4o 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
TAN. 18 
THE 
RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
(34 Park Row, New York), 
A National Journal for Country and Suburban 
Homes. 
Conducted by 
ELBERT S. CARMAN. 
SATURDAY, JANUARY 18, 1890. 
Stop It. Read the R. N.-Y.’s note 
of Cornell’s bulletin, on page 47. 
“ By all means keep up the tax on 
such luxuries as bread and clothing, 
but make such necessities as rum and 
tobacco as cheap as possible.” Page 38. 
Our reviews of seedsmen’s and nur¬ 
serymen’s catalogues will be written 
with care and impartiality. Atten¬ 
tion will be called to all the promising 
novelties, so that our readers may be 
guided in their selections. 
“Rest assured that ground oats 
make an excellent food and one need 
not he afraid of getting too large a 
percentage of them for growing hogs ; 
but for fattening I would give more 
corn-meal and middlings. ” Page 34. 
The R. N.-Y. counts over 130 tools, 
large and small, in the picture sent us 
by that Ohio man mentioned in a re¬ 
cent issue. The picture will be 
printed as soon as we can get a good 
engraving, and will prove very inter¬ 
esting to our readers. The farm upon 
which the tools are used contains 93 
acres and the farmer has “made 
farming pay.” 
The R. N.-Y. is asked whether it 
furnishes as premiums the cheap sets 
of Dickens, Scott and Cooper so exten¬ 
sively advertised in some of the farm 
papers. Yes. The offers will be found 
in the regular premium list. We 
should prefer to offer books with bet¬ 
ter paper, better binding, and better 
printing, because we think quality 
should be considered in the selection 
of books. The R. N.-Y. will supply 
as premiums any books published or 
sold in the country. 
It is now about eight years since 
theR. N.-Y., after planting the White 
Elephant and Late Beauty of Hebron 
side by side, found that they were one 
and the same. It is a notable fact 
that our farm contemporaries still 
speak of them as different : most of 
the catalogues offer them as distinct 
and often at different prices, and, fin¬ 
ally, some of the experiment stations 
are at pains to plant them separately 
in various ways rendering separate 
reports just as if they were distinct. 
In a field near where we write is $80 
worth of New York stable manure. 
It cost, delivered, about $2.50 per ton 
three months ago. It is spread in a 
heap 50 feet long and eight feet wide. 
It was originally five feet high. It is 
now less than three. There it will re¬ 
main until next spring. 
“Why did you do it?” asked the 
writer of the hard-working owner of 
the manure. “I had time in the fall; 
I shall have none in the spring. I as¬ 
sumed there would be a loss, but be¬ 
lieved that it would be less than the 
difference in the value of my time as 
between fall and spring.” 
According to Prof. Roberts’s inves¬ 
tigations, 4 this heap of manure will not 
be worth over half what it was when 
E laced there—the weather having 
een excessively wet—or, in other 
words, there will be a loss of at least 
$40. 
This young farmer works early and 
late. His wife works with him in the 
field; his little children—three or four 
in number—work with them, to make 
ends meet and lap over a little. Can 
he afford this economy of time at a 
loss of $40 in manure? 
Readers will kindly bear in 
mind that the R. N. -Y. clubs with 
all respectable periodicals and 
will guarantee to them the low¬ 
est possible combination rates. 
We cannot afford the space 
which a standing list in detail 
would require. The following- 
may serve as illustrations : 
R. N.-Y. and the New York Weekly 
World, $2.25. 
R. N.-Y. and the Chicago Inter-Ocean, 
$2.50. 
R. N.-Y. and the Chicago Weekly 
Times, $2.25. 
R. N.-Y. and Harper’s Magazine, $5. 
R. N.-Y. and The Century, $5.50. 
Several ot our Michigan subscrib¬ 
ers have stated that the R. N.-Y.’s re¬ 
ports of the apple crop were worth 
many times the price of the paper to 
them. In many parts of the State 
farmers were blessed with a large ap¬ 
ple crop, and thinking, because they 
bad a surplus, the country at large, 
must be well stocked, many sold early 
for half what they could have ob¬ 
tained later. TheR. N.-Y. was well 
satisfied, early in the season, that the 
entire crop of the country was short, 
and that farmers should hold for 
higher prices when it was convenient 
for them to do so. The R. N.-Y. is 
well satisfied that reliable reports as 
to the condition of any growing crop, 
or the comparative amount actually 
harvested or gathered, are of far more 
practical importance, in the long run, 
than any record of present prices can 
be. Of course we refer now to products 
that can be stored for a reasonable 
time. With market truck, fruits and 
eggs, present prices are of great im¬ 
portance although these prices are of 
necessity regulated by the supply. 
The business farmer in his buying and 
selling, studies the laws of supply and 
demand. Recognizing this fact, the 
R. N.-Y. has ever tried to give special 
attention to the probable surplus or 
deficit of any crop rather than to pres¬ 
ent prices. 
