724 
The Rural New-Yorker 
THE B V SIX ESS FARMER ’ S PAPER 
A National Weekly Journal (‘or Country mid Suburban Homes 
Established iSSO 
PubliHhed weekly by tho Rural I'uhlislilnp Company, 883 (Vest SOtb Street, Non York 
Herbert W. Collingwood, President and Editor. 
John J. Dillon, Treasurer and General Manager. 
Wm. F. Dillon, Secretary. Mrs. 10. T. Hoyle, Associate Editor. 
SUBSCRIPTION: ONE DOLLAR A YEAR 
To foreign countries in the Universal Postal Union, is?.. 04. equal to 8s. 6d., or 
marks, or 10H francs. Hemit. in money order, express 
order, personal check or bank draft. 
Entered at New York Post Office ns Second Class Matter. 
Advertising rates 60 cents per agate line—T words. References required for 
advertisers unknown to us ; and cash must accompany transient orders. 
“A SQUARE DEAL" 
We believe that every advertisement in this paper is hacked by a respon¬ 
sible person. But to make doubly sure we will make good any loss to paid 
subscribers sustained by trusting"any deliberate swindler advertising in our 
columns, and any such swindler will be publicly exposed. We protect sub. 
scribers against rogues, but we do not guarantee to adjust trilling differences 
between subscribers and honest, responsible advertisers. Neither will we bo 
responsible for the debts of honest bankrupts sanctioned by the eourts. 
Notice of the complaint must be sent to us within one month of the time of 
the transaction, and you must have mentioned The Rural New-Yorker 
when writing the advertiser. 
TEN WEEKS FOR 10 CENTS. 
In order to maintain the improvement und enlarge¬ 
ments that we are now planning for The R. N.-Y., 
we should have a circulation of 200,000 copies week¬ 
ly. We must depend on our old friends for this in¬ 
crease. To make it easy for these friends to intro¬ 
duce the paper to other farmers who do not now 
take it we will send it 10 weeks for 10 cents for 
strictly introductory purposes. We will appreciate 
the interest of friends who help make up the needed 
increase of subscriptions. 
* 
The Rural New-Yorker has , at its command, Ihe 
largest and most efficient corps of correspondents 
and advisers ever gathered by any farm paper in 
the world. Thus we can obtain for you the last 
word on any subject relating to the soil, its cultiva¬ 
tion or Us products, or the human life of the farm. 
This service is yours for the asking. 
* 
A few weeks ago we suggested a plan for scoring 
the milk supplied to town or city. The scheme 
would be to offer prizes for the cleanest milk. 
Dairymen who supply milk to the local market 
should lie encouraged to compete and send samples, 
or samples could lie taken at random off their 
wagons. There ought to he a fair “score” for judg¬ 
ing and an expert to decide. This plan would inter¬ 
est consumers in good milk and be a good tiling for 
dairymen. We understand the suggestion will be 
taken up in several large towns. 
* 
The Pennsylvania Railroad recently closed its 
saloon in the Pittsburgh station. No more intoxi¬ 
cating liquors will be sold at the stations or on the 
trains of this company. This action is due largely 
to public sentiment. Prohibition is spreading like a 
fire in Pennsylvania, and the State will undoubtedly 
be “dry” in a few years. Tlie Pennsylvania ordered 
its employees to quit drinking, and the public de¬ 
manded the ‘‘square deal.” If liquor is a bad thing 
for workmen it is just as bad for officers and pa¬ 
trons, and should he kept away from all. Just as 
soon as the public show that they mean business 
the temperance question will be settled. 
* 
For some years past the “carbonic acid” theory 
has been discussed by incubator men. Some thought 
the gas necessary in the incubator—others consid¬ 
ered it responsible for bad hatching. Prof. Lam- 
son’s long experiments, recorded on our first page, 
settle the problem. If now lie can obtain as con¬ 
clusive facts regarding the moisture question he 
will put brains into the “wooden lien.” Some may 
feel, as they generally do, that anything done at the 
experiment stations is theoretical and not practical. 
If running incubators for five years, carefully watch¬ 
ing the results many days and parts of many nights, 
is merely theoretical the man who does it may well 
sigh for a practical job. 
* 
In using lime-sulphur spray this year, one to nine, I 
have burned my fingers severely, causing a good deal of 
suffering and leaving my hands partly disabled for a 
couple of weeks. This occurred in spite of the free 
use of vaseline on the hands. After the injury had 
been done I used rubber gloves with leather gloves over 
them which, of course, gave perfect protection. I have 
never heard of this injury before and I wish to warn 
the “tenderfoot” variety of farmer of the possibility. 
