1184 
Hope Farm Notes 
Home Notes. —Both ends of the Hope 
Farm proposition seem to be working 
reasonably well. In New Jersey the 
ground is covered by a thick overcoat 
of snow. It comes upon us earlier 
than usual this year. Generally the ground 
(freezes hard so that we can mulch our 
strawberries before snow comes. This 
year the snow came upon a thin crust 
of frost and we have not covered the 
plants. They do not need the covering 
under present conditions, for the snow 
takes care of them. The object of 
the mulch or cover is to prevent the lift 
and settle of freeze and thaw. Snow 
will do that and we now expect to 
let the plants alone while they are cov¬ 
ered. The Fall rains were short in this 
country, and there will be trouble with 
water supply. Thus far Merrill and 
Philip have been husking corn in the 
barn and cutting wood. The corn crop 
is only fair as to grain, but the fodder 
is in fine condition. We never before 
had such a supply of stock feed. As we 
are wintering fewer animals than ever 
there will be hay and straw to sell. The 
feeding problem for the horses is simple 
enough this Winter. The flint corn 
grown thickly among the trees has only 
small ears or nubbins. We feed this 
without husking, carefully estimating the 
amount of grain in an armful. With this 
we give cabbage and carrots and a 
small quantity of wheat bran. This 
makes a cheap and simple method of 
feeding, and the horses do well on it. 
There are two good lots of hens—R. 
I. Reds and Light Brahmas. We have 
a ground mixture of oats, rye and corn 
as a mash—dry or wet as desired. This 
is “balanced” by beef scraps, and of 
course the hens get all the cabbage 
they want. In the absence of the girls 
the cats will no doubt find it necessary 
to do more rat and mouse hunting at 
the barn—but so much the better for the 
cats. Thus the barn people are well 
provided for. Inside the house Merrill 
is acting as cook and turning out some 
meals that are fully balanced. He has 
a “fireless cooker” and a kitchen stove 
and a full supply of food. Thus the 
northern end of the proposition is well 
prepared for Winter. 
I left the Southern end of the family 
at Jacksonville on their way down into 
Florida. They reached their destination 
safely, but I have no details about them 
yet. The frost I mentioned last week 
did some damage—killing the potatoes 
and beans in the boy’s garden. The rest 
of the vegetables, I judge, are all right. 
The strawberries seem to be coming on. 
It will take some time to arrange our 
big family for the Winter, but they will 
soon be in working order. That country 
Is beautiful now with the green foliage 
on the orange trees and the great fes¬ 
toons of Southern moss hanging from 
the trees. When we went there a few 
years ago we left snowdrifts in the 
North. We got off the train in Florida 
late at night. The moonlight was glit¬ 
tering on the white sand, and it seemed 
as if we were jumping off into snow. 
Under right conditions Florida is cer¬ 
tainly a “happy land of dreams.” 1 am 
speaking of those who can afford to go 
there for a pleasant loaf with the full 
price in their pocket. When you get 
south of Jacksonville you don’t much 
care what happens, for there is some¬ 
thing about the air which heals the 
weary mind. Go there, however, to 
make a living without proper capital or 
experience, and you will find it a land 
of nightmares until you can hang on 
and endure. 
Christmas Charity.— This is the 
time of year when most people are 
ready to think of others. They ought 
to have such thoughts every day in 
the year, but unhappily some of us let 
it go until Christmas is in sight. The 
women of our church made up a “bar¬ 
rel” for a minister out in some lonely 
district in Wisconsin, and they packed 
it full of clothing and other necessary 
things. All over the land such things 
are being done. In one community peo¬ 
ple may be well to do, so that what seems 
to them out-of-date or useless may be 
just exactly what the- people in some 
distant community need. The distribu- 
THE RURAL* NEW-YORKER 
tion of these things if it is done with 
the right spirit is one of the most help¬ 
ful things in modern society. Those who 
give their time and money and 
goods get back far more than they 
pay out in hope and moral satisfaction. 
The only trouble about it is that many 
of us confine such work to a few days 
at the close of the year. We ought 
to make every one of the year’s 365 
days a part of the scheme. I would 
like to call the attention of farmers to 
the work done by the Salvation Army 
in feeding poor people. This organiza¬ 
tion is doing a work which no other 
class of people could accomplish. It is 
safe to say that they reach classes of 
people which no other church organiza¬ 
tion can hold. I know too that the 
work is done in a businesslike way. The 
people in control are shrewd judges of 
human nature, and are not often fooled 
by fakers. Now I reason that the 
classes of society in our great cities 
which the Salvation Army reaches rep¬ 
resent part of the poison or gangrene of 
American society life. There is no man 
in the country who is not interested in 
doing what he can to destroy this poison 
as he is in killing off the germs or 
spread of typhoid, cancer or consump¬ 
tion. Now the Salvation Army can do 
this work far better than you or I 
ever can. If its soldiers are willing to 
do the actual fighting should not we be 
willing to help with supplies and am¬ 
munition? Now this year the army 
plans to give Christmas and New Year’s 
dinners to thousands of city poor. Many 
of these unfortunates would have noth¬ 
ing but bitter memories were it not for 
the army. I suggest that we help them 
out. They can use money or food. Out 
of your store you may be able to donate 
poultry, apples, potatoes or similar 
things. They will all be used wisely and 
well, and you cannot eat them or sell 
them with anything like the satisfaction 
which will come to you if you give 
them to the army. If you can help 
write to Miss Commander Booth, Sal¬ 
vation Army, New York, and tell her 
what you can do. 
