1909 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
sir 
Hope Farm Notes 
More Cold. —Last week I spoke of 
"A Cold Day.” Now I am prepared to 
stretch it out to a week. Day after 
day following the freeze we had a suc¬ 
cession of cold winds and fierce storms. 
When, on April 29, night found us 
with two inches of snow on the ground, 
I was prepared to bid a final and re¬ 
luctant farewell to the peach crop. It 
was hard, as many, a reader knows. 
The little girls cooked a batch of their 
famous doughnuts. Mother was sure, 
in spite of all, that we will still have 
some peaches; the boys thought their 
ducks and hens will help out, and the 
baby climbed on my knee and paid the 
high compliment of asking me to sing 
to him. It was probably a greater 
compliment that the others listened 
without protest. I think it was this 
same red-headed baby who suggested 
opening a can of peaches while the 
peach crop was in the balance. Oh, 
Hope Farm can face apparent disaster 
with some fortitude after all. Strange 
to say, I do not give up my peach crop 
yet. The trees were root-pruned, and 
consequently deep-rooted; they are 
mostly in sod and therefore a little de¬ 
layed in blooming, and most of them 
on the west slope of the hill. I have 
done my part. Now, when I see the 
mercury falling and the cold winds 
biting, I can stand by the good old 
text: 
“Except the Lord builcL the house, 
they labor in vain, that build it; except 
the Lord keep the city, the watchman 
zvaketh in vain.” 
We certainly have had a trying 
Spring thus far. On May 4 we had not 
planted a single piece of potato; in 
fact had nothing in the ground but a 
few garden peas and strawberries. Our 
land was plowed early, but the rains 
have beaten it down badly. On the 
other hand this promises to be the best 
season we ever had for grass, grain, 
Alfalfa and Crimson clover. Our straw¬ 
berry planting is fine—hardly one plant 
out of 6,000 failed to start. The 
wintered plants have fairly jumped up 
into the air. Why, within 60 days we 
shall no doubt be wanting rain. At 
any rate, I am laying my plans to be 
ready for that condition. A man may 
be frozen out or burned up or water- 
soaked, yet he should not throw up his 
hands and quit. I knew that any one 
of the Hope Farmers might get up a 
terrible tale of woe, based upon ap¬ 
parent facts, and yet, take us as a 
whole, there never was more to be 
hopeful for! 
‘‘Putting Up a Job.” —I often hear 
this expression. It describes a form of 
deception in setting a trap. In the 
ninth century Hastings, the old north 
pirate, attacked an Italian city. The 
bishop gave him everything to get 
rid of him, but kept the city gates 
shut. Then the old pagan pretended to 
be ill, and even received baptism. Soon 
after report came that he was dead, and 
his soldiers cried with pretended grief. 
They begged permission to bring his 
body inside the city. This seemed rea¬ 
sonable to the bishop, and they all 
marched in—weeping and screaming. 
W hen once inside the dead man sud¬ 
denly came to life. He struck the bishop 
dow-n and his followers drew their 
swords and captured the city. It may be 
said that the old rascal “put up a job” 
on the town. The process varies all the 
way from such a tragedy to the little 
arts which wife or daughter may play 
to. get father to agree to some well- 
laid plan. The object is to put the 
victim into some compromising posi¬ 
tion and then take advantage of his 
words or acts. Probably many of our 
famous men, like Clay or Blaine, have 
been led in this way to say or do 
things which were afterwards used 
against them. We have received quite 
a good many letters which, I feel sure, 
were written in an effort to “put up a 
job” on us. Some of them seem to 
have, been instigated by the Smith 
Fertilizer Co., the Buffalo Fertilizer 
Co., or their defenders. It was easy to 
see that the writers hoped and expect¬ 
ed that we would betray ignorance or 
malice or worse in the answer, and this 
would give a chance for attack. My 
idea is to answer all such letters open¬ 
ly and frankly with great good nature. 
I would give such facts as I was sure 
of, and state squarely that I did not 
know about the others, but that I 
would try to learn about them. That 
usually puts the “job” right out of a 
job, for the jobbers are usually ashamed 
to show such a letter. If a man suc¬ 
ceeded in tricking me into some ex¬ 
pression which I could not stand for, I 
should admit it at once and state how 
it was done. I have just read a story 
in “The Mark Lane Express’* of a 
Dutch farmer who tried to “put up a 
job" on the scientific men. By law 
he was compelled to send a sample 
of the blood from diseased cattle. 