W. C. D. 
We have had the same trouble, though not so ser¬ 
ious. The oil sprays do not “bite” in this way. Our 
folks use heavy canvas gloves and glasses or gog¬ 
gles. It is better to protect the horses with light 
blankets. By all means warn tlie “tenderfooted” 
farmer. The rocky road may make him lame, and 
if his hands give out he cannot feel liis way, or 
count tlie money which the real estate men tell him 
he ought to make. A farmer should dress for his 
job, and keep his hands as free from injury as he 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
The latest suggestion is to use ground limestone 
as a dust upon seed potatoes at tlie time of plant¬ 
ing. This comes from farmers who have quantities 
of tlie ground limestone on hand, and think it will 
take the place of plaster or of sulphur in dusting tlie 
seed pieces. Our advice is brief and emphatic— 
Don't do it. If you think of doing it, forget it at 
once. Powdered sulphur really is effective in pre¬ 
venting the scab disease, and it will help to prevent 
the .seed pieces from rotting in the soil. Laud 
plaster serves to dry out the seed, but has no other 
particular advantage. Ground limestone will, if 
anything, increase the scab disease, and will have 
no beneficial effect whatever. You might far better 
use the road dust on the seed pieces, for while it 
would do no particular good, it would not act to in¬ 
crease the germ disease as the ground limestone 
would be likely to do. The best plan is to soak the 
seed thoroughly in the formalin solution which we 
have so often explained, or to dust sulphur on the 
seed pieces as they are cut We do both, and find 
both the solution and the sulphur to he useful. 
* 
We have been accused by some enthusiastic 
parties of favoring the fertilizer trust, because we 
do not boil over with enthusiasm for the use of raw 
phosphate rock in tlie place of hone or acid phos¬ 
phate. There are two trusts that we stand for. One 
is the old-fashioned trust in Providence, the other a 
trust in tlie tried and tested truths of science. The 
latter is usually known as common sense. We use 
phosphoric acid to feed our crops promptly and 
fully—not to store it up for the future. It is ad¬ 
mitted that superphosphate, bone and similar forms 
give the quick returns, while the raw phosphate does 
not. But. say the raw phosphate men, the manure 
pile and the decaying sod make the raw phosphate 
available! Why use the costly sulphuric acid to 
“dissolve” the rock when your manure pile or your 
clover will do it for you? If the manure and the 
clover possessed any such power there could be only 
one answer—but are they able to do this? Some 
years ago a fertilizer concern offering the raw phos¬ 
phate claimed that Prof. Mooers of Tennessee had 
found that manure did make this phosphate avail¬ 
able. lie denied the statement, and now after sev¬ 
eral years more he denies it again: 
So far as I am aware there is no experimental evi¬ 
dence published by any of the stations to warrant the 
statement that manure makes the phosphoric acid of 
phosphate rock available to any appreciable extent. 
We tried for a number of years by both laboratory and 
field experiments to determine the effect of manure on 
phosphate rock mixed with it. We came to the con¬ 
clusion that the effect at best was inappreciable. 
Tennessee Exp. Station. c. A. mooers. 
Personally we have felt that the raw phosphate 
men were injuring their own cause by claiming too 
much for their methods. Some of them go so far 
as to say that horse manure will “dissolve” phos¬ 
phate rock as effectively as sulphuric acid. That is 
great nonsense, which will disappoint many farmers 
and lead them to loss. No one would welcome a 
cheaper form of available phosphoric acid more 
heartily than we would, but we want to know about 
it before turning our readers astray. 
* 
The picture of a White Wyandotte hen on tlie 
next page is shown by special permission of tlie 
American Poultry Association in order that our 
readers may clearly distinguish the difference be¬ 
tween those English Wyandottes and the ideal type 
of the American standard . On May 1 these English 
birds at tlie Storrs egg-laying contest were 112 
eggs ahead of the next best pen. Thus far they 
have, without question, laid all around the other 
birds in the contest, and are still holding their 
own. This fact has naturally aroused tlie curiosity, 
if not the suspicion, of many poultry men. The 
standard American Wyandotte is a lazy layer. If 
you doubt it look at the “ideal" bird on page 725. 
She is a round, plump, dumpling of a sleepy hen, and 
does not look capable of laying GO eggs in a year. 
The I lope Farm man will match his scrubs against 
10 such “ideals.” It is notorious among practical 
egg men that the fanciers have been ruining the 
Wyandotte as an egg-laying machine. Therefore 
when Barron comes with birds that run and jump 
for their feed, and do in three months what the 
standard Wyandotte would do in a year, it is a 
natural tiling to talk “hybrid” or “off type.” All 
that has been proved thus far is that these English 
Wyandottes would lie thrown out of a poultry show 
on “points.” After being thrown out four of them 
could safely go into a henhouse and challenge 10 
of the high-scoring “standards” to an egg contest. 
