251 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
1872.] 
until recently supposed that this species extend¬ 
ed wholly across the continent, but naturalists 
make the bird that extends from the great cen¬ 
tral plains to the Pacific, and from Texas to 
Washington Territory, a different species—the 
Western Lark. Our Eastern bird is Sturnella 
magna, while the Western one is called Stur- 
nella neglecta, but when ornithologists come to de¬ 
scribe the characters which distinguish the two, 
they are forced to admit that the differences are 
very slight. Prof. Baird, our highest authority, 
says: “ To sum up the preceding remarks, it 
may be stated that the real difference between 
the species lies in the greater tendency to nar¬ 
row transverse bands upon the upper surfaces, 
especiallj'- of the middle tail-feathers.” He 
adds that all observers have attested to a re- 
marlcable difference between the notes of the 
bird found in the West and that of the East. 
The Meadow-Lark is a very familiar bird, and 
does not seem to mind the “ inroads of civiliza¬ 
tion ; ” indeed, it is not rare to meet with them 
within the limits of New York City. Notwith¬ 
standing the numbers of young vagrants that 
go about the vacant lots shooting everything 
that has life, the note of the Meadow-Lark is 
occasionally to be heard. What a sweet note 
it is, and what a pity that its song is so soon— 
almost abruptly, ended! It is hardly necessary 
to describe so familiar a bird; its yellow breast, 
marked by a broad black crescent, is familiar 
to all who roam the fields. When startled, it 
flutters like a young bird, and seems a long 
while in making up its mind whether to flee or 
not. The bird builds its nest in a cavity scooped 
out at the base of a tuft of grass, and lays four 
or five eggs at a time; these are white, blotched 
and dotted with reddish brown. The opening 
to the nest is only large enough to admit one 
bird at a time. The male and female both take 
their turn at sitting. 
The birds gather in flocks in fall for their mi¬ 
gration southward, and return singly or in small 
flocks in the spring. 
The flesh of the young bird when fat is highly 
esteemed, but the old birds are said to be tough 
and of a disagreeable flavor. In the fall they 
are generally to be found in the city markets. 
Ogden Farm Papers.—No. 30. 
“ It droppeth like the gentle rain from heaven 
upon the place beneath.” How gentle it was ! 
How softly it dropped, and how all nature 
thanked heaven for its merciful quality! How 
the place beneath drew the soothing balm into 
its thirsty pores! Shakespeare must have gone 
through a long, unseasonable drouth like ours, 
to have learned that simile for the unstrained 
“ quality of mercy,” and every farmer in our 
w T ind-burned districts must have felt its fitness, 
as the long-delayed and tlirice-welcome rains 
of May came at last, to make him forget how 
dry and sad the world had been. It is no small 
part of the compensations of a farmer’s life, to 
be able to enjoy to the full the blessed, fructify¬ 
ing showers of spring, with which nature heals 
the winter’s scars and clothes field and forest 
with the promising green of early growth, and 
humbly to pay the tribute of his warmest grati¬ 
tude for the “early rain” which melts our 
mother earth into life, and gives its value to all 
our work, its fulfillment to all our hope. 
After four years of contention with the curse 
with which the earth-skinning of my predeces¬ 
sors had blighted every inch of our little farm— 
robbing it of its plant-food, puddling its clay to 
a water-holding firmness, and leaving its surface 
to weeds and moss—I had at last, by dint of 
draining, and manuring, and plowing, and cul¬ 
tivation, got one of its nine-and-a-half-acre sec¬ 
tions well laid down to grass. I had done my 
part, and nature must do the rest. There is a 
point where the most assiduous farmer must pa¬ 
tiently sit down and wait for the hidden hands 
of warmth and air and moisture, to take up his 
work and carry it on to completion. I had 
reached that point, and could only w T ait and 
hope. Through long weeks I waited for the 
hand that never came, and hoped for the com¬ 
pletion that seemed, every day, farther and 
farther away. March was colder and more sav¬ 
age than winter itself, and the late dry warmth 
and high winds of April seemed to sap the very 
fountains of growth. The first half of May 
had only rain enough to feed the drying winds, 
and even the grass of old meadows shivered 
and thirsted and stood still. But at last it came, 
the gentle rain from heaven, and hope grew 
high and completion marched on apace, until 
now the early days of June see my new meadow 
glorying in the fulfillment of the promise that 
never fails. The old curse is removed, and we 
rejoice in a fertility that I trust bad farming 
shall never again destroy. 
Those who think we have a rosy time with 
the so-called high prices we receive for thor¬ 
ough-bred stock, do not, perhaps, understand 
that the picture has another side. High prices 
come after an effort which it costs some risk to 
make. A neigbor who saw me shipping a young 
Essex sow, bearing her first litter, rolled up his 
ej r es when I told him she was sold for $75, 
blandly remarking that he would sell me a bigger 
sow than that, and a first-rate one, too, for $15. 
He was still more astonished a few weeks later, 
wlienl showed him aboar that I had just bought 
at auction for $140, and on which expenses and 
commissions amounted to about $20 more. 
