1883.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
9 
Corn Higher Than Wheat ? 
On several of the last days of November, no corn 
could be bought in the New York markets for im¬ 
mediate delivery under SI.08 to $1.10 per bushel, 
and hundreds of thousands of bushels were paid for 
at this rate, on Nov. 29th, while wheat was plenti¬ 
ful at $1,074 @ $1,084 per bushel. On the same 
days corn was selling at Chicago for prompt deliv¬ 
ery at 67c. per bushel, equivalent to 814c. in New 
York, allowing 14c. per bushel for the regular rail¬ 
way freight, and 4 c. for insurance, etc., as ex¬ 
plained in the American Ac/ricult?irist for November 
last. On the same days, corn was sold for delivery 
during January, at Chicago, for 59c. per bushel, 
and in New York for 63 @ 64c. Farmers having 
corn to spare, and being near enough to New 
York to rush it in before Nov. 30th, may in a few 
cases have been benefited. The explanation of this 
high price of corn is simple. In October, and up 
to Nov. 20th, speculators believing corn would be 
lower, or that they could knock prices lower, sold 
to other parties “ November corn,” that is, corn to 
he called for at any time during that month, at 
81c. @ 82c. per bushel, expecting to buy it at less 
rates. Many such sales were made, usually in ca¬ 
nal boat load lots—8,000 bushels being the under¬ 
stood “ boat load.” The purchasers of these con¬ 
tracts quickly and secretly bought all the corn in 
the city, and all on the way that could arrive before 
Nov. 30th, and as soon as it was too late for more 
to be brought here from western cities, they 
jumped the price up to $1.10 per bushel, refusing 
to sell for less, and made actual sales at this rate. 
The dealers of options being unable to buy corn, 
were obliged to pay the buyers the difference be¬ 
tween their contract rates and the actual quota¬ 
tions. Thus, those who sold at 81 5 /eC., paid a cash 
difference of 28 3 / e c. per bushel, or $2,270 on each 
boat load. But we have no sympathy for them. 
They “ bid ” on the price and got caught. All such 
transactions disturb legitimate trade, interrupt de¬ 
sirable exports, and are injurious to producers, and 
to the general business of the country. 
The Construction of Stalls. 
BY PROP. D. D. SLADE, HARVARD UNIVERSITY. 
It is rare, even in these days of progress, to see 
a well-arranged stall in a farmer’s barn. No 
horse stall should be less than six feet in width, 
nor of a length less than nine feet. This affords 
room for the animal to lie down and rise com¬ 
fortably without bruising hips and limbs, and 
also for the attendant to pass in and out. The par¬ 
tition between stalls should be of sufficient higlit 
to prevent playing, biting, and kicking. Racks of 
iron are neat and serviceable. The horse eats his 
food from the ground, and because many first pull 
out a greater portion of the hay from the rack, we 
shall dispense with the rack as commonly used, 
and substitute a single manger which serves for 
both hay and grain. 
Whatever may be the foundation of the stall, 
whether of brick, stone, cement, clay, or wood, it 
should have inclination enough to carry off all 
fluid. Over this place a flooring composed of 
strips of plank, four inches in width by two 
inches in thickness, with an inch intervening be¬ 
tween each strip. This needs not extend more 
than half the length of the stall, the upper portion 
being compact. The essential point is that the 
horse shall stand with an equal weight upon all the 
extremities. This custom of confining a horse to 
a sloping stall, in one position sometimes for days, 
is a cruel one, and very detrimental to the limbs 
and feet, as it brings about, sooner or later, serious 
affections in these parts. A loose box is far pre¬ 
ferable to the stall, wherever practicable. Every 
stable or bam should be provided with one at least, 
in case of sickness or accident. By the arrange¬ 
ment of a floor as just described, the bedding is 
kept dry and the animal clean and comfortable. 
