242 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
(which should be marked with the name of the cow,) 
and filled to the upper or ten inch line, and the number 
of degrees the thickness of the cream occupies in each 
tube, indicates the per centage. For example, if the 
bottom of the cream stands at 1 inch, if denotes 10 per 
cent, cream. 
In a trial, with one of these instruments, of seven cows, 
six weeks after , calving, in the months of March and 
April, we found they varied from 13 to 7A percent. Out 
of the seven cows the milk of two produced, after stand¬ 
ing twenty-four hours in a temperature of 48 degrees, 
thirteen per cent cream—one twelve and another eleven 
per cent, in the same temperature. Another at 46 de¬ 
grees 9 per cent, while two at 40 degrees stood at 8| and 
7 a per cent. The milk of four cows mixed, in a tem¬ 
perature of 48 degrees, marked 11 per cent. Now, it is 
well known by those have paid any attention to the sub¬ 
ject, that temperature has considerable influence in 
raising cream, which may, in part account for the low 
per centage of the two last named cows; but in other 
trials we have found they varied from 7 to 20 per cent. j 
After comparing the accounts given in a variety of places 
and situations of the average quantity of milk which a 
cow gives when kept alone, and well fed as they gene¬ 
rally are, with a full supply of food, such as they relish, 
to the extent of their appetites, the result is, that it greatly 
exceeds that of our best dairy herds, and the quantity of 
butter made from a given quantity of milk is also greater. 
I am aware that high feeding of milch cows on grain, 
is not generally believed to be profitable, but I am satis¬ 
fied that the cows would give milk nearly the whole 
year, be made good beef at the same time, and their 
calves would be much more valuable. 
If cows are ever allowed to fall away low during win¬ 
ter, in vain shall we hope to obtain an abundant supply 
of milk by bringing them into high condition in the 
summer; for if a cow be lean at the time of calving, no 
management afterwards, will ever bring her to yield for 
the season anything like the quantity of milk that she 
would have done, had she been all the while in high 
condition. C. N. Bement. 
American Hotel, Albany , August, 1845. 
AGRICULTURE AND MINES OF N. CAROLINA. 
Having passed over the principal part of this State du¬ 
ring the last year, I have thought perhaps it might inter¬ 
est some of your readers to give a sort of flying account 
of it. This State possesses as many natural advantages 
as any other in the Union. The eastern part of it has 
large and extensive fisheries for herring and shad. The 
planters who live on the coast and on the banks of the 
rivers, nearly all fish during the season. The offal of 
the fish is used by them as manure. This, together with 
the shell marl beds which are found in all the lower 
counties, enables the planters to make large crops of 
corn, wheat anil cotton. The marl, however, is not 
yet much used, as its application is not well understood. 
The land is generally low and level, formed of a deep 
alluvial bottom, and strongly acid. About five feet from 
the surface the formation of shell deposit commences, 
and extends in some places to the depth of ten feet. The 
marl laying so near the surface, renders its application 
easy, which would neutralize the acid and render the soil 
more friable. Large tracts of land, which will now 
hardly bring weeds, by a good marling could be made 
to produce heavy crops. The county of Terrel is cele¬ 
brated for its grapes and Seuppernong wine, several 
thousand gallons of which is made every year, but mostly 
for home consumption. On the bank of the Cape Fear 
river some attention is paid to the culture of rice; the 
fields are quite extensive and very handsomely laid out. 
The lands in the western part of the State are generally 
good, especially when you approach the mountains, and 
nearly all the counties west of Raleigh, are rich in min¬ 
erals; several extensive gold mines are in active opera¬ 
tion, and pieces of native gold have been found worth 
seventy dollars. In Davidson county there are some sil¬ 
ver mines which are worked daily with from fifty to one 
hundred hands, yielding a good profit. Copper mines 
are numerous, but little or no attention is paid to them. 
as the process of smelting is not understood, and the 
[transportation of the ore too expensive, with the present 
state of the road, to send it to market. A survey of 
turnpike roads was ordered by the last Legislature, and 
as soon as it can be completed there is little doubt but 
that copper mining will be found as profitable as the 
others. The principal crop of the mining region is cot¬ 
ton, but the low price and the distance from market, has 
caused many of the planters to turn their attention to 
mining, which will shortly prove very lucrative. There 
is great want of labor-saving machines here, both in 
mining and agriculture. 
Your paper has a good circulation in North Carolina, 
and its effects are plainly to be seen. Almost every in¬ 
telligent planter will tell you, or show you, something that 
he has learned from the Cultivator. The low price of 
lands, and the facility with which they could be im¬ 
proved offers great inducements to emigrants, and the 
investment of capital in this state. 
Your friend, John C. Mather. 
| Raleigh, North Carolina, July 14th, 1845. 
LETTER FROM DR. LEE. 
The Dairies of Chenango County—Science of Agriculture — 
The Crops. 
Smilhville, Chenango Co., N. Y., July 15, 1845. 
This county has long been noted as a good grazing dis¬ 
trict, and admirably adapted to the production of butter, 
cheese, beef, mutton and wool. Its broken surface and 
high hills seem to attract clouds loaded with vapor and rain, 
which, falling on the most elevated points, irrigate the 
whole district, and sustain numerous living springs. 
Pure cold water and a plenty of it, may be regarded as 
indispensible to the dairy business. In limestone coun¬ 
tries, the rocks are so full of seams and cavities that most of 
the water which falls in rains soon finds its way so far 
below the surface that the roots of the cultivated grasses 
cannot reach it. On the side hills and in the valleys of 
Chenango county, the grass is remarkably green and lux¬ 
uriant for this season of the year; owing, mainly, to an 
impervious subsoil, which keeps the water near to the 
surface. 
I have visited a number of fine dairies. In several, 
the butter is contracted at 13 cents a pound. The 
expectations of the cheese-makers are pretty well 
raised, in view of a better market in England than they 
have realized at home. In large butter dairies the 
cream or milk is churned either by water power, or the 
weight of a large dog or sheep walking on an inclined 
wheel. A sheep that will mate with cows, churn 30 or 
40 lbs. of butter a day, and yield its owner 5 pounds of good 
wool a year, is truly a valuable animal. There are such 
in this county, which run and jump on a tread-wheel and 
churn for an hour with more spirit than any boy or girl 
that I ever saw attempt to extract 20 lbs. of butter from a 
churning of milk or cream. 
Pans of milk set for the cream to rise should be placed 
not on board shelves, but either on cool flat stones, or 
on slats, so that the cool air can circulate under the bot¬ 
tom of the pan as well as around its sides. A well 
flagged stone or brick floor, moistened with cold wa¬ 
ter, keeps down the temperature of the milk house 
The butter is worked over by a machine which I will 
not attempt to describe, that manages 40 lbs. at a batch, 
and does its work much easier than a ladle. Ground 
Turk’s Island salt, or Liverpool, is preferred, and gene¬ 
rally used. The cows are never left in the yard over 
night, and never denied a plenty of good fresh feed. 
The shale and sand stone rocks of this region seem to 
yield, as they are decomposed, lime, potash, soda, mag¬ 
nesia, clay, silex, chlorine, sulphur, phosphorus, and 
the oxide of iron, enough to produce good crops of 
grass, but not enough of all these minerals, to make 
good crops of wheat. If we analyze the ash of timothy, 
which grows so luxuriantly in this section, and that of 
a ripe wheat plant, we shall find that the simple minerals 
contained in both are precisely alike in character, but 
very unlike in quantity. Thus, if 100 ounces of dry 
wheat, carefully burnt till all the organic mattter—car¬ 
bon, nitrogen, and water—are driven off, there will 