1 his “blood smear” was. to enable the 
authorities to see if the disease was 
contagious. 1 his farmer did not believe 
one sort of blood could be told from 
another. So he sent one sample of ox 
blood and at the same time a little 
blood from his own veins. In due time 
he received the following: 
To Johannes Hendrik retrus Boonzaier, 
Ks(|.. Vlakvarkfontoin. Sir,—With refer¬ 
ence to the blood smears furnished by you 
on the 15th ult., I have the honour "to in¬ 
form you that the one—that of an ox- 
shows no trace of disease. The blood on 
the other side appears to be that of a 
baboon in an advanced stage of senile de¬ 
cay.—I have, etc. 
Discriminating Taste.—I have re¬ 
ceived the following note from a New 
Flampshire woman: 
I have often read in “Hope Farm Notes” 
comments on Ben Davis apple, and one 
of my neighbors sent me over two Ben 
Davis to sample. One taste was enough 
for me and rest of family. I cut off a 
small piece and gave it to my canary. The 
bird took one taste of it, and no more 
would it take. It was given a piece of 
Baldwin apple then and ate all of the Bald¬ 
win we put in cage. So you see Ben Davis 
must be a pretty poor apple when even a 
canary will x-efuse to eat it, although the 
canary is very fond of good apples. 
MRS. r. j. p. 
If that bird is as sweet in song as 
it is discriminating in taste, that house 
will be flooded with melody. Out In 
Missouri two years ago I met a man 
who claimed that Ben Davis was the 
most popular apple he could raise. He 
said his customers wanted Ben because 
there is so much dry meat in it, while 
high-flavored apples “puckered the 
mouth.” In all my travels I have never 
known a man to select Ben Davis de¬ 
liberately from a dish containing 
Baldwin. Northern Spy, Greening or 
Jonathan. This “puckering” of the 
mouth seems to be popular. 
We have had pretty much an apple¬ 
less Winter. Canned fruit made a good 
substitute, but now we rejoice to wel¬ 
come rhubarb sauce. With nice hot bis¬ 
cuit, maple syrup and rhubarb we can 
watch the peach crop die in the bud 
and still feel reasonably good-natured. 
All Sorts. —Evidence in favor of my 
“world’s wonder” plant accumulates: 
The Hope Farm man says, page 399, he 
believes purslane can be used to fair ad¬ 
vantage as sheep food. Pigs eat it greed- 
ily; and last Summer I fed it quite regu¬ 
larly to my two cows—not hoed in a mess 
with grit, but dug out .and the earth 
shaken out. They would dispose of a 
bushel basket full in no time, and look for 
more. r. t. 
Somers, X. Y. 
I never kept sheep, and therefore 
simply believe things about them. I 
know about hogs. The purslane or 
“pussley” is well liked by all our ani¬ 
mals. I have some peach trees which 
beat any fertilizer analysis as evidence 
of the plant food in “pussley.” Yet 
it is a great nuisance as a weed and I 
would not, if I could possibly help it, 
let the stuff ever grow large enough 
to be of value as fertilizer or feed. 
Will it be necessary or profitable to apply 
anything besides plowing in Scarlet clover 
to expect a good crop of late Irish pota¬ 
toes? If so, what should it be and how 
much ? 
Maryland. 
It will depend upon the soil. The 
Crimson clover adds nitrogen, but the 
potatoes need both potash and phos¬ 
phoric acid. The average sandy loam 
on the peninsula does not contain 
enough of these available minerals for 
potatoes. Unless we knew from past 
experience that the soil is strong 
enough we should plow under the 
clover and roll it down. Then mix 
acid phosphate three parts and sulphate 
of potash one part and broadcast at 
least 500 pounds of the mixture. Then, 
if you can get the seed pieces down 
into the clover, you ought to have a 
crop. As for time of planting—go to 
the best growers in your neighborhood. 
What about the feeding qualities of 
bearded wheat? I have heard that it would 
kill horses to feed it to them with beards 
on it. Is this so? l. r. 
Vii'ginia. 
The best way to feed such wheat is 
to run it through a cutter. In our 
country the older farmers feed con¬ 
siderable rye in the head. The spines 
in the rye are stouter a^d sharper than 
those in bearded wheat. It is a firm 
belief here that these spines help clear 
the bots off a horse’s stomach. The 
chopped heads are mixed with feed and 
dampened. h, w. c. 
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