Litter should be always kept beneath the animal; it 
gives an air of comfort to the place and invites to 
repose of body and limbs by day and night. Stalls 
for both horses and cattle should be of sufficient 
height, as also all door and passage ways about a 
barn. Formerly, it was the custom to build in 
such a way, that no horse, and not even a man of 
respectable height, could enter a doorway without 
danger of knocking his skull, and inflicting serious 
injury. There are stalls in country barus so low 
that a horse cannot throw up his head without re¬ 
ceiving a blow against the beams above. Animals 
undoubtedly acquire the trick of pulling back, or 
of making a sudden spring when passing a door¬ 
way, from having been obliged to run the gauntlet 
of some narrow, low, ill-contrived passage way. 
The man who should now be guilty of building in 
this way would deserve to have his own brains 
knocked, every time he passes in and out, as a 
gentle reminder of his folly. All barn-doors should 
be high, wide, and when practicable, always slide. 
The common mode of securing cattle in the 
barn, especially milch cows, by placing their necks 
between stanchions, is not to be advocated, espe¬ 
cially when they are confined in this way for many 
hours at a time without relief, as is often neces¬ 
sary in the winter season. A simple chain about 
the neck with a ring upon an upright post affords 
perfect security, while it gives the animal fieedom 
of movement to head and limbs—and conduces to 
its comfort in various other ways.—Animals should 
uot be overcrowded, as is too often the case in 
large dairy establishments, a fact, which will make 
itself evident sooner or later in the sanitary quali¬ 
ties of the milk, if in no other manner. We cannot 
deny the fact, if we would, that everything, how¬ 
ever trifling, that contributes to the welfare of our 
domestic animals is a gain to the owner of them 
pecuniarily, and what touches a man’s pocket is 
generally considered to be worth looking after, 
at all times, and in all places. 
Field Experiments are Difficult- 
BY PROP. G. C. CALDWELL, CORNELL UNIVERSITY. 
Dr. Voelcker says: “The field experimenter 
must he a man who does not hesitate, if necessary, 
to throw the results of three or four years’ labor 
into the waste basket.” It is easy to get a decided 
result with a single experiment. Ask a crop 
whether it likes a certain kind of manure or treat¬ 
ment, and the crop seldom fails to do either better 
or worse than on an adjoining plot without the 
manure or other special treatment. But what man 
was ever satisfied, especially when a matter affect¬ 
ing his own pocket, with a single addition of a long 
column of figures, unless his result was proved by 
getting it a second time, or with counting a roll of 
bills but once. Much less should he be satisfied 
with a single result of a field experiment. If he 
puts that result into practice on a large scale, the 
chances are more than even that he will come to 
wish he had not. 
Dr. Sturtevant has recently given us a striking 
illustration of the matter : To 20 plots of corn of 
a twentieth of an acre each, variously manured, he 
gave ordinary cultivation, and 20 others manured 
in a corresponding manner were left entirely 
without cultivation, thus putting the question 
twenty times whether Indian corn likes cultiva¬ 
tion. If the whole number of plots be divided 
into two sets, with 10 adjoining cultivated plots 
and 10 adjoining uncultivated plots to each set, 
one of these sets will be found by the results to 
give the surprising reply that cultivation is not 
good for the crop. The average yield of the cul¬ 
tivated plots was a trifle less per acre thaD that of 
the uncultivated plots, hut the other set of plots 
gave the opposite answer, the average yield of the 
cultivated plots being 54.5 bushels per acre, against 
44 Dushels on the uncultivated plots. Looking at 
the results in another way, of the whole number 
of pairs of cultivated and uncultivated plots, 10 
voted more or less plainly in favor of cultivation, 
and 9 as plainly against it; one pair giving the 
same yield with and without cultivation, was non¬ 
committal. 