Mr. Card tells us on page 714 that the next “stand ¬ 
ard” will contain a modified or utility form for 
Wyandottes. It is high time, and here we have the 
whole case given away. No living hen of the 
sleepy shape and appearance of this “Standard” 
May 1 (», 
could have any chance in an egg contest. As well 
expect a big draft horse to trot in three minutes 
or less. We may thank these English Wyandottes 
and the egg-laying contests for putting the spur of 
public opinion into tlie A. P. A., and making them 
realize that people eat eggs rather than feathers. 
The It. N.-Y. is not acting for Tom Barron or any 
other individual. If anyone has evidence that these 
champion layers are hybrid or cross-bred birds put 
up to boom the breed, let him come forward with 
it at once. It seems to us it is up to tlie American 
Poultry Association to prove that these birds are 
hybrids, or else wake up their sleepy Wyandotte 
into energy and eggs. 
* 
The trustees of Cornell University have elected 
Dr. Beverly T. Galloway as dean of the N. Y. State 
College of Agriculture. Dr. Galloway is the present 
Assistant Secretary of Agriculture at Washington, 
lie is 50 years old and a native of Missouri. A farm- 
raised hoy, lie developed into a flower grower and 
botanist of high reputation. Entering the Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture, he rose by painstaking and 
careful work to the position of Assistant Secretary. 
Dr. Galloway is an o/ganizer and worker rather 
than an orator, and he will have ample opportunity 
for service in New York State at this time, when 
the idea of organization is uppermost. 
* 
I have often wondered if the 35-cent dollar which 
■' °u have so persistently and effectively advertised 
was a strictly American institution, or whether it 
was a universal thing. In this connection I have 
just noted a publication mentioned in the Experiment 
Station Record which gives some interesting figures 
bearing on the distribution of the consumer’s cost of 
meat in Paris. It is said to be as follows: 
Original producer . 76% 
Railways. o% 
Cattle commissioners . 1% 
City of Paris .* 5% 
Wholesale dealers . 3% 
Retail dealers . 13% 
This distribution, if correct, shows a condition of af¬ 
fairs quite different from what obtains in this country. 
K. s. 
The 35-cent dollar is an average of net returns 
received by farmers under many different conditions. 
The Department of Agriculture has issued figures 
which show an average of about 40 cents. Our own 
estimate is made up from thousands of reports 
which are sent from all over tlie country. In some 
cases the producer gets 100 cents of the final price, 
as the consumer comes to the door and bnys. On 
the other hand we have many eases where a shipper, 
instead of being paid for his goods, received a bill 
for the balance due for freight. It was claimed 
that the goods did not bring enough to pay expenses, 
though in some of these very cases the goods were 
actually sold at a high figure. Between these two 
extremes lies the average—a 35-cent dollar. It has 
been estimated that the yearly farm crop of food 
and fibre costs the final consumer about $16,000,- 
000.000. The producer receives of this about $6,000,- 
000,000—the handlers taking the difference. For 
more than 10 years we have challenged anyone to 
disprove these statements, but thus far no one has 
been able to controvert them. The situation is worse 
in this country for various reasons. This is a tre¬ 
mendous nation with long and costly hauls for food. 
We were last of all the civilized nations to adopt 
parcel post. The carriers have far greater mon¬ 
opolies than in European countries. Our roads are 
generally not so good, and our people have not been 
trained in cooperative work. These are some of the 
reasons why the 35-cent dollar is so largely an 
“American institution.” The greatest issue in all 
American life today, is how to find some way of 
giving the producer 50 cents or more of the final 
price of his product. A way will be found when the 
majority of our people understand how the consum¬ 
er's dollar is divided. The only way to make them 
understand is to keep at them. 
BREVITIES. 
Guard the garden. 
Running water in the kitchen will save walking for 
the wife. 
A man is known by the hack yard he keeps—not bv 
the paint on the front of his house. 
With Spring into and work rushing this is not ex¬ 
actly the open season for writing letters. 
It seems that the man who would train a dog or a 
horse successfully must first be trained himself. 
Here is a queer freak of nature—rhubarb is sour but 
the more acid it carries the more it sweetens the family 
life with its first mess. 
Right now when the Winter’s manure is to be hauled 
out. comes the time when we all wish the job had been 
done day by day through the Winter. 
Rf.I’orts which come to us of the city workmen taken 
to \\ uyne Co., indicate that these men and women an 1 
contented, and have given good satisfaction. 
Read what is said about using arsenate of lead on 
seed corn to repel the crows. There are many reports 
showing that crows are getting to rather like the taste 
of tar. 
can. 
