138 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
April* 
first in varied qualifications when wisely pursued; 
and shall the laborer in the field look on his hard 
hand, brown skin, and well developed muscles—his 
plain, strong, but comfortable clothing, and dwel¬ 
ling, and equipage, as signs of inferiority and mean¬ 
ness? His is health, strength, contentment and in¬ 
dependence; his is a central and fundamental posi¬ 
tion in society, and shall he cower? The humble 
and learned divine, the skillful and humane physi¬ 
cian, the acute but honest lawyer, the enlightened 
teacher of science, the keen but honorable merchant, 
and skillful mechanic, are all honorable men, whose 
virtues and agencies are indispensible to the best 
good of society; and so are their wives, their sons, 
and their daughters, honorable; but not exclusively 
so; nor in a higher degree than the farmer who ho¬ 
nors his calling. If the tiller of the soil has here¬ 
tofore enjoyed less honor than the indispensibleness 
of his calling naturally accorded him, it was because 
he brought fewer of the lights of science-to bear on 
his toils than naturally clustered around them. 
Now, that science is simplified and made accessi¬ 
ble to all; let the farmer concentrate its rays upon 
the dark bosom of the earth until it is radiant with 
the light of philosophy, while it fills his “ basket 
and his “ store ” with its rich and varied produc¬ 
tions, and teaches him the wisdom, power and grace 
of God. C. E. G. Utica, N. Y. 
<&l)c ttetainarg Apartment. 
Bone Disorder in Cows. 
It has often been mentioned that in some parts of 
Europe, where land has been long pastured by milch 
cows, the animals are subject to a weakness of the 
bones, a disease which has been attributed to the 
exhaustion of the phosphate of lime in the soil. 
We have also mentioned that in the older settled 
parts of our own eountx'y, the same disease had made 
its appearance. The application of bones as ma¬ 
nure to the soil, or the phosphate of lime as it is 
found in some rocks, has been found to restore the 
necessary quality in the grass, and the animals be¬ 
come healthy. It appears, also, that “bone meal” 
has been given to the cows with good success. 
Mr. Wm. R. Putnam of North Danvers, Mass.., 
gives some valuable ideas on this subject, in a com¬ 
munication to the N. E. Farmer. He says—“ In a 
former communication I attempted to show that 
there was such a disease, caused by the want of 
proper food. It will be my object, at this time, to 
show why it may exist in some sections of the coun¬ 
try, and not in others. Those farmers, in this 
town, whose cows have been affected by it, have not 
been in the habit of raising stock, but they have sold 
their calves to the butcher. The farmer who keeps 
ten cows, usually sells annually eight calves. These 
at five weeks old, will weigh one hundred and twen¬ 
ty-five pounds each. Where this course has been 
pursued for fifty years, there have been taken from 
the soil twenty-five tons of animal matter, and but 
small return made to it by the manure voided by 
calves at this age. Now it will be obvious to every 
one that this will sooner exhaust the animal matter 
from the soil, than where they raise stock; for the 
ox that is kept until he weighs as much as the eight 
calves, will have voided a larger amount of manure. 
11 It is the practice of most farmers here, to* pur¬ 
chase heifers that are-driven from New-Hampshire, 
Maine, and Vermont, in the autumn, before they are 
three years old, which are expected to calve in the 
snrinqr. This is a time when they will require the 
largest amount of animal matter to promote their 
own growth, and furnish nutriment for their off¬ 
spring. It is these young cows that are most likely 
to be affected by this disease. On Mr. Preston’s 
farm, alluded to in my last communication, for fif¬ 
teen- years before they began to use bone-meal, they 
were not able to keep any of these until they were 
six years- old. They became so stiff and feeble that 
they were obliged to dry them. Many of them were 
driven to New-Hampshire to a pasture that has al¬ 
ways been used for fattening cattle. There they 
fatted as well as cows that had never been diseased. 
“ I will give my reason why I think this disease 
has not shown itself any more in Hamilton; yet I 
think I have seen some signs of it there. When I 
see the boards about the cow-yard look as if the 
cows had been trying to eat them up, it is a sure 
sign of one form of this disease. The farmers in 
that town are in the habit of using a considerable 
quantity of hay from the salt marshes of Ipswich 
and Essex. I have never seen any analysis of this- 
grass; but, from the large quantity of lime in the 
shells of clams and muscles, found about these 
marshes, the inference is that it contains a large 
amount of phosphate of lime. 
11 The pastures there may be as much exhausted 
of animal matter as here;. yet if the cow has had a 
full supply of it during the winter, she will be able 
to go through the summer without showing the want 
of it. It is the opinion, of some there, that the ma¬ 
nure made from salt hay is better than that made 
when the cattle are fed upon English hay. The in¬ 
ference from this is, that it furnishes something to 
the soil, which the other does not. It is the prac¬ 
tice of many there to keep a portion of their best 
salt hay until the time the cows go to pasture.. They 
will often eat it then., when they will not eat the 
best of English, hay.. 
1 i It may not be, that those farms which have 
been cultivated the longest are most exhausted of 
animal matter. It depends more upon the manner of 
cultivation than upon the time. Perhaps we may ap¬ 
ply the same principle to feeding milch cows, that 
we act upon in feeding hens. When we see them 
trying to eat the lime from the walls of their coop, 
we think they need it to form the shell of their eggs, 
and we give it to them in oyster-shells, old mortar, 
and bones. So when, we see a cow trying to eat old 
bones, we should think that she needs something of 
this sort to furnish milk. 
cc In Dr. Dana’s Muck Manual, it is stated that 
the liquid evacuation of the cow contains a consi¬ 
derable quantity of phosphate of lime. When no 
attention is paid to preserving this, and the solid 
excrements are exposed to the air, the most volatile 
and valuable parts are lost. From this we may 
infer that where there is a barn cellar for. pre¬ 
serving the manure, the cows will not be so likely to 
have this disease, and experience will warrant the 
conclusion. It is there stated, also, that peat ash¬ 
es abound in phosphate of lime. By carting muck 
to our barn-cellars, to be wet by the urine of the 
cows, we not only increase our manure, but it 
will abound in that particular ingredient which the 
soil needs to produce proper food. for. milch, cowsd r 
Blind Teeth in Horses* 
Eds. Cultivator —In confirmation of Mr. Lit¬ 
tle’s statement in the February number of The Cul¬ 
tivator, concerning wolf or blind teeth in horses, 
I would add, that in the fall of 1849, I purchased a 
horse five years old. When delivered to me, after 
a long journeyI discovered a dullness of the eyes,. 