Such a sum total of results means little one way 
or the other: but with the single exception just 
noticed, every pair of cultivated and uncultivated 
plots, when considered by itself, gave a very de¬ 
cided answer of some kind ; therefore the chances 
were nineteen out of twenty, that a single experi¬ 
ment would have left the experimenter in no un¬ 
certainty, as to whether it is profitable to cultivate- 
this crop; but his knowledge thus gained is of 
little value. If such undecisive and even contra¬ 
dictory answers be obtained to the same question., 
put twenty times in the same season and on the- 
same little plot of land, what must be expected, 
when the question is repeated in different seasons,, 
on different soils, and under exposure to different 
weather? Some will say that the plots were too 
small; but all who have given the matter of field 
experimentation a careful trial, have found, that 
agreeing results are not so easily obtained with 
quarter or half-acre plots as with tenths or twen¬ 
tieths of an acre. Adolph Mayer, one of the best 
known of the German agricultural investigators of 
the day, on small plots about four yards square,, 
gets results that agree within five per cent of each 
other, and is not, like another investigator in the 
same field, discouraged because his results will not- 
agree within one per cent. He thoroughly mixes 
the soil, down to the depth ordinarily reached by 
the roots of the crop experimented with, uses seed. 
carefully selected with reference to uniformity, 
and plants and cultivates all plots to be compared 
with each other, on the same days. In estimating 
the crop he counts the whole number of plants on 
the plot, rejects all that stand within 18 inches of 
the border of the plot, as having possibly had more- 
than their share of light, or of food from adjoining; 
plots, and rejects all the remaining plants that are 
not quite healthy and normal in their growth. 
From the crop yielded by the remainder, he esti¬ 
mates the crop for the plot included within the- 
boundary line 18 inches from the border, and thence- 
per acre, with due allowance for the probability 
that there would be on the larger area the same- 
proportion of sickly or abnormal plants, or of va¬ 
cant places where the seed did riot germinate, or 
where the plants were injured or destroyed by en¬ 
emies of the crop. Suggestions such as these from 
investigators trained in the art of experimenting,, 
may help much toward putting the important mat¬ 
ter of field experimentation in agriculture on a 
more satisfactory basis. 
The World’s Wheat Crop. 
The interesting table herewith presents together- 
the average yield in recent years of the world’s 
great cereal crop. The figures, which we have col¬ 
lated from foreign sources, will be worth preserving- 
for reference. The average wheat crop in the prin¬ 
cipal countries where it is grown amounts to over 
one and a half billion (1,737,664,000) bushels—about 
l‘/ 4 bushel each for the entire humau race. The 
yearly consumption of wheat by a population mak¬ 
ing this the “staff of life,” generally averages, 
from 4 to 4‘/ 2 bushels each, excluding children, 
under three years of age. 
Countries. 
Average 
Crop.—Bush. 
Estimate for- 
1882. — Bush. 
United States. 
. 48 ( ',206,000 
499.408,000- 
France. 
. 282,632,000 
317,488.000- 
Russia. 
. 219,520.000 
205.800.000 
Germany. 
. 120,736,000 
112,501.000 
Spain. 
. 115,248.(00 
82,320.000" 
Italy. 
. 107,016,000 
120,736 000 
Great Britain. 
. 101.52S.000 
90.552.000 
Austro-Hungary. 
. 101,528.000 
131.712,000 
Turkey in Europe. 
. 41,160,0(10 
. 24,696,000 
35.672,000 
Algeria. 
Belgium. 
21,952,000- 
. 22,512.000 
24.696,000 
Australia. 
16.464.H00 
13.720.000 
Egypt. 
. 16.464.000 
13,720.000 
Canada. 
. 13,720,000 
16,464,000 
Portugal. 
8,232.000 
5,4S8,000 
Holland. 
5,080.000 
4,664.000 
Greece. 
4,770,000 
4.776,000 
Servia. 
4,112,000 
4,112,000 
Denmark. 
2,744.000 
2,192.000 
Switzerland. 
2,328,000 
2.192.000 
Sweden. 
2,328.000 
2,192,000 
Norway. 
192,000 
192,000 
Chili, East India, etc.. 
. 55,424,000 
49,936,000 
1,748,746,000 
1,762,488,000- 
