Title: Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 5, February 2, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside
Author: Various
Language: English
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FEBRUARY 2, 1884. ***



THE
PRAIRIE FARMER

A Weekly Journal for

THE FARM, ORCHARD AND FIRESIDE.

ESTABLISHED IN 1841.
ENTIRE SERIES: VOL. 56—NO. 5.

CHICAGO, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 2, 1884.

PRICE, $2.00 PER YEAR,
IN ADVANCE.



[Transcriber’s Note: The Table of Contents was originally located on
page 72 of the periodical. It has been moved here for ease of use.]


THE CONTENTS OF THIS NUMBER.

AGRICULTURE—Selection of a Site for a Park, Page 65; Fresh Meat for the
Farm, 65-66; Farmers’ Communicative Society, 66; Botany for Farm Boys,
66; Diogenes in His Tub, 66; How He Likes Dakota, 66; The Use of Salt,
66-67; Woven Paling Fences, 67; Illinois State Fair, 67; From Central
Kansas, 67; Field and Furrow Items, 67.

HORTICULTURE—The Farmer’s Garden, Page 70; Our Future Orchards, 70-71;
The Model Illinois Nursery, 71; The Basket Willow, 71.

POULTRY NOTES—What Ails the Pullets? Page 74; That Duck Farm, 74; From
New Hampshire, 74.

THE APIARY—Corn-silk Protection, Page 74; Feeding Back, 74; Bee
Pasturage, 74.

LITERATURE—Logic, Poem, Page 78; Don’t Wait, Poem, 78; The Curfew
Heroine, 78; Items, 78.

HUMOROUS—Old Shoes, Poem, Page 79; An Obstinate Wife, 79; Wanted
Weather Strips, 79; It’s a Telephone, 79; An Emergency, 79; Items, 79.

SCIENTIFIC—The Brilliant Sunsets, Page 75.

LIVE STOCK—Items, Page 68; A Scare in Missouri, 68; Public Sales of
Stock, 68; Remedy for Foot-and-Mouth Disease, 68.

THE DAIRY—The Wisconsin Dairymen, Page 68-69.

EDITORIAL—Items, Page 72; Mississippi Valley Horticultural Society, 72;
When It is Time to Resign, 72; Locating the Minnesota State Fair, 72-73;
Wayside Notes, 73; Letter from Champaign, 73; An Eloquent Tribute, 73;
Selection of Site for a Park, 73.

HOUSEHOLD—An Humble Confession (Poetry), Page 76; Pyramidal Women, 76;
Give the Babies Water, 76; Work for Little Fingers, 76.

YOUNG FOLKS—The Legend of the Stork and the Babies (poetry), Page 77; A
Chat About Halifax, 77; The Little Legislatures, 77; Walking Canes, 77;
Items, 77.

NEWS OF THE WEEK—Page 80.

MARKETS—Page 80.


[Illustration: DREXEL BOULEVARD, CHICAGO—DESIGNED BY H. W. S. CLEVELAND.]



SELECTION OF A SITE FOR A PARK.

BY H. W. S. CLEVELAND.


Few persons think of a park as anything but a place of recreation, a
pleasure ground, and an ornamental appendage of a city.

As a consequence, if it is proposed to create a park in any city, every
suggestion that is offered in regard to its location is based upon the
fact of its superior natural advantages; its picturesque character; its
command of fine views, or the features of attractive interest it
combines.

Without denying the value of any of these elements, I wish to call
attention to other objects which are rarely thought of, and yet are
deserving of careful consideration in determining the location.

Almost every city comprises within its limits some portion of territory
which is not adapted for business purposes, and is not attractive to
that class of inhabitants who can afford to choose the location of their
residences. Such localities are at first left vacant, but as population
increases they are occupied first by squatters, then by those who can
afford nothing better, and finally become the site of tenement houses,
or dens of resort for the worst class of human beings, male and female,
that the city contains.

The original cause of the avoidance of the place may have been that it
was low and subject to malarial influences, or of such topographical
character that it could only be adapted to residence purposes at very
great cost.

In either of these cases it is obvious that the first cost of the land
will be far less than that of a tract combining all the features which
render it most attractive as a site for residences. Let us now consider
some of the effects of improving such sites:

Suppose the area to be low and wet, an unsightly tract, suggestive of
chills and fever, and too extensive for improvement by its individual
owners. Instead of suffering it to become the plague spot and breeding
place of moral and physical diseases, as it certainly will if left to
itself, let the city purchase and improve it as a park, first, by
thorough drainage, and then by such artistic arrangement as shall make
it an attractive resort, and it is obvious that the result will be not
only the securing of a charming place of recreation and ornament to the
city, but the conversion of a threatening danger to health, into a chief
source of its promotion. The creation of such an improvement also
invariably changes the character of its surroundings by rendering them
desirable as residence sites, and thus repaying the cost by the
increased taxable value of adjacent property. It often happens, however,
that large areas are comprised within, or adjacent to, a city, which
even if unobjectionable on the score of health are not available for
residence on account of their topographical character.

The site of the New York Central Park affords an illustration of my
meaning:

At the time of its first inception in 1857—the whole of that section of
the city was a series of barren ledges of rocks of such forbidding
nature that no individual proprietor could afford the expense of
preparing an area for residence and providing himself with the simplest
necessities of comfort. The land had only a nominal value, and its only
occupants

(_Continued on Page 73._)



FRESH MEAT FOR THE FARM.


One of the greatest banes to the proper enjoyment of country life is the
almost constant use of salt meats. It is ham for breakfast, salty, oh,
how salty! Then for dinner it is salt pork, boiled or fried. Then for
supper a cold slice of ham, or boiled cold shoulder, varied a little by
chipped dried beef, which is within itself a “piller of salt.” Then it
is drink, drink, from morning to night without abatement.

Now, I know the great difficulties that lay in the way of a farmer,
located miles from city or town, to procure a daily supply of fresh meat
from the markets, to say nothing of the unbearable cost of such a
proceeding to those who live close enough to market to procure a daily
supply. Just think of it; we sell our beef cattle to the butcher for,
say three cents on foot, and pay for the article on the hook from twelve
and a half to twenty cents per pound, and our mutton and pork in the
same ratio. It is not my purpose, in this article, to show the relative
losses and profits in these transactions, but to show my brother farmers
how they can have fresh meat on their tables every day of the year, and
every meal of each day if they will, and that at their own first cost
prices. This plan of mine is not new; yet, I am safe in saying that it
is not practiced by one per cent of the farmers in the nation. Why is
this? Ignorance of the way to do it. It can be nothing else. For there
is less labor and work attending the process of preserving the meats put
up for home consumption, by keeping them fresh, than there is by
salting, smoking, wrapping in canvas, and packing away, as now
practiced. A second great advantage is, that the curing of meats in a
fresh state can be accomplished at any season of the year, no matter how
hot, and that without ice.

Then, a third consideration is the saving of labor to the farmer’s
family during the hot sweltering summer months, in fact, all through the
year.

To enable any person to understand the matter, I will explain by briefly
stating what we are now doing in the way of preparing our fresh meat for
next summer’s use. In the first place, we have as many lard or pork
barrels as will be necessary to hold a supply of meat for the family.
These barrels are clean, sweet, and tight, one end taken out. They are
arranged on a bench in the cellar, open end up. The pigs are killed and
cooled in the usual way. When the animal heat is all out they are cut
up, cutting off the sausage and lard, the lard cut up ready to be
rendered out. The shoulders and sides are then cut up into such sized
pieces as may be convenient for table use. These pieces are washed
cleanly, and boiled in large kettles, seasoned with salt and pepper to
make palatable, and when sufficiently boiled for table use they are
placed in a barrel closely together, but not pressed or mashed, thus
leaving each piece as near in the shape cut as possible. When the barrel
is filled within two inches of the top, we then pour in warm lard until
all the crevices between the pieces of meat are filled up, covering the
top with one or two inches of the warm lard. Next day we find that the
lard has settled down; we fill up again to the top and keep filled until
all has become a solid mass of meat and lard. This is the whole secret.
You can fill any tight vessel from a one gallon jar to a forty-five
gallon barrel in like manner, and if properly done, and kept in a cool
place the meat will keep fresh and sweet the year round.

The advantages of this process of keeping meat are manifold. You can
kill a fat hog at any season of the year, and its own fat can preserve
it, and the fat can be used for culinary purposes just the same as when
put up in cans for home use. The shoulders can be thus prepared, and
when cold are far superior to salt meat, even after being boiled. The
sides when cut in square pieces, with the ribs on, are just as good as
when cooked fresh in the fall of the year. Hams, whole, when well cooked
and seasoned, retain all their sweetness, and that without being
impaired by the excess of salt necessary to keep them. Then, there is no
trouble with flies, bugs, or skippers; the meat remains sweet,
wholesome, and palatable until the last piece is taken from the bottom.
All the care necessary in taking the pieces from the barrel is to press
the lard down closely over what is left, and thus exclude the air.

There are two great advantages in this mode of keeping meat; one is, it
is fresh, easily digested, and consequently more healthy, and decidedly
more pleasant to the taste; and it does not create that burning thirst
that is so hard to quench on a hot harvest day. Then it is always ready
for table use, and that without requiring your wives, daughters, and
house help to melt over a hot stove when the mercury is up among the
nineties, a no small saving in threshing time.

The only great drawback that I have found to this plan is, that I can
eat twice the amount that I can of salted meats; and, therefore, it
requires double the quantity for family use than under the salting
process; but I am persuaded that the difference is made up in better
health, and smaller doctor bills. Try it on a small scale, and you will
always follow it.

    A. R.
        CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO.



FARMERS’ COMMUNICATIVE SOCIETY.


I am now fifty-five years old and have always lived in a good
agricultural country. Having had no rich friends to draw on for supplies
I have had to look to Mother Earth for my living. Hence I feel that I
should pay homage to the Great Creator of all things for that fair
capacity which has enabled me to select good lands and grow crops well
adapted to the soils.

While my work has been arduous in the main, I have not felt it drudgery.
In fact, my farm has not only furnished me a good living, but in its
productions and developments I have been highly entertained.

I am not different from most of my fellowmen. I like to manage and
dictate, and have my own way. I manage so as to bring my lands into
subjection. I do it by making them better. I cultivate and dress them
until they look better and feel better, and I know they are better.

When I plant my crops I give them such attention that it seems they have
every confidence that I will remove all obstructions to hinder their
growth, and the young and tender plants seem to avail themselves of the
situation and spring up as by magic. In their prosperity I rejoice.

I take a half dozen farm journals and a few newspapers so as to learn
what others are doing without going from my home, especially in the
winter season. For I find that when I go from home I can’t always get
delicious fruits and vegetables that I have learned to be so fond of in
my riper years.

Now I come to a point where I will venture a proposition to my brother
farmers: That we organize a—well I don’t know just what to name it, but
say Farmers Communicative Society. I mean by this that we select some
farm journal that seems most fitting and send in our names and
addresses, agreeing to write once a month a short and candid statement
of our plans and successes and failures in our agricultural and
horticultural pursuits. I am of course intending to get the best of the
bargain as I always try to do in business. But it must be apparent to
all that we, as farmers, can be more benefited by commingling our
interests together in the developments of the farm, and learn from one
another in a few years what it will take each one of us a whole life
time to learn in case we continue to “go it alone” as in olden times.

Now Mr. Editor, I think you can afford to second the motion to help
organize these practical old farmers and get them to write for your
journal. I feel that we can give your readers many practical ideas of
benefit to all, and you agree to clothe our crude thoughts and make them
appear intelligent before the public, so that no one need be embarrassed
to “speak out in meetin’.”

Now the benefits to be derived from an association to communicate
through the paper are to my mind much greater than from conventions. All
admit that farmers’ conventions have accomplished great good in the
different interests, and that they are indispensable. I am indebted to
these conventions for much of my success in farm life. But I conclude
that as great good, or even greater good, can be accomplished at much
less cost. For a few hundred farmers can communicate to each other
through a good farm paper like THE PRAIRIE FARMER, so paged that it can
be filed for future reference, and we can, as it were, have our meetings
every week at our homes and with our families, and impress the lessons
upon our children’s tender minds so they will not have to wait until
they are of mature age before hearing discussions as to the best modes
practiced in agriculture and horticulture. I have felt in attending
these conventions like asking those old veterans who must soon pass
away, where are the young men of our country? For very few seem to
attend these interesting gatherings.

Another reason why I suggest we adopt THE PRAIRIE FARMER is, that THE
PRAIRIE FARMER COMPANY sends to each of their patrons a large map of the
United States, which would enable us to know the exact locality of
parties giving useful information, which is always more satisfactory.

Now I am always trying new things and looking after new industries, and
I have made a great many observations, some of which I shall promise to
give in farmers’ communications, in case we can get a fair start so as
to get others to give me their observations, for that is my prime
object, as I stated in the outset. I am like my Irish friend “I want a
little more than I give.” I am developing our sweets in Kansas. I have
also the finest fruits of the land and succeeded in both, and I will
tell how I did it.

    J. H. W.
        POMONA, KAN.



BOTANY FOR FARM BOYS.


This time I would like to call your attention to the subject of botany.
It might seem rather odd at this time of year, but you know that the
farmers have more time now than in summer to read THE PRAIRIE FARMER. It
is better for the farmer’s boys to become acquainted with the laws of
nature than to spend their time in reading novels, or other books, which
bring them little information. A little knowledge of the nature of
plants is worth infinitely more to the farmer’s son or daughter, or even
to the farmer himself, because it has special relation to his calling.
And in order to obtain a practical knowledge it is best to study the
plants themselves, their structure, their habitat and peculiarity of
growth, etc., and in order to do so, it is best to have some apparatus
for the purpose, requisite for the accomplishment of this object.

The student in botanical science should give early and persevering
attention to the collection and preservation of specimens of as many
species of plants as he can procure. The advantages to be derived from
such collections, either in refreshing the memory by reviewing them, or
in instituting a more thorough examination at one’s leisure, are such as
will afford an abundant compensation for all the labor requisite in
preparing them. Such a collection of dried specimens of plants is called
an herbarium, or by the more significant title, hortus siccus (dry
garden).

The apparatus requisite for the accomplishment of this object is, first,
a close tin box, twenty inches in length, and of a portable form;
second, a portable press, consisting of two boards of light material,
twelve by eighteen inches, opening and shutting by hinges, like the
cover of a book, and secured by springs (even a large book is a good
substitute); third, a quantity of smooth, bibulous paper, of large size
(a dozen or more quires of printing paper); fourth, eight or ten boards
of the same size as the paper; fifth, a small screw press, or several
lead weights of various sizes, from fifteen to thirty pounds each.

In gathering plants for this purpose, or specimens, as they are called,
the smaller and herbaceous plants should be taken up with a portion of
the roots, while from larger plants there should be selected a shoot,
with complete representations of the leaves and flowers. They may be
preserved for several days, without withering, in the tin box, or they
may at once be laid between several thicknesses of the paper and
inclosed in the portable press. It is always desirable that they be
gathered on a dry day; if not they should be freed from dampness before
being committed to the paper and press.

In drying the specimens, great care is required, that they may preserve
well their natural appearance, form, and color. It is generally
recommended that they be carefully spread out, as nearly in their
natural position as possible, between eight or ten thicknesses of paper,
and then submitted to pressure between the boards. The degree of
pressure should never be such as to crush their parts, and may be easily
regulated by the screw, or by the number and size of the weights used.
Cotton-batting may be used to equalize the pressure.

As often as once a day they should be taken from the press, transferred
to fresh and dry paper, and returned, until they are thoroughly dried,
when they are ready to be transferred to the cabinet. The true secret of
preserving specimens with all their colors is to extract the moisture
from them by pressure in an abundance of dry, bibulous paper as soon as
possible.

The next object with the collector is the arrangement of his specimens.
For this purpose each one is first to be fastened to a sheet of firm
white paper, about ten by eighteen inches, either by glue or with loops
of paper of the same kind, or they may be stitched to the paper with a
fine needle. The latter mode, if done skillfully, is preferable. Then
let all those specimens which belong to the same genus be collected
together and placed within a folded sheet of colored paper, with the
name of the genus and each species written on the outside. Each sheet
should also be labeled with the names of the plants, the locality, time
of gathering, habits, etc., etc.

The genera are next to be collected together into orders, each order
being wrapped or folded in a still larger sheet, of a different color
from that which enfolds the genera, having the name of the order with a
catalogue of its genera on the outside. Thus arranged, the orders are to
be laid away upon the shelves of a cabinet, or packed in a chest. To
protect the plants from the attack of insects pieces of camphor gum are
to be laid among them, or a piece of sponge saturated with the oil of
turpentine. To save them from decay they should be kept dry and well
ventilated.

Fruits and seeds which are too large to be pressed with the plants, and
also truncheons of wood, are to be pressed separately in a cabinet. In
the above I have closely followed the directions of Professor Wood in
his excellent work on Botany, which would prove a profitable pastime for
those desiring to improve their knowledge in this direction.

    H. A. P. WESSBERGE.



DIOGENES IN HIS TUB.


Diogenes in this desires to call the attention of all readers of THE
PRAIRIE FARMER to what he deems a very important subject and a great
wrong—one to which they have heretofore seemed strangely indifferent.

The papers teem of late years with accounts of sharks passing about
among farmers and others, and under various pretences, obtaining their
signatures to documents, innocent in themselves—but which eventually
turn up as notes of hand in possession of third persons. And the result
(it is always so stated) is, that the note is collectable and has to be
paid.

And the papers with one voice unite in warning their readers against
using their signature in such a way.

Now, Messrs. Editors, and fellow readers, is it possible that there is
such a principle in our laws—common or statute—that makes such a thing
possible; that legalizes such a fraud? If so, it is not only unsafe for
a man to sign a contract of any sort, but to write a letter to a friend.
And while I am loth to believe there is any statute justifying it, I
feel sure there is no common law principle that will sustain it; or if
there is, it is a relic of barbarism that common sense and common
justice ought long since to have swept into oblivion.

The theory seems to be acquiesced in on the ground that innocent parties
must not be made to suffer. But this theory will not hold good.
Thousands of cases occur in which innocent persons do, and are compelled
by law and by right as well, to suffer loss from just such frauds. A
rogue may steal or borrow my horse and sell him to a neighbor, who buys
in good faith. The law, and right and justice, instead of compelling me
to lose my animal, permits me to replevy him and take him home, and my
neighbor pockets his loss. And this is done daily over the land without
objection; and we hear no newspaper cautions to the “gullible” farmers
not to lend horses. So with every other species of property; one can
take his own legally wherever he may find it—in the hands of a rogue or
of an innocent purchaser.

