85b 
THE RURAL, NFCW-N’ORKECR 
Hope Farm Notes 
Accidents. —We bad our first little 
taste of the employer’s liability law when 
Merrill got one of bis fingei’s too near 
the mower knife at the moment Tom 
saw a bunch of clover just beyond his 
nose. Merrill reached in to clean one 
of the knives and Tom, after that clover, 
reached too far and the blade started. 
There was a slash at the end of the fin¬ 
ger which bled and would not stop until 
the doctor took it in hand. Under our 
New Jersey law a farmer is liable for 
accidents to hired help unless he can 
prove that they were foolishly negligent 
or drunk. Our accidents have not been 
serious thus far. I have heard of sev¬ 
eral New Jersey farmers who have been 
forced to pay out more than they can 
hope to make in three years through ac¬ 
cidents to hired hands. In one case at 
least a stupid or ignorant foreigner in¬ 
sisted upon doing just what the farmer 
told him not to. This law is likely to 
cause great loss or trouble to small farm¬ 
ers. There should be some form of ex¬ 
emption for farm or household workers. 
When applied to the large corporations 
or business houses this law is useful and 
fair because such concerns have ample 
capital and should be made to use safety 
appliances for machinery. With a small 
farmer the case is very different. He 
rarely has capital enough to buy tools 
or fertilizer to advantage and a single 
serious accident, though no fault of his 
might even cause him to lose his farm. 
Many of such farmers lose money each 
year through the blunders or careless¬ 
ness of hired help, yet under such a law 
they have no redress, the obligation be¬ 
ing one-sided. I wonder what workmen 
would say to a law which laid aside part 
of their wages as a fund to pay damages 
for which they were responsible? 
During the past week Mother has been 
suffering from a bad case of ivy poison¬ 
ing. As this injury was evidently pro¬ 
duced on the farm perhaps she could 
under the law bring in a good-sized bill 
for “mental suffering” in addition to the 
physical troubles. I tell her she must 
first admit that she is a “hired girl” or 
regular employee. There are many farm¬ 
ers’ wives and daughters who do hired 
girl's work and get none of her wages. 
Speaking of poison ivy here is a new 
“remedy.” It is simple enough at any 
rate: 
At this season of the year there is a 
good deal of discussion about poison ivy 
and a positive cure and relief from the 
poisoning is often a valuable piece of 
knowledge. Many remedies are widely 
subscribed to and some of them may 
sometimes be of use, but I have never 
known plain hot water to fail and it has 
invariably given instant comfort. The 
outbreak usually begins on the wrists 
and hands and it is necessary to put the 
affected parts into hot water. Then make 
it hotter and keep on increasing the 
heat until a limit of endurance is 
reached. Let the parts soak for 10 min¬ 
utes all together and relief will then be 
obtained. In the course of two or four 
hours, or a day, the trouble may recur 
when the same treatment will again be 
successful. Mild attacks may yield to 
one heating while severe attacks may 
take a dozen, hut the relief given by this 
method is positive and is very grateful 
to the sufferer. w. E. SAUNDERS. 
Ontario, Canada. 
Oiled Roads. —For several years now 
our town or borough has used oil on the 
roads. As a result there has been prac¬ 
tically no road dust. The town next 
ours did not use the oil and the moment 
one passed over the line the difference 
could be noticed in a cloud of dust every 
time a hoof struck the road. This oil is 
usually put on in May. For a few days 
it makes a nasty mess, but finally it 
cleans up and holds the dust all Sum¬ 
mer. This year the plan of throwing dry 
sand over the oil when first sprinkled 
on proved a good investment. Here are 
the figures of cost for this year: 
7,844 gallons of oil. $398.06 
Sand for top dressing. 15.50 
Labor . 75.00 
$488.56 
There are between seven and eight 
miles of road to be oiled. This brings 
the cost per mile to about $60—this for 
a town with less than 150 voters. In 
many country towns as our people know 
them this would not pay. With us it is 
a good investment and advertisement. 
Our land is too expensive to be used 
permanently for farming. It will sooner 
or later be given up to small places or 
residences and anything which induces 
people to come here or to select this 
country for an outing helps advertise the 
locality. There can be no question that 
the oiling lays the road dust and pre¬ 
serves the road. 
