4oo 
May 11, 
The Rural New-Yorker 
TUE BUSINESS FARMER'S PAPER. 
A National Weekly Journal for Country and Suburban Homes. 
Established 1850. 
Entered at New York as Second Class Matter. 
Hekbert W. Colling wood, Editor. 
Or. Walter Van Fleet, . 
Mrs. E. T. Hoyle, (Associates. 
John J. Oillon, Business Manager. 
SUBSCRIPTION: ONE DOLLAR A YEAR. 
To foreign countries in the Universal Postal Union, S2 04, 
equal to 8s. (id., or 8% marks, or 10y a francs. 
“A SQUARE DEAL.” 
We believe that every advertisement in this paper is 
backed by a responsible person. But to make doubly sure 
we will make good any loss to paid subscribers sustained 
by trusting any deliberate swindler advertising in our col¬ 
umns, and any such swindler will be publicly exposed. We 
protect subscribers against rogues, but we do not guarantee 
to adjust trifling differences between subscribers and honest, 
responsible advertisers. Neither will we be responsible for 
the debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned by the courts 
Notice of tbe complaint must be sent to us within one 
month of the time of the transaction, and you must have 
mentioned The Rural New-Yorker when writing, the adver¬ 
tiser. 
Name and address of sender, and wbat tbe remittance 
is for. should appear in every letter. 
Remittances may be made in money order, express order, 
personal check or bank draft. 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER, 
409 Pearl Street, New York. 
SATURDAY, MAY 11, 1907. 
$ 2.00 $ 1.50 $ 1.00 
We want farm photographs suitable for printing in 
I he R. N.-Y. The above-mentioned prizes will be 
given for the best three pictures sent in the next two 
weeks. The same offer will be made each succeeding 
two weeks until further notice. Pictures not used re¬ 
turned postpaid. Suitable pictures not winning prizes 
will be paid for. We prefer practical farm subjects 
with a few distinct figures. Landscapes or pictures with 
much detail are not desired. This competition is open 
freely to all who may desire to compete, without charge 
or consideration of any kind. Prospective contestants 
need not be subscribers for The R. N.-Y. in order to be 
entitled to compete for the prizes offered. 
* 
The New York Senate has defeated Gov. Hughes 
in his efforts to remove the State Superintendent 
of Insurance. On page 404 will be found names of 
opposing Senators who come from districts where 
farmers hold the balance of power. THE R. N.-Y. 
will begin paying its respects to them next week. 
* 
On page 286 we spoke of the new business organiza¬ 
tion of the New Jersey State Grange. There are great 
possibilities for buying and selling in this co-operative 
enterprise. The foundation of success must be mutual 
help. The managers of this business cannot make it 
succeed unless the Patrons help. There is absolutely 
no sense in starting a co-operative business and then 
standing back to let a few leaders do all the work. 
You cannot co-operate without the “co.” 
* 
On page 364 we gave figures of fruit exports. In 
eight months this country had send abroad $14,926,760 
worth of nuts and fruits. Figures for March are now 
given. In that month we exported $1,014,476 more, 
making a total of $15,941,236 for nine months. Of 
this total $7,490,927 were for apples—green and dried. 
During the same period the exports of steel rails were 
worth $6,343,876 and for wire $6,384,400! We intend 
to keep these figures right before the public. The 
export trade in fruit will grow into an immense busi¬ 
ness—equal to that of half a dozen so-called protected 
industries. 
* 
The purebred cattle associations appear to have 
their troubles. The Short-horn Association has just 
disbarred W. M. McLemore, of Kearney, Neb., and 
W. O. Merz, of Monticello, Minn. Those men can no 
longer register cattle in the Short-horn herd book. 
They were charged with issuing fraudulent pedigrees 
for cattle. In other words, the papers did not fit the 
cows. The Short-horn breeders do not seem to have 
lost much time in going into the cases. They were wise, 
because the public can make only one inference when 
people dawdle and shuffle over their plain duty. Jus¬ 
tice, prompt and stern, is the only thing that can save 
an association in such a case. It is admitted that a 
grade animal may give as much milk and be just as 
handsome as one purely bred. The only possible rea¬ 
son why the purebred should bring more than the grade 
is the value she takes from her ancestors.. If the grade 
is substituted for the purebred hopes for the future of 
a herd may be blasted. How is a common man to know 
whether he buys blood or bluff? 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
Every year it seems necessary to explain why Tiie 
R. N.-Y. docs not print more big stories of great suc¬ 
cess on tlie farm! Several new books have appeared 
this year in which we are told how people make $1,500 
more or less on an acre of land! Some of the agricul¬ 
tural papers, too, make it appear very easy to dig gold 
dollars out of the soil. Why are we behind the pro¬ 
cession in mentioning those easy “good things”? The 
only reason we think of at present is that we own a 
farm and try to make it provide for a large family— 
also keep fair accounts. We have made a few square 
rods produce great results, but somehow it is hard to 
spread them over acres. We have learned that our 
philosophical friend in Connecticut who tells us on page 
394 that he does not expect to get rich is a wiser 
guide than he who tells the “big stories.” We have not 
yet been able to find any plant food in words. 