It is strange to me that this thing has been permitted to go on so long
unchallenged. I do not know whether the courts have ever sustained such
a principle; if they have, unless there be much more cogent reason for
it than I can conceive of, the sooner it is reversed the better for
honest men and good government. Will you allow me, through your widely
read pages, to earnestly call the attention of your readers to the
subject matter—and not only your readers, but your cotemporaries of the
agricultural press as well. Let the principle be ventilated.

    DIOGENES.



HOW HE LIKES DAKOTA.


In passing through Chicago last spring on my way to Dakota, I called at
your office and paid for THE PRAIRIE FARMER. The gentleman in the office
requested me to write you about Dakota. I have delayed doing so until
now to learn about the winters here, and as it is now on hand, I write.

The last half of December and the first half of January we had the cold
wave, the mercury going below zero from 8 to 40 deg. We have from six to
seven inches of snow on the level. Thermometer now ranging from 10 below
to 20 above. We have had some windy days that make the snow fly. I was
in Illinois before leaving for Dakota some forty-five years, and I did
not in all that time see a more pleasant winter; but a very few days
that a man could not be at work if he choose. The wind is no harder nor
more frequent than in Illinois—just the same as near as could be made.
Now for the land, etc.:

Here in Brown county, about twelve to fifteen miles from the 46 parallel
(south) the land is nicely rolling, just about as any one would wish.
There is very little choice in location, only as distance from railway
stations. The soil is black sandy loam, good for small grain, and,
judging from experiment in sod corn, we can raise corn and a good crop
mature if put in in good season, and of an early variety.

I never say anything against Illinois. It is good enough, and Dakota is
just as good, and in one-quarter of the time that Illinois was in
developing, Dakota will be up even with her, the facilities being far in
advance of those of early Illinois. Then we had to team all of our wheat
into Chicago by wagon for nearly twenty years before we had a canal or
railroad. But here we have the railroads to start with, and if
emigration is as large next spring as it was the last there will not be
a foot of land to be located. There is not a quarter section left now in
Brown county, unless it has been overlooked. Towns are growing up as
fast as toad-stools in summer. We are located six miles from Frederick
(600 inhabitants), seven miles from West Port (200), ten miles from
Ordway (500), twenty miles from Aberdeen (2,000), twenty from Columbia
(1,000), county seat. The land is watered about the same as Illinois,
with the elm and maple along the Jim river. For wells we dig from
twenty-five to forty feet and get the best of water.

I think Dakota as good a place for a young man of small means as can be
found. There are some counties where the land has not been surveyed yet,
where good location may be made. Our crops were short last year in Brown
county, caused by a short time of dry weather in June, just as the wheat
and oats were in blossom, at which time these crops require rain in
order to “fill” well.

The only drawback we have is in the matter of fuel as yet. Soft coal
sells at from $7 to $8 per ton: hard, $12 to $13. Dry-goods and
groceries are as low as in Illinois. Lumber from $2 to $4 higher. Our
vegetables can not be beaten.

Just a thing or two more. I want to ask you what are the best kinds of
timber for us to put out on our tree claims. Will the black walnuts,
black and white oaks do well as far north as we are? How will the Scotch
and Norway pines do? I wish to put out such timber as will make good
lumber when grown. Cotton wood, box elder, etc., will just answer the
law, that is about all.

    A. J. FOORD,
        BROWN CO., DAKOTA.



THE USE OF SALT.


In THE PRAIRIE FARMER of January 5th, in report of Illinois
Horticultural Society, Mr. Earle is made to say he used salt on
asparagus and it killed the weeds and most of the asparagus. This is
different from my limited experience; I have used lake salt at the rate
of one ton to the acre and did not kill either weeds or asparagus. I am
now making arrangements to use about three and one-half tons to the acre
from the refuse of pork packing houses.

Will Mr. Earle please give particulars in THE PRAIRIE FARMER: The kind
of salt, time of year it was used, amount per acre, nature of soil,
etc. By so doing he will confer a favor on many readers.

    S. P.
        TERRE HAUTE, IND.



WOVEN PALING FENCE.


A Washington firm of patent solicitors write us, as we suppose they have
all the agricultural papers, warning readers against persons claiming of
them a fee of $500 and upwards for alleged infringements of a patent
upon a so-called “Wire and Picket Fence.” Our informants say that, “It
is quite true that there are a number of patents for wire and picket
fences, or so-called ‘woven paling fences,’ but all these patents are
limited in their claims to the detailed construction of the woven fence,
and there is no broad patent on this class of fence. Indeed it was
invented as long ago as 1829, when Chauncy Hall, of Meriden, Ct., on
November 27th, of that year, obtained the first patent for a wire and
paling fence. All recent applications for patents which have endeavored
to claim the woven fence broadly have been rejected, as we find by an
examination of the records of the United States Patent Office, on the
old patent to James Moore, of Pittsburg, Pa., for a woven picket fence,
which was granted June 30, 1857, and therefore, expired in 1871, so that
it is now public property. There is another patent of the same year
granted to J. B. Reyman, of Bloomington, Ill., No. 18,301, dated
September 29, 1857, which, also, shows a paling and wire fence, or
picket and wire fence. This patent has, also, been frequently cited as a
reference against applications of subsequent patentees who endeavor to
claim broadly the invention of the combined wire and picket fence. In
1849, one, Lucius Leavenworth, obtained a patent for a method of
constructing a fence by fastening pickets or palings upon the wires by
means of a series of links formed on the connecting wires and adapted to
receive or hold the pickets or palings. All of these patents have long
ago expired, and are now public property, so that no person can claim to
have a broad patent on the, so-called, woven picket fence, and any man
who, by virtue of a pretended claim covering broadly that class of
fences, asserts such a right may be put down as an impostor, and should
receive treatment as such. Of late years a number of patents have been
granted for this class of fences, but, as soon stated, the claims of all
these patents are confined to the detailed construction of the fence,
i.e., the precise weaving of the pickets between the wires. A number of
machines have, also, been patented for constructing this kind of fence,
one of the first being that which was patented by Fletcher on Nov. 17,
1868.”

We have heard of no trouble from these patent agents in the West, but
give our readers for what it is worth the information vouchsafed by the
Washington firm.



ILLINOIS STATE FAIR.


This fair, as we have before announced, begins at Chicago on the 8th of
September. The Superintendents of Departments for 1884 are as follows:

Class A, Cattle, Mr. Reynolds; Class B, Horses, Mr. Lewis; Class C,
Sheep, Mr. Vittum; Class D, Hogs, Mr. Gore; Class E, Poultry, Mr.
Griffith; Class F, Mechanics, Mr. Chester; Class G, Farm Products, Mr.
Skeavington; Class H, Horticulture, Mr. Haskell; Class I, Fine Arts, Mr.
Pearce; Class K, Textile Fabrics, Mr. Savage; Class L, Science and
Education, Mr. Rush; Class M, Speed, Mr. Lewis; Class N, Farm Machinery,
Mr. Schuttler; Marshal of the Ring, Mr. Judy; Superintendent of Grounds,
Mr. Gillham; of Forage and Stalls, Mr. Virgin; of Press Department, Mr.
David; of Permits and Privileges, Mr. Washburn; of Purchasing
Department, Mr. Pullen; of Gates and Tickets, Mr. Dysart. Auditors,
Messrs. Funk, Pearce and David; Committee on Reception, Fair—Messrs.
Landrigan, Scott, Gillham, Reynolds, Judy, Pearce, Washburn and Vittum;
Com. on Arrangement, Fair, Messrs. Landrigan, Scott, Gillham, Reynolds,
Vittum, Gore, Haskell, Pullen, Dysart, Washburn, Lewis, Virgin,
Schuttler and Fisher; Com. of Arrangements, Fat Stock Show, Messrs.
Landrigan, Gillham, Reynolds, Gore, Pullen, Dysart, Vittum, Funk,
Virgin, Schuttler, Savage, Scott, Washburn and Judy; Com. on Printing,
Messrs. Savage, Dysart and Fisher; Com. on Finance, Messrs. Pearce,
Pullen, Gore, Lewis and Chester; Com. on Crop Reports, Messrs. Gore,
David, Skeavington and Fisher; Com. on Agricultural and Industrial
Education, Messrs. Scott, Reynolds, Washburn, David and Rush; Com. on
Museum, Messrs. Gillham, Scott, Haskell and Savage; Com. on Library,
Messrs. Haskell, Rush and Fisher; Com. on Transportation, Messrs.
Landrigan, Vittum, Judy, Schuttler, Griffith and Fisher. Jury on
Pedigrees, Class A, Messrs. Reynolds, Dysart, Judy, Funk and
Skeavington; Class B, Messrs. Lewis, Virgin, Griffith, Pearce and
Chester.

The same arrangement of Superintendents and Committees is followed in
the management of the Fat Stock Show which takes place at Chicago in
November.



FROM CENTRAL KANSAS.


Mild, open winter in this the central part of Kansas. Very little cold
weather. Wheat and rye looking fine, and very large acreage sown the
past season. Stock doing finely; but little fodder used as yet. In about
ten days plowing will begin.

We need more settlers of energy and thrift to fill up the large scope of
unoccupied lands. No homestead lands here but plenty railroad lands yet
for sale. The price ranges from $4 to $8 per acre on long time, with a
discount for cash or short time.

We have good water and grass, and plenty of the finest limestone
building rock.

This is a good place for a man of small means to get a home. Having been
here six years I know whereof I speak.

In THE PRAIRIE FARMER of January 5, 1884, I noticed an article on Meadow
Oat Grass, by J. W. Robson. I would like to know where the seed can be
obtained.

    J. D. MC. P.
        ALLIANCE, BOSTON CO., KANS.

—We presume you can get the grass seed from all our reliable seedsmen.
In a few days THE PRAIRIE FARMER will doubtless be favored with plenty
of their advertisements.—[ED.



FIELD AND FURROW.


Secretary W. A. Armstrong reports that all the kinds of commercial
fertilizers applied to the alluvial soils cultivated by members of the
Elmira Club proved in every instance to be “practically worthless.” The
best that can be said is that “some of them used on uplands in which
clay is a constituent, have fair probability, at least, of yielding
satisfactory returns.”

At the Mississippi Valley Cane-Growers’ meeting at St. Louis, delegates
from Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, and Michigan gave their
experiences in growing cane and making sirups. In Illinois, Kansas, and
Nebraska good results were generally obtained, but the season was bad in
other States and expectations were not realized. All concurred, however,
in the belief that the cultivation of sorghum was a good thing, and
would yield handsome profits.

The New York Tribune: The animated discussion of the subject at the
recent meeting of the Connecticut Board was unfavorable to ensilage.
Exhibition of a sample of clover put in a silo when wet called out the
query whether it was fed to cows to make Limburger cheese. One reporter
says it “fairly howled” through the City Hall, echoing and reverberating
a fearful smell. President James A. Bell, of the State Agricultural
Society, is quoted as declaring that the free talk of the occasion “will
save the farmers thousands of dollars by keeping them out of the silo
system.”

At which end should a hoe-handle be the larger? At which end should a
pitch-fork be the larger? It is not every farmer that thinks of these
things until his attention is called to them. As Mr. J. J. Thomas
remarks, the laborer who makes with a common hoe 2,000 strokes every
hour should not wield a needless ounce. If any part is heavier than
needed even to the amount of half an ounce only, he must lift this
needless half ounce 2,000 times every hour. A hoe-handle should be
smallest near the hoe and largest near the other end; a pitch-fork
handle the reverse. Oughtn’t it?

A member of the Oxford (Ohio) Farmers’ Club recently said: We know
something how soil was made, if we do not know much. The soils in the
forests and untilled lands are better than they were a century ago, or
in the days of our fathers; but, alas, it is not so with the soils man
has cultivated. He thinks the term “cultivating” means to improve, make
better. We may make our soils better, but so few do that that we ought
never to use the term “cultivating the soil.” We harass, and torture,
and murder, and starve the soil. By withholding more than is meet we rob
our best friend.

New York Times: Tobacco is a universal insecticide. It kills ticks upon
sheep; the troublesome scab insect; its related species which produces
mange and itch; lice, fleas, and all other insect parasites which infest
and annoy animals; and root-lice, leaf-lice, and all other pests which
injure plants. Just at this season an application of fine tobacco dust
or snuff may be used effectively to relieve calves and fowls from the
vermin which keeps them poor and wretched, and a decoction of tobacco,
applied to house or greenhouse plants with a brush, will destroy the
pestiferous green fly and all other insects which infest them. The same
liquid may also be poured around the roots of house plants that are
infested with the small white worms which are the larvæ of a small black
fly that may be found in the pots and upon the soil in them.

The town of Amenia, in Dutchess county, N. Y., has tried, with marked
success, the plan of keeping a force of four or five men at work on
highways through most of the year under the supervision of an
experienced and skillful builder of roads, who gives his attention
constantly to the work. Every part of the seventy-five miles of highway
in the town is in good condition, and the expense of keeping it so has
been much less than it could have been by the old method. The new plan
has greatly relieved the farmers, who have not been called to work on
the roads at a time when other duties demanded their attention. New York
has a law which directs that the voters of any town may elect to adopt
this plan of hiring a force of men and a competent commissioner to make
and keep in repair the roads of their town, but the plan, once adopted,
must be followed for not less than three years. It has been found that
by the method described the roads have been kept in better condition
than ever before, and that the cost of the work has actually been less
than that of road-making by the old way.

Correspondent Ohio Farmer: In 1882 I raised a piece of Hubbard squashes.
The ground was manured very heavily with rich rotten compost, probably
at the rate of fifty tons or more per acre. It is necessary to make the
land very rich to succeed with this crop, but that isn’t the point I am
after. That same land last year was planted with potatoes, and it was
there that they rolled out so large and numerous as to yield at the rate
of 500 bushels per acre. Just over the fence, on a part of another lot,
where no manure had been applied for many years, there were only 200
bushels per acre. Difference in soil and kinds of potatoes might account
for some of this great variation in yield, but I think it fair to say
that 200 bushels per acre of the best yield was owing to the manure put
on the ground for squashes the previous year. The potatoes were none of
them sold for less than forty cents a bushel, so we have at least $80
per acre cash benefit from that heavy manuring the second year, to say
nothing of $240 an acre which the squashes brought. It was, of course, a
little more trouble to pick up and market the larger crop, but enough of
the potatoes were sold for over forty cents per bushel to pay for that.

       *       *       *       *       *

BROWN’S BRONCHIAL TROCHES for Coughs and Colds: “There is nothing to be
compared with them.”—_Rev. O. D. Watkins, Walton, Ind._

       *       *       *       *       *

The difficulty with most people is that they want to sit in the sunshine
and have good fortune come tumbling into their laps. Nature is an odd
dame, however, and does not give even half a loaf to a man who can do
his own loafing. You must get your spindle and distaff ready and then
Providence will send you the flax to spin.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

Cheapest Farms for Sale in Illinois.

BEST FRUIT REGION IN THE STATE.

Send for my List of Farms and timbered Lands for sale.
    DEWITT C. SMITH, Land Agent.
        Stone Fort, Saline Co., Illinois.

When you write mention THE PRAIRIE FARMER.


       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration]

Print Your Own Cards

Labels, Envelopes, etc. with our $3 PRINTING PRESS. Larger sizes for
circulars, etc., $8 to $75. For pleasure, money making, young or old.
Everything easy, printed instructions. Send 2 stamps for Catalogue of
Presses, Type, Cards, etc., to the factory.

KELSEY & CO., MERIDEN, CONN.

       *       *       *       *       *

First-Class Plants
OF BEST VARIETIES OF SMALL FRUITS.

Catalogues free. Address
O. B. GALUSHA,
Peoria, Ill.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration]

We will send you a watch or a chain BY MAIL OR EXPRESS, C.O.D., to be
examined before paying any money and if not satisfactory, returned at
our expense. We manufacture all our watches and save you 30 per cent.
Catalogue of 250 styles free. EVERY WATCH WARRANTED. ADDRESS
STANDARD AMERICAN WATCH CO., PITTSBURGH, PA.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration]

FARM MACHINERY, Etc.

GREAT SAVING FOR FARMERS.

THE
Lightning
Hay Knife!

(WEYMOUTH’S PATENT.)

[Illustration]

Awarded “FIRST ORDER OF Merit” at Melbourne Exhibition, 1880.

Was awarded the FIRST PREMIUM at the International Exhibition in
Philadelphia, 1876, and accepted by the Judges as SUPERIOR TO ANY OTHER
KNIFE IN USE.

It is the BEST KNIFE in the _world_ to cut _fine feed_ from bale, to
cut down _mow_ or _stack_, to cut _corn-stalks_ for feed, to cut _peat_,
or for ditching in marshes, and has no equal for cutting ensilage from
the silo. TRY IT.

IT WILL PAY YOU.

Manufactured only by
HIRAM HOLT & CO., East Wilton, Me., U.S.A.

_For sale by Hardware Merchants and the trade generally_

       *       *       *       *       *
[Illustration]

CHICAGO SCALE CO.

2 TON WAGON SCALE, $40. 3 TON, $50.
4 Ton $60, Beam Box Included.

240 lb. FARMER’S SCALE, $5.

The “Little Detective,” ¼ oz. to 25 lb. $3.

300 OTHER SIZES. Reduced PRICE LIST FREE.

[Illustration]

FORGES, TOOLS, &c.

BEST FORGE MADE FOR LIGHT WORK, $10.

40 lb. Anvil and Kit of Tools, $10.

Farmers save time and money doing odd jobs.

Blowers, Anvils, Vices & Other Articles

AT LOWEST PRICES, WHOLESALE & RETAIL.

       *       *       *       *       *

CHAMPION BALING PRESSES.

[Illustration]

A Ton per Hour. Run by two men and one team. Loads 10 to 15 tons in car.

Send for descriptive circular with prices, to GEHRT & CO., 216, 218
and 220 Maine St., Quincy, Ill.

       *       *       *       *       *

“THE BEST IS THE CHEAPEST.”

