1868 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
L5X 
beams, which are subjected to severe strains, are 
braced at three points instead of two. Besides 
these advantages, the main beam and brace- 
beam on each side are hinged together with a 
pair of strong door hinges. When the harrow is 
not in use, the hooks which hold the brace-beams 
in the mortises being undone, and the center 
tooth and the bolt at the front end removed, the 
harrow comes in two parts; the beams of each 
side fold together, and it is laid away, taking up 
but little space. Among the advantages of 
wooden-toothed harrows is the compression of 
the soil which they effect. While they tear up 
sods and break down the clods quite as effec¬ 
tually as iron-toothed ones, thej^do not tear out 
and uncover long manure so badly, and they 
settle and compact the. soil a good deal like a 
roller or clod crusher. Their work is chiefly on 
the surface, and they cannot be settled deeply 
into the soil as can the others. This form can¬ 
not carry so many teeth as the square harrow, 
made with four parallel beams, but labor with 
it is more economically expended, as a general 
rule, for it is uniformly the case that, however 
accurately arranged, the teeth in actual use will 
follow more or less one in the track of another. 
Tim Bunker oh the Hay Tedder. 
“What sort of a consarn is that, Squire?” 
asked Jake Frink, one hot day last July, as I 
drove my new tedder to the field. 
“You just come down to the horse-pond lot 
and I’ll show you,” I replied. So Jake followed 
on, where we found at least a dozen of my 
neighbors standing round to see the last novelty 
in farming. The field had just been mowed, 
and though I say it that shouldn’t, it was the 
stoutest grass in Hookertown, plump three ton 
to the acre of Timothy, just in bloom, upon a 
lot where water used to stand half the year, and 
nothing but rushes, hardback, and sour grasses, 
ever made a crop. It is astonishing to see how 
underdraining improves land, and how much 
more good manure does upon a soil that has had 
the bottom knocked out of it. Jake Frink 
groans every time he goes by that horse-pond 
lot, to think that he sold it for twenty dollars 
an acre. It pays the interest on three hundred 
now easy. I had never tried the tedder on so 
heavy grass, and I felt considerable worried 
about the result. I started alongside the wall, 
and the grass flew up in a cloud behind the ma¬ 
chine just as if a whirlwind had got hold of it. 
“A sort of patent compound grasshopper, 
ain’t it?” said Jake inquiringly, as he noticed 
the kicking motion of the forks. 
“ You can’t say that’s no great shakes'' said 
Seth Twiggs emphatically, as he puffed away 
at his stump pipe. 
“ It’s a shaky consarn any how,” said Uncle 
Jotliam Sparrowgrass, striking the ground with 
his cane a little harder than common. “ It will 
never amount to any thing, see if it does. Job 
Miller had a thing a good deal like it thirty 
year ago, over on the Island. It was too hard 
on the horse and didn’t pay.” 
“It leaves the grass very light and even,” 
said Deacon Smith. “ I shall have to get one.” 
“ It must dry very rapidly,” Mr. Spooner re¬ 
marked. 
“ That’s so,” responded George Washington 
Tucker; “ but it means less work for poor folks, 
and harder times. Every new machine drives 
another nail in their coffins.” 
“Less work, you lazybones!” exclaimed 
Seth Twiggs. “ It’s hard telling how you could 
do any less and live.” 
“ You may as well put up your stirring sticks 
and old rakes’ tails. You wont want ’em any 
more,” said Benjamin Franklin Jones. 
“It will cure the hay too quick,” said Uncle 
Jotliam. “The sun gets at it so on all sides 
that the grass will break like a pipe stem.” 
“ The quicker hay is cured, the better,” said 
Deacon Smith. “Two hours are better than 
two days, if you can get the water out of it.” 
Nothing has awakened so much interest as 
the tedder since the subsoil plow was introduced. 
The times have changed a good deal since then, 
and the presumption now is that a new tool is 
good for something, especially if it makes its 
appearance in my fields. So many of my jobs 
have turned out well, and so many of my neigh¬ 
bors have imitated my example, that public 
opinion is very much changed. I had heard 
and read a good deal about tedders, but never 
saw one work until this season. I had a good 
many doubts. The English tedder is a heavy 
affair, quite likely to get out of repair, and en¬ 
tirely unsuited to our Yankee ways. But the 
first time I saw one of our sort of tedders I 
made up my mind to have one. You see, Mr. 
Editor, it just supplies the last tool we wanted 
in Iiay-making. The mower, rake, fork, tedder, 
all going by horse-power, make haying as light 
and pleasant as any work upon the farm. 
The tedder saves a good deal more work 
than I had thought for. To begin with, it does 
the work of at least ten men. You can stir two 
acres of heavy grass in an hour easy, and it is 
more thoroughly stirred than it is possible to 
do it by hand-power. It is sent up into the air 
with a sudden jerk, that shakes all the water 
out of it, and it falls back upon the ground so 
loose that the sunshine can reach every particle. 