* 
LOST BY THE EXPRESS COMPANY. 
Well, what about that report from those Jersey cattle 
investigators? Did they make the papers fit the cows? 
This famous question seems destined to rank with other 
old classics, like “How old was Ann?” or “Why should 
the spirit of mortal be proud?” We are informed 
(page 404j that this famous report has been lost by 
an express company. We have had large experience 
with those lost packages, running all the way from pep¬ 
per plants to a baby carriage. If the A. J. C. C. will 
accept our advice we would say, let the report go, send 
in a large bill for damages and hold a new public 
hearing. No doubt some years hence there will be an 
auction sale of undelivered packages. Some one will 
bid in what he thinks a bundle of greenbacks, and will 
get—that famous report! But, in all seriousness, who 
ever heard of anything more ridiculous than this entire 
performance? Here are men supposed to guard the 
vital principles in the business of breeding Jersey cattle. 
It is now a year since Mr. Rogers made his complaint. 
The executive committee dawdled, shuffled and dodged 
until the case was put up to them like the end of a 
red-hot poker. Then they moved. Even after The R. 
N.-Y. has put the facts in type they have the assurance 
to intimate that the committee was forced to inves¬ 
tigate in spite of Mr. Rogers instead of with his aid. A 
month after the cows were examined we are told that 
the report has been lost! Do they actually expect peo¬ 
ple to believe that grown-up men would depend upon 
a single copy of an important document? 
Prof. Redfield, the legal member of this executive 
committee, attempts to justify their course by saying 
that the first complaint was “hearsay” evidence. The 
secretary of the club informed Mr. Rogers that his affi¬ 
davit was “proper,” and that on the strength of it a 
committee would undoubtedly be appointed. Now, does 
Prof. Redfield want the public to understand that this 
was done to keep Mr. Rogers quiet, and that they never 
intended to investigate at all on the strength of his 
statement? There is an ugly word in the dictionary 
to cover work of that sort. If that is the truth it 
would have been a more manly thing to tell Mr. 
Rogers that stronger statements were needed, instead 
of treating him as they did. The cat was let out of 
the bag at Dansville! Mr. R. M. Gow of the A. J. 
C. C. was asked why they did not tell Mr. Rogers that 
his statement, while “proper,” was not strong enough. 
Here is his reported reply: 
“You could not expect us to put a club into your 
hands to hit one of our own members!” 
There you have the whole thing in a nutshell. We 
will not help you strike at any possible fraud, or even 
at a “mistake,” if there is any danger of hitting a mem¬ 
ber of the A. J. C. C.! The club ought to send Prof. 
Redfield after that express package. He could doubt¬ 
less make an argument so plausible that the report 
would walk out of its hiding place! Did the papers fit 
the cozvs? 
* 
Speaking at the dedication of the new College of 
Agriculture at Cornell, Governor Hughes struck the 
vital spot in the future history of that institution. He 
made it clear that the buildings belong to the State, 
while Cornell is intrusted with their keeping and con¬ 
trol—like an honorable trust given to one in whom 
the owner has confidence. The Governor well said: 
This is a sacred trust. To your administration the 
State has committed one of the most important interests of 
the people, represented in the establishment of this school. 
It is not a school to be administered for the benefit of Cornell 
University, but it is a school to be administered by Cornell 
University for the benefit of the people. We may vdew its 
future with confidence as we recall the services rendered 
in the past by those connected with the agricultural work 
of this university, and I am sure it is gratifying to the 
people to know that the work is to continue under the imme¬ 
diate supervision of that accomplished director, Liberty 
Hyde Bailey, to whose ability and pnergy this institution 
owes so much. 
We are all hopeful for the future of the New York 
College of Agriculture. Tt has a great work to do, and 
it is well that the public has confidence in the char¬ 
acter and power of Prof. Bailey to work out the prob¬ 
lem. 1 he R. N.-Y. spends little space in reporting 
what men say the future has in store. We strive to 
record what they do, and help to direct tendencies and 
harness energies for doing the work of the plain 'farmer. 
