JOURNAL  OF  HORTICULTURE  AND  COTTAGE  GARDENER, 
July  21,  1898. 
58 
GLEANINGS. 
Not  from  the  corn  fields  as  yet.  As  far  as  our  judgment  goes 
harvest  cannot  be  an  early  one.  It  is  marvellous  what  a  hot  July 
may  and  can  do,  but  Wheat  that  did  not  “  bloom  ”  till  the  middle  or 
rather  the  end  of  June  must  have  six  weeks  before  beiDg  ready  for 
the  reaper.  We  do  not  like  too  rapid  progress  in  ripening,  it  generally 
means  deficiency  of  quantity  and  quality.  This  year’s  straw  will  be 
wheaten.  We  think  nothing  can  bring  up  the  Barley  and  Oat  straw 
to  more  than  just  passable  average. 
However  clean,  bright  Wheat  straw  is  a  valuable  commodity,  and 
it  is  such  a  comfort  to  think  there  need  be  no  shortness  for  bedding 
or  thatching  purposes,  and  certainly  you  cannot  have  corn  without 
straw  to  support  it.  Early  in  the  season  there  was  much  complaint 
as  to  “  rust  ”  in  Wheat,  but  it  appears  to  have  yielded  to  the  more 
genial  weather.  We  have  heard  this  spring  of  “rust”  attacking 
Barley  as  well  as  Wheat. 
If  America  has  a  favourable  harvest,  her  output  of  Wheat  must 
this  year  be  large — 43,000,000  acres,  as  against  39,000,000  last  year, 
and  about  the  same  quantity  in  1891.  We  have  not  yet  seen  any 
estimate  of  the  European  \\  heat  crops.  Personally  we  prefer  to  make 
an  estimate  after  the  first  day’s  work  with  the  threshing  machine  ; 
but  then  we  are  old-fashioned,  and  do  not  like  to  prophesy  before 
the  fact. 
Has  this  last  been  a  “  dripping  ”  time  ?  We  rather  thought  so, 
but  it  appears  we  have  been  misled  by  appearances.  The  showers  we 
saw  and  felt  were  not  in  reality  so  heavy  as  we  thought.  Bain  from 
N.E.  always  seems  to  search,  and  to  last.  The  rainfall  for  June  was 
1*282  inch,  as  against  last  year’s  3-569 ;  but  if  we  had  not  excess  of 
rain,  we  certainly  had  excess  of  cold— fires  in  the  evening  up  to 
June  21st,  and  a  sharp  frost  on  the  night  of  the  14th.  The  tempera¬ 
ture  was  at  least  4°  or  5°  below  the  average  during  the  month,  and 
we  find  that  in  many  things  (Roses  to  wit)  we  are  at  least  a  fortnight 
behind  our  usual  time. 
Wool  buyers  are  coming  round.  They  shake  their  heads  and 
talk  of  poor  prices.  Where  are  the  days  when  wool  made  2s.  6d.  per 
lb.,  and  the  farmer’s  wife  had  quite  a  nice  little  revenue  from  her 
share,  the  “  locks”  or  “dockings,”  as  they  are  called  ? 
Still  another  butter  substitute  in  the  market,  with  a  most 
seductive  name,  “  Butterina.”  What  difficulties  the  poor  farmer  has 
to  contend  against !  Surely  pure  butter  is  cheap  enough  for  everyone’s 
purse.  We  only  hope  the  inspectors  whose  duty  it  is  to  see  that 
substitutes  are  not  sold  as  the  real  thing  will  be  on  the  alert.  The 
penalties  are  heavy  enough  should  a  fraudulent  trader  be  caught — 
£20  first  offence,  £50  second,  £100  third.  But  it  is  the  public  who 
are  to  blame.  Why  will  they  insult,  their  stomachs  by  making  them 
the  receptacles  of  such  nastiness  ?  This  cry  for  cheapness  is  the  ruin 
of  legitimate  trade.  How  about  the  imported  milk  from  Normandy  ? 
It  may  do  for  adults,  but  if  it  contains  any  preservative  (and  it  is 
almost  sure  to  do  so),  it  is  most  unfitted  for  infants. 
In  1897  we  paid  £71,500,000  for  imported  animal  produce,  being 
nearly  £5,000,000  in  excess  of  1896.  A  very  fair  butcher’s  bill  when 
added  to  our  home  production.  Let  us  hope  this  means  that  more 
people  are  in  a  position  to  feed  themselves  better — it  looks  like  it. 
