1900 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
835 
HOPE FARM NOTES. 
Thanksgiving. —It is Thanksgiving 
night, and I am alone in the old house. 
The other Hope Farmers from the Scion 
to Grandmother have gone to a chil¬ 
dren’s entertainment at the schoolhouse. 
The day has been cloudy, wet and dis¬ 
mal, but now the moon has found a rift 
in the clouds and the damp valley below 
us is shining. Grandmother left a big 
nut cake within easy reach anu there 
are plenty of Baldwin apples near by. 
We left a little of the turkey at dinner, 
and a few relics of Charlie Chester are 
yet to be found in the pantry. The wood- 
fire is snapping and darting out sparks. 
Surely, if bodily comforts are to be con¬ 
sidered the chief aim and end of life I 
have much to be thankful for. There are 
strange things about an old house. At 
least three and perhaps four generations 
have been born and reared in the Hope 
Farm building. You do not realize how 
strange some of these things are until 
you sit alone at nightfall on a day that 
may be called a trap for memories. 
There - are strange noises about the old 
place. If the whole family were here 
you would know at once it is only the 
creaking of a weary timber, the dog 
pawing at the door, or perhaps a slam¬ 
ming blind. Alone, and with busy 
thoughts, it is easy to imagine the old 
house peopled once more with those who 
lived and struggled and thought within 
its walls. You will hardly expect a 
tough, practical old farmer to give much 
thought to such shadowy visitors, yet it 
seems as though they had been with me 
to-night. There are no ill or evil spirits 
among them. They seem, on the whole, 
to be well wishers—their sorrow being 
the fact that they cannot make humans 
understand the real mystery and end of 
human life. I may say without irrever- 
a nee that these shades are pasi masters 
in the art of living, if I understand 
their Thanksgiving message, they all say 
—’way back to the old pioneer who first 
bought Hope Farm from the Indians— 
that human days are all too short for 
us to be properly thankful for the privi¬ 
lege of living and attempting to do our 
duty. That is about what it comes to, 
and so I lean back in my chair, put my 
feet in a comfortable position and think 
it over. 
Beginning Emily. —When I came 
home last night Jack came with me. Jack 
is Grandmother’s youngest son. He is 
at a school in Massachusetts, fitting him¬ 
self for Y. M. C. A. work—especially the 
department of physical culture. As we 
drove in the gate behind old Franko 
Jack delivered a yell of true Thanksgiv¬ 
ing volume, and a great procession im¬ 
mediately streamed out of the rack door. 
The Madame is light of foot, and she 
came in ahead, with Aunt Jennie a close 
second. Grandmother is no longer a 
runner, but she got her share of the 
greeting. The children danced up and 
down for joy. We had a merry time 
over our supper—the Madame opening 
one of her famous cans of preserved 
fruit. After supper Jack regaled the 
company with an account of his adven¬ 
tures until alter the usual Hope Farm 
bedtime. Yes, yes, we all went to sleep 
with the spirit of thankfulness hover¬ 
ing over the house like incense. If a 
chemist could have analyzed that incense 
he would have doubtless found a high 
per cent of mince pie, turkey dressing 
and roast pork in it. 
The Day.— We were all up betimes to 
find a light flurry of snow on the ground 
and a dull cheerless sky. Breakfast was 
surely something to be thankful for. 
Oatmeal and cream, hot biscuits and 
fried potatoes and a great dish of fried 
short ribs, the latter contributed by 
Charlie Chester, who ended his days in 
doing it. We kept busy through the 
forenoon at a variety of jobs. Among 
other things we set out several October 
Purple plum trees which we hope will 
enable us to give thanks a few years 
hence. About 3 o’clock the Hope Farm¬ 
ers got into their good clothes and sur¬ 
rounded the dinner table. I think we 
had the biggest family in the township 
at dinner that day. We sent samples of 
Charlie Chester to two other families 
also. Jack tried to get a picture of the 
Hope Farmers in their great act of wait¬ 
ing for the carver, but the prints were 
too dim. 
“Well, Mother, I shall have to turn 
this bird over after all!” 