Perpetual Motion. —You will remem¬ 
ber that we recently printed a note from 
a young man who said he had invented 
a perpetual motion machine. Here are 
some comments from a hard-headed cit¬ 
izen : 
In The R. N.-Y., page 1142, I read as 
follows: “I am a young man of 23, and 
am writing you as to the proper place to 
send drawings of a perpetual motion ma¬ 
chine which I have designed.” Now, young 
man, I take great interest in a man of 
your age, and will give you advice which 
may be worth many dollars to you, and be¬ 
sides save much valuable time. Take a 
washtub and place it on the floor, jump into 
the tub, take both hands and take hold 
of the handles of the tub. If you can lift 
yourself and tub off the floor then go 
ahead and get a patent for your machine. 
But if this test fails, you might as well 
drop your perpetual motion ideas. 
Maryland. h. z. mast. 
I read along until I came to the 
words “take both hands and take hold 
of the handles of the tub.” What I ex¬ 
pected was the further advice to lean 
over and put the head into the water 
and keep it there for a reasonable time. 
My experience with perpetual motion 
inventors is limited, but the few I have 
seen appeared to be incurable. 
Women’s Farm Work. — I doubt if 
there was ever a time when so many 
women are looking to the country for 
a possible chance to find self-support¬ 
ing work. The following is a fair sam¬ 
ple of many letters we receive: 
Will you tell me how to raise mush¬ 
rooms, also if you consider it profitable 
work? I read your article concerning 
what you would recommend for a poor 
widow with a farm, which set me thinking, 
and made me realize how little prepared 
I am to be numbered among the bread¬ 
winners ; therefore I decided to find some 
occupation, and it occurred to me I might 
raise mushrooms. h. m. 
I would not attempt to make a living 
growing mushrooms, for I do not know 
how to do it. At the same time there 
are people who know how to do the work 
at a profit. It is a job requiring patience, 
skill and adaptability. One must be 
“half toadstool,” just as he must be 
“half hen” to make a living with poul¬ 
try. Also I think one should be located 
near a large city or a fine market in 
order to make it pay. Statements of 
prices received for mushrooms seem 
tempting at times, yet the dark side 
of the business is rarely told. On the 
whole I should consider mushroom 
growing a doubtful proposition for a 
woman who knows nothing about the 
business to start with. I think some 
form of greenhouse work like flowers 
or cucumbers would pav better in con¬ 
nection with a chicken business. 
“Killed” By Lime. —In another part 
of the paper is a question about lime- 
sick land. The following personal qm 
tions are sent me in addition to the 
other: 
I have a farm that has been “killed” by 
the excessive use of marl, so that it will 
hardly grow broom sedge. The former 
owner “marled” it all over twice and pait 
of it three times. He also boasts that he 
killed another farm some way. The mail 
has the same effect on the soil that lime 
has; to make it give up its fertility at 
once. One way is to use plenty of fer¬ 
tilizer and legumes to restore it. A much 
quicker way to do with such land (900 acres) 
is to sell it and move away. I have de¬ 
cided on the latter method. A farmer once 
had land that was overrun with sassafras 
and persimmon and asked the editor of 
his favorite farm paper, how to get rid 
of sassafras and persimmon infested land. 
He got this reply, “Sell it and move 
away.” If the Hope Farm man owned and 
tried to farm land that was killed with 
lime as dead as mine is, he would become 
an “anti-lime crank,” as I am. d. d. c. 
No, you could not make me an “anti- 
lime crank,” for the trouble with this 
farm is not due to the use of lime, but 
rather to its abuse. I should feel that 
such land could be made usefpl, and 
that the lime in it could be utilized. As 
stated elsewhere, this farm is probably 
too alkaline—the extreme reverse of too 
sour. Acid phosphate will help and 
green crops plowed under and permitted 
to ferment will fit that soil once more. 
A man could probably buy such land at 
a bargain. I believe I could fit it up 
and make it pay. We have no such 
cases in our countrj. Here the trouble 
is that pra'ctically all the land is sour. 
H. W. C. 
MAKING GOOD LOSS OF PLANT FOOD. 
