340 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
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Nov. 
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directions more particularly applicable to domestic 
manufactures may be most valuable. 
As potash acts strongly on woody fibre, a strong 
thick leach-tub, for dissolving the ashes into ley, should 
be obtained; a portion of the hollow trunk of a bass¬ 
wood tree makes the best and most durable. Four bar¬ 
rels of ashes will usually make one barrel of good soap, 
and sometimes more. As all ashes become more or less 
weakened by a combination with the carbonic acid of 
the air, a layer of quick-lime must be spread after the 
first portion of ashes is put in, to absorb this acid from 
the ley as it passes downwards. Enough is not usually put 
in; there should be sufficient to absorb all this acid, 
say at least a peck to a barrel of ashes—it can do no hurt. 
It very often happens that entire failure results from 
a neglect; the house-wife finds her ley to be of full 
strength by means of the domestic hydrometer, a hen’s 
egg.—but no soap is the result. A sympathising neigh¬ 
bor tells her that she is working in the wrong time of 
the moon—or that perhaps her soap is bewitched. A 
strong effervescence of the ley with sharp vinegar, 
usually tells the secret; and the application of caustic 
lime will not unfrequently remove the difficulty at once 
and restore order. The ashes should be closely beaten 
down in the tub, or else the water will descend too 
rapidly through it, and before it becomes saturated with 
the dissolved potash;—the only remedy in which case 
being to run the ley again through the ashes. The ley 
should always be used fresh, as it becomes weakened so 
much in a day or two, by exposure to the carbonic acid 
of the air, that soap cannot be made. In such cases, 
the remedy consists in adding fresh lime to render it 
caustic. 
The fat usually employed, is the refuse grease of the 
kitchen, which does well; to prevent it from becoming 
mouldy, before use, it should be covered with weak or 
strong ley. When used, it is boiled over the fire, and 
small portions of ley successively added, keeping it 
boiling, till there are two gallons of ley to four pounds 
of grease. Weak ley must not be added during the 
process, if it becomes of less strength towards the close 
of the running. Let the soap boil, to evaporate, until 
the proper consistency is shown by adding to a portion, 
an equal bulk of water. If good, add to the whole its 
own bulk of water, stirring it well, and the process is j 
completed. The consistency of soap is controlled by 
this addition of water. The best is tenacious, and not 
brittle, which induces waste. The corroding quality 
of soap is owing to the deficiency of grease. 
Soap must be kept in a pine tub—a thick pine tar- 
barrel is good. 
HINTS TO THOSE ON SMALL FARMS. 
Ed. Cultivator —Having but a few acres of land to 
cultivate, I have made it my study to obtain as much as 
possible from those few. The amount of manure I can 
command is small, hence I have not been permitted to 
accomplish this object by heavy crops from a high state 
of fertility. But I have been compelled to do it by a 
selection of crops profitable in themselves; some of 
which are as yet scarcely known, as farm crops, to far¬ 
mers generally. 
Among these, root crops hold an important place. I 
have formerly raised ruta bagas, and field beets largely; 
the former are very easily raised on light soils, costing 
me usually from 3 to 5 cents per bushel, according to the 
favorableness of the season. But to be raised thus 
cheaply, the land must be previously rich and well 
tilled, and cleared of weeds, and the young plants must 
be hoed before they are two inches high. The hoeing 
must be finished before they are that height. This is 
perfectly indispensible. Some of my richer neighbors 
have tried to raise them. The have selected some waste 
piece of ground, where a manure-yard, old stack, or de¬ 
molished building formerly stood, such spots being of 
rich soil. But they seemed to forget that such places 
were also richly charged with the seeds of weeds, hence 
a hard job to hoe the young crop. To make the matter 
ten times worse, they put off the hoeing a week, 
when the weeds had shot up six inches or a foot high, 
and the labor of cleaning them became enormous; 
while half the amount of the crop was lost by the stunt¬ 
ing they thus received. What was the conclusion? 
*>' Why these rooty beggys are the hardest crop I ever 
raised, and I shan’t have nothing more to do with 
’em.” 
Roots, raised in the cheap manner I have already de¬ 
scribed, I have found of the greatest advantage, nay, 
almost indispensible, in carrying my stock through 
winter, reducing the amount of hay needed to one-half, 
and requiring but little land comparatively for their 
production. 
But useful as I have found ruta bagas, for feeding 
horses, store cattle, &c., I never could make them an¬ 
swer perfectly for milch cows; the milk and butter 
would have a slight taste of the turnep, alhough this 
was greatly diminished by feeding just after milking, 
and by working all the butter-milk from the butter. 
Hence I have adopted Carrots as the main root crop. 
They are hardly so productive as turneps, but their su¬ 
perior richness far surpasses all other roots. Horses, 
not very fond of ruta bagas, will often prefer carrots to 
oats themselves, and for feeding in company with oats 
and hay, they are superb. All cattle eat them with 
avidity; and milch cows through winter if fed on them 
plentifully, give the richest milk and make the best 
butter. The white carrot, projecting from the ground 
four to six inches, is very easily harvested, and is more 
productive than the yellow carrot; while the latter has 
the advantage of remaining uninjured if left in the 
ground till spring. Hence I raise some of each. 
But the crop most neglected by farmers, and which 
I find the most profitable of all, is corn, sown in thick 
drills for fodder. This mode of raising fodder is so 
easy, requires so little labor, and yields so enormous a 
crop, that it is eminently worthy the adoption of every 
farmer, rich and poor, small and great, in debt and out 
of debt, thriving and not thriving, east, west, north, 
and south. Good soil is plowed, harrowed, and fur¬ 
rowed about two feet apart, as for potatoes; one man 
strews the grain from a basket along the furrow as fast 
as he can walk, about fifty grains to a foot, or two 
bushels to the acre; another follows with a common 
harrow, lengthwise with the furrows, or across them as 
is most convenient, and covers the seed. Passing the 
cultivator once or twice between the rows afterwards, 
is all the attention the crop needs. It quickly grows 
up, and covering the whole ground, entirely precludes 
the necessity of hoeing. When the crop is taken off 
in autumn, the ground is clean as a floor, (and they are 
not always clean, I am sorry to say.) Wheat may be 
sown after, with very great propriety, as the mere growth 
of herbage, (no grain being produced,) does not ex¬ 
haust the soil. Hence this becomes an excellent crop 
for a course in rotation. The amount, (if sown thick 
enough, not otherwise,) is about five to seven tons to the 
acre, of the very best fodder, cattle eating all the stalks; 
and by the most liberal estimate of labor, interest on 
land, and cost of seed, I have never made it cost more 
than two dollars a ton—often not more than a dollar 
and a half. This crop may be sown right after the 
usual time of planting corn, and before hoeing com¬ 
mences; and may be harvested directly after the usual 
harvests. One load of it is worth more than two of com¬ 
mon corn-stalk fodder. My neighbors all around are 
astonished at the advantages I derive from this crop, 
and resolve to try it themselves; but when the usual 
time arrives for sowing it, something prevents, or they 
have not land to spare, and it is neglected. Because 1 
have not land to spare, is the very reason I adopt this 
course; for with one acre, I get as much of better fod¬ 
der as is usually obtained from four or five acres of 
meadow. 
The use of ashes, plaster, domestic poudrette, and 
muck, I find very beneficial, in the absence of a large 
supply of common manure; and the use of the subsoil 
plow lately commenced will, I doubt not, be very ad¬ 
vantageous. X. Y. Z. 
