers 
who produce milk for sale or for disposal to 
cheese factories. It is stated in the census re¬ 
port of the State of New York for 1875, that 
the whole number ot cows from which milk 
was sold to cheese factories, was 398.722; the 
whole product of milk per cow delivered to 
the factories iu the season of 200, days was 
3,108 pounds, or an average of 15J pounds per 
day or about seven quarts, a quart of milk 
weighing 2.2 pouuds. This is exactly equal to 
my daily product per cow, out of 18 cows, aud 
at the depth of the wiuter season; hut I have 
two dry cows included, and those included in 
the factory reports were doubtless all in full 
average milking. My cows are about the 
average of commou dairy cows. Seven quarts 
per day is far from profitable for a dairyman 
who patronizes a cheese factory at less than 
one cent per pound, or sells his milk in cities 
at four cents per quart or less, and payB one 
and one-quarter or one and one-half cent per 
quart for freight. Ten to twelve cents a day 
of income from a cow do not pay the cost of 
the milk. Fortunately I am situated so as to 
get five cents a quart net for my milk, and that 
pays a profit. But there are other poor farms 
than mine, where milk must be sold at two aud 
oue-half cents per quart, or less, aud the ques¬ 
tion what kind of cows shall be kept, becomes 
very interesting. 1 am farming for profit— 
aud not for fun, by any means—so that it in¬ 
terests me also to know what kind of cows can 
be procured that will yield an average of ten 
to twelve quarts a day during nine to ten 
months, and when they fall off to five quarts, 
may be made fat and sent to the butcher. 
11 It won't be a Jersey cow, you may be sure.” 
said Mr. Martin. 
" These Jerseys, or Alderneys, as I call them, 
have ruined the stock of cattle here,” said my 
old neighbor. “We have little scraggy beasts 
that give a little rich milk, perhaps, but after 
a few years they are useless, and to get fat 
upon them is out of the question. I was offer¬ 
ed #8 the other day for a dry Jersey cow, and 
she has eaten #10 worth of meal in trying to 
make her fat. Jerseys may be well enough for 
butter-makers; but for a milk dairy they are 
poor stock.” 
“I think they maybe left out of the ques¬ 
tion,” 1 replied, “ when the dairyman hopes to 
sell a fat calf and fat a cow when she fails in 
milk, for a return of his first outlay. I have a 
young Dutch cow here that has given 20 quarts 
a day, and is now giving 10, after having milk¬ 
ed nine mouths, aud is due to calve again in 
three months more: but 1 am not satisfied with 
the milk; my customers complain that her 
milk is too watery.” 
•' What do yon think of this?” said William. 
“ My boy, Fred, bus just come home from the 
Agricultural College for the holidays, and he 
gave me this scrap from an agricultural paper. 
It says that, one Holstein—that is what you call 
Dutch, I think—gave 16,274 pounds of milk in 
one year; that is more than 20 quarts a day 
for the whole year.” 
I don’t believe it, William,’’ said his grand¬ 
father. 
“That is a pretty tough story.” remarked 
Martin. 
“ It may be true, nevertheless,” said I. I 
have seen those Dutch cows on their native 
pastures, in north Holland, and not in Hol¬ 
stein— where there are no snob cows at all— 
and hare known them lobe milked three or 
four times a day, and give a large pailful each 
time; but the cows have been bred on the rich¬ 
est pastures in the world, for years and years, 
some say tor more than 2,000 years, and have 
been brought up to it. Yet what is their milk 
good for ? It makes those round, hard cheeses, 
which arc said to have been used for cannon 
shot at the siege of Antwerp, when iron balls 
gave ont, and the cheese,' bursting into frag¬ 
ments, did so much execution that the enemy 
hauled off their 6hip6 and fled. And these 
cheeses have precisely the same flavor and 
texture as onr skim-milk cheeses, which are so 
much berated by everybody but those who 
make them. My Dutch cow will not give two 
pouuds of butter out of a whole week’s milk, 
aud as I am inclined to believe this is the gen¬ 
eral character of the breed, I exclude them 
from the list of cows profitable for a milk 
dairy. I have crossed this cow with a pure 
Jersey bull aud expect the produce, if a heifer, 
will make a valuable cow. We shall see about 
that iu time." 