It is now half a century since the first agricultural 
college was started. In that length of time most other 
systems of education develop what we may call mental 
snobs. Of all things may agricultural education be 
kept from snobbery. 
* 
Up to a few weeks ago tbe Delaware Agricultural 
College never had a farm of its own. Some exper¬ 
iments were conducted on farms in various parts of 
the State, but agricultural instruction at the college 
could not be of much account. The wisest man cannot 
sit in a classroom or laboratory and show boys how 
to handle the soil. Delaware is too good a State and 
its possibilities are too great to permit such a condition 
to continue. A farm has now been obtained, and the 
college will be put on a sound basis. A committee of 
the college trustees has just returned from a trip 
through several States where they studied the equip¬ 
ment of agricultural colleges and the methods of teach- 
ing agriculture. And this was no junket committee out 
for a good time. Men like Samuel H. Derby, one of 
the best farmers in Delaware, know what agriculture is 
and what it needs. We can well remember the time 
when the affairs of agricultural colleges were managed 
by lawyers, doctors or business men, because it was 
said farmers were not qualified to do the work. To-day 
that statement is nonsense—farmers will have more and 
more to say about their own colleges. It is right that 
they should dominate, and we expect to see Delaware 
take a front rank in agricultural education. 
* 
It is a strange turn in history that has made possible 
tbe conditions outlined in that western man’s problem 
printed on the first page. Very likely the land which 
this man can now sell at $150 per acre was worth less 
than $5 when some eastern pioneci took it. It is hard 
to see how the price can go much higher for farm pur¬ 
poses, and it seems like good business to sell at the 
high figure and buy mo;e land elsewhere, reserving 
fair working capital. We can well understand how a 
western man may wonder why New England land is 
so cheap. There must be some trick about it as judged 
by a western farmer’s experience. Yet there is no 
deception whatever about many of these eastern farms. 
Read the following letter from Prof. F. W. Card, of 
Rhode Island: 
The chief cause which brings farms on the market is the 
settlement of estates, or the old age of the owners. It has 
often happened that with a large family the older son 
would go to tlie city as soon as old enough, to lie followed 
in turn by each of the others. Perhaps if the family con¬ 
tained one member deficient in mental caliber he might be 
left, at home. In either case when the old people come to 
drop away there is no one to carry on the farm, and it 
comes on the market for what it will bring. Sometimes a 
wealthy man may buy such a farm as a plaything, hold 
it for a time, tire of it, and offer it again. There is not 
necessarily any trap about such an offer. To be sure many 
of these farms would look like a hard proposition to a 
western man, and some of them are a hard proposition 
for anyone, but many of them are real bargains. 
Let tbe western man remember that New England 
has a history running back some 200 years before the 
Central West was a factor in civilization. The very 
things which caused a depression in farm values now 
offer new opportunities. One thing is sure, however; 
a western man coming from rich, level land must 
expect to go through a long and humble course of 
education before he can make a rough New England 
farm profitable. _ 
BREVITIES. 
Tf it’s 'in The R, N.-Y. and you don’t believe it tve will 
be glad to have you prove it wrong. 
In what department of life are you IT? 
A conscience is an inconvenient thing to have around at 
times. 
One thing may be said for salt on potatoes—it will not 
increase scab. 
Don’t you think there are about as many tuberculosis 
germs in city dust as there are in farmers’ milk? 
A nr ,and of coffee known as “Wedding Breakfast” con¬ 
tained 35 per cent of chicory. Rather a bitter start! 
Of what benefit to the world is wisdom when it gets into 
a man’s head and grows to him so that he cannot get it 
out? 
We hear from people who say they like the spirit of those 
Tioga Co. (Pa.) Grangers in sending the free seeds back: 
“Go and do thou likewise!” 
Read Dir. Ballou’s article on planting and training the 
grape vine. This vine can be made a great source of 
pleasure to you if handled right. 
The liquid “weed killers” usually contain soluble arsenic. 
This will destroy plant life and poison the soil. Carbolic- 
acid is also used to keep walks or paths clear 
lx old days the men strong on finance went hunting for 
the golden fleece. Now the financiers sit still and let the 
lambs shear themselves and bring the gold to them. 
Apuil 16 a man in New Mexico writes us that sweet peas 
are in bloom, and April 27 a man in Illinois says he 
expects more frost that night. Surely no man need leave 
the United States in search of change of climate. 