That’s what I had to report after 
scraping all the meat I could find on one 
side of the turkey. We have a fashion 
of using a big turkey and limiting our 
dinner to one side—then eating the other 
side on Sunday. This year there were 
so many urgent calls for “a little more 
white meat” that one side was not 
enough. The rest of the bird turned up 
on Sunday as a “picked-up” mess or 
hash. But you can hardly be interested 
in such matters—doubtless you had just 
as good a dinner in your own home. If 
I had time I would tell how I walked 
over the farm and sized up each field 
and tried to make up my mind whether 
I should be thankful or faultfinding over 
its condition. The Madame wisely re¬ 
marked that “if, in counting up our 
blessings we were limited to those things 
which we really deserve, most of us 
would be stricken with a sudden and 
complete poverty!” But here they are 
back from the school entertainment. 
When I ask how they enjoyed it the old¬ 
er folks put on a wise and patronizing 
look, but the little ones say it was “fine” 
without any reserve. I can imagine the 
group of melancholy shadows that have 
been with me to-night, nodding at each 
other and trying to tell me—that from 
their experience the greatest thing a 
man can be thankful for is that he has 
kept alive about him somewhere a lit¬ 
tle of the freshness, faith and fun of bis 
childhood! 
Farm Notes. —I feel anything but 
thankful over the mistake I made in 
not sowing rye after potatoes. That 
was a clean, downright blunder. The 
rye would have prevented washing and 
put the soil in better shape for next 
year’s corn. . . . We have not fed a 
spire of hay yet. Corn fodder and Kaffir, 
with Crimson clover and rye pasture, 
keep the stock well. We fed the horses 
ear corn for a time, but now we feed a 
mixture of bran and oats in the morn¬ 
ing and ear corn at night. . . I have 
never believed much in corn-and-cob 
meal. If we were to grind the cob with 
the grain I should want to cook it be¬ 
fore feeding. With hogs I prefer to use 
the grain for food and the cob for medi¬ 
cine. What do I mean by that? Why 
burn or char the cob and keep ashes or 
charcoal before the hog. 1 think that 
will do him more good than the ground 
cob. . . it is remarkable how a small 
amount of green food helps a fattening 
pig. From August our pigs have had 
little beside cabbage, rape, apples and 
what they could root out of the manure 
pile. They made good steady growth, 
but were not fat. We took two out to 
fatten and fed quite heavily on corn. 
They made a fair gain, but did much 
better on less corn and a few heads of 
cabbage each day. No use talking, there 
is a value in roots, cabbage or silage 
which the chemist cannot analyze. The 
juicy quality or succulence helps to' a 
better digestion of the other food. . . 
. . All that is true, and yet I am not 
ready to build a silo and turn my corn 
crop into silage. As we are situated it 
will pay us better to feed hogs, hens and 
horses than to keep cows. Silage is of 
little account for our stock—though very 
fine for cattle. With dry stalks, dry 
grain and cabbage we can make more out 
of our corn crop. . . . It is a mis¬ 
take to assume that stock fed heavily 
on succulent food will need little or no 
water. According to the chemist’s story, 
cabbage, roots or silage contain nearly 
water enough for the stock, yet they 
will drink plenty of water in addition if 
permitted to do so. 
Broom Corn. —With our big family to 
provide jobs for I have often studied 
over the Winter-work problem. I 
thought possibly we might raise a crop 
of broom corn and work it into brooms 
during the Winter. Those who ought to 
know say this will not work. Here is 
one letter: 
In a recent issue of The R. N.-Y. the 
Hope Farm man asks whether a small 
crop of broom corn would not be profitable 
for farmers. We raised it for three years 
on my father’s farm, but found it a very 
unsatisfactory crop. It requires a good 
deal of labor, and here (Onondaga Co.), it 
does not attain a satisfactory growth or 
color, all that I have seen grown here be¬ 
ing of a dark red color. The yield was 
from 300 to 500 pounds of short red brush 
per acre. A neighbor planted about half 
an acre of his best ground to broom corn 
this year, and has about 150 pounds of 
brush, worth three cents per pound. Pro¬ 
vided a man gets a good crop the tools and 
machinery necessary to work it up by 
hand power would cost about $100, and it 
requires a mechanic to make a salable 
broom just as much as it does to make a 
wagon s. s. c. 