ENGINES,
SAW MILLS, THRESHERS,
HORSE POWERS,

(For all sections and purposes.) Write for FREE Pamphlet and Prices to
The Aultman & Taylor Co., Mansfield, Ohio.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

LIFE LOANS
AT 4 PER CENT.

[Illustration]

Principal need never be paid so long as interest is kept up.

[Illustration]

No security required except for interest, and then only personal. These
loans are for poor or men of moderate means, in amounts of $100, $500
FOR LIFE. Send a cent for particulars. W. ROBERTS, Manager, 195 W. 5TH
ST. CINCINNATI, O.

       *       *       *       *       *

TO PRESERVE THE HEALTH

Use the Magneton Appliance Co.’s

MAGNETIC LUNG PROTECTOR!

PRICE ONLY $5.

They are priceless to LADIES, GENTLEMEN, and CHILDREN with WEAK LUNGS;
no case of PNEUMONIA OR CROUP is ever known where these garments are
worn. They also prevent and cure HEART DIFFICULTIES, COLDS, RHEUMATISM,
NEURALGIA, THROAT TROUBLES, DIPHTHERIA, CATARRH, AND ALL KINDRED
DISEASES. Will WEAR any service for THREE YEARS. Are worn over the
under-clothing.

CATARRH, It is needless to describe the symptoms of this nauseous
disease that is sapping the life and strength of only too many of the
fairest and best of both sexes. Labor, study, and research in America,
Europe, and Eastern lands, have resulted in the Magnetic Lung Protector,
affording cure for Catarrh, a remedy which contains No Drugging of the
System, and with the continuous stream of Magnetism permeating through
the afflicted organs, MUST RESTORE THEM TO A HEALTHY ACTION. WE PLACE
OUR PRICE for this Appliance at less than one-twentieth of the price
asked by others for remedies upon which you take all the chances, and WE
ESPECIALLY INVITE the patronage of the MANY PERSONS who have tried
DRUGGING THEIR STOMACHS WITHOUT EFFECT.

HOW TO OBTAIN This Appliance. Go to your druggist and ask for them. If
they have not got them, write to the proprietors, enclosing the price,
in letter at our risk, and they will be sent to you at once by mail,
post paid.

Send stamp for the “New Departure in Medical Treatment WITHOUT
MEDICINE,” with thousands of testimonials,

THE MAGNETON APPLIANCE CO.,
218 State Street, Chicago, Ill.

NOTE.—Send one dollar in postage stamps or currency (in letter
at our risk) with size of shoe usually worn, and try a pair of our
Magnetic Insoles, and be convinced of the power residing in our Magnetic
Appliances. Positively _no cold feet where they are worn, or money
refunded_.

       *       *       *       *       *

CONSUMPTION.

I have a positive remedy for the above disease; by its use thousands of
cases of the worst kind and of long standing have been cured. Indeed,
so strong is my faith in its efficacy, that I will send TWO BOTTLES
FREE, together with a VALUABLE TREATISE on this disease, to any
sufferer. Give Express & P.O. address. DR. T.A. SLOCUM, 181 Pearl St.,
N.Y.

       *       *       *       *       *

SELF CURE FREE

Nervous   Lost      Weakness
Debility  Manhood   and Decay

A favorite prescription of a noted specialist (now retired.)
Druggists can fill it. Address

DR. WARD & CO., LOUISIANA, MO.

       *       *       *       *       *

FOR SALE—One-half interest in a thoroughly equipped CREAMERY located in
one of the best dairy districts of Wis. J. G. SNYDER & SON., Mt. Hope,
Wis.

When you write mention THE PRAIRIE FARMER.

       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

LIVESTOCK DEPARTMENT.

Stockmen, Write for Your Paper.


Leland Stanford, Palo Alto Stud, Mayfield, Cal., has sold to H. J.
Agner, Honolulu, Sandwich Islands, seven head of young thoroughbred
horses.

       *       *       *       *       *

Col. Charles F. Mills, Springfield, Ill., informs THE PRAIRIE FARMER
that his Elmwood herd of Jerseys are going through the winter in
excellent condition.

       *       *       *       *       *

H. K. Lewis, and John Cotton, Boyle county, Ky., have sold to G. L.
Chrisman, Independence, Mo., a nice lot of pure-bred Southdown ewes,
yearlings, at $12 per head.

       *       *       *       *       *

T. D. Chestnut, Danville, Ky., recently sold to Simon Johnson, Garrard
county, Ky., ten Cotswold ewes at $6 per head, and fifty head of
Cotswold ewes to Robert Collier, Garrard county, at $5.50 per head.

       *       *       *       *       *

Breeders of Short-horns in Scotland are to meet in Edinburgh next week
for the purpose of furthering the movement in aid of centenary prizes
for Short-horns at the forthcoming show of the Highland and Agricultural
Society of Scotland.

       *       *       *       *       *

Mr. Charles H. Walker, President of the Nebraska Stock Breeders’
Association, writes THE PRAIRIE FARMER that the association will meet at
Lincoln, February 13-14. He adds: “This meeting is not in the interest
of any one breed; but is intended to help all persons engaged in
breeding, feeding or marketing cattle, horses, and swine.”

       *       *       *       *       *

The Nebraska State Wool-Growers’ Association will hold its annual
meeting on Friday, February 15, at the Senate Chamber, in Lincoln. Every
sheep man in the State should be present, as matters of great importance
to this large industry will come under discussion, and especially the
present unsatisfactory state of the tariff. So writes the President, Mr.
P. Jansen, of Fairbury, Neb.

       *       *       *       *       *

The collective shipments of live stock and fresh meat from the United
States and Canada landed at Liverpool during the first week of the
present year amounted to 861 cattle, 850 sheep, 100 hogs, 7,598 quarters
of beef, and 1,906 carcasses of mutton. The figures show a large falling
off in the arrivals of both live stock and fresh meat when compared with
the imports of later weeks of the preceding year, more particularly with
regard to live stock, which arrived in very small numbers.

       *       *       *       *       *

Chicago Evening Journal: “The prospect is that the little ring of
political office-seekers who want Congress to make places for themselves
as “inspectors” of cattle and hogs will succeed in defeating the
proposed measure of retaliation against those European countries which,
without good reason, are discriminating against imported American
pork-products. The producers of and dealers in Western cattle and hogs
should take instant measures to head off Sanders and his gang.”

       *       *       *       *       *

The flock belonging to the estate of the late K. W. Gentry, of Sedalia,
Mo., was disposed of at auction last week. The unregistered Merinos were
disposed of in lots of fifty at from $3.25 to $4.50 per head. Grade
lambs brought $2 to $3. The registered Merinos were sold by sixes and
sevens at from $17.50 to $60 each. The best rams brought from $20 to
$101, and a few of the ram lambs sold at from $18 to $46. Samuel Jewett
bought largely. On the same occasion the Berkshire hogs sold at from $20
to $43; one pair of mules brought $205; the yearling Jersey bull Elmwood
Favorite, bred by Col. C. F. Mills, Springfield, Ill., sold for $165.

       *       *       *       *       *

The Inter-State Short-horn Breeders’ Association held a meeting at
Kansas City last week to adopt rules to govern the sales of breeding
Short-horns at the next Fat Stock Show in that city. After considerable
discussion it was resolved that the pedigrees be submitted and cattle
ready for examination on or before the first day of June, and that the
committee be requested to visit and inspect, some time in June, the
cattle offered for the sale. The executive committee was given plenary
powers in regard to deciding what animals are to be admitted in the
sale, and authorized to have the catalogues compiled and published. So
far over one hundred head have been entered for sale.

       *       *       *       *       *

The stockmen of Rush county, Kan., have organized an association to be
known as the Rush County Stockmen’s Union, and adopted a constitution.
The objects of the association are set forth in the following
_therefore_ of the preamble to the constitution: “In order to protect
ourselves from persecution and to secure for ourselves all possible
legitimate advantages, and in all proper ways to promote the interests
of those in our country engaged in the production of any kind of live
stock, we, a number of the stock growers of Rush county, have formed an
organization known as the Rush County Stockmen’s Union.” It is said
there exists in Rush county an element of society which is violently
antagonistic to the stock interests.

       *       *       *       *       *

While at Elgin last week we accompanied Dr. Pratt to his home to take a
look at his herd of Holstein cattle. The sight of the long rows of
stalls filled with this young breeding milk stock was a surprise.
Counting a new arrival of twenty-five during our visit the Doctor now
has about 130 head—certainly one of the largest as it is one of the
best herds of Holsteins in the country. The Doctor breeds and buys to
sell again, and his trade is large, as he does not demand fancy prices
but simply a fair return for his investment, care and labor. The famous
bull Cyclone heads the home herd. The females are generally from a year
and a half to three years old. Duchess of York is his brag cow, though
he has other strains nearly as famous for milk. The young bull,
Berkhout, a prize winner in Holland, is a capital animal. Though a dull
season of the year shipments from this herd are numerous. A bull and
three heifers go the present week to J. J. Conklin, Valley Creek, Texas.
H. H. Bissell, Navasota, Texas, takes a bull and two females. The
promising bull Duke, of Oak Hill, goes to A. H. Woodruff, Lansing, Iowa.
Mr. W. also takes a yearling heifer. The Duke weighs 1,650 pounds, and
was but two years old the 17th of June last. The Doctor reports the
demand from the South as wonderfully increasing. In 1883 he had orders
from Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Florida, Kentucky and Tennessee. He
will stock his ranch in Kansas this spring and summer with a view to
supplying the West and Southwest with grades and full bloods.



A SCARE IN MISSOURI.


Information was received at the Department of Agriculture, at
Washington, last week that a new and heretofore unknown cattle disease
has broken out in various parts of Missouri. It was reported most
prevalent in the vicinity of Mexico.

As is usual in such matters when first brought to public notice the
facts have been greatly exaggerated. Dr. Salmon, Chief of the Government
Veterinary Bureau, who was in Chicago this week, says that as presented
to him at Washington he did not consider the outbreak a very serious
one. The trouble so far as he knows exists in but a single herd, and
that near Mexico. He promptly sent a veterinarian to the spot to
investigate and report. He judges from the information he has received
that the disease is simply the impaction of food in the stomach,
something far from uncommon at this season of the year. It results
generally from eating the dried fodder of the corn-fields. It is in no
sense contagious.

Perhaps our veterinary editor will give us something regarding the
treatment of this trouble. In the meantime we give a remedy suggested by
a Missouri gentleman who called at this office last week: Keep in a
trough before the cattle at all times, a mixture of slaked lime and
salt, and let them have free access to good water.



PUBLIC SALES OF STOCK.


So far as they have come to our notice the following are the principal
stock sales announced thus far to take place in 1884:

March 19—Wm. Yule, Short-horns, Somers, Kenosha Co., Wis.

Feb. 21—A. G. Epler, Jerseys, Virginia, Ill.

March 26—D. L. Emery, Galva, Ill.

April 2—D. M. Fall, Albia, Iowa.

April 3—Elbert & Fall, Albia, Iowa.

April 10-11—Leonard Bros., Kansas City, Mo.

April 22—Ex’rs of L. Palmer, Chicago.

April 24—Saline Co. (Mo.) breeders.

April 30—S. W. & W. O. Sinclair, Ashland, Ill.

May 1—Hon. Wm. M. Smith, Lexington, Ill.

May 1-2—Lafayette Co. Breeders’ Association, at Higginsville, Mo.

May 13—Thos. H. Crowder and B. Z. & T. M. Taylor, Decatur, Ill.

May 15—R. Huston & Son, Chicago.

May 27—R. F. Burke, Camp Point, Ill.

May 27—J. C. Stone, Leavenworth, Kan.

May 28—J. S. Latimer, Abingdon, Ill.

May 29—Strawther Givens, Abingdon.

June 3—J. N. Brown’s Sons, Berlin, Ill.

June 4—S. E. Prather and D. W. Smith, Springfield, Ill.

June 5—Pickrell, Thomas & Smith, Harristown, Ill.

June 6—J. H. Potts & Son, Jacksonville, Ill.

June 11—W. Cummings & Son, Buda, Ill.

June 17—T. W. Harvey, Short-horns, Chicago.

June 19—R. Huston & Son, Chicago.

June 20—T. W. Harvey, Holsteins and Jerseys, Chicago.

Hagan W. Williams (Short-horns), St. Marys, Kas., Feb. 8.

H. H. Lackey & Son (Short-horns), Peabody, Kas., Feb. 27 and 28.

A. B. Matthews (Polled-Angus and Galloways), Kansas City, March 12 and
13.

G. W. Henry (Polled-Angus and grade Short-horns), Kansas City, March 26
and 27.

John X. Giffith (Short-horns), Shenandoah, Iowa, April 1.

M. H. Cochrane (Polled cattle), Chicago, April 2 and 3.

M. H. Cochrane (Polled cattle), Kansas City, April 8 and 9.

Thos. Hughes (Short-horns), Chicago, April 9 and 10.

George Leigh (Imp. Herefords), Chicago, April 10.

Leonard Bros. (Polled cattle), Kansas City, April 15, 16, and 17.

Prather G. Bennett (Short-horns), Safford, Kas., April 18.

C. M. Gifford & Son (Short-horns), Manhattan, Kas., April 23.

R. L. McDonald (Short-horns) St. Joe, Mo., April 30.

Jackson Co. Breeders (Short-horns), Kansas City, May 6, 7, and 8.

H. D. Ayres (Short-horns), Breckenridge, Mo., May 9.

Leonard Bros. (Polled cattle), Kansas City, May 13, 14, and 15.

W. P. Young (Short-horns), Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, May 27.

J. G. Gowan & Son and Col. Thad Hickman (Short-horns), St. Joe, Mo., May 28.

J. S. Latimer & Sons (Short-horns), Abingdon, Ill., May 28.

W. T. Hearne (Short-horns), Lee’s Summit, Mo., May 29.

Clinton County, Mo., Breeders (Short-horns), Plattsburgh, June 4 and 5.

Thoroughbred Live Stock Association, Higginsville, Mo., Oct. 15 and 16.

Adams Earl (Herefords), Chicago, Nov. 20.



REMEDY FOR FOOT-AND-MOUTH DISEASE.


Rev. F. H. Brett, Carsington Rectory, writes as follows to the English
agricultural papers:

Some few years ago, when the foot-and-mouth disease was prevailing, I
gave a farmer in this parish, who had the disease among his cattle, some
sulphur_ous_ acid, and advised him to make trial of the following
treatment: To put about two ounces of the acid into a quart bottle and
fill up with water, and then give about a tablespoonful of this dilution
three times a day to the diseased cattle. He acted upon my advice, and
the result was that his cattle were quickly cured of the disease. Again,
two or three weeks ago one of my parishioners came to me to inform me
that one of his cows was affected with this disease, and to ask me if I
could give him anything for it. I gave him some of the same acid, to be
used as above stated, and advised him also to burn a little sulphur in
the shed in which the diseased cow was kept, two or three times a day.
He followed my advice, and three or four days after I was informed that
the cow was doing nicely, and was giving her milk again. My confidence
in the remedy is therefore confirmed, and I think I am in duty bound to
make it as widely known as possible. In addition to giving the acid
internally, I advised the moistening of the affected feet also with the
same dilution with a sponge.

The sulphur_ous_ acid acts remedially, I conclude, by being destructive
of the life of the microbes, or exceedingly minute animaculæ, that gives
rise to the disease; and I feel persuaded that, if the owners of cattle
would take the trouble to burn a little sulphur once or twice a week in
their cattle sheds, they would not only protect their cattle from
attacks of foot-and-mouth disease, but have them also in a more healthy
and vigorous condition, especially in the season of tying-up and
confinement.

I have underlined the last syllable of sulphurous to guard against
mistake. Sulphur_ic_ acid would only be productive of mischief.
Sulphur_ous_ acid may be obtained through any druggist in sealed
stoppered bottles at a small expense.

The simplest way of burning sulphur in the cowsheds is as follows: Take
a slip of cardboard, or of extra stout brown paper, about a foot long
and two inches wide, and place on one extremity about as much
coarsely-powdered brimstone as would lie on a penny piece, hold it by
the other end, and apply the flame of a candle till the sulphur is
ignited, and then wave it about in the shed, in order to disperse the
vapor among the cattle; if there be straw, or anything else inflammable
about, hold a tile, or something of the sort, in the other hand, under
the burning sulphur, to catch any that may drop.



[Illustration]

THE DAIRY

Dairymen, Write for Your Paper.


THE WISCONSIN DAIRYMEN.

The papers and discussions at Lake Mills comprehended quite a range of
topics, and they were handled with marked ability. Three of the essays
have now appeared in THE PRAIRIE FARMER in full. They were too good to
slaughter by abridgment, and the same remark applies to other papers,
yet our space is too limited for an unabridged report.


THE ROAD TO THE FACTORY,

by Robt. Fargo, showed the people how much they are losing by persisting
in having poor roads, when by a small expense they might have good ones.
The road tax is improperly applied. He thought that a good gravel road
in most localities could be made for $1,000 per mile, the road-bed to be
graveled one foot deep and twelve feet wide.


CANADA VS. WISCONSIN.

Mr. Harris’ paper, printed in last week’s FARMER, elicited considerable
discussion. Members desired to know if, in the essayist’s opinion,
Canadian dairy management was superior to that of the States, and
especially of Wisconsin. The reply was in the affirmative. There seems
to be more thoroughness on the part of Canadian dairymen. They have no
better grass, nor water, nor cows. They discriminate more rigidly
between good and bad patrons. They sometimes bring the law to bear
against those who water milk or skim it. The factories there are mostly
owned by stock companies. When tainted milk is discovered in the vat, it
is traced back as soon as possible to its source, and the patron
bringing it is excluded. The law there is similar to that in New York
and was founded upon that law. Mr. Fish related an instance where a
fraudulent patron in Herkimer county, N. Y., had been detected, sued,
and heavily fined for his practices. Mr. Harris said as inspector of
factories, he always refused to receive milk from cows allowed to feed
on slough grass or drink stagnant water. Such milk would always prevent
the manufacture of good cheese. He wants no milk from cows forced to
feed on marshes. When a man applies to a factory to sell his milk, he
looks the man over, he visits his farm, he looks at the stables and all
the surroundings, and he can generally tell whether or not it is safe to
receive that man’s milk.


COMPETITION.

