682 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
statements of your correspondent indicate that the 
phenomena were observed before the gas was connect¬ 
ed with the house, at any rate before the gas range 
was installed. If the sink-well is responsible for the 
phenomena its ventilation, as suggested, and certainly 
if trapped by the method described, should prevent the 
flames and possibly the reports, but it would not of 
course prevent the electrical discharges. These might, 
however, be silent, and probably usually would be 
nearly so at least. 
If the phenomena are due wholly to electrical dis¬ 
charges, and the lights seen are electrical brushes and 
sparks only, the remedy must be found in making a 
better electrical connection between the house and the 
ground. When an electrified cloud passes above an 
isolated house or elevated object it has a tendency to 
draw out of the ground the opposite phase of electric 
energy, causing it to accumulate upon the surface and 
particularly the upper or higher surfaces of the house. 
When in this strained condition the two phases of 
electric energy tend to break across the air space sep¬ 
arating them and come together. Whenever a dis¬ 
charge does take place the movement may be either 
downward or upward; indeed the conception now held 
is that a discharge consists of a large number of ex¬ 
tremely rapid alternations of movements to and from 
Ihe cloud, much as if a stiff spring were drawn aside 
and released, allowing it to vibrate back and forth 
until it finally exhausts the energy that drew it aside 
and comes to rest. When these rapid alternations 
are taking place the flow is greatest along the sur¬ 
faces of the best conductors, but there is always a 
tendency of the energy to jump from point to point 
across intervening air spaces, and where these jumps 
occur sparks or brushes of light may be produced, 
oftentimes invisible in bright light, but much more 
conspicuous in the darkness of night, and if any 
inflammable gas 'should exist in the path of one of 
these discharges it might readily be ignited, just as 
the gas jets in the chandeliers of churches are com¬ 
monly lighted by electric sparks through the escaping 
gas. The house of the correspondent, being more or 
less isolated from other houses and perhaps on ele¬ 
vated ground, is particularly well situated for elec¬ 
trical storms to induce charges upon it, and the gas 
pipe, leading to the house under ground, only makes 
better connection and allows the electric energy to 
accumulate more freely under the induction of the 
passing cloud. What is needed is conditions which will 
permit this induced current to pass with the greatest 
freedom and down the outside of the walls and roof 
of the house so that as little as possible of the dis¬ 
turbance may be required to go through the interior 
of the house. 
If every house could have an outer skin of metal 
or other good conductor, and this skin were well 
grounded, there would be scarcely a possibility of a 
damaging stroke in the interior of the house. Build¬ 
ings with metal roofs, if these roofs are only well 
connected with ground which is permanently moist, 
are well protected against lightning. In the case of 
your correspondent we would recommend covering the 
ridge of the roof of both the main house and the 
kitchen with strips of No. 28 galvanized iron, six or 
eight inches wide, riveted together and nailed closely 
to the ridge board on one side and then bent over and 
nailed on the other side. Such strips can be made at 
the shop and rolled up to be carried to place and then 
unrolled. It would also do to cut the galvanized iron 
into strips of proper width and have them bent at the 
proper angle at the shop, these to be laid on the ridge 
and nailed down with their ends overlapping two 
inches. From this metal ridge strip other strips two 
or three inches wide should run continuously down 
each slope of the roof, one near each end of the roof 
and one near the center. These strips, if the house 
has wooden shingles, should start under the ridge 
strip and then should run straight down the slope, or 
if desired, at the butt of each shingle the metal may 
be shaped so as to lie close to the shingle all the way, 
and it should be tacked at sufficient intervals, better 
with galvanized wire nails to avoid rusting, so that it 
is securely held in place. Near the lower edge of the 
roof each of the three strips running down the roof 
should be connected with a similar continuous strip 
running from end to end of the roof, and this strip 
should be carried down the corners of the house and 
into the ground to a depth of three or four feet, 
where the soil is continually moist, and in the case of 
your correspondent one or more of these strips should 
EASY WAY OF MAKING BORDEAUX. Fig. 258. 
be well connected with the gas main outside of the 
house. These galvanized iron strips may be turned 
right down over the edge of the roof on to the corner 
boards and carried down along the corner boards, 
tacking them securely and closely to them. The metal 
gas main running off through the ground makes the 
best possible connection of the rods on the house 
with the ground. But where such a good “ground” 
is not provided a hole at least two by three feet should 
be dug where the strips are carried into the ground 
down to permanently moist soil, and the strip from 
the house securely riveted to a sheet of the same 
galvanized iron lying flat on the bottom of the hole, 
and having an area of two by three feet, a good 
“ground” will be provided when the hole is refilled 
so that the plate is in permanently moist soil. It will 
probably be sufficient in most houses to connect the 
roof strips with the ground only at diagonally oppo¬ 
site corners of the protected roofs. In the case of 
your correspondent the roof of both the upright and 
the kitchen should if possible be grounded to the gas 
main outside the house. 