The Lime Question. — I sometimes 
think we have talked so much about lime 
that the subject must be tiresome. Yet 
we receive dozens of questions about lime 
every week. Here is one which comes 
from our own county in Northern New 
.T ersey: 
I want to use some lime on my farm 
and am thinking of using raw ground 
limestone. Will you advise me if this 
kind of lime would give as good satis¬ 
faction as any other? H. L. M. 
You cannot settle the lime question by 
saying yes or no, because the cost of 
lime, the crops needing it and the char¬ 
acter of the soil must all be considered. 
When limestone is taken out of the soil 
it is either crushed to a powder or 
burned in a kiln. In the former case we 
have what is called “raw ground lime¬ 
stone.” When the limestone is burned 
we have “lump” or “quick” or “caustic” 
lime. When this quicklime takes up 
water it slakes and is then known as 
slaked lime. Usually the choice of a 
lime is made between the ground lime¬ 
stone and the slaked lime. In choosing 
we should compare the cost and consider 
what we want to do with it. 
In our country freight rates are high 
and the hauls up our hills are heavy. 
Slaked lime of good quality in carload 
lots costs $7.20 per ton at our station. 
This lime contained about 65 per cent 
of actual lime or 1,300 pounds to the ton, 
which makes a cost of about half a cent 
a pound. A few miles away some farm¬ 
ers bought ground limestone at $6.80 
per ton at the station. This contained 
about 50 per cent of lime or 1.000 pounds 
to the ton. This means more than half 
cent per pound pf actual lime. On our 
hard soil we are obliged to use twice as 
much of the ground limestone as of the 
slaked lime in order to obtain equal re¬ 
sults. Near the kiln where freight rates 
would be low the ground limestone would 
be the better bargain. It is the cost of 
freight which makes lime expensive, and 
I doubt whether it pays to buy limestone 
and pay over $1.60 per ton freight. First 
of all I should figure it out in this way 
to find the cost of a pound of lime. 
Then what sort of soil do you want 
this lime for? Our own soil is tough 
and hard. It bakes to a brick in time 
of drought. The action of the ground 
limestone seems too gentle for results on 
such soil. At any rate, experience shows 
us that annual applications of slaked 
lime, put on as we plow under cover 
crops, gives us best results. On a loose, 
open soil, well filled with organic matter 
or on a thinner soil with more sand I 
think the ground limestone would an¬ 
swer and in some respects would be bet¬ 
ter. For land naturally sour and hard 
and lacking in organic matter the slaked 
lime will give quicker results and help 
get cover crops started so as to furnish 
the needed organic matter. We use 
annual applications of about 600 pounds 
per acre on all crops except strawberries 
and potatoes. This is because we have 
no definite rotation, but each year plow 
under a cover crop and use the lime with 
it. In a regular rotation of four to five 
years we should use a ton of lime to the 
acre whenever seeding to grass or clover. 
I am speaking now of slaked lime. If 
you use ground limestone you must ex¬ 
pect to use two tons or twice as much 
as of the slaked. It makes little differ¬ 
ence when you use the lime—Spring or 
Summer—provided it is thoroughly 
worked into the soil. Do not plow it un¬ 
der. but spread on the furrows and har¬ 
row in. 
Farm Notes. —The last load of hay 
went to the barn on July 5—just before 
the showers started in. The grass rip¬ 
ened earlier than usual this year. Our 
crop is short—not over 60 per cent of 
last year’s, but the quality is higher. 
R cports from the hay-producing sections 
indicate a short crop. Prices ought to 
be high and they will be to buyers. 
Whether farmers can get more for their 
hay or not will depend on their ability to 
get closer to the consumer. I am in 
hopes that the new department in New 
York will be able to help in this by fur¬ 
nishing names of parties who want to 
buy hay direct. With these names and 
a fair guarantee on both sides there 
ought to be a chance for direct deal¬ 
ing. . . . Now comes the struggle 
with weeds in the corn. A few light 
showers have moistened the soil and the 
weeds are jumping. With hay inside the 
barn we can get into the cornfields. The 
weeder has saved us much work and now 
we have a two-horse cultivator for Tom 
and Broker to play with. As you know 
our corn is all grown in the young or¬ 
chards where cultivation helps both corn 
and trees. If the large weeds get past 
us we pull them out and throw around 
the trees. We can tell you more about 
the corn crop later. It looks right now. 