It cropped out in this discussion that in some parts of Wisconsin and
Illinois there are too many factories. Competition leads factorymen to
often receive milk that should be discarded. To offend a man by
enforcing strict cleanliness, non-skimming, and stripping was to drive
him to a neighboring factory and his custom is lost. It is hard to make
owners of cows honest when dishonest or selfish factorymen encourage
them in selfish and fraudulent ways. Mr. Harris said at some of the best
Canadian factories patrons were refused the privilege of taking home the
whey in their milk cans. He would have no objection to their taking the
whey if all would cleanse their cans properly. But this could not be
depended upon.


WATER IN MILK.

He detects water in milk by means of a little German instrument called
Horren’s Milk Tester, patented in Hanover. They cost fifty cents each by
the 100. They are for sale by Cornish & Curtis, Ft. Atkinson, Wis., and
by some others of the dairy supply concerns. This little instrument is
invaluable to the factoryman.


PRIDE IN BUSINESS.

Another thing about the Canadians is they take such pride in their
business that they are not given to adulterating their butter and
cheese. They make a cheese that sells as the best cheddar in the English
markets. The best Wisconsin cheese that Mr. Harris saw at the Milwaukee
dairy fair was several points below the best Canadian article. The
difference lies in the want of skill in the maker, and the greed of the
patrons which often leads them to skim and to withhold the strippings.


SKIMMING.

There were those present who claimed that more money can be realized by
making both butter and cheese than from cheese alone, though its quality
makes it bring a higher price. So long as this is the case such will
continue to make skim cheese. They say a man must be governed by the
market he is to supply. If one makes for a home market where skim cheese
is liked it is all right to make butter from the same milk. It was
replied that as our dairymen in general must look abroad for their
market, that good, straight, full cream cheese is bound to win in the
long run. When the foreign market for the Wisconsin product is
destroyed it will take years of honest effort to rebuild the old
reputation.


THE CHEDDAR.

The cheddar cheese of Canada is made by drawing off the whey while it is
sweet, the curd being allowed to sour afterward. It takes too long to
make this cheese to suit the Western cheese-maker. But you can not make
the best cheese in a hurry. There is more nutriment in the cheddar than
in the common cheese of the States.


BY THE ACRE.

Mr. Hiram Smith said in his paper that he computes his butter and cheese
by the acre, meaning that his effort is to see how much dairy product he
can get from an acre of ground. The herd of cows that can produce the
most from a mow of hay or a given amount of pasturage is the best herd.
That system which will take 1,000 lbs. of feed and get the most from it
is the best system. He plows up about four acres of pasture every year,
and proposes to reduce the acreage of his pasture thus gradually to the
end. He grows feed for the cows on the acres plowed up. It is the
cheapest method. He uses green feed, bran, straw, roots, etc. This gives
the most milk at the least expense. He uses the submerging system of
butter-making. A bushel basket full of pounded ice twice per day will
keep milk cool regardless of weather. Cool the milk suddenly no matter
what the system. Four pounds of butter from 100 pounds of milk is all he
expects to get in summer. In fall, perhaps another pound, but it will
not be of so high a grade.


THE HOLSTEINS.

Mr. Curtis, of New York, said a good word for the Holsteins as dairy
stock. At the Cornell University farm they come in at two years, are
milked seven or eight years, and then fattened for beef. He would not
recommend this system for all breeds.


CALVES.

Mr. Northup said he can raise better calves on skimmed milk than on
whole milk. Others agreed with him, and a few differed, asking what the
Lord put the cream in milk for. Reply: to mix with butterine.


ITEMS.

Professor Henry mentioned some of the experiments now being carried on
at the State University to show the value of different stock foods,
tile, drainage, etc. He is feeding cotton seed meal, malt, sprouts, oil
cake, ensilage, etc. Cotton seed meal induces a very rich flow of milk.

Mr. Smith thinks skimmed milk worth 35 cents per 100 pounds for
cheese-making, for those who have a demand for that kind of cheese.

Mr. Favill, of Walworth county, set the teeth of the dairymen on edge,
by asserting and proving by figures that he could make more money from
same outlay in beef making in six months, than any of them could in a
year from the dairy. Mr. F. will write out his experience in this line
for THE PRAIRIE FARMER at an early day.

We cut short our notes of the discussions somewhat, to make room for Mr.
Smith’s instructive essay on


NEGLECTED OPPORTUNITIES.

So long as it is true that the average yield, per cow, in milk that is
taken to the factories is less rather than more than 3,000 pounds per
season, and so long as it is true that there are dairymen whose cows
yield from 4,000 to 5,000 pounds each per season, it will be easy to
make it appear there are neglected opportunities on the part of most
dairymen which, if availed of, would greatly augment the annual yield,
and consequently make larger the profits.

One of the fundamental truths in stock-raising, and in profitable milk
production, is, that it takes a given amount of food to support the
animal’s existence in such a way that it will simply maintain its
status; and that growth in flesh or yield in milk, above an evenly
balanced existence, must come from the food given to cause an increase
of weight in flesh, fat, or milk products. Hence, all the profit must
come from that excess, and is large or small just in proportion as the
animal is capacitated to utilize and digest it, within the bounds of
healthy, judicious feeding. So that farmer was sound who, when he fed up
to the very verge of that limit, and was told by a skeptic that he did
not believe high feeding paid, replied he was only sorry that his cows
could not healthfully digest more. The capital invested in the cows, in
the soil, in the barns and stables, in the care and time devoted to
milking and waiting on them, is very nearly the same, whether they
produce 3,000 pounds each per season, or 5,000 pounds. At first it may
be granted that if a farm is stocked to its capacity in feeding a herd
of 3,000-pound cows, that some outside food must be imported from other
soil to enable the same herd to yield 5,000 pounds each. But the
enriching of the manure through high feeding, and the consequent
enriching of the land, will soon obviate the necessity of the
importation of outside food. If this is not true, I admit that my
opinion is based on false premises; and that the opponents of high
feeding have the best of the argument, as well as a majority of the
disciples, and a majority of the thinly-covered bones of the so-called
dairy stock of the State. In support of the idea that there is an added
value to the manure through high feeding, it may be stated that there
are many places in the Eastern States in which in estimating the
earnings of the cow each year, that the milk, or butter and cheese, the
calf and the pork are not only counted, but $10 per well-fed cow is
added for the increased value she has put upon the soil, deposited it in
a bank that never breaks. What is true of the old East is fast becoming
true of the soil of the older settled portions of Wisconsin. To augment
the productive capacity of a given number of acres, that will now
support in semi-starvation a given number of cows, to a point in
fertility that will add 2,000 pounds of milk per annum to each cow, milk
worth, say $20, is to have the funds in hand to pay the sum of $400 as
interest on the added value to an ordinary farm of eighty acres that is
made to well keep twenty cows, instead of keeping them in the usual way.
Four hundred dollars will pay 5 per cent interest per annum on an added
value of $100 per acre to the farm. This can be done without adding a
cow to the herd. All done by a simple expansion, through better use of
the capital already in the hands of many who work on the semi-starvation
plan.

The very first neglected opportunity of the mass of farmers is, that
they do not see, and do not make much effort to see, that there is a
better way than to plow, and plow, and plow, seldom seed down, keep a
few head of spindling cows, mostly to give birth to spindling calves,
that by a stretch of the imagination may be called cows when five or six
years old; sell such cows, instead of selling butter and cheese to buy
their clothes and groceries, sell hay to buy their whisky, and their
farms by the bushel to pay for them if in debt, or to add some
improvements in buildings if they are not. It would be useless to
further describe them—they are not here, as they never go to dairy
conventions, or even to county agricultural meetings or annual fairs;
and so any rebuke of their methods would not reach their ears. Let them
pass; the chief regret for their fate being that their name is legion,
and that they seem to be beyond the reach of mercy.

The next class, and the one for which this association has much
missionary work to do, is the one that has shown some signs of progress;
that is still in unbelief of the radical truth, but yet seems to be
uttering the invocation of doubting Thomas, of old. The most marked
neglect of opportunity by this class is in not accepting the truth
alluded to previously, that it pays to transform 2,500 and 3,000-pound
cows into 4,000 and 5,000-pound ones, through the process of more
generous, and better paying feeding. Many of this class know that a
paying flow of milk comes only from food judiciously given; but who have
not yet learned the programme by which such food can be ever on hand, or
do not possess the intelligent enterprise to put forth the means to
obtain it. As this is, largely, the hopeful class, we may well pray for
their growth in dairy grace, in the knowledge of the truth, as it is
exemplified in the reliable experience of the few saints in the
business, who know how to make good common cows earn $50 and $60, and
more, each, per annum.

Observation and my factory books for a series of years, teach that
persons of this class start out well in the spring, and have cows that
maintain the flowing stream for awhile, so that the
four-and-five-thousand pound yield would be obtained if they did not
suffer it to come to grief, by not providing means to hedge against the
immediate and consequent influences of the first serious check in the
supply of palatable and easily digested food in the pastures. This is
the great fatality of the whole business—a tolerated calamity as we may
call it, for it endures a lapse that can not afterward be made good, the
same season. It is to the paying yield of the cow what an untimely frost
is to an unmatured corn crop. It is my firm belief that this is the
great sin of the medium good dairyman of this and other dairy
States,—the cause of the low average earnings of the cows; the reason
why so many dairymen work so cheaply; the promoter of infidelity in the
mind of the dairyman as to whether he has not made a mistake in entering
upon the dairy business at all; in short, it is the chief “neglected
opportunity” to get upon the highway to success. That opportunity, when
interpreted, means that when the chief available supply of food fails,
or lessens, or becomes unpalatable or undigestible, that a substitute
previously provided should be immediately supplied. Let the substitute
be early rye, clover, oats, millet, corn, or other fodder, grown for the
purpose, according to the time in the season in which the pressing need
comes; and if neither are in available time, then let the substitute
take the form of ground grain in larger measures than should be given to
every cow in milk, every day, even when feeding on the flushest and
choicest of grasses. That is the way the 5,000-pound to the cow dairymen
do; and they win in doing it. But the blighted class seem to look upon
it as they would on an accidental fire, an untimely death, an early
frost, an unavertable calamity; a kind of Providential dispensation, the
superstitious regard it. The latter class betake themselves to prayer
for rain, instead of taking the scoop-shovel to the provender, and
distributing it to their famishing herds. Troops of them don’t know that
they are suffering any but present loss in weight, and delude themselves
into thinking a blessed rain will restore their cows to the position
they fell from. They don’t seem to comprehend that they thus lose their
grip on the $50 and $60 per annum prize, and their uncertainty of
getting it. The result is, they have their big flow of milk at the
season of the year in which dairy products are ever the cheapest; and
their cows are crippled for good performance at the pail, when
ever-returning good prices in the fall and early winter show them what
golden opportunities they have lost.

Now I can look over my list of patrons and see in my mind’s eye the men
who practice both the systems I allude to. One is the discomforted,
doubting dairyman with but too little to show for his hard work; and the
other has a good bank account, or a plethoric purse, and his sharpest
look is given in search of more good cows, whose owners don’t know any
more than to sell them. There is not a whine about them, nor do they go
into a decline because another half-cent could not be squeezed out of
the cheese market. Their talk is, content with “well done,” and their
cure for hard times is, “more milk.”

The most manifest loss, as it appears to one taking note of merely
dollars and cents, in the prosecution of any special pursuit comes to
light in the dairy business, from this the chief neglected opportunity
of the dairymen to gain more wealth.

There are other neglected opportunities,—minor matters in
themselves—that if improved would make the goal of the enterprising
dairymen easier of attainment, and are, therefore, desirable adjuncts in
accomplishing his purposes, and they seem to be concomitants of
measurably high success. One is in not properly testing the real
profit-earning capacity of each cow, and weeding out those that are not
only not profitable but are actually, year after year, eating into the
profits derived from other, and it may be not so good appearing cows.
Profitable performance not only at the pail, but at the churn and the
cheese-vat, should alone give a cow respite from coming, in her youth,
to the butcher’s block.

Another, is that there is a woeful benightedness in providing stables
suitable to milk in, and easy and healthful for the cows to live in, as
they should be allowed to do for more than half of the hours of the
year. The advanced dairymen who have plank floors daily littered,
cleaned, and cleansed, drops in the floor, and clean walks in the rear
of the cows, well-ventilated, but warm, non-freezing stables, would be
amazed and disgusted to enter what I greatly fear are a majority of the
stables of the State, in which the cows are thrust to endure a painful
and filthy existence. When purity of product has a great influence in
gauging the price, and the health of consumers is at stake, this neglect
in providing better and more cleanly stabling is one of the crying ills
of our dairy system. I am glad to know that the supervision of the
health officials of Milwaukee extends to the stables of the cows that
produce the milk that is allowed to be sold in that city. It would be
well if it was made the imperative duty of the health officials of every
town to forcibly establish the blessings of a decent civilization in the
cow stables of more than half of the farmers of Wisconsin. I am moved to
thus speak because of what I have seen—and smelled. I will not quarrel
with a man who claims the unalienable right to rot, as a hermit, but I
deny his right to freely make and sell to others, unwholesome food, into
which he has mingled filth and the germs of disease and death. It is
shameful to neglect to provide good and healthful stables for
food-producing dairy stock—one that calls for vengeance on a
criminality.

Another neglected opportunity of the dairymen to increase the number of
head their farms might subsist, and thus increase their profits,
especially those who occupy our highest priced lands, is in their
declining to adopt the system of soiling. I do not know of a highly
successful dairyman in the State who has not adopted it, in part, at
least—enough to save his cows when famine is in sight. Neither do I
believe there is one who would not be more successful if he should
practice it more. The arrived-at goal of the select few who keep as many
cows as they have acres of land, has been reached by and through the
soiling process; and approximate successes like theirs must be achieved
by traveling the same route. There are those who are ensmalling their
pastures, and at the same time, increasing their herds, because the
lands taken from the pasture and devoted to soiling crops produce more
than the old herds can consume. The wandering cow feeds herself, in
fact, from what might be the choicest product of her own milk, tramps
the life out of much more, and tosses her head in disdain at much that
if cut and properly fed in the stall, she would eat with a relish; so
that it may be safely said that two, and some practical men say three,
cows might be well-fed through soiling, on the same land that one is by
the system of exclusive pasturing.

Another, it may well be called the lost opportunity—that grows out of
the neglected ones alluded to, is that the cows are not kept in good
milking condition more of the time of the year. The men who seize and
utilize the few opportunities I have mentioned very soon learn that they
have an almost perpetual fount of wealth; and that they can not afford
to dry it up, and wait for spring. Putting in more time for the cow to
produce, inevitably convinces them of the fact that the larger part of
the cow’s earnings are made when dairy products are high in price; and
they are dull, indeed, if they do not see in that a revelation that more
winter dairying would pay. I am aware that the flippant answer made by
those disinclined to adopt soiling and winter dairying, is, that they
involve employment of more manual labor on a given number of acres, and
that reliable farm labor is hard to get and troublesome to keep. This is
the first superficial pretext of nine-tenths of those advanced enough to
ever give these subjects a serious thought. Nevertheless, the practice
of these innovations are essential in the higher grade of farming; and
that practice, instead of being an ill, is a blessing to the farm, to
the farmer, to his older children, and to the hired laborer; for it
gives all of them steady and profitable employment, while the present
system requires the far greater proportion of labor in the spring and
summer months, and furnishes less to do in winter for the hired man and
the grown-up boys and girls. They thus lounge, often, in debasing
idleness, or are early weaned from the farm, and go away, never to
return to partake of its real, invigorating life, its independence, and
its joys. The dairy, with the accompaniment of soiling and more
production of dairy products in the winter, would make the farm more
like a factory, with every wheel in motion almost the entire year. The
home and the family of the dairy farmer should be as large as the
capacity of the man and the woman at the helm; and as steady employment
as that which must be given to the store or shop would go a long way in
developing and increasing the capacity of the whole force to manage
more. Giving regular employment to good men on the farm makes it far
easier to get and to keep them; and it retains a more brawny set of men,
who are otherwise enticed to the factories and railways that give steady
work, and so have the pick of the intelligent and most reliable ones. It
is an accomplishment in a farmer and his wife to know how to get, and
how to keep good, faithful hired men. I know of those who are slaves,
because they don’t know how. Many of them ascribe it to the men, when
they themselves are principally at fault. There is a mortal dread of
“tramps,” especially among the more ignorant farmers. But I aver that
the common system of almost exclusive grain farming that crowds most of
the labor of the year into a few spring and summer months, is a direct
cause of much of the tramp evil of which so many farmers complain. It
manufactures the tramps who rove from necessity, and even drives out
their own children to swell the ranks of those in search of a job. On
the other hand, a large increase of milk-stock kept on the farm
necessitates the retention of most of the manual force of the summer
months. Not how to dispense with hired labor or the labor of his
children, but how to profitably employ and elevate it, and make it
inviting, rather than abhorrent and slavish, is the problem the
progressive farmer should study to solve. The manufacturer counts upon
additional gains through the addition of well-employed laborers. The
farmer could do the same if he used more educated brains and a little
less over-taxed muscle in his business. The bulk of every fortune
steadily acquired, consists of the success of its possessor in getting,
honestly or dishonestly, a profit from the labors of others. This must
be so, so long as it is an axiom in political economy that labor is the
basis of all wealth. The owner of the soil can succeed in winning more
than a pro rata proportion, just in the ratio of his ability to make his
brains help the work of his hands.

I know of whole sections, and even contiguous miles square, on which the
system of farming prevails that I have condemned—the hired man is
unknown, save only for short periods of the year—the children gone to
the cities, to the factories, the railroads, or to the West—the land
denuded of stock, almost, as well as of the rightful ones to care for
it; and half-impoverished farms, half farmed by the old folks, or
continuously cropped on shares by more indigent neighbors. Possessions
that by nature are as fair as ever the sun shone upon, that do not, and
can not now pay five per cent interest on $25 per acre; when well
managed dairy farms in the same county pay more than that per cent on a
basis of $100 per acre. In view of these patent facts that stare us in
the face, is it any wonder that some of us feel we have a loud call to
dispense the pure dairy gospel to these perishing sinners who thus
neglect their grand opportunities.