That is sensible, I am sure. I am af¬ 
ter information, and am glad to get it. 
Another reader in Illinois says this: 
I see the Hope Farm man is thinking of 
growing broom corn. He would better go 
. ne gets started. This is the great¬ 
est broom-corn region in the United States; 
three-fourths of all the broom corn in the 
country is raised within 50 miles of this 
town. Any place in this region, if you get 
up on a windmill, you can see thousands 
of acres of it in the growing season. I 
raised 10 acres this year, had 13 1 /> tons and 
sold at $80 per ton. This was my first crop. 
It takes about all the profit of the first 
crop to pay for the necessary preparation, 
sheds, slats and some machinery. One of 
my neighbors, a renter, raised 250 acres last 
year, had 85 tons and sold at $70, and before 
he delivered it, it was $125 per ton. Like 
everything else there is a trust in this, too; 
the Union Broom Corn Supply Company 
controls the price. Every town has big 
broom-corn warehouses holding hundreds 
of tons, and the majority of them have a 
broom factory connected. Tell the Hope 
Farm man to be sure he knows what he 
is doing, and get good seed and of the right 
variety. I have worked in it for 20 years, 
yet there was much I didn’t know when I 
undertook to raise it myself. j. b. f. 
Mattoon, Ill. 
That’s what we found about our cab¬ 
bage crop. You may be sure that we 
shall go slow with broom corn—except 
such corns as the broom handle raises 
on the hands. It looks as though the 
hen is about the best Winter partner 
after all. ii. w. c. 
An Excellent Seedling Peach 
On September 15 F. S. Hall, of Lewis¬ 
ton, N. Y., sent us samples of a seed¬ 
ling peach about which he tells the fol¬ 
lowing story: 
The peach pit from which this tree grew 
was tossed over the railing of the veranda 
and forgotten. The following year the 
sprout appeared, and was allowed to grow 
for two years. It was not until then it was 
discovered to be a peach tree, and was set 
out in the garden one year ago last Spring. 
It was a scraggy tree, owing to its location 
while growing, but the result of transplant¬ 
ing was watched with much interest. This 
Summer it was noticed the tree had a 
quantity of peaches on it; when they 
ripened they were found to be of good 
shape, and certainly of good flavor and 
color. 
The peach is shown at Fig. 320, page 
830. Mr. Hall says the samples sent us 
were smaller than the average, as the 
larger ones were too ripe to send by 
mail. The peach is of good color and 
very goou flavor. 
RHEUMATISM 
As experience stands, the 
most promising way to treat an 
old settled rheumatism is: to 
set up the general health. 
Whatever makes health, in 
other respects, is good for 
rheumatism. 
We don’t say it will cure it. 
Sometimes it does; sometimes 
it don’t. 
Your chance is better with 
Scott’s emulsion of cod-liver 
oil than with anything else now 
known. 
Green Cut Bone 
doubles number of eggs, adds months to 
laying season, makes fowl fatter, sleeker 
and better flavored. The only thoroughly 
satisfactory means of preparing it is the 
STEARNS ) 
BONE CUTTER 
(Formerly Webster & Hannum). . 
No other cuts bone fine enough for ' 
chicks. Self-feeding, self-regulating, non-clogging. 
Easiest running Cuts meat or gristle. Cracks corn. 
Send for catalogue and book on poultry feeding. 
E. C. STEARNS & CO,, Box 20, Syracuse. N. Y. 
PRnWN Bone Cutler 
UlIU H II for cutting art** 
or the 
man. 
catting gran 
Best in the world. 
Lovett in price. Send for circular and testL 
menials. Wllwa Bros., EASTON, PA. 
MAKE POULTRY PAY 
by feeding green cut bone. Tlie Humphrey 
Green lbme ami Vegetable Cutter is guaran¬ 
teed to cut more bone in less time with leas labor 
than any other cutter made. Send for free book 
containing blanks for one year’s egg record. 