Fernald of the Amherst Agricultural 
College deems it “a terrible pest;” 
Prof. Hargin, of Harvard University, 
says it is not “ alarmingly destruc¬ 
tive.” No doubt, however, should de¬ 
lay for a day the work of speedily ex¬ 
terminating it. If only a moiety of 
what is said with regard to it is true, it 
would pay the farmers of the country 
to contribute a million or more dollars 
to insure its prompt extirpation. This 
could probably be effected with com¬ 
parative ease now ; but another sea¬ 
son may see it too widely propagated 
to allow of its extermination by any 
human agency. 
would the decreased price help the 
manufacturer or the consumer? 
These questions are entirely aside from 
the fact, which the R. N.-Y. assumes 
to be admitted, that the majority of 
those who use tobacco regard the 
habit as neither cleanly nor healthful. 
THAT DEEP-WATER HARBOR. 
A CRY FOR HELP. 
STRAY BEAUTY AND BLISS’S 
TRIUMPH PROBABLY THE 
SAME POTATO. 
The following letter explains itself : 
‘ ‘ Yours of December 28th at hand, 
and in reply I would say that I con¬ 
sider Bliss’s Triumph and Stray Beauty 
identical. At an exhibition of the 
Massachusetts Horticultural Society 
two or three years since, both variet¬ 
ies were on exhibition under their re¬ 
spective names. I requested the 
Chairman of the Vegetable Commit¬ 
tee to examine the varieties. He did 
so, and pronounced them identical. 
I wrote Mr. Wilson, who advertised the 
‘Stray Beauty,’ stating the facts; 
but he took no notice of my letter. The 
Bliss’s Triumph, as introduced by our 
late firm in 1878, is a cross of Peerless 
and Early Rose.” b. k. bliss. 
The R. N.-Y. has merely to add that 
Bliss’s Triumph was raised at the 
Rural Grounds during the season of 
1883 and Stray Beauty (from Samuel 
Wilson) during the season of 1885. 
The descriptions and yields do not 
differ materially in any way. 
A NEW INSECT PEST. 
F OR some time back numerous re¬ 
ports haye been reaching us of 
the prevalence of great destitution 
among the settlers in some parts of 
North Dakota, and several weeks 
ago we suggested to our readers the 
propriety of contributing towards the 
relief of the sufferers. Since then a 
large number of reports have been 
sent abroad from that State emphati¬ 
cally contradicting the existence of 
any distress there, which could not 
and would not be readily relieved by 
her own citizens. Indeed some of our 
Dakota contemporaries rather un¬ 
graciously advised outsiders to mind 
their own affairs, saying that 
the inhabitants of the new State 
were very well able to attend 
to theirs ! Cries for aid still continued 
to come from the afflicted, however, 
and now Governor Miller officially de¬ 
clares that official investigation proves 
that there is a world of sore destitu¬ 
tion in several of the northern coun¬ 
ties and that outside aid is needed 
and will be thankfully accepted. 
t “The year before last,” he says, 
the settlers had very poor crops, 
and last year still poorer ones. Many 
of the people went there with very 
little means, and were not prepared 
to meet failure of crops. Whatever 
property they have—such as stock— 
has been mortgaged all it will stand.” 
The State, we are informed, has es¬ 
tablished distributing headquarters at 
Fargo, and all contributions for the 
relief of the sufferers should be sent 
there. It is a burning shame that ef¬ 
forts should have been made to pre¬ 
vent relief for thousands of destitute 
farmers and their helpless wives and 
children lest the exposure of their un¬ 
fortunate plight might check immi¬ 
gration into the State; yet there is 
now no doubt whatever that such an 
atrocity has been perpetrated by some 
of the most prominent people there. 
THE TAX ON TOBACCO. 
G OVERNOR Brackett, of Massa¬ 
chusetts, in his inaugural mes¬ 
sage to the Legislature, the other day, 
was emphatic m warning the farmers 
of the Old Bay State of the necessity 
for taking prompt and effective meas¬ 
ures for the extermination of a new 
imported insect pest, which, it is 
feared, may prove as disastrous to the 
agricultural interests of the country 
as the Colorado Beetle has been. It is 
the Gypsy Moth—Ocueria dispar— 
which, it is charged, has done a world 
of mischief in Europe. At present it 
is confined to the neighborhood of 
Medford, Massachusetts, where, last 
fall, millions of the moths appeared 
suddenly and attacked shade and 
fruit trees as well as all kinds of 
shrubbery, leaving only twigs and 
trunks behind them. 
The eggs of the pest, we are told, 
were imported 20 years ago by Dr. L. 
Trouvelot, of Medford, who saw them 
at the Paris Exposition and put a few 
in his vest pocket. After years of 
‘ * innocuous desuetude ” a little bunch 
of the eggs was accidently blown out 
of the window, and never heard from 
till last fall when myriads of the insects 
appeared to commence their ravages. 
Entomologists, however, appeal- to 
disagree with regard to the character 
of the newcomer; for while Prof. 
T HE tobacco question has been 
started in the “Discussion” de¬ 
partment. Before it is ended we hope 
to know more about it. There are 
several points beside those bearing 
upon what may be termed the moral 
side of the matter, that we want to 
know something about. 
1. If the revenue tax be abolished, 
will tobacco in its various manufac¬ 
tured forms be made cheaper? 
