THE CULTIVATOR 
and with the accompanying directions, they can be put 
together again all ready for operation, in a few hours. 
Thus they can be sent to any part of the country. 
Price of presses from $130 to $165, including cap¬ 
stan. Weight of presses from 1600 to 2000 lbs. 
Weight of bales from 250 to 400 lbs. 
Ice House. 
A correspondent of the New England Farmer, gives 
a description of a very cheap mode of erecting an ice 
house, which he has found to keep ice the year round 
without any difficulty. The whole cost was three thou¬ 
sand feet of lumber, 25 lbs. of nails, and four or five 
days work, not exceeding in all about twenty-five dol¬ 
lars. It is built within another house, which be finds 
to be of great advantage. The following is the des¬ 
cription of his mode of buildii g: 
In the first place, dig out the dirt where you wish 
your house to stand, to the depth of two feet, or more, 
if exposed to frost greatly, and fill up with stone, then 
put your sills on level with the ground, put in strong 
sleepers, and cover this over with three inch plank. 
Commence upon these plank with scantling, sawed one 
and a half, by four inches for your wall, laying one 
upon the other and nailing them one to the other; in¬ 
side of this lay up another tier, leaving a space of 
about four inches to be filled up with sawdust, or tan- 
bark ; so continue till you have it as high as you wish 
for ice ; then take plank and cover over, having them 
come to the outer edge of your inside wall; continue 
on as before with your walls, until as high as you like, 
and cover all over with plank two inches double; if 
under cover no roof will be necessary more than this. 
Have two doors, one where the ice is, and one above 
where you can put in butter, milk or anything you like 
to have kept cool. Bore these upper plank full of two 
inch holes, the ones above the ice; and the ones at the 
bottom of the house bore half inch holes through them 
once in about a foot all over the bottom, and spread 
two inches, or more of sawdust or tan-bark over the 
bottom before putting your ice in. Pack the ice as 
closely as possible, not having it come quite up to the 
top and edge of your house, and when full throw saw¬ 
dust, or whatever you may use, over the top, and also 
fill up between the ice and sides of the house and I 
will venture to say you will not be out of ice by rea¬ 
son of melting by July 20th. Joseph Blake. Ash- 
field , August 17. 
Sowing Grass Seed in Autumn. 
We have never succeeded so well in seeding land 
speedily and heavily with timothy, as by sowing about 
or before mid-autumn, or as soon as the moderately 
damp weather has fairly set in, and harrowing it light¬ 
ly, without connexion with any other crop. It has al¬ 
ways afforded a good product the following season, but 
not equal to that of the second summer. Several in¬ 
teresting experiments, corroborating the advantages of 
this practice, are reported by S. O. Knapp of Jackson, 
Michigan, in the Michigan Farmer. The land, which 
was new, had been in consequence of stone and brush, 
but very imperfectly plowed late in the autumn of 
1851; and without further plowing the next spring, a 
heavy seeding of oats was applied, and thoroughly 
harrowed. The crop was good, and as soon as it was 
harvested, the ground was plowed and near the end of 
September, 8 quarts of timothy seed were sown per 
acre. A month and a half later, two acres more were 
seeded in the same manner. An equally heavy crop of 
grass was cut the following summer (’53,) from both por¬ 
tions, estimated at two tons per acre of dried hay. 
Another portion of land? was sown with grass in spring, 
on ground in better order than the other; but although 
this formed a good turf, it gave no crop of hay. In 
one instance, late sowing during a drouth did not suc¬ 
ceed so well;—the growth being small, about one half 
of the grass was winterkilled \ but the vacancies were 
well supplied by early spring seeding. A single ex¬ 
periment was made with fall sowing of clover, with 
the timothy. The time is not mentioned, but it is sta¬ 
ted that although the young plants formed only the 
third leaf, they escaped the winter without injury. 
Our own opinion is that autumn-sowing of clover, to 
be at all relied on, should be performed early in au¬ 
tumn, and if a wet period follows, it would doubtless 
succeed well. 
The results of the preceding experiments have 
strongly shown the advantages of sowing grass seed 
alone —mixed with other crops, they operate precisely 
as weeds, and choke it out of several months growth. 
It is very important, indeed, that it be sown at the 
right season ; but with this precaution, we are satis¬ 
fied it is much more certain of success when sown 
alone. 
We observe in a late number of Moore’s New-York¬ 
er, a statement of the eminent success which resulted 
from early fall sowing, after several failures in seed¬ 
ing with spring crops. 
Dwarf Pears. 
We never saw finer bearing dwarf pears than the 
present season on the grounds of Bissell & Hooker 
and o£ Ellwanger & Barry, of Bochester, N. Y. 
The former showed us several Bartletts in a row, six 
or seven feet in height, bearing a good crop, and ap¬ 
pearing in every respect as healthy and thrifty as trees 
of the same variety standing near them, on pear roots. 
Two trees of the Louise Bonne Jersey presented a 
beautiful appearance, both from their thrifty appear¬ 
ance and dense crops of handsome fruit. We never saw 
fruit trees of any kind more heavily laden—an acre 
of such would certainly afford a large pecuniary profit. 
Ellwanger & Barry have large numbers of fine speci¬ 
men trees; and although the season has been unfavor¬ 
able to some, others were handsomely loaded. A small 
tree of the Tyson, about four feet high, was profusely 
filled with pears, and we never saw a more beautiful 
picture than this graceful little tree with its trusses of 
ruddy cheeked specimens presented. It is to be da- 
guerreotyped. The Beurre Giffard , on the same 
grounds, afforded specimens, notwithstanding the unu¬ 
sual season, having all the freshness, juiciness, and 
high flavor which in former years it has been found to 
possess. It ripens before the Tyson and Bostiezer, or 
about the time of Osband’s Summer, and although 
much inferior in the vigor and beauty of the tree, is 
certainly decidedly ahead of the latter in the quali¬ 
ty of the fruit. This and the Summer Doyen 
the two greatest acquisitions of late years arnon^ 
mer varieties. 