. . . Our mangels or cattle beets 
might be better. We have read of people 
who grow 2.000 bushels of beets to the 
acre. Men have come here telling us 
that a farmer ought to be ashamed if he 
fell below 1,000 bushels. It looks now 
as if we are in to carry a heavy load of 
shame unless our beets get a most won¬ 
derful gait and keep it up. Do we call 
these 2.000 bushel-men liars and frauds? 
Not a bit of it. They are just smarter 
than we are. We do not know how to 
do it yet. I cheerfully admit that they 
beat us growing mangels—though I 
think our crop will make a profit. If, 
however, these mangel growers got some 
back-to-the-lander without experience to 
put in several acres and try to keep the 
crop clean at this season I should blame 
the teachers for their lack of human na¬ 
ture. For mangel growing while the 
weeds are marching over the land is no 
job for a hammock, a novel and cold 
lemonade. . . . After picking the 
last strawberries we cut off the vines 
with the mower and began cultivating. 
The plants are four and five years old, 
yet we shall keep them going. This 
strawberry culture seems a very simple 
matter to us, but there are so many 
questions about it that I will try and tell 
the story as we do it. H. \v. c. 
HOW TO HANDLE CELERY. 
I have read innumerable articles on 
trenching of celery for late Fall and Win¬ 
ter use, but none of them tells what to 
do with the soil thrown out in digging 
the trench. I don’t see how this can be 
levelled or sloped away from each side 
of trench, to carry off rain water shed by 
the A-shaped roof, unless boards are 
placed at each side of the trench, above 
ground level, to retain this loose exca¬ 
vated soil and keep it from falling down 
upon the tops and into the hearts of the 
plants; yet I have never read of boards 
being used for that purpose. F. s. 
West Carrollton, O. 
One of the common methods of pre¬ 
serving celery for Winter use is to earth 
it up where it is growing. This earth¬ 
ing up commences six or seven weeks 
after the setting out of the plants, and 
is commenced at this time for the pur¬ 
pose of blanching or whitening it. The 
first operation is known as handling. 
After the soil has been drawn to the 
plants with the hoe the leaves of the 
plant are held in an upright position with 
one hand, while with the other hand the 
soil is further drawn close around each 
plant, in sufficient quantity to keep the 
leaves upright. Care must be taken not 
to cover the heart of the plants; the 
center or heart of the plant must have 
unrestricted opportunity to grow and de¬ 
velop, or they will be distorted and seri¬ 
ously injured, and very often almost 
ruined. This earthing up musf be con¬ 
tinued as the growth of the plants de¬ 
mand up until danger of freezing 
weather, when it is completed by spading 
the soil from between the rows and hank¬ 
ing it upon each side of the rows clear 
to tiie top; then fill in between the rows 
with straw or forest leaves, piling it over 
the tops of the rows also, to a depth of 
10 inches or more. This will prevent in¬ 
jury by freezing. Of course in sections 
of the country where the temperature 
goes much below zero the covering of 
straw or leaves will need to be thicker 
and in mild sections it may be less, but 
usually a covering of 10 to 32 inches of 
jstraw or leaves will be sufficient to pre¬ 
vent damage where the temperature does 
not go much below zero. The dwarf sorts 
may be planted in rows three feet apart 
and six inches apart in the row. Giant 
Pascal and other large growing sorts 
must be 4V> to five feet apart between 
the rows. 