Wherever there are chimneys protruding through 
the roof one or two strips of the galvanized iron 
should be carried directly up one side of the chimney 
and down the opposite side, all of the way tacked 
closely to the chimney and lead off from the foot of 
the chimney far enough to be connected with one or 
more of the roof strips of metal. Such strips of metal 
on the chimney provide an opportunity for the electric 
PRESIDENT X ROYAL SOVEREIGN. NATURAL SIZE. 
Fig. 259. See Ruralisms, Page 586. 
discharges to play up and down the metal without 
going through the body of the chimney, and it is 
especially important to carry the strips over the 
chimneys, because they stand highest, and for this 
reason become most highly charged, and therefore 
become lines of discharge. The metal vent pipe, 
where it comes out through the roof, should also be 
well connected with the metal strip system, as this 
will lessen the tendency of the current to follow 
the vent down into the house. The section of rubber 
hose, which we understand your correspondent placed 
between the cap and the main pipe, could have, as he 
found, no appreciable effect. F. h. king. 
QUICK WORK IN SPRAY MIXING. 
Perhaps it is too late to answer your call for 
methods of spraying, but our way is such a labor- 
saver that I am sending a description together with 
a picture of our outfit (see Fjg. 258). We dug out 
an old spring and shored it up so that the spout of the 
pump is about four feet higher than the driveway. 
The two casks are placed so as to be filled conven¬ 
iently with the short trough. Forty-eight gallons of 
water is put in each, and a bag containing 48 pounds 
of blue vitriol is hung just below the surface of the 
water; this dissolves in about two hours, so that as 
fast as one cask is used up the other is ready. The 
boy drives up to the pump, dips out eight gallons of 
vitriol solution, and puts it in the sprayer. Then he 
lays the long trough, which is a piece of galvanized 
roll ridge cap, on the funnel and pumps water into 
the tank until a little gauge hole in the end indicates 
45 gallons. Next he mixes six pounds of ground fin¬ 
ishing lime in four gallons of water, puts it in the 
sprayer and drives off. The whole operation takes 
scarce longer than the telling, and is far easier than 
our old way of using pails for dissolving and filling. 
New York. henry r. sill, jr. 
BUCKWHEAT IN THE NORTH. 
We consider buckwheat one of our best crops. I 
have kept from 100 to 130 hens for the past 20 years 
and consider buckwheat the best one feed for poultry. 
When I have the buckwheat to feed I feed all they 
will eat; when boxes are nearly empty I put in more. 
Certainly nothing seems to start pigs along better than 
small potatoes boiled and mixed while hot with buck¬ 
wheat bran and middlings. We feed buckwheat mixed 
with oats to horses with good results—one-third or 
one-fourth buckwheat. We get the lightest, whitest 
and best flour from Japanese buckwheat. It is not 
always a sure crop, straw stronger, and ' harder to 
thrash, and rquires better soil than other buckwheats. 
What is called here Antimason buckwheat is generally 
sown for feed—a small buckwheat—not very good for 
flour. A fair piece of sod, turned over in the Fall 
requires no manure for buckwheat. I have had a fine 
crop the second year by wetting the seed and rolling 
it in good fertilizer and sowing immediately, mixing 
not more than one bushel each time. It soon dries out 
and will not hold the fertilizer. We drag with a 
spring drag as soon as seed is sown, in order that 
seed may not dry off and be separated from its coat¬ 
ing of fertilizer; 100 pounds fertilizer used in this way 
is better than 200 pounds sown broadcast, as the fer¬ 
tilizer used is right at the root of the plant. Buck¬ 
wheat requires very little manure. If too much is 
used, or if soil is too rich, the buckwheat grows 
rank, and will lodge; such buckwheat has little if any 
grain. We sow buckwheat from the 10th to 20th of 
June, after other crops are in. The grain fills better 
after cool nights come. Hot dry weather when plants 
are in bloom blasts the flower, and we get little if any 
grain. I do not consider it safe to sow much after 
June 20 here in the Adirondacks as we are liable to get 
July 18, 
frost soon after September 1. I usually sow my 
garden seeds May 25, but last year the ground was 
frozen some, and white with snow on that date, so I 
waited till June 1. Our desire is to sow buckwheat 
as late as possible and escape early frost in September. 
