930 
The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
is a common sight to see an old woman with her 
milk cans piled in a cart pulled by a big, friendly 
looking dog. Last Winter I used to like to see an 
old lady spread a burlap bag on the cobblestones for 
her dog to lie on while she went in to sell her milk. 
The numerous flocks of nice fat geese, tended by the 
picturesque little goose-girls, are also unique and 
interesting. The time of the girl is actually much 
cheaper than the wire which would be required to 
keep them in after our fashion. 
BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY.—The more civilized 
parts of Europe present an attractive form of man¬ 
made beauty in terraced hills and neatly arranged 
lields, if not the imposing extent of a Nebraska corn¬ 
field or an Oregon apple orchard. One of the real 
sights near Prague is a road over a mile long, lined 
on both sides by a row of cherry trees. A stroll 
through such a blossoming vista is one to be remem¬ 
bered, even though the trees themselves may not be 
cared for according to most up-to-date specifications. 
ABUNDANT LABOR-.—But the most far-reaching 
difference between European and American agricul¬ 
ture is the abundance of the labor supply here. In 
the line of the improvement of machinery this is not 
an unmixed blessing, for since the necessity to make 
them lighter is not so great, the tools here are heavy 
and clumsy to an American eye. They are heavier of 
draft and not so easy to manage, for why economize 
on labor? While you farmers in New York and Con¬ 
necticut are struggling along with one hired man, I 
have seen over here six people operating one wheat 
sowing machine. One man drove, two girls walked 
behind and kept the machine from getting clogged, 
and three women with a rope attached to the axle 
held it from sliding downhill. 1 well remember that 
the hand cultivator on the Connecticut farm on 
which I used to work tried to slide sideways on a 
side hill, but no farmer could have afforded to hire 
a, man to hold it up hill with a rope. Of course this 
question of cheap labor has more than one side to it. 
•None of the Americans over here who have a chance 
to see the kind of emigrants which leave Europe 
Would advocate the lowering of immigration re¬ 
strictions. Besides, our experience teaches us that 
these same peasant women would not work so well 
•nor be so happy away from the life to which they are 
accustomed. 
THE FUTURE OF THE PEASANT.—Then just a 
word about the European peasant and the future. 
He is becoming more and more class-conscious, more 
and more intelligently interested in his calling. The 
president of the Agricultural Society of France had 
a very interesting article in the papers a while ago, 
and the big industrial journals did not dare to ignore 
it. On a continent torn with racial hatreds, the 
farmers are beginning to turn away from national 
prejudices toward a better understanding of their 
brothers on the soil. This was brought home to me 
the other day when I chanced to read in a foreign 
language an article on grafting. The immense bar¬ 
rier of language faded, and I felt a glow of kindred 
feeling. The man who wrote that article, in spite 
of his foreign nationality, was working on a prob¬ 
lem which also occupies the attention of you folks 
back home. There should be, and there is, a point 
of contact. And when the workers in the oldest and 
most fundamental occupation thoroughly understand 
thedr brothex*s in other lands we shall be a great 
deal nearer to world peace than endless discussions 
among the intellectuals can bring us. 
ARTHUR r. COLEMAN. 
The Northern Migration of Negroes 
D URING the past few years there has been an 
exodus of colored people from the Southern 
States which, in some localities, has gi*own to 
alarming proportions. In some counties most of 
the laborers have gone, leaving many farmers un¬ 
able to work their farms to advantage. The move¬ 
ment started before the Great War, but was great¬ 
ly stimulated by the events growing out of that 
struggle. Many young colored men were drafted 
and taken from their homes. Some of these went 
overseas, while others spent months in northern 
training camps. The effect of this distribution was 
much the same as that which has always occurred 
in history whenever members of an agricultural 
race closely kept at home have finally been scat¬ 
tered or given an opportunity to “see something of 
the world.” Thousands of southern negroes have 
left the South in the hope of bettering their condi¬ 
tions. A large proportion of them have located ixx 
New York or other large northern cities. Others 
have gone to manufacturing towns, while still 
others are on farms or working in the country at 
iU a • *>J VUliJ ViiJ 'j * V. O'* 
contractors’ jobs. Many more are coming, and it 
has come to be a vital problem as to what the out¬ 
come will be. The southern people seem confident 
that the negroes, or most of them, will return to 
the South. They think our northern climate is too 
severe, and that northern people do not know how 
to handle the negro. At this time there does not 
seem much chance for such a return. The southern 
negroes seem well satisfied to remain. Most of 
them are doing quite well financially, and the new 
immigration laws favor them in preventing compe¬ 
tition in rough labor. They are forming associa¬ 
tions here, and must be reckoned with as a perma¬ 
nent factor in northern economic conditions. They 
have, however, intensified the race problem which 
our northern people have not heretofore met face 
to face. 
As to the effect upon the South, we find that 
southern people vary in their estimates of the situa¬ 
tion. Some of them are pessimistic, and feel that 
with the loss of her natural farm labor the South 
will suffer greatly. On the other hand, there are 
An Apple Tree Badly Infested with the Destructive 
Tent Caterpillar. Fig. .352 
many who see in this migration a form of emanci¬ 
pation for white farmers. We have lettei-s fi-om 
many of our southern readers, and the following 
statement from a Georgia fanner states the hope¬ 
ful outook which many white men proclaim: 
“It Will Prove a Blessing” 
As to the migration of the negroes from the 
South, I will say more than half have left the 
farmers here. It is a blessing in the long run. If 
the negi-oes had stayed and the boll weevil had not 
come, cotton would not bring $20 per bale. As it 
is, the white farmer has to use his brains as well 
as hands; if he does, he will get more for labor 
than ever. 