Humphrey & Sons, Box 39 . Joliet, 111. 
G et more egos, how? 
freed the hens on jerecu cut bone. They/ 
will lay double the eggs 
right in the middle of the winter, / 
when eggs are worth most money. I 
DANDY C "cutters 16 
with or without gear are the best 
machines for preparing bone for 
fowls. Cut fit at* turn easy. 
Catalogue and prices free. 
STRATTON MFG. CO.. * 
Box i 8 . Erie, Pa. * 
EASY ECC MONEY 
▲ man can easily make money selling eggs if he can but get the egg*. 
He can get the eggs Mure— twice as many, if he will feed his hen. 
m Green Cut Bone. No better way to prepare It thau with 
ADAM’S 
GREEN BONE 
CUTTER 
It cuts on the shear plate principle. Takes off 
a fine ribbon iike piece, easily consumed by the i 
chicks or fowls. No sharp splinters to injure throat. U 
Turns easily. Only ball-bearing cutter made. For hand or power 
Catalogue No.82 free. W. J. ADAM, Joliet, III. 
HENS LAY BEST 
-In fact they lay double the eggs winter 
\nd summer when fed Green Out ltone. 
Mann’s Hew Bone Cutters 
rat all hard and soft bones, meat, gristle, 
•tc., fine, fast and witheutchokingand run 
oasy. Clover cut with our Clover Cutter, 
helps wonderfully. Mann’s Granite Crystal 
Grit and Feed Trays too. Cats logue FREE. 
P.W. MANN CO., Box 15. Milford, Mass . 1 
INCUBATORS 
From SSS.OO Up 
BROODERS FROM $3.80 UP. 
Free Catalogue. 
L. A. 1JANTA, Ligonler, Ind. 
SEND FOR FREE CATALOGUE. 
Prairie State Incubator Co. 
Homer City, Pa. 
PINELAND 
INCUBATORS Don’t forgetthe name 
have the mostscieutitic system of ven. 
ill ation, an d the mostsensitive ami sim¬ 
ple regulator ever introduced. The Pin®* 
Sand Brooder isnotequaledbyanyother. 
Get our free catalog, judge for yourself. 
flneiand Incubator* Brooder Co.,Boi p Jamesburg, ILL 
200-Egg Incubator 
for $12.00 
in construction and 
Hatches every fertile 
for catalogue to-day. 
H. STAHL, Quincy, III. 
VICTOR 
INCUBATORS 
are made in many sizes to meet 
every want. Reliable, s i m p 1 e , 
aelf-regnlating. Circular free; 
catalogue 6 cents. 
GKO. KRTKL CO., Quincy, III. 
SPECIAL PRICES 
80 Day. Trial on 
none 0111*11 Incubator. 
NUNC-dUull and Brooder.. 
Self regulating. Automatic egg 
Perfect - 
tray. 
810 and up. 
ventilation. Price" 
Fully guaranteed" 
Send 4c. 
for catalog. 
FOREST INCUBATOR CO., Forest, Ohio. 
MARILLA. 
That's the name which means 
’highest excellence in Incubators 
land Brooders—the most perfect 
regulation of temperature and 
moisture. Hot air or hot water. 
Send2c for catalogue and guar¬ 
antee. Your money back if you 
„aro not satislied 
MARILLA INCUBATOR CO M 
Box 45, Bone Hill, N. Y, 
INCUBATORS ^FARfti 
By and by there will be a sure 
cure; it will make a big noise 
in the world when it comes. 
We'll send you a little to try if you like. 
SCOTT & BOWNE, 409 Pearl street, New York. 
muse he him pit* in oneiaiiou, 
•nr© in results. Th it's the 
SURE HATCH INCUBATOR. 
anybody can run it, becaute it 
runs itself. Send for our free 
catalog and sea for yourself how 
very successful It has been on 
the farm. It also describes our 
Common Sense Folding 
Brooder. We Pay the Freight, 
SURE HATCH INCUBATOR CO., CUy Center, Nebraalt* 
B PRACTICAL POULTRY BOOK 
One which covers 
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r» ■ w-- - __ industry from in- 
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