1851 
THE CULTIVATOR 
249 
NOTES FOR THE MONTH. 
Postage of The Cultivator under the New Law. 
—To any posUffice 
Within 50 miles of Albany,... 5 cents a year . 
Between 50 and 300 miles from Albany,. 10 cents a year. 
Between 300 and 1,000 miles,. 15 cents a year. 
Between 1,000 and 2,000 miles, . .. 20 cents a year. 
Between 2,000 and 4,000 miles,. 25 cents a year. 
The above are the rates as fixed by the new law, which 
goes into operation on the first of July, 1851. 
Acknowledgments.— Communications have been re¬ 
ceived, during the past month, from D. B. K., S. W. 
Johnson, John Johnston, A Subscriber, Wm. Weeden, 
An old Subscriber, G. Evans, Prof. Norton, G. W. Ed- 
mundson, Alex. Rives, F. Holbrook, A Constant Read- 
er. 
Books, Pamphlets, &c. have been received as follows,; 
Report of the Commissioner of the Patent Office for 
1849, Part II, Agriculture, from Hon. T. Ewbank, Com¬ 
missioner.-Official Catalogue of the Great Exhibition 
of the works of Industry of all Nations, from B. P. 
Johnson, Esq.——Dixon and Kerr’s Ornamental and 
Domestic Poultry, from E. H. Butler & Co., publishers, 
Philadelphia.-—-Proceedings of the Clinton Co. Ag. 
Society at its annual meeting, with its Premium List for 
1851, from J. Battey and W. Keese. ——The Old Red 
Sandstone, or New Walks.in an Old Field, by Hugh Mil¬ 
ler, author of Foot-prints of the Creator, &c., from Gray 
& Sprague, booksellers, Albany,——Proceedings of the 
Am. Pomological Congress at. Cincinnati, from Prof. 
Mather, Sec. Ohio' Board of Agriculture.-—-Farmer’s 
Guide, Part 17, from L. Scott & Co., publishers, 
New-York.—Annual Report of the Regents of the 
University, from Dr. T. R. Beck, Sec. 
Phosphate or Lime.— Prof. Emmons has had a quan¬ 
tity of this article, from the quarry at Crown Point, pre¬ 
pared for use. The rock was first pulverized with sul¬ 
phuric acid, and. then dried otf by mixing with wood 
ashes. It is thus brought into a state convenient for ap¬ 
plication. Prof. E.. is desirous that extensive trials 
should be made with this article during the present sea¬ 
son, and has left several barrels witluMessrs. Emery for 
distribution. We hope the opportunity will be imp^>ved, 
to give this manure, which has proved of such great value 
in Europe, a fair test here. We will here correct an 
error made in a previous notice, in regard to the quan¬ 
tity of phosphate contained in the specimens from Crown 
Point. Prof. E., as well as well Prof. Norton, assures 
us that it contains from eighty, to ninety per cent. 
Writings of thf late Timothy Pickering.— Hon. 
John W. Proctor, whose very interesting sketch of 
Col. Pickering, was given in our March and April 
numbers, writes —“ I have received a letter from a gen¬ 
tleman in Philadelphia, familiar with the records of the 
Philadelphia Societ y for Promoting Agriculture, estab¬ 
lished 1785, of which Mr. Pickering was Secretary and 
Samuel Powell was President. He says that on looking 
over the books kept by him, he was astonished to find 
that he had not only made full and complete minutes 
of all the doings of the society, but had prepared a large 
folio volume of documents entirely in his hand writing, 
arranged with great precision, which have not been pub¬ 
lished. This is a fact, as is remarked, ‘ among the labors 
of this interesting man, in his capacity of farmer, that 
should not be omitted,’ and I am pleased to annex it to 
others that I have communicated.” 
Fat Cattle from Kentucky. —Since the completion 
of the railroad from Cincinnati to Cleveland, many of 
the droves of fat cattle designed for the New-York and 
Boston markets, have been taken this route to market. 
Formerly they had to be driven across the Alleghany 
Mountains—sometimes making a journey of more than 
a thousand miles, and, though traveling at the rate of 
only ten to fifteen miles a day, at a great loss of weight, 
especially in the animals which were fattest at the start. 
We have noticed several droves of excellent cattle from 
the interior of Kentucky, which were transported over 
the railroad from Cincinnati to Cleveland, thence by 
steamboat to Buffalo, and thence to the Hudson river by 
railroad. Here they either take boat for New-York, or 
cars for Boston. They arrive here in fine condition, and 
must make a great saving in weight over the old mode 
of reaching market. - 
English vs. American Implements. —The London 
Economist has an article on the u Rural Machinery” on 
exhibition at the “ Crystal Palace,” in which the posi¬ 
tion is set up, that i£ no other nation has reached any¬ 
thing near our [English] state of advancement” in this 
department. The writer goes on —“ This will be obvi¬ 
ous on inspecting the Belgian and French agricultural im¬ 
plements, which consist only of plows and other tools 
for turning up or pulverising the soil, and are far less ef¬ 
fective than ours. And it is even more obvions on look¬ 
ing at the American implements, which, with few excep¬ 
tions, consist also of tools for performing the first ope 
rations of husbandry. Their plows are implements of 
very little power, and are quite incapable, we apprehend, 
of turning up a deep furrow. Indeed, the upright stilts, 
and short beam and mould-board, give the American 
plows exhibited much the appearance of a horse-hoe, or 
small potato plow, occasionally used by market garden¬ 
ers; they afford, more than any other description can 
do, a conception of the primitive condition of husbandry 
in the New World.” 
The above is in several respects unfair. In the first 
place it takes the very unreasonable ground, that the 
London Exhibition represents the actual condition of ag¬ 
ricultural implements in the different countries. Eng¬ 
land, of course, makes her utmost display; she has every 
facility and inducement for doing so; other nations, and 
especially the United States, have made no attempt at a 
general competition with her in this department. The 
great distance and various impediments, have prevented 
our manufacturers from sending many articles. Thus 
of plows, there are only specimens from three American 
manufacturers. Many of our best implements are entirely 
unrepresented. The assertion that our plows “ are imple¬ 
ments of very little power,” is evidently made by a person 
who knows nothing about it. There is no evidence that 
he had seen the plows tried, and they had not, in fact, 
been tested in England when the article was written. 
Hence any judgment of this kind must be premature. 