In some one of the first sentences of this paper I alluded to the
influence of good and profitable farming in improving the condition and
standing of the farmer, as a man among men. This, after all, is the
crowning objective point, or should be, of all those who make the most
of the opportunities the great mass neglect. If with all his getting a
man does not get some real wisdom, some development in stalwart
morality, and a higher cultivation of the mind, it needs no Solomon or
Bible to tell the on-lookers that he is a comparative failure; and it
ought to be apparent to himself. The legitimate profits of a higher
grade of farming ought to be expended to elevate the farmer, his wife,
his children, and all the attendants whom he directs. Part of them
should appear in the form of better and more comfortable houses and
barns, finer stock, better horses, better roads and school-houses, a
larger list of newspapers and periodicals, better libraries and better
housekeeping, and more cheery houses in which intelligence and music are
not strangers. It is as important that a man should spend his earnings
aright, as that he should use his energies and talents to earn. It is
not a manly element in a man whose chief forte is that he can hold all
he can get. A clam can do that, and not suffer much, either, in a
comparison of brains with the groveling getter of mere wealth. The high
behest to earn much, by and through grand opportunities to labor and
direct labor, blossoms into blessing in its best sense only when the
earnings are spent to increase the intelligence, add to the comforts,
and aid men to discharge their private and public duties more nobly than
it is possible for a man to do with an income that simply gives him
bread.

Because the earnings of the farm are not more frequently spent in thus
installing a section of paradise on the farm, is the real cause of the
stampede therefrom of many of the smart ones who deem the struggle for
elevation there a hopeless one, and, catching an inspiration from the
shriek of civilization that announces each swiftly flying train, they
turn their backs on what have been to them farm dungeons, and mingle
with the surging throng in quest of a better condition. That they are
often mistaken and baffled in taking such a route, does not deter a new
crowd from going. They fly from what they dread, as much as they are
inspired by what they hope to win. These things ought not so to be; and
a wise improvement of the many neglected opportunities on the farm would
go far to rectify the ills they fly from, but from which yet few escape.

Say what we will about all its defects, its uninviting toil, and low
wages, agriculture disenthralled of its ignorance is the basis rock of
our hope; and he is a slanderer of the noblest occupation who raises the
veil to expose its defects and servility for any other purpose than to
help make greener its verdure, and brighten its bloom.

       *       *       *       *       *

REMEMBER _that $2.00 pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _from this
date to January 1, 1885; For $2.00 you get it for one year and a
copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED STATES,
FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any first-class
weekly agricultural paper in this country._

       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

HORTICULTURAL

Horticulturists, Write for Your Paper.


THE FARMER’S GARDEN.

BY J. M. SMITH.

A few years ago it was necessary for me to call upon a gentleman upon
some business. After my business was completed and I was about to leave,
I started toward the garden. He called to me saying, “Do not go
there—you can not get through the garden.” I arrived at the border and
stopped. He had evidently complied with one of the necessities of a good
garden, viz., plenty of manure, for it is simply impossible for weeds to
grow at the rate, or attain the size they had there, except upon very
rich land.

Rabbits would have been perfectly secure from foxes, and foxes from
dogs, in that immense and tangled growth of weeds.

The owner of that garden was one the best and most enterprising farmers
in the State. He had at one time been president of his State
agricultural society.

Many years ago I visited a friend living upon a 160 acre farm. It was
one of the most beautiful section farms that I have ever seen either in
this or any other State. While there I was speaking of a splendid crop
of melons that were then just ripening. He said, in rather a fretful
manner, “I do not see why my melons do not grow. I know the land is
rich, and there are no weeds in the hills. I hoed them all up only a few
days ago.” I walked out to his garden with him, and there were his poor,
puny vines struggling for life. As he said, there were no weeds in the
hills, a little circle of perhaps two or three feet in diameter had been
hoed out, and the balance of the land was covered with a dense growth of
weeds from two to six feet in height.

He had a most industrious and refined lady for a wife, and young
children growing up around him, and, as before stated, a most excellent
as well as valuable farm. Yet not one early pea or one ear of sweet
corn; not even early potatoes or a tomato, or, in fact, anything that by
any stretch of the imagination could be called a garden bed—yet the man
has been to college.

Another gentleman said in my presence, “In the spring, at the proper
time, I purchase cabbage seed and sow them; when it is time to set them
out I buy the plants and plant them; when it is time for cabbages they
are _there_, and so I always have cabbages.”

He is among the very best farmers in the State. He teaches others how to
farm, and does it well. The man who attacks him in a convention needs a
strong cause and a ready tongue, or he will be apt to consider his own
cause a very poor one before he gets through with it. This man has been
president of a State dairymen’s association.

One case more: Another gentleman, who is far above the average farmer,
and who has also been president of a State dairymen’s association, as
well as a public teacher, as he was going out to attend a farmers’
meeting or convention, where he was expected to be a teacher, happened
to look out over the place where his garden should have been, and saw an
immense growth of weeds going to seed. He said to his sons and hired
men, “Boys, bring out a team and hitch to the mower, and mow off the
garden; I can not conscientiously go and teach others how to farm with
that crop of weeds going to seed in my own garden.” The work was done.
“There,” said he, “I can now go and teach without a troubled conscience.
There are no weeds going to seed in my garden.”

I have strong hopes of this gentleman. He has a conscience. He attends
church; and although I consider him intellectually as far superior to
most of the preachers of the day, yet if the right man should become his
pastor, I fully believe that there is salvation for him even in this
life.

As to the other three the case seems at least to be a very doubtful one.
One can not but be reminded of the anecdote of the three little boys who
had commenced studying the catechism. Some one asked them if they had
learned any of it? “Oh, yes,” says one of them, “I am past
justification.” A second one says, “I am past sanctification.” The third
jumps up and says, “I have beat them all; I am clear past redemption.”
It is much to be feared that the three first described gentlemen are
all of them clear past redemption.

Let us turn for a moment to a farmer’s garden of another order. He has a
beautiful as well as an excellent farm. Around his house are quite a
number of handsome trees that stood there when the Indians were the
proprietors of the soil. The present owner has added such other trees as
he thought would add both to its beauty and comfort. The house is a
number of rods from the highway, and in the summer is one of the most
beautiful rural homes that I ever saw. Back of, and near by, the house
is his garden. It is so arranged that most of its crops can be
cultivated with a horse and cultivator. A nice asparagus bed furnishes
not only himself and family an abundant supply of this the first as well
as one of the best of the products of the outdoor garden, but also a
quantity to sell. His strawberry beds, containing only a few of the
standard varieties and a very few plants of some of the most promising
of the new ones, were models of both beauty and economy in their
arrangement for cultivating both well and cheaply. The same was true of
his peas, beans, sweet corn, cabbages, potatoes, etc. His raspberries,
both red and black-caps, furnished an abundant supply for the family
during their season. The same is true of his blackberries and grapes.

A short distance from these well cared-for necessaries and luxuries of
his farm is a moderate-sized and well cared-for orchard. I have no doubt
he can, if he wishes, have some of the products of his orchard or
garden, or both, upon his table every day of the year.

The gentleman who owns and controls this farm has never been president
of any State dairymen’s association, nor has he ever been sent to
Congress. But, gentlemen, he is one of the most thoroughly wide awake
and enterprising, as well as one of the very best farmers that Wisconsin
can boast of; and we have some good ones.

The question very naturally arises, Why is it that so many, not only of
our common, but of our very best farmers, fail to have anything that can
be called even a poor garden? It is not because they do not like its
products.

Time and again have men who were good farmers, when looking over my
grounds, said: “Well, it is too bad that I have not had a decent garden;
but I am determined to have one after this, and will neglect it no
longer.” I have no recollection of any farmer’s family among my
acquaintances who would not enjoy its products. Perhaps the best reason,
and often the only one, that can be given for so many almost entire
failures in this respect is the want of time. It is a well-known fact
that almost all of our farmers are short of the help they really need to
keep their farms in good condition. Something is sure to be neglected,
and, in three cases out of four, if not in nine out of ten, the poor
garden is the first thing that is left to care for itself, which it
generally does by growing a tremendous crop of weeds.

It is perfectly useless to attempt to have a respectable garden, unless
arrangements are made in the spring for its planting and cultivation
with the same care that arrangements are made for the care of the wheat,
oats, corn, or potato crop, or the care of the dairy.

When these arrangements are made and faithfully carried into execution
during the season, then shall we see good gardens upon our farms; and
not only that, but, as a rule, they will be the best paying pieces of
land upon the farm, not only in the comfort they give to the family, but
in the profit as well.

I do not propose at this time to give you a treatise upon gardening. A
few hints that may be of value to those who wish to make some
improvement, is all that will be attempted.

In the first place, select, if you can have a choice, a piece of light,
loamy soil, with a little sand, if you can get it. A heavy clay soil
will raise as large a crop as the one above mentioned, but it is not as
early, and is much more expensive and different to work. In laying out a
garden on a farm take plenty of room, and arrange the goods in such a
manner that the greatest possible amount of work can be performed with
the horse.

The selection of seeds is to me the most annoying and perplexing job of
the season. The circulars come pouring in, and are filled with the names
of new varieties of this and that and the other, each better than any
other of its kind, and so very desirable that you are apt to think that
you must have a few of the seeds just to try them.

Of course, there is occasionally some improvement made in vegetables and
plants but it is safe to say that in nineteen cases out of twenty the
farmer or the amateur who invests in some new varieties of seeds or
plants upon the recommendation of his circular, loses both money and
time by the operation. If I should record my own experience in this line
during the past twenty-five years, the result would show that I have
drawn an occasional prize and a marvelous number of blanks, and some of
them very annoying, as well as expensive ones.

I will give you a list of such seeds as have proven themselves to be
about the best that I can find, after years of experience:

    Asparagus—Conover’s Colossal.

    Beets—Early Egyptian for first early; Early Blood Turnip for
    fall and winter.

    Carrots—Early Scarlet-Horn.

    Parsnips—Common Dutch Hollow-crown.

    Ruta Bagas—American purple top, imp.

    Turnips—Flat Dutch.

    Bush Beans—German Dwarf Black Wax.

    Pole do.—Lima.

    Cucumbers—White Spine.

    Cabbage—First Early Jersey Wakefield; Fall and Winter, Prem.
    Flat Dutch.

    Celery—Golden Dwarf.

    Muskmelons—Early White, Japan, and Hackensack.

    Watermelons—Mountain Sweet.

    Cauliflower—Early Dwarf, Eurfart.

    Peas—Extra early Dan O’Rourke, American Wonder, Champion of
    England.

    Summer Squash—Round Scallop, American Turban, Hubbard.

    Lettuce—Curled Simpson and Boston Market.

    Pepper—Large Bell and Butternosed.

    Tomato—Trophy and Acme.

    Sweet Corn—Early Minn., Crosby’s Early, Stowell’s Evergreen.
    These if planted at same time will give proper succession.

    Radishes—French Breakfast, and Covent Garden.

When we come to the small fruits I will recommend as follows:
Strawberries—Wilson’s Albany seedling for main crop. If a few very
large ones are wanted try the No. 30, and the Sharpless. With me they
are both worthless except for the purpose of producing a few very large
berries. To lengthen out the season the Kentucky is the best of any that
I know of. Downer’s Prolific is also a fair bearer, of excellent
quality. I am constantly trying those of the new varieties that seem to
me most likely to do well, but almost invariably lose both time and
money. I have some twelve or fifteen varieties of these now on trial,
but presume the result with nearly or quite all, will be the same as
with hundreds of others I have had during the last twenty-five years,
viz., after two or three years of trouble and expense plow them under
for manure.

For raspberries, the Doolittle and the Mammoth Cluster have done nicely
among the black-caps. The Gregg is also highly recommended by those who
have tried it. I have not tried it a sufficient time to tell what it
will do with me. The Philadelphia is a standard among the reds, and
justly so. After two or three years’ trial I think very highly of the
Cuthbert, although with me it is not as hardy as the Philadelphia. In
fact, they all do better for being covered in winter.

Blackberries. For this portion of the State I know of nothing that I
believe would give better satisfaction than Stone’s Hardy.

Among currants, the Red and White Dutch are still the standards.

The Concord grape is yet among grapes about what the Wilson is among
strawberries—the standard for the million. The Worden, a seedling of
the Concord, is very promising, and may yet prove to be a strong
competitor in the race. The Delaware does splendidly in the Fox River
Valley, but is not as reliable in all parts of the State as the
above-named varieties.

I have tried to recommend nothing but what will do well with good fair
cultivation upon any good soil. Yet you will often be annoyed in
selecting seed, from the fact that the same seed is sent out by
different seedsmen under different names. For instance, I have had early
peas sent to me under different names and by different seedsmen and all
planted on the same day, side by side, all cared for precisely alike,
and all alike claiming to be remarkably early and prolific as well as
excellent in quality, and yet every one of them precisely like the old
extra early Dan O’Rourke that I used to grow, I do not know how many
years ago.

The American Wonder is the only one of the new varieties that I have
tried in many years that really seems to be an acquisition to our list.
It is a dwarf about second early, and with me a good bearer, and of
excellent quality. I mention this to show the farmer that as a rule it
is better for him to rely upon the old standard list, until some grower
with whom he is acquainted has fairly tested the new variety, and
ascertained whether or not they are worthy of cultivation, and some good
common sense are all that is needed to insure a good farmers garden. In
twenty-five years I have failed but once to harvest at least a paying
crop of strawberries, and most of the time they have been both large and
profitable. During that time I have failed once to have a corn crop, and
have a number of times failed to have a paying crop of potatoes; in
fact, I have failed oftener with my potatoes than with any other of the
long list of crops that I attempt to grow. Yet if I should say to the
farmers of this audience that they did not know how to grow a crop of
potatoes, they would consider themselves insulted, though I presume that
not one of them has had complete success with them for any long series
of years.

Peas and onions should be put in as early as the land is in good
condition to work in the spring. If the ground freezes hard soon after
they are sprouted it will not injure them. Parsnips, beets, carrots,
radishes, turnips, cabbage, cauliflower, lettuce, and salsify will all
bear a little frost after they come up, but not much.

Corn, beans, peppers, tomatoes, vines of all kinds, require a warm soil
and will do their best in no other.

A place for the wife and children’s flowers should not be forgotten or
neglected. Give them a place, furnish help to prepare and care for it,
and do not complain about the little time and expense it takes, either.
Probably you will neither eat nor sell the flowers, but they will pay
you better than a few extra bushels of wheat would. We are apt to hear
complaints at our conventions that the young men will persist in leaving
their farm home and seeking a new one in some of the towns or cities.
Well, when I am traveling in our own and in other States and see so many
desolate, dreary places that are called farmhouses—no trees, no
shrubbery, no fruit, no flowers, no garden, in fact, nothing but a shell
of a house, and some land, and it is fair to suppose that it is about as
cheerless inside the house as it is dreary outside of it, I often wonder
how, or why, any bright, active, wide-awake young man can stay there one
day after he is at liberty to leave.

Gentlemen, I know that there are many beautiful exceptions to the above
described homes, and that they are yearly becoming more numerous. If the
exceptions could become the universal rule, what a glorious Northwest we
should have! Presidents of State agricultural societies would not have
to warn their friends against attempting to get through the tangled mass
of weeds called the garden. The man who has been to college would no
longer fret because his vines could not grow. The President of the State
Dairymen’s Association would no longer buy cabbage plants or cabbage.
Neither would he be compelled to order out his team and mow his garden
before his conscience would allow him to teach others how to farm.

Instead of these, should be homes beautiful, homes bright, homes
happy—so happy that the young would be loath to leave and glad to
return. As our Northwest is the grandest portion of our republic, so
should our homes be the most beautiful, and the inmates thereof the most
intelligent as well as the happiest and most contented citizens of our
wide domain.



OUR FUTURE ORCHARDS.

Granting our Apple Orchards on High lands, Ridges, and Slopes
are Suffering, or Starving from Insufficient Moisture, What will
be our best course with them?


_Number Four._

In the first place, it may be well to enlarge a little on the subject of
deficient moisture the average orchard is liable to on prairie and all
other Western soils of a drift origin, where the strata lie nearly
parallel to the plane of the earth’s surface. Here there are, therefore,
few, if any, of those springs or fountains of water which often supply
abundant moisture to land of considerable slope and elevation. If this
difference in geological conditions is taken into account, it will
explain why, in many sections, orchards often do quite remarkably well
on hillsides and mountain slopes.

There is little or no resemblance between the apple tree and the orange
tree, when both are botanically considered; but considered from the
point of view as a source of fruit, the one is the best product of warm
climates, and the other of cold ones; both being esteemed nearly
universally. The orange being a very juicy, and at the same time, a
fruit in which sweet and sour are equally blended, requires a moist soil
and a large supply of water, in addition to a relatively high
temperature. Accordingly, when grown in warm but dry climates, as in
Spain and along the north shore of the Mediterranean, the ground bearing
orange trees is uniformly copiously irrigated two or three times a
month, during the warm season, and every two months in the winter. The
orange-producing portion of Louisiana is mostly confined to the sixty or
seventy square miles of cultivatable land along the Mississippi river
banks, south of New Orleans. Here the soil is alluvial and sandy, the
rainfall sixty or seventy inches per annum, and the state of the
atmosphere so continuously humid, as to drape all arboreal vegetation
with moss. Florida has the same rainfall, the same humid atmosphere, the
same moss, with the advantage of a soil quite as sandy, in which, as
constitutes elements, phosphoric acid and potash abound in far greater
proportions than in the alluvial of the Mississippi. And it is probably
due to this happy association of heat, humidity, a sandy soil, rich in
the phosphates of lime and salts of potash, that Florida oranges really
are, and are regarded the best in the world. But in spite of these
advantages, and another, no less important—that by capillary
attraction, through the sand—the orange roots have direct and easy
access to water beneath; it is found that the trees do better if mulched
to prevent evaporation during the cool months—they being the dry
season, while the summer months are the wet. The Louisiana
orange-growers go farther; they not only mulch liberally with rice straw
every year, but in addition, every third or fourth year, from eight
inches to a foot of the earth under the trees is removed and new earth
put in its place.