M. B., Hudson, N. Y .—A year ago last 
Spring I plowed a piece of land 50 feet by 
275 alongside of creek, a silt loam. It was 
sod, planted to potatoes, which yielded 47 
bushels; would have yielded more but the 
dry weather cut them short. After dig¬ 
ging I seeded to rye, plowed this under in 
Spring of 1910, planted to potatoes again, 
which yielded 62 bushels, which we dug 
.Tuly 22, harrowed and sowed Red-top White 
Globe turnips on .Tuly 23. We had a few 
nice showers and turnips grew rapidly and 
we began pulling on September 9 ; sold up 
to November 18, 77 bushels of turnips, 42 
bushels at 50 cents and the remainder at 
40 cents per bushel. No manure was used 
on this land except 300 pounds of potato 
manure each time potatoes were planted. 
Ilow much fertility have I used the last 
year, both in . potatoes and turnips, and 
how much fertilizer must I put back on 
land to make this land as rich as it was 
in the Spring of 1910? I ask this because 
I intend to get two crops of some kind 
from this land, as it is easily worked and 
no weeds. 
Ans. —You had 13,750 square feet or 
.315 of an acre. This means at the rate 
of 149 bushels per acre the first year and 
197 the second. Assuming that the po¬ 
tato vines and turnip tops were left on 
the ground, you removed the following 
amounts of plant food: 
Phos. 
Nitrogen. Acid. Potash. 
109 bushels potatoes.. 14 5 19 
77 bushels turnips... 8 5 18 
December 24, 
When you write advertisers mention The 
R. N.-Y. and you’ll get a quick reply and 
“a square deal. • see guarantee page 10. 
Totals .22 
10 
38 
In order to make good this loss you 
can use 140 pounds nitrate of soda, 75 
pounds sulphate of potash and 75 pounds 
of good acid phosphate. While this 
would return the plant food removed by 
these crops, it might not leave the soil 
as rich in available plant food as before. 
The theory of returning just what the 
plants remove does not work out ex¬ 
actly because in spite of all our care 
some nitrates are lost by drainage and 
some phosphoric acid and potash may 
pass into forms which are not available. 
It is always safer to use more plant 
food than you expect to take out, and 
we should add 50 per cent to the 
amounts given above. 
You Should Have 
Our Prices 
So you can buy your Galvanized Steel 
Roofing at wholesale and save the job¬ 
ber’s and retailer’s profits. 
Wc make thousands of tons of Roofing 
a'year and sell direct to the user. All of 
our Roofing is brand new, standard qual¬ 
ity and is sold with a guarantee that if it 
is not satisfactory in every way it will not 
cost you a cent. 
Send us a postal asking for a free sam¬ 
ple of our Galvanized 
Steel Roofing 
and wc will send it to you together with 
our booklet which shows the different 
styles we make. 
We Pay the Freight charges, and the 
letter you will receive with our sample 
will tell you what your Roofing will cost 
delivered to your nearest railroad station. 
Don’t fail to write before you buy, be¬ 
cause at our prices you can save money. 
The Ohio Galvanizing & Mfg. Co. 
NILES, OHIO 
Consider This Well. 
When we pay our good, hard-earned 
money for a grain drill, we have a right 
to one that has a feed that will correctly 
sow any seed that we want to plant and 
a fertilizer feed that successfully handles 
all brands of commercial fertilizer in 
wide range of quantities. We have a 
right to expect a well made drill, free 
from a lot of fads and so simple as to 
be readily understood. It should have 
furrow openers that open proper seed 
trenches, and which place the seed in 
the ground at an even depth without 
skips or bunching the grain. 
The Empire Grain Drill has been on 
the market for more than half a cen¬ 
tury. If it was not right, it could not 
have survived. There are many Em¬ 
pire Drills in use to-day that were pur¬ 
chased from fifteen to thirty years ago, 
and they are doing good work to-day. 
This drill is manufactured by The Amer¬ 
ican Seeding-Machine Co., Incorporated, 
Richmond, Ind., and is sold under a 
warranty that means much to the farmer. 
Write them and ask for their Empire 
catalogue. No matter what your seed¬ 
ing conditions may be you can get an 
Empire Grain Drill that will please and 
satisfy you. Go to your local dealer and 
ask to see the Empire Drill. 
Spring Delivery Orders 
Are Being Rapidly Entered. 
Your order now means a strictly first-class job of 
painting, because it allows plenty of time for each 
coat of paint todry before thenextoneis applied. 
Don't wait, but send for new catalogue, select 
the proper size and place your order at the earliest 
possible date. 
THE PARSONS WAGON CO., 
Dairy Dept. Earlville, N. Y. 
“NEW MODERN” 
FEED and 
LITTER 
CARRIERS 
Do twice the work in half the time. 
TIIEY PAY FOR THEMSELVES. 
Easy to use and nothing to get out of order. 
“NEW MODERN” 
Swing Cattle Stanchion 
with individual manger 
and watering basin is 
the best yet. 
“NEW MODERN” 
Sanitary Steel Stalls 
There is nothing bet¬ 
ter nor easier to keep 
clean. 
Write for Catalog. 
GL0R BROS. & WILLIS MFG. CO., 66 Main St., Attica, N. Y. 
“Everything for the Barn." 