, For those who do not grow celery on 
a large scale cellar storage is perhaps 
the most satisfactory method of Winter 
preservation now practiced. Quite a 
1 quantity may be stored in any cellar 
where there is no artificial heat. The 
cellar must be fr*e from water, as the 
July la, 
hearts will rot very quickly if they once 
get wet. A good dry dirt floor, either 
clay or sand, is essential. If the cellar 
is naturally very dry the floor may need 
wetting down a week or 10 days before 
taking the celery in. From the first to 
the middle of November is about the 
proper time to remove it from the field to 
the cellar, much depending on the local¬ 
ity and the season. While celery will 
stand 10 to 15 degrees of frost without 
much injury, a temperature of 20 to 25 
degrees will ruin it, so care must be 
taken that it is removed to its Winter 
quarters in time. When all is ready for 
the work of storage to begin take a com¬ 
mon garden hoe and open a narrow 
trench three to four inches deep close to 
and parallel with the cellar wall, draw¬ 
ing the earth toward you, and just 
enough to open the trench. Now lift the 
celery from where it has grown, one 
bunch or plant at a time, with a garden 
fork, leaving as much soil on the roots 
as possible. Set them upright in a box 
or wheelbarrow close together for safe 
transportation to the cellar, and be sure 
the plants are perfectly dry and free 
from frost. Now' transplant them in the 
trench, setting the plants closely to¬ 
gether and filling in enough of the soil 
from the trench to hold the plant from 
falling to one side, after which take a 
long-spout w'atering can (slip a piece of 
three-quarter-inch hose above 18 inches 
long over the spout; this will prevent 
splashing) and thoroughly w r et the roots 
of the entire row of plants, being very 
careful not to get any w’ater into the 
hearts of the plants after the water has 
soaked into the earth. Finish filling in 
the trench until the roots are all cov¬ 
ered, using the earth that w'as removed 
from the trench with the hoe. You are 
now ready for the next row', w'hich 
should be as near the first row as pos¬ 
sible without disturbing the plants in it, 
thus continuing the work on each row, 
as with the first until the job is com¬ 
pleted. I have stored my celery in this 
way for years, with entire satisfaction, 
and know' of no other method of storage 
for Winter preservation that w'ill give 
celery so fine a flavor. Do not place any 
earth betw'een the plants; just cover the 
roots and w’ater well as directed above, 
and be sure to give plenty of fresh air 
at all times when there is no danger of 
freezing. . K. 
Sharks and Bathers. 
When staying at Durban, Natal, South 
Africa, at the Beach Hotel, I bathed for 
months at the same spot in front of the 
hotel where a rope was attached to posts, 
chiefly for ladies. I used to wade in 
as far as I could and come back with a 
wave. The landlord and I had returned 
to dross one morning and two young 
Scotchmen took our places. Shortly 
there was a yell and we saw one strug¬ 
gling with the other, a shark having 
seized him by the leg which was simply 
stripped of flesh in the struggle. We got 
the poor fellow out, but he died imme¬ 
diately. The extraordinary thing was he 
was just above the knees in water. No¬ 
tices were put up that a man-eating 
shark was about, but three days after a 
native fishing was seized and practically 
cut in two. The police set to work and 
caught the shark and found the loin 
cloth of the native inside it. My friend 
and agent, Mr. Rodwell, a well-kuown 
citizen of Port Elisabeth, had just got 
hold of the jetty ladder when his leg 
was taken off above the knee. He now 
goes about with a false one in the best 
of health. I think it is a well-known 
fact that a shark, like a lion or tiger, 
once tasting human flesh will always 
prefer it and dare a lot to get it. 
Durban was fast becoming the favor 
ite seaside resort for the tired-out golu- 
seekers of Johannesburg, etc., in apposi 
tion to Cape Town and these shark trag 
(“dies so alarmed the corporation that 
they immediately drove piles out into the 
sea and surrounded them with shark- 
proof netting, which has been a great 
success. 
Might I ask II. H. S. if he ever saw 
or heard of a fight between a Sword-fish 
and Thresher versus a whale? A. most 
extraordinary fight as I saw it! 
Port Jefferson, N. Y r . J. B. B. 
“I wish I knew what to do with al! 
this broken crockery,” said Mrs. Flat- 
dweller. “There isn’t any place to throw 
it away, and-” “I have it!” cried 
Mr. Flat-dweller, his eyes aglow with the 
fires of genius. “Put ’em in the parcels 
post, and mail ’em to some fictitious ad¬ 
dress.”—Melbourne Australasian. 