“Well!” said he, “that beats me, and I don’t 
see how you are going to get out of it.” “ Why,” 
said he, “that hog is worth just about $30.” 
In one sense that was his value, but in another 
it would be difficult to fix his real worth. He 
is a very good pig, indeed, good enough to sa¬ 
tisfy any breeder. Of this I felt confident before 
I bought him, but the reason why I bought him 
—and I gave my agent an order to buy at a 
much higher price, if necessary—was because 
he had the reputation of being the best Essex 
boar in the country. I might perhaps have got 
as good an animal for much less money, but I 
could not afford to let Lord Lyons II, with Ms 
reputation, go to another breeder. If there were 
zrot this necessity for keeping up the good name 
and fame of a herd, the breeding of thorough¬ 
bred stock would indeed be an enviable busi¬ 
ness; but no matter how much bad luck we 
have in the w’ay of death, abortion, unsatisfac¬ 
tory progeny, and all the other ills a breeder 
knows, which affect the income most seriously, 
the outgo is sure and unfailing. 
I am often asked by enterprising farmers 
whether I would advise them to pay a very high 
price for some thorough-bred animal. Advice 
in such cases must depend on the circumstances 
of the inquirer. If he can afford the invest¬ 
ment, and if his object is to establish the foun¬ 
dation of a fine herd, I do not hesitate to advise 
him to pay whatever he must for the best animals 
(and those in the best repute) that he can find. 
The foundation may be very costly, when viewed 
by itself, but measured by the scale of its results, 
the case is bravely altered. One hundred dol¬ 
lars is a deal of money for a small farmer to 
pay for a Jersey bull-calf, but that calf will prob¬ 
ably become the progenitor of twenty or more 
good dairy cows, and there can be no question 
that they will be worth, on the average, a good 
deal more than $5 ahead more than they would 
if sired by a scrub or grade bull. Two yearling 
heifers (not akin) of really first-class Jersey 
stock, both with calfto different bulls, may cost, 
if very choice, $500. Supposing them each to 
have a bull-calf, or that their heifer-calves be 
exchanged for bulls (not akin) we have the foun¬ 
dation for a herd that may within a few years' 
number fifty animals, all tliorough-bred, and of 
distinct strains of blood. These animals will 
be worth, on an average, nearer $50 than $10 
eacli, more than the same number of common 
stock. 
A retired merchant, who pays $500 for a cow 
for his lawn, and for the sake of Jersey cream 
for his coffee, commits a great extravagance, but 
a farmer buying the same animal to improve 
his stock for practical dairy purposes, makes a 
wise and prudent investment. 
My own experience tends to show that the 
great sale of thorougli-breds and high prices is 
to practical farmers, and not to “ wealthy ” men. 
The latter class are fast learning that good 
grades or tliorougli-breds without pedigrees are 
as good for their purposes, and the farmers are 
learning equally fast, that while they can not dis¬ 
regard quality in making their purchases, pedi¬ 
gree is the sine qua non of successful breeding. 
Occasional letters received, asking for informa¬ 
tion about Jerusalem artichoke, remind me 
that I owe some amends to readers of the 
Agriculturist who have taken my advice to 
adopt this as a root crop. It is all very well so 
long as you want artichokes; they grow easily 
and anywhere, and produce enormously of nutri¬ 
tious roots, but if left in the same ground, they 
finally crowd it so closely as to make very small 
tubers, and then it becomes desirable to rotate 
them out of office. In this part of the programme 
I have signally failed, and any one who will show 
me how it is to be done, shall have my hearty 
thanks. I believe that they might be in time 
fed out by hogs, but as my patch is in the center 
of a farm without interior fences, this is imprac¬ 
ticable, and I have tried plowing, mowing, 
freezing, pulling, digging, and hand-picking to 
no purpose. I have now over about a quarter- 
acre not less than ten robust plants to the square 
foot—the very worst weed I ever had to contend 
with. All that I have heretofore said in favor 
of this plant is strictly true. I did not know 
until now how true is the other side of the story, 
and I would advise no one to try it, except in a 
patch where hogs can be confined if necessary. 
It is not pleasant to enter the lists of so free 
a fight as that now raging between the deep- 
plowers and the shallow plowers. Indeed, I 
think that each is right according to his success 
or failure under certain circumstances. But it 
is undoubtedly safest to advise all enterprising 
young farmers to leave well-enough alone, until 
they have found, by actual experience on their 
own land, that deeper plowing will not be in¬ 
jurious. One plowing, ten inches deep, has 
cost me already four years’ use of eight acres of 
land, which, had I left its vegetable soil at the 
top and its “ pizen ” clay at the bottom, would 
have given me a fair return for the seed and 
manure and labor I have thus far squandered 
upon it. Four summers’ heats and four winters’ 
frosts, with manure enough to have made the 
adjoining land highly fertile, have hardly had 
an appreciable effect in overcoming the detest¬ 
able impoverishment of the very unfertile sub- 