I have five negro families on my farms; four 
for wages, one on halves, and one white man by 
the month and another running a dairy on half. 
All are doing well; not any of the negroes are 
thinking of going North. Each family has four 
acres of cotton on halves, and get about the same 
money out of it as they did when they planted 20 
acres before the Great Wax*. The time for a big 
strong negro to walk behind a 4-in. scooter plow 
and a mule has passed. 
A few months ago I was in a wholesale feed 
house in Atlanta. They showed me a freight bill 
on five cars of hay which amounted to $19.00 per 
ton. My first crop of Alfalfa is in the barn, and 
the second is now 10 in. high. This makes an 
average of four tons a year. I can sell it at $40 
per ton. Last year I sold Irish potatoes to a whole¬ 
sale house in Atlanta at $.3 per 100 lbs., and made 
114 tons pea vine hay on same land by the fii-st of 
October, with 100 per cent less labor per acre than 
cotton. 
The average negro who rents does not care to 
diversify. Cotton is all he wants to plant. Under 
boll-weevil conditions he cannot make it. The negro 
nt gleets corn, food and other feedstuffs, therefore 
he will not make 50 per cent of a crop. 
* iniv/V i -J * •'t i Llj ' 1. 1 4j.v«r. vl j -t.’ 
June 2S, 1924 
The time when a land-owner could live in town 
and let the negroes run his farm and bring him 
the cotton in the Fall has passed and not any too 
soon for the land’s sake. john keller. 
DeKalb Co., Ga. 
New Form of Vermin Poison 
READ with interest the ai*tiele 011 page 850, 
“Thinning the Woodchuck Crop.” I note you 
stress the use of hydrocyanic-acid gas and give di¬ 
rections and cautions legarding its generation and 
use. 
Hydrocyanic-acid gas can be prepared and used 
with far greater simplicity and with much less ex¬ 
pense by another practicable method. Ants, the 
chinch bugs, and moles, rats and woodchucks can 
be killed simply and quickly by the use of calcium 
cyanide. 
Calcium cyanide is a chemical compound, easily 
obtainable, that offers itself particularly to the 
fai-mer. It is a poison and should be handled care¬ 
fully, but its natui'e is such that it can be handled 
with greater safety than sodium or potassium 
cyanide. To kill a woodchuck simply place a table¬ 
spoonful of the powder in the mouth of the bur- 
row and within four or five minutes the wood- 
< tuck is dead. Rats leave their burrows and die 
at the entrance or just outside. The results of 
this method are immediate. 
Chemically, the moistxxre of the air or the bur¬ 
row is just enough to set free the poisonous fumes 
and to kill the pests. All that is left after the gas 
is freed is a tiny bit of slacked lime. The quan¬ 
tity used is lethal for small animals but harmless 
to man. • As the farmer is accustomed to handling 
poisons and to observing certain precautions, I un¬ 
hesitatingly recommend this method of vennin 
eradication as one of the cheapest and most ef¬ 
fective of any known. clarence w. winchell. 
“Lakeweed” as a Fertilizer 
Your interesting article on the “Use of Seaweed as 
Manure” which appeared on page 830 prompts me to 
inquire as to the quality and value of “lakeweed” as 
a source of humus to be used on sandy soils. Small 
lakes and streams usually have a deposit of weeds and 
leaves, being the accumulation of years. These de¬ 
posits usually are from two to four feet in depth, 
which could be removed with grappling hooks or simi¬ 
lar devices at a small expense of laboxx As a ma¬ 
nure, is it valuable? If so, what would it be advis¬ 
able to use where corn and vegetables are grown ? 
Detroit, Mich. a. s. h. 
HIS lakeweed is not in any way equal to sea¬ 
weed as a fertilizer. It contains only a small 
amount of potash, and if you consider its fertilizing 
value entirely its xise woxxld not warrant the ex¬ 
pense involved in taking it from the lake and dis¬ 
tributing it on the land. It would, of course, add 
some organic matter to light soils, but this could 
be obtained cheaper and of better quality by plow¬ 
ing under green crops. The seaweed, or at least 
some vaiieties of it, is quite equal to stable ma¬ 
nure in actual fertility. The waters of the ocean 
contain small quantities of every element known 
to the earth, and the plants which form the sea¬ 
weed take up more or less of this fertility. Fresh 
water does not contain any such variety of plant 
food, and while this lakeweed might add some or¬ 
ganic matter it is very doubtful if its use would 
pay. A good quality of muck or peat dug out of the 
swamp, dried and spread on the land, would be 
more effective. This is the opinion given by the 
Michigan Experiment Station. They have not tried 
the material on sandy soils, bxxt judging from its 
appearance and analysis they do not consider it of 
any great value. Some fanners have an idea that 
anything that is black in color or anything that 
gives off a very offensive odor must be rich in 
plant food. That does not follow, especially with 
regard to the odor, for some of the substances 
which smell worst have little if any feiffilizing 
value. Not even an expert can safely analyze a 
substance with his eye and nose alone. If a farmer 
has access to some fertilizing waste and there is 
enough of it to pay to handle it, it will always be 
profitable for him to have a fair analysis made be¬ 
fore he pays anything for it, or spends much time 
hauling. 
A singular murder case was recently tried in Eng¬ 
land. It seem« that a man and woman made what is 
called a suicide compact. They were to kill each other 
together. The man died, the woman survived, and 
later was convicted of murder by a jury of women. The 
theory was that the man’s death was the result of a 
conspiracy. 
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