From these statements we get some idea of the amount of water the orange
tree demands in the soil, and the measure of moisture in the atmosphere,
to supply evaporation from its large evergreen leaf surface and fill its
fruit with juice. An apple tree is not an orange tree, to be sure, but
when in leaf, and bearing a heavy crop of fruit, the farmer must
necessarily make large drafts on the soil to meet the surface
evaporation and supply the required juice to its fruit. Every tree in
leaf is a pump, constantly drawing on the soil and drying it, and in all
reasonable probability the drafts are in proportion to fruit and
foliage. Has any body calculated the daily demand for moisture a
twenty-five-year old Northern Spy, or Baldwin, carrying twenty or thirty
bushels of apples makes on the soil beneath and around it during the hot
and dry months of August and September? The quantity probably is largely
in excess of the common estimate, and perhaps not half required by the
orange—but it is so much it affords a sufficient reason why such trees
grow faster, are healthier, and bear more and better fruit, on lands
that are moist, than on lands that are dry.

But orchards on high lands, or on slopes, or on slopes and ridges,
suffering for moisture, can not be removed to low lands, nor can they be
irrigated, except at an enormous expense. What then can be done? In the
first place, the annual rainfall can be held to the space it falls upon,
under the tree, by the throwing up a furrow or ridge around it, as far
out as the limbs extend, where the ground is level, and by a dam on the
lower side, when the ground slopes. The latter could also be made to
stay a portion of the rain falling on the higher ground above. Further:
a general system of mulching ought to be adopted; not for the purpose
alone of keeping the surface moist, but also for supplying food to the
roots as the mulch decays. If the orchard is in grass, clover, or weeds,
they should be mowed at least twice a year, the burden suffered to lie
on the ground and rot, or be thrown under the trees. After pruning, the
wood removed should either be left where it falls, or piled in heaps
about the orchard and suffered to rot as in the “hammock” land orange
groves of Florida, where the under brush and extra timber is rarely
burned, but piled in heaps to rot away.

If it is desirable to bring barren trees into bearing, or to rescue them
from decay and death those in an unhealthy state, measures of a more
radical and expensive character must be taken, measures similar to those
which have been practiced for centuries with the grape vine, with
complete success. These measures consist either in removing the earth
under the trees and putting new and fresh earth in its place, as
practiced with orange trees in Louisiana, and on the coffee plantations
in the tropics, or in digging a deep and wide ditch around the tree,
inside the outer diameter of the branches, and refilling it with near
half the earth removed and half such mineral fertilizers and amendments
as tree leaves and refuse decaying vegetable matter of any sort for the
other half.

But nothing more than a general outline of the course to be pursued can
be indicated here; and nothing more is necessary for the intelligent
amateur, fruit-grower, or orchardist, who feels the strength of the
proof, and accepts the situation.

In these latter days most of the diseases which afflict humanity are
believed to be attributable to improper nutrition and faulty hygiene,
and are relieved or cured by a more or less radical change in food and
habitat.

In the animal world, the truth appears in a still stronger light;
while in the vegetable kingdom, nutrition counts for almost everything.
Still, in the case of the peach yellows and pear blight, both appear, on
first sight, to be distinct diseases, neither yielding to any remedy yet
applied to them, and both being attended with the present fashionable
bacteria, which are made responsible for many diseases and all
epidemics. But has anybody yet made the experiment whether water
supplied copiously to the spare and thin roots of the pear will or will
not prevent the blight, or tried the same thing with the peach? We all
know the gigantic and venerable pear trees of the Wabash and Kaskaskia
country were planted on the sandy second bottoms of the rivers named,
where in their early youth, if not in their mature age, water was always
within easy reach of their roots; and we have seen the item in the
agricultural papers telling how one experimenter at least, has saved his
pear trees from blight by copious watering. The prairie and timber
country both are drying out and losing soil moisture very much faster
than we have any conception of. Situations where moisture in the soil
was abundant enough for all crop purposes twenty-five years ago,
suffered quickly after a brief drought now, and would be benefited by
irrigation where it would have been injurious fifty years before.
Beside, we have borrowed many of our ideas from the fruit-growing
experiences of the East, and they from the cooler and moister countries
of Europe. And in that way the amount of right teaching has been too
attenuated, until it is in many respects practically worthless.

    B. F. J.



THE MODEL ILLINOIS NURSERY.


We have visited in our time very many nurseries both East and West. We
have seen those East where the elaboration of landscape gardening was
made to add effect to and set off the nursery stock grown. We have seen
West hundreds of acres covered with stock in a single nursery. Yet we
have never seen the perfection of details coupled with strict accuracy
as to name in the varieties of stock grown, united to evenness and vigor
in growth, nor a stricter method displayed in adaptation of varieties
suited to the climate of the West, added to the most perfect cultivation
and handling of stock, than at the premium nurseries of Spaulding & Co.,
near Springfield, Ill.

These nurseries, covering 375 acres originally, of first-class land,
were thoroughly tile-drained, at heavy expense before anything was
planted thereon, the land having been first cleaned and stumped of its
timber. Thus, the groundwork having been laid for a great and model
nursery, under the management of Mr. J. B. Spaulding, a well-known
nurseryman of many years’ standing in Illinois, and whose practical
experience from a critical standpoint is perhaps broader than that of
any man in the West, it is not strange that whenever entered for premium
before the State Board of Agriculture, such should have been unanimously
awarded by the committee of examination. This, however, the records of
the board will show.

In speaking of the artistic adornment of some old and extensive
nurseries East, we find this difference: In the nurseries of Mr. J. B.
Spaulding the useful is never lost sight of. Mere ornament is not what
strikes the visitor, and yet the nursery is one beautiful picture in its
varied and blending colors of fruit, flowers, and foliage; for the
orchard and garden are by no means neglected—the visitor can find the
fruits themselves, the crucial test. It is worth the journey to see.

The immense stock, the ample building, the splendid drives, the office
connected with the Western Union Telegraph lines by telephone, and
everything pertaining to the great nursery, is kept in the most perfect
condition. Blight and borers are strangers to their 10,000 orchard trees
of pear, peach, chestnut, and apples, all of varieties unexcelled, and
adapted to the soil and climate of the West. The real gist of the whole,
however, lies in the record of sales of this nursery for the fall
delivery just closed, which amounts to nearly $120,000.

The most gratifying success has attended the efforts of this firm in
growing stock. Of 150,000 buds set the past season, comprising cherries,
pears, plums, and peaches, almost no rebudding has been required, and
their stand is unexampled. It is not strange that the firm have the
approval of the State Board of Agriculture and nurserymen of experience
East and West, especially from the large nurseries proprietors of
Western New York. All unite in saying Spaulding & Co.’s grounds,
comprising upward of 375 acres, thoroughly tile-drained, for the growing
of nursery stock, are unsurpassed. The 1,500,000 one, two, and
three-year old apple trees, and 175,000 one, two, and three-year old
cherry trees—the latter budded on Mahaleb roots, imported from
France—together with their enormous stock of evergreens, pears, roses,
shrubs, etc., are matchless in their perfection of growth, whether it be
from an Eastern or Western standpoint.

In driving through the nursery we were shown a large block of American
chestnuts, from five to eight feet high, and thence were driven to the
chestnut orchard nearly all in bearing. The chestnut here seems fully as
much at home as any other plant cultivated.

For the protection of their patrons against outside imposition, each of
their nearly one hundred selected salesmen are accredited with a
certificate of agency.

The long experience of this firm, being nearly thirty years in the
business at Springfield, Ill.; the reputation they enjoy; the approval
and indorsement they receive from the State—all commend this nursery to
the favorable attention of those who have ground upon which to plant
shrubbery or trees.



THE BASKET WILLOW.


A correspondent wishes some information about the basket willow. In
Onondaga county, Central New York, this willow is cultivated and
manufactured on a large scale and is, in fact, a leading industry. The
cultivation is increasing very rapidly and is a great benefit to this
and neighboring counties. The baskets made from this willow are better
and cheaper than the splint basket, and raising the stock is found to
pay much better than other farm crops, while the manufacture gives
employment to hundreds of men, women, and children, who would otherwise
have nothing to do during the winter.

These willows are grown on high land and on low land, on wet and dry
land, and on very cheap land, and on land that is worth one thousand
dollars per acre. The crop needs to be planted but once, and an average
yearly crop can not be worth less than one hundred dollars per acre. As
the timber suitable for baskets is getting scarce and dear, it is plain
that the demand for willow will increase every year. In most parts of
the country are Germans who understand working the willow, and it is a
great benefit to them and to their neighbors to have this industry
introduced. Not one farmer in a dozen has on his place as many baskets
as he needs, for the reason that they are scarce and dear. This willow
is the easiest thing in the world to raise, and yet we import from
Europe $5,000,000 worth a year.

About two hundred tons of willow are manufactured every year in one
little village in this State. One man in Syracuse told me he should send
to New York this winter one hundred and forty tons of peeled willow,
mostly of his own growing. In all the large cities more or less willow
is manufactured every year, and the amount thus worked in the city of
Milwaukee is very large. This industry is a benefit to the whole
community and deserves to be encouraged, and the West especially should
take a deep interest in extending it. The fact that it gives employment
to poor during the winter, thus making comfort take the place of want,
should exert a great influence in its favor. Here then is a means by
which the farmer can put money in his pocket and help his poor neighbor
at the same time. I have no interest in this matter as I do not raise,
buy, or sell, but I do know it has been a great blessing to our State.
There is one variety grown here that is much preferred to any other, but
I can not find out the true name for it. Even the man that brought it
here does not know its name.

In a future number I will give directions for planting, etc.

    A. M. WILLIAMS
        LONG ISLAND, N. Y.

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BLUE STEM SPRING WHEAT!!!

The best variety of Prairie Wheat known. Yields
largely and is less liable to blight than any other variety.

Also celebrated Judson Oats for sale in small lots.

Samples, statement of yield, and prices sent free upon
application to

    SAMPSON & FRENCH,
        Woodstock, Pipestone Co., Minn., or Storm Lake, Ia.

When you write mention THE PRAIRIE FARMER.

       *       *       *       *       *

BLOOMINGTON NURSERY CO.
BLOOMINGTON, ILL.

Established 1852, by F. K. PHŒNIX Incorporated 1883. We offer for the
_Spring Trade_ a very large & fine stock of every description of Fruit &
Ornamental TREES. Catalogue for Spring of 1884 now ready and mailed on
application. 600 ACRES. 13 GREENHOUSES

       *       *       *       *       *

SEEDS

Our large GARDEN GUIDE describing _Cole’s Reliable Seeds_ is MAILED FREE
TO ALL. We offer the _LATEST Novelties_ in SEED POTATOES, Corn and Oats,
and the _Best Collection_ of Vegetable, Flower, Grass and Tree SEED.
Everything is tested. COLE & BRO., Seedsmen, PELLA, IOWA

       *       *       *       *       *

SEED-POTATOES and SEEDS.

[Illustration]

60 newest varieties of potatoes. Garden seeds. Seed Grain, etc., at
lowest prices. Illustrated catalogue and treatise on POTATO CULTURE,
free. _J. W. WILSON, Austin, Ill._

       *       *       *       *       *

SEEDS! PLANTS—Catalogue Free.

A. E. SPALDING,
AINSWORTH, IOWA.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration: SEEDS FOR THE GARDEN, FARM & FIELD.]

ESTABLISHED 1845.

Our Annual Catalogue, mailed free on application, published first of
every January, contains full description and prices of RELIABLE
VEGETABLE, TREE, FIELD AND FLOWER SEED, SEED GRAIN, SEED CORN, SEED
POTATOES, ONION SETS, ETC; ALSO GARDEN DRILLS, CULTIVATORS, FERTILIZERS,
ETC., with full information for growing and how to get our Seeds.

Address PLANT SEED COMPANY,
Nos. 812 & 814 N. 4th St., ST. LOUIS, MO.

       *       *       *       *       *

SIBLEY’S TESTED SEEDS,

For all Climates, For all Soils, All Plants.

EVERY SACK TESTED FOR VITALITY. ALL TESTED IN GARDENS FOR PURITY AND
VALUE.

CATALOGUE AND PRICE LIST OF ALL TESTED VARIETIES, FREE.

Mail orders promptly filled, making a Seed Store at home. Send for
Catalogue.

HIRAM SIBLEY & CO., Rochester, N.Y. and Chicago, Ill.

       *       *       *       *       *

SEEDS

ALBERT DICKINSON,

Dealer in Timothy, Clover, Flax, Hungarian, Millet, Red Top, Blue
Grass, Lawn Grass, Orchard Grass, Bird Seeds, &c.

POP CORN.

Warehouses  {115, 117 & 119 Kinzie St.
            {104, 106, 108 & 110 Michigan St.
OFFICE.      115 Kinzie St.
CHICAGO, ILL.

       *       *       *       *       *

PUBLISHERS’ NOTICE.

_THE PRAIRIE FARMER is printed and published by The Prairie Farmer
Publishing Company, every Saturday, at No. 150 Monroe Street._

_Subscription, $2.00 per year, in advance, postage prepaid._

_Subscribers wishing their addresses changed should give their old as
well as new addresses._

_Advertising, 25 cents per line on inside pages; 30 cents per line on
last page—agate measure; 14 lines to the inch. No less charge than
$2.00._

_All Communications, Remittances, &c., should be addressed to THE
PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING COMPANY, Chicago, Ill._

       *       *       *       *       *

The Prairie Farmer

ENTERED AT THE CHICAGO OFFICE AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER.

CHICAGO, FEBRUARY 2, 1884.

       *       *       *       *       *


WHEN SUBSCRIPTIONS EXPIRE.

We have several calls for an explanation of the figures following the
name of subscribers as printed upon this paper each week. The first two
figures indicate the volume, and the last figure or figures the number
of the last paper of that volume for which the subscriber has paid:
EXAMPLE: John Smith, 56-26. John has paid for THE PRAIRIE FARMER to the
first of July of the present year, volume 56. Any subscriber can at once
tell when his subscription expires by referring to volume and number as
given on first page of the paper.

       *       *       *       *       *

OUR PREMIUM LIST.

Revised, extended, and properly illustrated will this week be sent to
every subscriber. There must be something offered in it that every one
needs or would like to have. The terms are the most liberal ever
offered. All readers are hereby constituted agents to solicit
subscriptions to THE PRAIRIE FARMER. If those who can not enlist in the
work will hand the PREMIUM LIST to some person who will do so, they will
confer a great favor upon the publishers and editors. What we all want
is to double our present list before the first day of April.

       *       *       *       *       *

RENEW! RENEW!!

Remember that every yearly subscriber, either new or renewing, sending
us $2, receives a splendid new map of the United States and
Canada—58 × 41 inches—FREE. Or, if preferred, one of the books offered
in another column. It is not necessary to wait until a subscription
expires before renewing.

       *       *       *       *       *

WE WANT AGENTS

in every locality. We offer very liberal terms and good pay. Send for
sample copies and terms to agents.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Transcriber’s Note: Original location of table of contents.]


       *       *       *       *       *

Here is a little PRAIRIE FARMER toast that we like, and though we get
such often, we never tire of it. It was prepared by Mr. J. W. Hall, of
Bates Co., Mo.: “THE PRAIRIE FARMER, the Western man’s friend. It grows
better all the time; may it continue the good work.” We respond to all
such toasts by striving to better deserve them every week in the year.

       *       *       *       *       *

Our esteemed correspondent, Alex. Ross, this week tells farmers how they
may keep their pork fresh for summer use. It will be generally
regretted, we fear, that Mr. Ross did not contribute this article
earlier in the season. It is timely to those who have not yet salted
their pork, and for those who have, the recipe will keep, as well as the
pork, until another season. Do you all file THE PRAIRIE FARMER?

       *       *       *       *       *

The Smiths have it this week! We mean J. M. and J. A., one in the
Horticultural and the other in the Dairy department of THE PRAIRIE
FARMER. If any agricultural paper of this week contains two more
valuable essays than these two, that is the publication we should like
to see. The dairymen have a little the best of it, for dairymen all need
good gardens, and hence both essays meet their cases, but the “Farmer’s
Garden” is alone worth the subscription price of the paper to every
farmer. Ought not the dairymen to subscribe for two copies?

       *       *       *       *       *

If you are an active young man or young woman, or if you are not so
young and active as you used to be, do not sit down and say to yourself
that you can not secure some prize as offered in our premium list. There
is hardly a present subscriber who may not get others to subscribe, or
interest some one else to do so. We propose to give away a great deal of
money value in these prizes, and the more we are called upon to give the
better we like it, for we know that while increasing our list we are at
the same time widening the influence of the paper and conferring
benefits upon the country. Be assured that we offer no “snide” or
worthless articles. We give genuine goods for genuine work.

       *       *       *       *       *

They have a barbarous way of testing the comparative strength of draft
horses in some parts of England. At Huddersfield the other day two
owners secured the tail-ends of their carts together and then put their
teams to the draft to see which would give way. First one and then the
other was drawn backward, “_while the macadam was torn up to the depth
of five inches by their struggles_.” The horses were kicked and beaten
to make them do their best. The London Live Stock Journal says the
brutes, the men we mean, not the horses, were arrested and fined $5 each
for their fun. It should have been $500 apiece and imprisonment. The
whipping post is none too severe for such criminal inhumanity to man’s
most useful animal.

       *       *       *       *       *

France has about one-half the agricultural implements in use that
England has, though the cultivated acres in France are greatly in excess
of those of England. The reason, doubtless, lies in the fact that French
farms are very small and do not warrant the purchase of the larger
labor-saving machines. The manual labor of the members of the family is
often sufficient to carry on almost all the operations of the little
farm “patches.” The late French census gives the following list of
implements: 4,800,000 plow and diggers of various kinds, 1,650,000
harrows, 20,000 drills, 15,000 mowing machines, 18,000 reapers, 60,000
chaff-cutters, and 55,000 root-cutters. As compared with our own country
this is indeed a small showing. We have dozens of reaper factories that
turn out yearly more machines than are owned in all France.

       *       *       *       *       *

Our readers will notice that in our premium list, as sent out last week,
the Saskatchewan fife wheat is among the prominent offers. Here is a
pointer showing the estimation in which the wheat is held by those who
have grown it. We take it from the Detroit Record: “Last Spring
twenty-six members of the Becker County Farmers’ Union clubbed together
to the extent of $5 each for the purpose of giving the Scotch fife wheat
(as grown in the Saskatchawan Valley) a trial, and the result has been
most satisfactory. Thirteen bushels of the wheat were bought at $10 per
bushel, and Iver Christianson, of Richwood, sowed it on thirteen acres
of new land, for one-fourth of the yield. The wheat was threshed last
Wednesday and divided among the stockholders yesterday, each receiving
twelve bushels for his investment of five dollars, the total yield being
403 bushels, 61 pounds to the bushel, of the finest quality of No. 1
hard. Mr. Wellman, of whom the said wheat was purchased, began growing
the wheat several years ago from a few kernels received in a letter from
the Saskatchawan Valley, and the grain has been hand picked and kept
perfectly clean each year.” The members of the club express themselves
as perfectly satisfied with results and indorse the wheat in the highest
manner. In all our premiums we have aimed to select useful articles, and
such as are calculated to meet the wants of farmers and friends.