The  daily  papers  are  lull  of  accounts  of  agricultural  shows.  How 
these  shows  do  multiply  !  Where  does  all  the  money  come  from,  and  is 
it  wisely  spent  money  ?  One  gentleman  complains  bitterly  that  at  the 
“  Royal  ”  all  butter  and  cheese  is  safely  guarded  by  glass  cases ;  he 
contrasts  this  with  the  liberality  of  the  Bath  and  West  of  England 
Show,  where  apparently  the  butter  and  cheese  are  freely  sampled. 
Well,  we  rather  agree  with  him,  we  ought  to  know  how  first-class 
butter  eats  as  well  as  looks.  At  one  Devonshire  show  the  prize 
cheeses  are  distributed,  possibly  with  an  accompanying  biscuit  and  a 
bit  of  Celerv. 
By-the-by,  what  an  awful  disappointment  the  attendance,  or 
rather  non  attendance,  of  the  people  at  the  Royal  must  have  been  to 
the  executive  ?  How  did  it  happen  ?  Do  not  the  Midlands  care  for 
agricultural  displays,  or  was  the  site  too  far  out  of  town  ?  Fancy 
98,278  as  against  217,980  at  Manchester  last  year.  The  thing  seems 
absurd. 
How  is  the  compensation  Act  for  injury  to  Avorkmen  going  to 
affect  the  farming  community  ?  We  do  not  quite  knoAV  yet.  The 
poor  employer  seems  to  stand  a  very  bad  chance.  Surely  there  will 
be  found  to  be  some  mode  of  insurance.  Happily  on  a  farm  accidents 
are  few  and  far  between. 
We  see  one  farmer  advises  his  brethren  to  “  get  rid  of  any  horse 
that  has  a  tail.”  Well,  a  kicking  horse  is  a  nasty  thing  on  a  farm. 
We  never  heard  of  “  kickers”  so  denominated  before,  but  suppose  that 
the  idea  comes  from  the  hunting  field,  where  an  inveterate  kicker  is 
decorated  with  a  ribbon  on  the  tail,  which  reads,  “  ’Ware  heels,”  to  the 
initiated.  It  seems  hard  to  have  to  pay  for  a  man’s  own  careless¬ 
ness,  but  this  is  one  of  the  small  ironies  of  life. 
A  busy  day  has  been  spent ;  the  engine  and  saw-bench  have 
converted  much  rough  wood  into  useful  fencings  and  gateposts.  Where 
wood  can  be  got  direct  from  the  plantations,  there  should  never  be  a 
lack  of  good  fencing  material ;  the  time  and  money  are  Avell  spent, 
and  it  is  not  a  bad  plan  to  finish  up  with  a  few  logs  for  Avinter 
consumption. 
About  most  farms  there  is  always  to  be  found  plenty  of  hedgerow 
timber,  old  baulks,  and  oddments  of  all  kinds;  that  properly  cut 
make  the  most  agreeable  of  winter  fuel,  not  only  picturesque,  but 
economical  into  the  bargain.  We  have  already  devised  a  means  by 
which  these  precious  logs  may  be  safely  kept  under  lock  and  key. 
WORK  ON  THE  HOME  FARM. 
The  Turnip  crop  in  the  Eastern  counties  is  not  making  the  rapid 
progress  that  the  crop  should  if  it  is  to  be  a  good  one,  and  we  have  done 
little  hoeing  as  yet  ;  in  fact,  we  have  had  to  clean  the  Mangold  before 
striking  out  the  Swedes,  which  has  not  been  our  usual  experience. 
We  have  seen  Mangold  look  better,  but  still  they  are  a  good  plant, 
and  nothing  to  grumble  at.  We  think  a  top-dressing  of  nitrate  of  soda 
at  the  rate  of  2  cwt.  per  acre  is  all  that  is  wanted  to  force  a  very  good 
crop.  If  Cornwall  Potatoes  benefit  from  20  cwt.  per  acre  of  nitrate,  we 
are  convinced  that  English  Mangold  crops  must  pay  for  any  dressing  up 
to  5  cwt. 