2. If the product is made cheaper, 
who will derive benefit from this re¬ 
duction—manufacturer, seller or con¬ 
sumer? 
These thoughts are suggested by the 
following letter—the first of quite an 
extensive correspondence from those 
who have taken the pains to see just 
what proportion of their neighbors and 
friends use tobacco in some form. 
“I have canvassed this school dis¬ 
trict and find 30 men, of whom 22 use 
tobacco. I am sure that the propor¬ 
tion of smokers in this district is lower 
than in any other in Greene County. 
I conclude so from a very extended 
acquaintance throughout the county. 
I think five-sevenths of the men use 
tobacco in this county and favor the 
present or higher tax on it, as after the 
repeal of the tax, tobacco would cost 
as much as ever and the dealer, etc., 
would get the amount of the tax. 
Acra, N. Y. g. c. m.” 
Sb we see there are a good many 
different ways of looking at this ques¬ 
tion. What will be the probable 
effect of the removal of the tax? 
Shall we assume that the traffic in to¬ 
bacco would follow that in matches if 
the tax is removed? Do men now use 
all the tobacco they desire? In short, 
T HE special board of engineers ap¬ 
pointed by the Secretary of War 
to examine and report upon the most 
available point for a first-class deep¬ 
water harbor on the Texas coast, esti¬ 
mates the cost of completing the nec¬ 
essary works at Galveston—the place 
selected—at $6,200,000, which, it is 
proposed, shall be paid out of the Na¬ 
tional Treasury. The rapid develop¬ 
ment of the country west of the Mis¬ 
sissippi renders the construction of 
such an outlet for its multitudinous 
products a matter of national impor¬ 
tance in the opinion of the energetic 
people of that vast region. Within 
the last 18 months they have held 
large conventions for the purpose of 
advancing the project, at Fort Worth, 
Texas; Denver, Colorado; Topeka, 
Kansas, and St. Louis, Missouri. It 
has been heartily indorsed from the 
Mississippi to the Rockies and from 
the Canadian line to the Gulf. Few 
conventions of any kind have been 
held for upwards of a year in any 
part of the great West in which it did 
not have strong advocates. It will he 
fully and earnestly discussed at the 
present session of Congress, and few 
measures of general welfare are likely 
to excite such widespread interest 
in all the region west of the Father of 
Waters. It will meet with open or 
covert opposition from all in any way 
interested in the present ran and 
water lines of transportation between 
the far West and the Atlantic and the 
other Gulf ports as well as from the 
shipping and many of the mercantile 
interests at these points; for the com¬ 
pletion of such a harbor and of the 
projected vast system of rail road lines 
converging to it, would undoubtedly 
divert to it a great deal of their pres¬ 
ent and prospective traffic and trade. 
A general national desire, however, 
for “fair play” for the freest and 
fullest development of all sections and 
for the adoption of all means obvious¬ 
ly promotive of that end, appears to 
favor the movement. 
BREVITIES. 
Oranges are cheaper than apples here 
now, and much more plentiful. 
“A RECENT brief editorial on overeating 
was, indeed, ‘ a word fitly spoken.’ ” j. 
Cobleskill, N. Y. 
“Notes On Back Numbers” will be 
printed next week. They will be well 
worth reading. 
The proper “grip” for you to catch just 
now is a grip on that manure that is wash¬ 
ing out of your barn-yard. 
The facts regarding the effect of silage on 
horses will be printed next week, and our 
friends may expect some surprising state¬ 
ments. 
The R. N.-Y. Trench System of raising 
potatoes seems to have given in most cases 
very satisfactory results, as may be judged 
from subscribers’ letters. 
“I enjoy the Rural New-Yorker very 
much. We take about twelve other papers ; 
but the Rural New-Yorker returns to 
me in dollars and cents more than all the 
others combined. e. w. c.” 
Binghamton, N. Y. 
Last year Iowa demonstrated her right 
to entitle herself “The Banner Corn State 
of the Union,” by ranking first both in ag¬ 
gregate yield and in yield per acre. For the 
former she can show 349,966 bushels, and 39 
bushels for the latter. 
W ill some of the wise people who tell us 
that a hen can lay but a certain number of 
eggs tell us how the present season is 
likely to turn out ? The hens are doing un¬ 
usually well now. Will they lay fewer in 
the summer to pay for it ? 
Remember, readers, what the R. N.-Y. 
has said of Horsford’s Prelude Tomato. In 
so far as we can judge, it is probably 
the earliest tomato. It has one advantage 
over other first early tomatoes—that of re¬ 
sisting rot. The tomatoes average rather 
small, but they are smooth and of good 
substance. 
A good many farmers in the South have 
lost their “ meat” this year iu consequence 
of the mild winter. Many killed their hogs 
at the first frost, expecting weather cold 
enough to permit the meat to cure prop¬ 
erly. Many Northern farmers who usually 
keep beef in frozen snow have not been 
able to provide their usual supply. The 
R. N.-Y. wants to know more about the 
preparation of dried beef. Will those of 
our readers who preserve beef in this way 
kindly tell us about.it ? ~' ‘ 