"What do you thiuk of the Ayrsbires?” 
asked William. “Fred calls them the model 
dairy cows.” 
“Aud Fred is right," rejoined the old gentle¬ 
man. “When I was a boy, it took the whole 
of one cow’s milk to make enough for my 
breakfast, and if we got two or three quarts at 
a milking from a fresh cow, that was doing 
pretty well, and the first good cows we could 
get, were the Ayrshire cross that came from 
New England about 40 years ago. Since then 
the best cows I have seeu or owned had Ayr¬ 
shire blood in them.” 
“ Flint says, for purely dairy purposes the 
Ayrshire cow deserves the first place, and the 
Ayrshire cow gives a larger return of milk 
for the food consumed than a cow of any other 
breed,” said Fred, who being fresh from books 
quoted confidently and fluently. 
“ The best cow I have seen,” said 1, was “the 
cross-bred Ayrshire aud Short-horn exhibited 
a few years ago by General Hungcrford at the 
New York State Fair. She gave over 100 
pounds of milk a day for three days in succes¬ 
sion, which is equal to 45 quarts a day. She 
was a heavy-bodied cow that would make,when 
fat, 600 pouuds of beef at least. Now such cows 
as that are what we want.” 
“ If wc could ever get them," remarked Mr. 
Martin, dubiously. 
“ Why should we not ? We have a race of beef 
cattle from which wo can rear beeves of 1,400 
lbs. at two years old and 1,800 lbs. at three 
years old, every time by proper feeding; now 
what is to prevent us from making a race of 
cows that will yield milk as surely as a Short¬ 
horn steer will make beef. The milk-produc¬ 
ing capability should be made hereditary. We 
have pigs, sheep and cattle that possess cer¬ 
tain meat-making qualities and never fail in 
them ; we have the same as regards butter in 
the Jersey, and we want the same in regard to 
milk.” 
“Why don't we have plenty of good Short¬ 
horn dairy cows now ?’’ remarked Dr. Jones; 
“Bell, in his history of Short-horns, mentions 
the first Duchess cow which gave 30 quarts of 
milk a day and made 24 pounds of butter a 
week, and at that time cows nearly as good 
were not rare ; now. it takes two Short-horn 
cows to nursjj one calf.” 
"Of some kinds,” I replied. “I have seen 
plenty of nurse cows about the yards and 
stables of fancy breeders, but these nurses 
are all well-bred grade Short-horns and good 
milkers. Harris Lewis has a herd of pure 
Short-horns kept purposely for milk, aud he 
wrote me Jot long ago that his cows give 40 
to 50 pounds of milk per day. and are good to 
hold out if fairly fed. There are several high- 
milking herds of this breed 5d New England, 
and most of the best dairies which supply the 
cities of New York and Brooklyn with milk 
are made up of grade Short-horns. 
“ But those large cows consume more food 
for the milk produced thau a smaller Ayrshire 
cow,” said Fred. “ A small cow of 800 pounds 
live-weight, will eat 24 pounds of hay or its 
equivalent of other food daily, and a cow of 
1200 pounds weight will eat 36 pounds or 50 
per cent more; if the small cow gives 20 
quarts of milk, that will cost per quart just 
the same as 80 quarts from the large cow. If 
Mr. Lewis’s Short-horn cows give only 40 to 50 
pounds, or 18 to 22 quarts a day, and Mr. Cro- 
zier’s or Dr. Sturtevant’s Ayrsbires give the 
same, the Ayrshire milk would only cost two 
cents a quart, if the Shoot-horn milk cost three 
cents ; so that there would be a loss of 50 per 
cent on the large cows.” 