This work is done in the hottest part of the day, 
and the drying goes on very rapidly. The ted¬ 
der works so fast that you can go over your 
field three or four times, if it is necessary, and 
get heavy grass cured enough to go in the same 
day it is cut. This is a very great saving of la¬ 
bor. By the old method it frequently takes 
three days of tolerably good weather to cure 
heavy grass. The cocks have to be made and 
opened twice or three times before the hay can 
go into the barn. Now, with the tedder, 
we can have the hay all shaken out by 
eleven o’clock, if it is all mowed by that time, 
and by keeping it stirred up it is pretty well 
cured by three in the afternoon, especially if 
the grass is fully fit to cut. It makes the mow¬ 
ing machine worth a good deal more to us than 
formerly, for now we can mow all we want to 
in a fair day, and have no fears but we can get 
it up. Sometimes we used to get so much down 
that a part of it would get injured before we 
could get it secured. One grand thing about 
the tedder is, that it cures the grass very uni¬ 
formly. There are no wet, green locks in it, 
and even if it is not quite cured enough the first 
day, by leaving the cocks in the field covered 
with hay caps overnight, they will often be just 
right to go in the next day without opening. 
The quicker you can get hay nicely made and 
out of the sun, the better. 
We have had the tedder up for discussion in 
the Hookertown Club, and it has passed muster, 
after a pretty severe overhauling. If we keep 
on inventing new tools, I expect we shall get the 
farms so that they will run themselves pretty 
soon. Yours to command, 
Timothy Bunker, Esq., 
Hookertown, Conn., Oct. 15,1868. 
Wheat in England. — The Agricultural 
Gazette estimates the annual consumption of 
■wheat in the United Kingdom as 20,000,000 of 
quarters, it maybe a million more, and states the 
average yield per acre, throughout the kingdom, 
at 27 bushels. An English quarter is 8 bushels. 
---« m» —.- 
The Potato Excitement. 
When we read the accounts of the enormous 
prices paid for tulip bulbs in the 17tli Century, 
we think that the stories must be much exag¬ 
gerated or the people of that time must have 
been very foolish. The present excitement in 
regard to new potatoes in a measure rivals that 
of the tulips—at least we thought so when we 
were told that $50 each had been refused for a 
couple of tubers that we were inspecting. The 
late Mr. Goodrich began his experiments with 
unimproved stock from South.America, and the 
Early Bose and other new sorts are derived 
from Mr. G.’s seedlings. Whoever produces a 
better potato than we already have is a public 
benefactor, and if he gives us one which will 
produce more to the acre, he adds largely to the 
wealth of thecountiy. It has thus far happened 
that those who have done most for the improve¬ 
ment of the potato have not been pecuniarily 
benefited. Mr. Goodrich, it is said, made no 
money, and we learn that the large sums derived 
from the sale of the Early Rose went to others 
than the originator of that variety. The suc¬ 
cess of the Early Rose has been so very general 
that new seedlings will doubtless abound, and 
it is not unlikely that many indifferent ones will 
be offered at enormous prices. It will be well 
for those who wish to experiment with new 
sorts to purchase only of dealers of established 
reputation. The remarkable specimens above 
referred to were raised by Mr. Breese, the orig¬ 
inator of the Early Rose, but they will not be 
put upon the market this year. Another seed¬ 
ling by Mr. Gleason, of Mass., and by him es¬ 
teemed of high quality, is the Willard, sent out 
by Mr. Gregory, of Marblehead. It is a neat¬ 
looking, long potato, of medium size; the skin 
is red and blotched somewhat like that of the 
Calico. Mr. Heffron, of Utica, has a seedling 
from the Early Rose, called the Climax. Those 
who have tested it speak in high terms of its 
quality upon the table. It is a white variety 
with a rough skin and depressed eyes, and has 
the hardy look that marks most of the Goodrich 
seedlings. With the new sorts already offered, 
with others to come, we may anticipate some 
interesting developments in potato culture. 
A Eish-Oil and Guano Factory. 
In November of last year (1867) we gave an 
engraving and description of the Menhaden, or 
Moss-bunker, with an account of the process of 
manufacturing the fish into oil and fish-guano. 
Since then one of our artists lias visited one of 
the most extensive factories, located at Green- 
port, L. I., and made several spirited sketches, 
which are presented on the following page. In 
the article above alluded to will be found a full 
description of the fish and its products, and we 
need now only point out what the engravings 
illustrate. A correspondent at Greenport writes: 
“ The fish are obtained from fishermen, who 
either own their own “ rigs” or are part owners 
with the factorymen, and who receive a certain 
price per thousand. A rig consists of a yacht, 
very often a fast sailer and elegantly fitted up; 
two “ carryaways,” and two seine boats of 
about the size of an ordinary whale-boat; the 
gang is composed of eight or nine men, includ¬ 
ing the captain, who share equally in the profits 