I save all the straw very carefully for bedding. I like 
to have enough so the pigs can bury up in it out of 
sight. Cattle eat it, but I never supposed there was 
much nutriment in it. Some stack buckwheat straw 
in the barnyard and put a fence around it, close 
enough so the cattle can reach it. Then they eat it 
clean. s. c. Armstrong. 
Warren Co., N. Y. 
THE USE OF A WEEDER. 
I consider the weeder one of our most useful farm 
tools when properly used, but how seldom it is that 
the weeder is really properly used! Just lately I 
have been amused to watch a man near here using 
a weeder in a cornfield. He runs it on the principle 
of the story of one of our hard-headed old New 
England forefathers, who was riding along the rough, 
rocky roads, so common in those days, with his wife 
by his side in an ordinary spring wagon. In crossing 
an unusually rough spot in the road the spring on the 
wife’s side broke, when the old man exclaimed im¬ 
patiently, “I always hist up a little.” This man in the 
cornfield evidently had the same idea to “hist up a lit¬ 
tle” all the way across, and as he did not start the 
weeder until the corn was two or three inches high, and 
the weeds higher, it is safe to say that the weeder in 
question will soon be thrown aside as a “new-fangled 
contraption,” and the hoe and bull-tongue cultivator in¬ 
stalled in its place. I am so firmly convinced that the 
weeder ought not to be held up that I seldom touch the 
handles, except in turning at the ends, and have run 
mine for days at a time with a fertilizer sack con¬ 
taining 40 or 50 pounds of stones tied securely on 
top of the frame to which teeth are bolted. The 
weight of stones will be much more easily kept in 
place if it is made up of six or eight smaller stones 
rather than one larger one. 
It goes without saying that the land must be well 
fitted and free from trash and sods if the weeder is 
to be weighted in this manner, but it is work which 
pays well. I like to be particular in hitching to the 
weeder to see that the shafts are held at just the 
proper height to allow the three rows of teeth to do 
just the same work. This is a point too often neg¬ 
lected. I have frequently seen a weeder running with 
either the front or back row of teeth hardly working 
at all on account of carelessness in this particular. 
The proper time and manner of using a weeder in 
corn and potatoes has been frequently spoken of in 
these columns, but seldom does anyone ask about the 
use of the implement in fields of sown or drilled 
grain, and yet careful trials and an experience of 
many years and on many different soils has convinced 
me that the benefit to crops of this character is as 
great in proportion as it is with corn or potatoes. 
Before weeders were so well known I was in the 
habit of going over my grain fields with a light 
smoothing harrow with teeth well slanted. This im¬ 
plement always gave good results if used when grain 
was two or three inches high. Of course if grass or 
clover was to be seeded with the grain as is common 
here the seed must be sown broadcast just before or 
immediately after the weeder or harrow is used. 
Vermont. l. c. Litchfield. 
SUBSTITUTES FOR HIRED MEN. 
On page 533 Mr. J. D. Prickett gave an account of 
some helpful farm machinery. We printed the pic¬ 
ture of a four-horse disk plow driven by a woman. 
Mr. Prickett sends us the following note: 
“A word about the lady sitting on the disk plow 
seat. Under protest Mrs. Prickett took the ‘seat of 
honor.’ Her health requiring out-of-door life, she 
secured a girl for housework and mounted that plow, 
and with four horses did more and better work than 
any two men I ever had around. Upon our level land 
and with nothing to do but handle the team (no levers 
to touch) she found the task mere play. She excuses 
the ‘indignity’ of it by saying, ‘Well, it is honest work.' 
When we first began using the four-horse teams the 
neighbors laughed, but later one confessed we two did 
more than any three men. I send a picture, Fig. 259, 
THE BOY AS HIRED MAN. Fig. 2G0. 
of our two-horse cultivator with our 10-year-old boy 
at the helm. He does not handle the cultivator right 
along, but part of the time takes the place of two 
men with the old-fashioned one-horse cultivator. I 
am short one man now, and with 41 acres, of corn 
and 29 acres of clover and Alfalfa coming in bloom 
(June 8), I find the boy comes in pretty handy. I 
first cultivate every other row, and as the cultivator 
cuts more than half way this leaves less hard ground 
in the remaining rows, and here is where the boy 
gets in his work.” J. d. prickett. 
Ohio. 