“Fred puts the case very well.” 1 remarked, 
“ aud if he knows so much of other farm busi¬ 
ness as he has learned about cowb at the Col¬ 
lege, an Agricultural College is a good place 
for the young men to go to. No one can work 
a farm profitably now, unless he tboroughly 
understands his business ; aud the want of this 
knowledge is, to a great extent, the cause of 
much of the dissatisfaction that is rife among 
farmers. The pity is that farmers do not see 
clearly that it is as necessary to educate their 
boys to understand their work, as it is for pro¬ 
fessional and other business men to give their 
sons a business education at a business college. 
But go on, Fred, tell us something about these 
Ayrsliircs of Mr. Crozicr aud Dr. eturtevant.” 
Fred took from his pocket a small, red, 
leather-covered book ; referred to an index, 
and turned over the leaves, until he found 
what he wanted. 
“ Let me look at that book Fred ?” The book 
was a blank paper memorandum book ruled 
and paged, aud with an iudex; the page Fred had 
turned to was headed "Ayrshire cows” and 
under that head he had many items respecting 
those cattle. “ Well go on Fred,” said I. re- 
turaing the book. 
“Beacon Belle, an Ayrshire cow imported 
and owned by William Crozier, NortUport, 
Loug island, gave 43J quarts of milk, equal 
to 95 lbs. daily, when fresh, at eight years old. 
In 1878 when 15 yeais.old, she gave28 quarts 
or 501 lbs. daily, a month after having her 13th 
calf. 
“Dr. E LewisSturtcvantof Waushakumfarm 
Mass., records the yield of his herds during 
seven years viz: 
Average of Natives. 4775 lhs. per cow. 
Average of Ayrshires. 6309 tbs. per cow. 
The yields iu the best year of the seven for 
each class was: 
Avermre of Nstives. 4834 lbs. per cow. 
Average of AyrsUires. 6047 tbs. per cow. 
A daily average of 15f lbs. for the Natives 
aud of 19 lbs. for the Ayrshire. The yield of 
the 10 best Ayrshircs out of 18 was 7317 lbs. in 
the year, and of the 10 best Natives 6943 lbs. 
One Ayrshire cow, Lady Kilbourme, gave 
1338 lbs. in oue mouth after calving; anotuer 
cow, Georgia, gave 1417 lbs. in one month when 
fresh. These cows weighed about 850 lbs. 
In averaging the yearly yield of first-class 
Ayrshire cows. Dr. Sturtevunt places it at 
5674 Lbs. or 2629 quarts per cow or nearly 
niue quarts per day for 300 days or 10 months, 
leaving the cow dry for two months in the 
year. As to the quality of the milk Mr. Miller 
of Delaware (Jo.. N. Y. reports oue Ayrshire 
cow us yielding 14 lbs. 13 oz. of butter in one 
week in June; another gave 14 lbs 11 oz. and 
another 184 lbs. a year previously the last 
cow gave 18t lbs in oiie week. In a pamphlet, 
“Mific Analyses” by Prof. Sharpless, Ayrshire 
milk is shown to have almost precisely the 
same composition as human milk and is there¬ 
fore the best substitute for the natural food of 
infante.” 
"That is not sogood as I expected.” said Mr. 
Martin ; “ but it is good enough ; 2,639 quarts 
at 21 cents is equal to #65.97 and at five cents 
would lie over *180 per cow iu the year.” 
“ Harris Lewis’s Short-horns yield 351 lbs. of 
butter per year and he expects to reach 300 
lbs." I rejoined; if 20 lbs. of milk, make one 
pound of butter, that is, 5000 to 6000 lbs. 
per cow, but his cow, Princess, will eat 
50 per cent more than Ayrshire cows. Their 
great advantage, however is that when they 
have passed their profitable age for milk, they 
are easily fatted for beef. On the whole, I 
think the. Ayrsbires are the cows I ought to 
keep hero. 
“Take my word for it;’’ added my old 
ueighbor “ you are right, aud if there’ is a 
good Native cow that turns up anywhere, 
when vou find out her pedigree, you will find 
Ayrshire iu it.” Ayrshire cows will certainly 
be the most profitable for me. 