We  have  got  a  beautiful  crop  of  Clover  in  splendid  condition  ;  the 
weather  has  been  windy  and  dry  rather  than  hot,  and  the  result  is  a 
huge  heap  of  fodder  green  as  grass  in  its  natural  state,  but  absolutely 
dry.  As  a  labourer  to-day  remarked,  “  It  would  make  fine  tea.” 
The  weather  is  so  favourable  that  we  are  cutting  our  grass  at  once 
to  take  every  advantage  of  it ;  the  crop  is  a  good  one,  and  as  the  Clover 
has  exceeded  our  expectations  we  have  hope  that  the  hay  may  do 
the  same.  A  good  bulk  of  Clover  and  hay  is  a  fine  thing  for  the  stock- 
owner  to  face  the  winter  with.  Prost  and  snow  with  a  thermometer 
down  below  zero  arouse  little  fear  in  his  mind,  for  when  Turnips  are 
frozen  to  solid  ice  a  cutting  out  of  the  haystack  is  always  available, 
and  very  likely  the  animals,  if  they  could  tell  us,  would  say  that  they 
did  not  mind  the  cold  weather  if  they  always  had  such  warm  food. 
Wheats  have  flowered  well,  look  thick  and  full,  very  long  in  the 
straw,  and  show  no  signs  of  the  sharp  June  frost  ;  Barleys  have  very 
much  improved,  and  may  now  be  quite  an  average  crop,  but  the  unevenness 
resulting  from  fickle  weather  is  still  apparent,  and  must  affect  quality  if  it 
does  not  so  much  reduce  quantity. 
Potatoes  would  do  now  with  another  good  rain  ;  the  ridges  are  rather 
hard,  and  a  soaking  would  not  only  encourage  growth,  but  assist  the 
young  fibres  to  make  their  way  through  the  baked  soil.  Strong  root 
action  is  a  great  factor  in  keeping  the  soil  open  and  in  free  condition. 
METEOROLOGICAL  OBSERVATIONS. 
Camden  Square,  London. 
Lat.  51°  32'  40"  N.;  Long.  0°  8'  0"  W.:  Altitude  111  feet. 
Date. 
9  A.M. 
In  the  Day. 
Rain. 
1898. 
July. 
Barometer 
at  32°,  and 
Sea  Level 
Hygrometer 
Direc¬ 
tion  of 
Wind. 
Temp, 
of  soil 
at 
1  foot 
ShadeTem. 
perature. 
Radiation 
Tempera¬ 
ture 
Dry. 
Wet. 
Max. 
Min. 
In 
Sun 
On 
Grass 
inchs 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
deg. 
inchs 
Sunday  . . . 
10 
30-371 
55-2 
52-4 
N. 
61-3 
61-4 
52-0 
78-3 
49-9 
— 
Monday  . . . 
11 
30-377 
56*3 
53-1 
N. 
59-3 
73-9 
43-9 
119T 
39-1 
— 
Tuesday  . . . 
12 
30-211 
68-9 
61-1 
N. 
60-2 
76-6 
50-8 
124-9 
45-9 
— 
AV  ednesday 
13 
29-901 
57-9 
53-4 
N. 
62-1 
69-8 
57-9 
116-3 
55-2 
0-010 
Thursday  . 
14 
30-089 
61-8 
55-2 
AV. 
61-1 
78  T 
47-3 
119-9 
42-3 
— 
Friday . 
15 
30-164 
70-8 
63  1 
N.AV. 
62-7 
82-9 
54-6 
127-1 
50-1 
— 
Saturday. . . 
16 
30-140!  72-6 
61-0 
N.  AV 
64-9 
82-7 
57-1 
127-7 
53-8 
— 
30-179 
63-4 
57-0 
61-7 
75-1 
51-9 
116-2 
48-0 
o-oio 
10th. — Overcast  day,  with  drizzle  between  7  and  9  a.m.  ;  clear  after  5  p.m. 
11th. — Overcast  almost  all  morning  ;  generally  sunny  afternoon. 
12th. — Fine  and  generally  sunny ,  hut  cloudy  at  times. 
13th.— Overcast  early  ;  slight  rain  between  8.30  a.m.  and  9.30  a.m.  ;  frequent  cloud 
in  morning  ;  bright  sun  from  2  p.m. 
14th. — Bright  sun  almost  throughout. 
15th. — AVarm  and  sunny  throughout. 
16th. — Bright  sun  from  sunrise  to  sunset. 
Another  fine  and  (almost)  rainless  week — G.  J.  Symons. 