       *       *       *       *       *

The Northern Illinois Horticultural Society held an interesting meeting
at Elgin last week. The attendance was not large, but included such life
long leaders in Illinois horticulture as A. R. Whitney, S. G. Minkler,
J. W. Cochrane, D. C. Schofield, A. Bryant, Jr., Dr. Slade, Wm. Kellogg,
of Wisconsin, D. Wilmot Scott, H. Graves, A. L. Small, L. Woodard, and
others. The papers read were brief and excellent. Robert Douglas, O. B.
Galusha, and Samuel Edwards, who were not present contributed
instructive essays. The election for the ensuing year resulted in the
choice of S. M. Slade, Elgin, President; A. Bryant, Jr., Princeton, J.
V. Cotta, Mt. Carroll, and David Hill, Dundee, Vice-Presidents; D.
Wilmot Scott, Galena, Secretary; E. W. Graves, Sandwich, and J. S.
Rodgers, Marengo, Recording Secretaries. The society voted to hold its
next annual meeting at Elgin. We will give a digest of proceedings in
next week’s paper.

       *       *       *       *       *

The alleged operations of certain patent sharks as recorded on third
page of this paper reminds us of a couple of swindling operations
humorously noticed in a late New York Tribune, viz: Certain Michigan
farmers gave their notes, ranging from $50 to $500 each, for “hulless
oats,” payment to be made out of the crop produced at $1.50 per bushel.
But the I. O. U.’s were promptly sold on liberal terms at the bank or
elsewhere. The persuasive agent “lighted out,” and the victims now think
they perceive symptoms of the cutting of belated teeth, of the eye
variety. Another interesting “little game” is this: Two men, apparently
strangers, meet at a farm-house; get acquainted; arrange to stay over
night. During the long evening they make a bargain with each other for
some piece of property, draw writings, and ask their host kindly to
append his name as witness. Just as might have been expected, the
farmer’s signature turns out to be the most important of the three,
since the document is so artfully constructed that by cutting it in two
pieces one of them becomes a promissory note, which is subsequently
negotiated, and, under the present bad law, has to be paid.—In view of
such occurrences as these (still astonishingly common after years of
repeated exposure by the press) the aggressive “Jabez” of the Tribune
maintains that the countryman who doesn’t treat as frauds all tramps, no
matter how well dressed, who seek his autograph, under any pretense
whatever, would better have given his time to reading and not learned to
write, for these bad signs indicate that he will never be forethoughtful
enough in such emergencies to make his mark.



MISSISSIPPI VALLEY HORT. SOCIETY


The fifth annual meeting of the Mississippi Valley Horticultural Society
held at Kansas City, Mo., January 22-25, was the most interesting and
profitable ever held by this vigorous and valuable organization.
Delegates were present from fourteen States, covering the great
water-shed embraced by the “Father of Waters,” and its tributaries—in
and of itself, an empire. The personnel of this body was excellent; it
was a convention of practical, brainy men, alive to the interests of one
of the most important pursuits in range of the rural industries. The
essays, and the discussions they provoked, were full of interest, and
highly instructive. We have attended scores of such assemblies during
the last quarter of a century; none of them equaled this, all things
considered, and we think this opinion was shared by the oldest and most
prominent among those in attendance.

Our columns, as we find on our return home, are too crowded this week to
admit of publishing a synopsis of the proceedings, but will make room
for the eloquent, touching, and well-deserved tribute of the society to
the memory of Dr. John A. Warder. Next week an epitome of the work of
the convention will be given, and two of the papers that were read will
also appear, to wit: “The Best Fruit Packages,” by E. T. Hollister, of
St. Louis, Mo., and “The Educational Influence of Horticulture,” by Mr.
G. A. Lyon, of Galesburg, Ill. Other valuable and interesting papers
read at this meeting will soon appear in THE PRAIRIE FARMER; among
them, Prof. S. A. Forbes’ paper on “Insects Affecting the Strawberry”
(which is supplemental to a former paper which we published last year);
another by Prof. John W. Robson, of Cheever, Kansas, on the “Circulation
of Sap,” and others which are very useful, on various leading
horticultural topics.

The re-election of Parker Earle, as President, W. H. Ragan, Secretary,
and T. C. Evans, Treasurer, was a fitting indorsement of the faithful
and efficient services of these officers.



WHEN IT IS TIME TO RESIGN.


We observe a general tendency this winter to re-elect about all the old
officers of the various dairy, horticultural and other meetings, and
this regardless of age or previous terms of office. While this practice
is highly complimentary to men who have held the positions, and is a
recognition of services well performed, we think the more frequent
infusion of new blood an excellent remedy for stagnation and other ills
liable to creep into association management. At several meetings this
winter writers and speakers have expressed regret that more young men
were not in attendance. Perhaps if the old members were a little more
willing to give young men a fair proportion of the management there
would be less cause of complaint in this direction. We have often
wondered at the tenacity with which some old and otherwise sensible men
hold on to offices in State agricultural societies. They indeed seem to
think it a personal slight if they fail of renomination. We have in mind
one clever old gentleman, now in almost every way ill-fitted for the
position, who has for long years held the office of president of a State
Association. Every member of the organization is aware that the days of
this old gentleman’s usefulness in the position have long since passed
away, yet he was re-elected almost by acclamation at a late annual
meeting. It was remarked, in our hearing, that some younger, more
vigorous and active man should be selected, “but,” it was added, “it
would break the old man’s heart to put another man in his place, and
that is the way all feel about it.” Such a sentiment speaks well for the
hearts of the members with whom the old gentleman is associated, but
less can be said of the judgment that is manifested. We respect age,
especially if it has been attained while doing good service for the
public. But something is due to the present and the future as well as to
the past. It is to be regretted that men do not better recognize the
fact that these little affairs of the world would move along just about
as well if their management were sometimes resigned to other hands
before death compels the change. But such is seldom the case. We have
known a man, once a president of a State Agricultural Society and long
one of its vice-presidents, who has really felt that many of his old
friends and associates became his personal enemies the moment they aided
in electing another man to his position. He thinks them so still, yet
the fact is he has no more faithful, well-wishing friends on earth. It
was one of those cases where public good demanded the sacrifice of
private preference. It will be better for all our organizations when
such adherence to correct principles universally prevails, or when
failing faculties bring with them self-consciousness of weakening
powers.



LOCATING THE MINNESOTA STATE
FAIR.


The Minnesota State Agricultural Association is now working under the
provisions of the new law passed by the Legislature last year. This law
entitles to vote delegates in the management of the State Society, from
each county association holding a fair and paying premiums to the amount
of the donation by the State to these local organizations. At the late
meeting at St. Paul over twenty county societies were represented. It
was also decided to allow one vote each to the State Horticultural
Society, and to the Southern Minnesota Fair Association.

The financial report showed that the State Society received from all
sources in 1883 the sum of $14,068.78. The disbursements amounted to a
little less than this sum. As it is a matter of interest everywhere to
know what it costs, by items, to run a State society, we here give them
for Minnesota: Salaries of officers and assistants, $3,601.39; printing
and advertising, $1,415.65; general expenses, $2,520.97; special ring
purses, $2,434; premiums, $3,945.50.

It will be seen that a little over sixty-one per cent of the whole
amount of prize money went to the fast horse interest. Thus it is
considered in Minnesota that racing is worth more money to the State
Fair, that is, it brings more money from attendance and “privileges,”
than all the cattle, farm horses, swine, sheep, fowls, farm products,
vegetables, flowers, machinery, fine arts, domestic products, and
everything else that can be brought out at the State exhibition. We do
not take Minnesota as an example because it is any better or any worse
than other States in this respect, but to show to the farming people of
this country wherein lie the attractions of the modern agricultural
fair. They are at liberty to draw their own conclusions. These fairs are
in their own hands, or should be, and if reforms are needed it is from
them that they must emanate.

For several years there has been a feeling of intense rivalry between
the Fair Association at Minneapolis and the State Society. The rival
fairs have been held at the same time, and the result has been
detrimental to both organizations. We suppose the feeling had its birth
in the commercial rivalry between the cities of St. Paul and
Minneapolis. However this may have been, or whether good or ill has
resulted, the State Society and the farmers of the State are to be
congratulated that a movement is on foot to obliterate all differences,
and to establish somewhere between the cities of St. Paul and
Minneapolis permanent fair grounds that shall secure to Minnesota one of
the greatest fairs of the Northwest. At the meeting, about which we
began to write, it was resolved to instruct a committee, appointed for
the purpose, to negotiate with the citizens of the two cities for eighty
or one hundred acres of land for a permanent location of the State
Society. It was also advocated to call upon the Legislature for
appropriations for the construction of permanent buildings.



WAYSIDE NOTES.

BY A MAN OF THE PRAIRIE.


I can’t help remarking to myself as I read my two or three foreign
agricultural papers, how great is becoming the influence of American
agriculture upon the farming of Great Britain. Our ways are gradually
insinuating themselves into British practice and it will not be long
before our respected “cousins” will be ready to acknowledge that we have
in great part paid off the debt we owe them for the many lessons in
methods of thorough culture and intelligent breeding they have given us.
What has led me to mention this matter is an item in a London journal
showing a tendency to bring beef stock to the block at an earlier age
than has formerly prevailed in that country. It was not until
inaugurated at the Chicago Fat Stock Show, I believe, that the English
ever took it into their heads to make a record of average daily gain of
bullocks for their Fat Stock Shows, or of the amount of food it took to
bring them into show condition. It is only lately that stock raisers
there have thought about selling by weight instead of the “guess” of the
buyer. Farm scales are not half enough in use here, but we are manifold
ahead of the farmers of Great Britain in this respect. It was only after
Americans had pronounced upon the benefits of the silo that British
farmers thought it worth their while to experiment with the innovation
from across the channel. But about this early maturity question: I
notice that a correspondent of the Yorkshire Post mentions that at the
late Fat Stock Show two Prize Hereford bullocks weighing (dressed) 896
pounds, and 700 pounds, were aged respectively one year, nine months,
and five days, and one year, seven months, and twenty-two days. At the
Grimsby show there were two Short-horns weighing 14 cwt. and 13¾ cwt.
live weight, the first being one year and nine months old, and the other
one year, nine months, and fourteen days. They took the second prize as
grazing steers. I don’t need to mention anything about the new farm
implements we have given the old country, nor the many modifications
that her own implements, wagons, etc., are undergoing, especially in the
way of lightness in construction, that are directly traceable to the
influence of American manufacture. Indeed, if the intelligent and
unprejudiced Englishman of to-day who is familiar with our agriculture
will sit down and reflect upon the subject he will readily acknowledge
that the influence of the United States upon the political ideas of
England has not been more marked than it has upon her agricultural ideas
and practices.

       *       *       *       *       *

And while I have strayed so far away from home for a subject for a
“note” I may as well stay there long enough to say that the English dog
is not a whit less fond of mutton than is the average canine of this
country. And further, it does not seem that British law regarding the
protection of sheep is at all in advance of ours, either in its
provisions or the manner of its enforcement. In Cheshire, for instance,
dogs, in the course of the first two weeks of this year, killed 140
sheep valued at $1,500, and the most that was done about it was to hunt
up the offending cur—no it was not a cur but a Retriever—and kill it.
The dog is a great favorite in England, certainly he seems there as here
to have more friends than the sheep that clothes and feeds. When will
man, anywhere, become fully civilized and humanized?

       *       *       *       *       *

I met a Wisconsin tobacco and corn-grower the other day, and he was
bluer than a pipe stem. The frost last fall cut off both his corn and
his tobacco. He said he had actually nothing to sell but a little
wrapper tobacco which grew in a protected place, and now the Government
had nipped his hopes for this in the bud by declaring that Sumatra
tobacco should be admitted into the country on a duty of 35 cents per
pound, while it is acknowledged that it is worth at least five times as
much as the best Wisconsin with which it competes. Probably a later
decision by Secretary Folger that this Sumatra leaf must pay 75 cents
per pound has done one of his sores some good. The only thing I could
then, or can now, recommend as good for the other—caused by the
untimely frost—is, that he no longer put all his eggs in one or two
baskets. I am convinced that for farmers of moderate means through the
acceptance of the doctrine of diversified farming alone lies their
permanent and universal salvation from financial hades in this world.

       *       *       *       *       *

In the Punjaub, British India, there was last year an outbreak of the
cattle plague. The authorities took hold of the matter, and by means of
isolation of affected cattle and the prescriptions of the veterinarians,
the disease was completely eradicated. The authorities were jubilant
over their success. The natives were congratulated on being ruled over
by a Government which kept such excellent watch over their interests.
But the natives, while they admitted the existence of the disease,
wherein they were more intelligent or less prejudiced than are some of
our citizens regarding pleuro-pneumonia, did not have a much better
opinion of the vets and commissioners than your correspondent, B. F. J.,
seems to have. They said to an official: “Yes, sahib, the isolation of
cattle gave great trouble, and the salutries’ hunger was difficult to
appease. When they had left the village, we got a holy man, who drew a
line on the ground round the herd. Then he got on horseback and rode
round the herd, sprinkling water and repeating the creed. It was that
which cured the cattle.” What we farmers want is the isolation and the
vets.’ advice, and if Mr. Allerton and Gen. Singleton have a “holy man”
at command to draw a line about the infected herds, perhaps we can get
rid of the disease, and thus all parties will be satisfied.



LETTER FROM CHAMPAIGN.


We have now (January 25) had forty days of snow, and nearly
uninterrupted good sleighing, and the end is not yet—neither of snow
nor sleighing, for there is fully a foot of the former now on the
ground, and few, if any, bare spots. But the steady cold is quite as
uncommon as the snow or sleighing, and will make the winter of 1883-84 a
memorable one. Another remarkable feature is the low range of the
thermometer where mild winters are thought to be insured by the
latitude. Thus, Central and Southern Kansas and Missouri have had as
cold weather as Central Illinois—a good example of which was the 27
degrees below zero registered at Makanda, a few miles north of Cobden,
Ill., while the lowest point reached, 200 miles further north, was only
a degree or two lower. It may be winter will break up soon—and it may
be deeper snows and intenser cold are in store for us, as in some other
winters of great severity.

       *       *       *       *       *

At any rate, the protracted cold and snow which takes all pasturage out
of the account in carrying stock, is making very heavy drafts on hay,
grain, and fodder of all kinds and it looks now as if the big hay crop
of this section will be fed out before spring. As for corn, the most of
which is soft and has no grade and no sale as a merchantable commodity,
except for feeding where it grew—is being very lavishly fed to stock of
all kinds, as the most profitable way to get rid of it. Accounts from
Nebraska and Northwest Kansas report corn in very little better
condition than in Central Illinois, and dealers who bought and cribbed
it early in the season are reputed badly caught.

       *       *       *       *       *

There is nothing new to report in respect to the condition of winter
wheat. So long as snow covers the ground it is safe; and after, it will
come through if the weather is warm, or cold and wet, and there is
little freezing and thawing to thaw it out of the ground. It is thought
by those who have given the subject some attention, that though the buds
of fruit trees may be killed or badly damaged by the intense cold, and
though the wood was not thoroughly ripened last year, the ground not
being frozen and the earth being covered by snow at the time, the
vitality of the trees will remain unimpaired. It is the experience of
Vermont and Maine orchardists, that if snow falls before the ground
freezes to any considerable depth, apple trees effectually resist any
degree of cold.

       *       *       *       *       *

The latest contribution of facts going to establish the new departure in
respect to the location of orchards, comes from a farmer of Geauga
county, Ohio. He writes to the Country Gentleman of a late date as
follows: “There was little fruit the past season, and as in many former
years, orchards on high lands bore only a few defective apples. Such
orchards have not borne much for several years, while orchards on low
lands, somewhat protected, have borne large crops of fair fruit. My
orchards on low land, protected by evergreens, have brought me several
hundred dollars a year for several years, while the orchards on high
lands, a little west, have not borne enough for family use for some
years.” Who will tell THE PRAIRIE FARMER about the many orchards of
Livingston county, Ill., which produced, last year, very remarkable
crops of fine apples—a fact which raised the value of land in that
county several dollars per acre?

    B. F. J.



AN ELOQUENT TRIBUTE.


The following eloquent tribute to the late Dr. John A. Warder was
written by ex-Gov. J. Sterling Morton, of Nebraska, chairman of the
memorial committee at the late meeting of the Mississippi Valley
Horticultural Society at Kansas City. In its estimation of the man and
his work it is appreciative and just: Ingersoll himself could not
surpass it in the sublimity of its pathos. To be thus commemorated in
the minds and words of men is the lot of few, and those only who have
lived exalted, useful lives, and whose glowing hearts have kindled the
fires of friendship and love in the breasts of friends and associates in
life’s cares and labors. Mr. Morton said:

As guests register their names at a hotel, depart, and are forgotten, so
humanity, stopping for a short time on the earth, makes its autograph
upon the age and sets out upon its returnless journey to that realm
whence come neither tidings nor greetings.

Each individual of the race leaves some trace of his existence on the
generation in which he lives, and considerable numbers transmit their
names to posterity italicised in good deeds or embalmed in noble and
elevating thought.

The desire to be remembered and esteemed by those who come after us,
seems to be, with the better and more exalted minds, a greater
inspiration to high intellectual effort than the mere plaudits of
cotemporaries. As on the stage, those actors who play best their parts
are recalled and applauded after the curtain has fallen, so those in the
brief drama of life, who have best performed their duties are, after
their mortal costumes have been forever laid away in restful graves,
again called out by their admiring cotemporaries, and thus their
intellectual and moral personalities reappear before the lights, amidst
tumultuous and emulative applause.

It is the duty and pleasure of your committee, gentlemen of the
Mississippi Valley Horticultural Society, in harmony with this line of
reflection, to bring before you the character and services of the
recently deceased Dr. John A. Warder, of Ohio. His naturally strong
mental faculties were led out and trained, in school and college, to a
full and vigorous stature. His chosen profession of medicine, in the
earlier years of his manhood, occupied his entire thought and stimulated
him to untiring labor of mind and body, and, at the same time, gave him
also that culture of the heart which, through his refined, emotional
nature, was ever incarnating itself in delicate acts of kindness and
generosity toward those who needed sympathy or friends.

But he turned at last from his professional studies—from the books in
his library—to those broader investigations of the mysteries of life
and growth of flowers, fruits and forests, to which the fields,
orchards, and wild woods of Ohio ever allured him. His childhood and
youth had passed amidst the rustic scenes of a home in the country, on a
farm; and as the seashell, though ever so long and far away from its
home in the surf, will, when placed to the ear always moan of its ocean
home, so his great and tender soul ever yearned for a life among the
flora and sylvia of youth. His brave and benignant spirit explored all
avenues of knowledge which led into flowering fields and orchards. To
his eye every blossom was a poem; to his quick perception every tree a
book full of useful and agreeable teachings. And to the study of these
volumes—these continued annuals—fresh in new binding, embellishment,
and gilding every summer and autumn, Dr. Warder devoted the choicest
years of his mature manhood.

It is the enthusiast of a cause who gives vitality and propulsive power.
Dr. Warder was an enthusiast in horticulture and in forestry. To advance
the race in those two vocations no labor was too great for him to
undertake, no sacrifice too severe for him joyfully to make. At his own
expense he went into fresh territories and States, preaching, as a
missionary of a new gospel, the importance and necessity of orcharding
and tree planting. His thoughts were strewn, like precious seeds, among
the dwellers on the prairies of Nebraska, Dakota, Wyoming, Minnesota and
the Northwest. And they took root, so that the concepts of thousands of
groves and orchards, which now stand as living monuments to his useful
life, came from his own philanthropic brain. In his mind miniature
forests grew on every prairie, and golden fruit flashed in the autumn
sunlight of every hill-side. He knew no limit to his love of
horticulture and arboriculture. He was earnest; he was active, sincere,
and his vitægraph is written wherever flowers bloom, fruits ripen, and
forests wave all over the country he loved so well and served so
modestly, efficiently, and faithfully.

His example is worthy of the emulation of our sons and of their sons.
And standing at his grave it is meet and proper for this society to
recall his noble services to its cause, to wish that, with each
recurring year his memory may, like the flowers and foliage he studied
so well, be clothed in new verdure and its fragrance perpetuated as a
grateful perfume.

Resolved—That the Mississippi Valley Horticultural Society deplores the
death of its friend and active member, Dr. John A. Warder of Ohio; that
our sincere condolence is extended to his family, and that we recommend
to kindred societies throughout the Northwest the planting of memorial
trees and groves to commemorate his labors, his achievements, and his
philanthropy as a skilled orchardist and forester.



SELECTION OF A SITE FOR A PARK.

(_Continued from Page 65._)


were squatters of the lowest class living in hovels. The construction of
the Central Park, and the opening of the streets in its neighborhood,
changed the whole character of the surrounding region. In the ten years
succeeding the commencement of work upon the park, the increased
valuation of taxable property in the wards immediately adjacent was no
less than fifty-four millions of dollars, affording a surplus of three
millions after paying the interest on all the city bonds issued for the
purchase and construction of the park, a sum sufficient if used as a
sinking fund to pay the entire principal and interest of the cost of the
park in less time than was required for its construction.

A similar instance of the profitable conversion of a deserted and
forbidding region into a rich and elegant quarter of a city, is afforded
by the Park des Butte Chaumont in Paris.

It occupies the site of old abandoned slate quarries, the precipitous
walls and rough excavations of which have been converted into
picturesque scenery by judicious treatment and tasteful planting, so as
to give it the appearance of a wild mountain gorge. The result has been
that its vicinity has become a rich and elegant quarter, simply because
it has been made attractive to the large and constantly growing class
who are seeking pleasant residence sites within easy access of their
places of business.

These illustrations will suffice to prove the truth of my assertion,
that the objects of most essential importance to a city in the creation
of a park will be attained by selecting for its location a site which is
naturally undesirable or even repulsive and converting it into an
attractive quarter, rather than one which combines all the elements of
beauty and health, and as a consequence is so desirable for residences,
that it can only be had at great cost.

       *       *       *       *       *

The Illinois State Dairymen’s Association will hold its next annual
meeting at Champaign, December 17-19, 1884. Champaign County
Agricultural Society has adopted a resolution, pledging aid in getting
up a first-class meeting.

       *       *       *       *       *

REMEMBER _that_ $2.00 _pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _one year, and the
subscriber gets a copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED
STATES, FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any
first-class weekly agricultural paper in this country._

       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

POULTRY NOTES.

Poultry-Raisers, Write for Your Paper.


WHAT AILS THE PULLETS?

DEAR FANNY FIELD—Please be kind enough to tell me what ails the
pullets? We have fifty or sixty spring pullets hatched in April and May,
from which by this time we expected to get eggs plentifully, and it
stretches our patience to get only from one to five eggs per day. They
have an underground room with only the front exposed, well lighted, and
we have fed them till they are fat.

We feed them a warm breakfast of potatoes and bran, or oats ground, with
a little pepper occasionally, then an hour or two later oats, and again
at night oats or corn, about three times a week. Plaster, coal, and
gravel are liberally supplied. They have milk and now and then powdered
bones, or refuse meat, cooked.

By an accident a fine one of over four pounds’ weight was killed, and I
had supposed she ought to lay as she was one of my earliest, but on
investigation I found eggs from a hickory nut down to shot eggs, that
were black or dark and hard, and I readily conjectured if the rest were
like her it was not strange we had no eggs. Please tell us the cause and
cure.

Our fowls are mixed, light and dark Brahmas, Leghorns and everything you
would get by changing eggs with the neighbors. We have added Plymouth
Rocks of late, having more of them than any other. We save the best Rock
roosters each year. It is the more surprising as our fowls usually lay
well.

Please help us if you can, and oblige a subscriber.

    MRS. C. H. R.
        MARENGO, IOWA.



THAT DUCK FARM.


DEAR FANNY FIELD—I have often thought I would write you through our
dear old PRAIRIE FARMER, but the old thief, procrastination, stole my
time. But reading your description of “A Duck Farm” aroused all the
ambition I have, and the editor willing (I not being one of the number
knowing your private address) would like to ask a few questions I
consider “necessary,” and will promise to abide by the terms given in
“Chats with Correspondents” of January 5th, as near as possible.

I don’t wonder the woman owning the “duck farm” wished to withhold her
name and whereabouts from the public generally, besides guarding her pen
with “well-trained dogs” if she has ducks she can induce to lay 125 or
even 100 eggs per season, nine and one third of which will hatch out
ducklings that will all live to be grown ducks.

Take an average of 113 and the ducks will lay 1,808 eggs per season, and
she sells $100 worth at $3 per doz. making 400; then she sends 24 doz.
to New York, then raises “1,100 ducks on the place,” making in all,
1,788, which, taken from the 1,808 leaves 20 eggs for non-hatchers and
dead ducklings. This I call pretty close work.

I have had some little experience with ducks, and I can only get them to
lay from sixty to seventy eggs per season, and about one eighth of the
eggs don’t hatch (from various causes) and about the same amount of
ducklings die. Now if you will be kind enough to reveal the woman’s
whereabouts to me I would like to invest if she will warrant them to
come up to your figures; also, is the said woman a widow?

Now Miss Fanny (if such you are) please excuse my familiarity. As I have
perused your writings with such pleasure, I feel well acquainted, so
strike me as hard as you please, but remember there is a hereafter. I
have several facts in regard to my fowls for another time providing I
gain admission.

    A. SUCKER.
        DE WITT CO., ILL.



FROM NEW HAMPSHIRE.


Eggs are worth thirty-three cents per dozen here. The hens are not
laying nearly as many as they were at this time last year. Can any one
tell the reason? Farmers ought to pay more attention to the hens. They
do pay, and pay big if properly cared for. Give them hot feed in the
morning, consisting of bran, corn meal, beef scraps, a little salt and a
little cayenne pepper. Don’t make them drink ice water these cold days.
Give them wheat and oats at noon, and whole corn at night. The warmer
your house is the more profit you will reap. I don’t care whether your
fowls are pure bloods or not, if you take good care of them they will
give you eggs. A good neighbor of mine says that his pure Plymouth Rocks
do not lay as many eggs as his common “old fashioned” fowls.

Shall I raise a tempest among the breeders?

    G. G. A.
        HUDSON, N. H.



[Illustration]

THE APIARY.


CORN-SILK PROTECTION.

A correspondent of “Gleanings” writes: I winter on the summer stands,
and pack them a little differently from most persons. I spread the combs
so that eight or nine will fill same space occupied in summer by ten.
Then placing sticks crosswise of the frames, to allow a passway for the
bees, I spread a cloth above them, and pack on the top of this two or
three inches of corn-silks. For packing, these are superior to anything
I have yet seen or heard of. They are clean, and excellent
non-conductors, and will more readily absorb the moisture than either
chaff or saw-dust, and yet remain perfectly dry. They are easily
collected by a boy when men are husking in the fields; and when taken
off in the spring can be stored away for another winter. Knowing the
value of them by experience, I hope that many of our brother bee-keepers
will give them a fair trial.



FEEDING BACK.


The question of “feeding back” honey to bees was discussed at the
Michigan State Convention at Flint. W. Z. Hutchinson had had a poor
season; but as he had mentioned incidentally that he had practiced
“feeding back,” it brought down upon him a shower of questions. In
feeding back 1,000 pounds of extracted honey, he had received 800 pounds
of comb honey. Had tiered up the cases of sections until they were three
or four cases high. Had fed the honey as fast as they would take it.
Looked the sections over about once a week, and removed the full ones.
Some colonies did much better work than others. After the first trial,
selected the best. No honey was coming in at the time of the feeding;
did not weigh the hives; weighed only the sections and the amount. He
had a friend who had fed back upon exactly the same plan, but his friend
had not found it profitable. He thought that to know just how to feed
back, at a profit, was not yet positively known.

D. A. Jones: The question of feeding back has but few advocates, for the
reason that the majority have failed to make it profitable. To be
successful in feeding back there must be no place in the hive in which
the bees can store honey, except in the sections. Those hives must be
selected that contain the most honey, or else those having but few
combs. My plan of feeding is to elevate the hives in front and pour the
feed in upon the bottom-board. The bees do not carry the honey out of
the hives; they must store it somewhere. Bee-keepers fail to make it
pay, because the bees had an empty brood-chamber. Section boxes filled
with foundation had been given a colony at 9 A. M.; feeding commenced,
and the next day, at evening, the bees had commenced capping some of the
sections. Fifty-two pounds of honey was fed, and forty-four pounds of
comb honey obtained. To get unfinished sections filled, and at the same
time have the honey removed from some other unfinished sections, I put
the sections that I wish emptied, over the hive, and the ones that I
wish finished, in the main body of the hive, keeping the queen out of
them by using perforated zinc.

W. Z. Hutchinson: Will not pouring in honey at the entrances excite
robbing?

D. A. Jones: I do not pour it in at the entrance. I pour it down inside
the hive at the back.

W. Z. Hutchinson: You speak of using perforated zinc. I should like to
know something about that. Do the bees work through it freely? Is there
any objection to its use, except its cost? And where is the expense? Is
it in the material, or in the preparations?

D. A. Jones: It is in no way detrimental. The bees work through it
freely. I see no objection to its use except its cost, and its cost is
the preparations. Tin would be no cheaper, for the reason that it comes
in smaller sheets, and the waste would be greater.

W. Z. Hutchinson: I have used honey boards the past season made of
wood, the slats of which were 5-32 of an inch apart, and they answered
every purpose; and are cheaper than zinc.

S. T. Pettitt: I can hardly think the wooden boards would be better than
the zinc. It would take some time to make them, while the zinc is all
ready, and so lasting.

W. Z. Hutchinson: The wood boards cost only a third as much as the zinc
and I prefer them.



BEE PASTURAGE.


At the late Nebraska Bee-keepers’ Convention Mr. Ballard spoke very
highly of dandelion and alsike clover, stating that he had seen four or
five bees on one blossom of dandelion, and recommends alsike clover, as
it will take root on the prairie.

G. M. Cooper, Beatrice, gave it as his opinion that white clover did not
secrete any honey last spring, on account of the cool weather.

P. M. Aldrich said that his bees worked on rape long after frost. No one
present had ever seen rape fail.

Mr. Colwell sowed the roadside twice last year, and had a continuous
bloom all summer, and late in the fall; puts one peck to the acre on the
roadside.

Mr. Hawley sows about six pounds of rape seed per acre.

Mr. Colwell’s bees have a great feast on box elder sap, early in spring.

Mr. Hawley has sown rape several times, but the bees only gathered fast
enough to build up; he can tell when his bees are gathering rape honey,
by the odor.

C. C. Turney, Ceresco, had seen bees work very extensively on the
blackberry, both blossom and fruit, and also on parsley.

Wm. Sutton, Elk Creek, saw his bees on raspberry and alsike clover; they
did a great deal to stimulate his bees, although the quantity is limited
in his locality; they bloom about the middle of June.

       *       *       *       *       *

The ancient Egyptians of the Nile had floating bee-houses, designed to
take advantage of the honey harvest. They were warned when it was time
to return home by the depth to which the boat sank in the water under
the weight of the cargo of honey. That the bees might not be lost, they
were obliged to journey during the night-time.

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RAILROADS.

[Illustration]

A MAN WHO IS UNACQUAINTED WITH THE GEOGRAPHY OF THIS COUNTRY WILL SEE BY
EXAMINING THIS MAP THAT THE

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By arrangements with the publishers of this Map we are enabled to make
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CHICAGO, ILL.

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A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE SHEEP.

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REMEMBER _that_ $2.00 _pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _one year and, the
subscriber gets a copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED
STATES, FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any
first-class weekly agricultural paper in this country._

       *       *       *       *       *



SCIENTIFIC.


The Brilliant Sunsets.

Few of our readers, probably, have failed to note the fact that
brilliant sunsets have been unusually frequent since the latter part of
November. Now a highly colored sunset is not, in itself, a remarkable
phenomenon, and it may occur at any time of the year, and owe its origin
to any one of several causes, very simple in themselves, as refraction
by the atmosphere of the sun’s rays, which are thrown upon the sky after
the orb itself has passed from sight, or a peculiarly humid condition of
the upper air, or a remarkable electric condition, such as sometimes
precedes a thunder storm. But the late brilliant sunsets do not belong
to the category of ordinary phenomena. In the first place, they have not
shown gorgeously hued clouds, as in usual sunset displays, but skies of
dazzling tints and colors. In the second place, they have been prolonged
for weeks, and have been seen, at intervals, over nearly every part of
the globe. Evidently, some unusual circumstance must have given rise to
these unwonted phenomena, and scientists in both hemispheres have been
interested in seeking an answer to the problem. As it seemed very plain
that no condition of humidity could account for such remarkable
refraction, it was universally concluded that some substance, as dust,
must exist in the upper air regions. This being accepted as probable
another theory was needed to account for the presence of this dust. The
first theory put forward by scientists in this country suggested the
hypothesis of meteoric dust.

Meteors are gaseous bodies, which move through space in immense numbers,
and in definite orbits. Drawn astray from these orbits by the attraction
of the earth, they are set on fire on contact with the atmosphere, this
ignition producing the phenomena of shooting stars. The product of this
combustion is sometimes heavy enough as to fall rapidly, in the shape of
stones, to the earth. More often it is an impalpable substance, which
filters slowly down through the air, and is found in the shape of
metallic dust, on the summits of snow-covered mountains and in the
Arctic regions. About the middle of November the earth passes through a
meteor zone—that is, an immense swarm of meteors revolving around the
sun—and during this month there are always vastly more shooting stars
to be seen than in any other month of the year. The brilliant sunsets
being first seen in the latter part of November, their near coincidence
in time with an unusual display of brilliant meteors, seemed to
substantiate the theory that they were of similar origin. It is known
that the telescope reveals immense numbers of these meteors too small to
be seen by the naked eye, and it seems very probable that millions more
are too small to be seen even with the telescope, mere meteoric dust
that can only announce its presence to the eye by its refraction of the
sun’s rays as they pass through it. When this dust falls it becomes
visible otherwise, perhaps. We have spoken of its appearance on
snow-covered hills. Sometimes it appears as a haze or dry fog. At least
the appearance of any very remarkable haze, like that which obscured the
light of the sun for weeks over Europe, in 1783, is now ascribed by
science to the dust of enormous falls of meteors.

Had this theory of the cause of the bright sunsets been the true one,
however, there should have been unusual displays of shooting stars
visible as soon as darkness came on after the sunsets, for meteors are
always ignited by the friction of the earth’s atmosphere. As these were
not seen, the meteoric dust theory did not gain a very general support,
and the opinion of many scientific men was that we must wait for a more
probable theory. When it came to be known that these remarkable
appearances of color in the sky had been visible from different points
of the earth’s surface ever since last September, a theory was offered
by Prof. Lockyer, the well-known English astronomer, and the editor of
Nature, a leading scientific periodical, which is now generally accepted
as solving the problem.

Mr. Lockyer thinks that these remarkable sunset glows are the late, but
direct effects of the great volcanic eruptions which occurred in Java,
last August. He believes that the enormous volumes of fine volcanic dust
thrown out by these eruptions were carried into the upper air, and being
borne by prevailing winds around and above the earth, the reflection of
the sun’s rays upon them have produced the phenomena witnessed at so
many different points.

The adequacy of this supposed cause seems plain, when we remember what a
mighty convulsion of nature occurred at Java. Earthquake and eruptions
followed one another with such force that they were felt for hundreds of
miles distant. Large islands sunk from sight and new land appeared and
the entire conformation of the Archipelago in that locality was changed.
The great volumes of mud thrown out of the volcano Krakatoa fell in
showers for over three hours in localities more than thirty miles away.
With volcanic forces at work on this mighty scale, millions of tons of
earth must have been hurled into the upper air. Of this the coarse and
heavy material would naturally fall at once, but vast clouds of
impalpable dust would be borne upward by the heated air, until they
reached the region of the upper trade-winds, by which they would be
borne westward in the circuit of the globe. Each evening these immense
dust clouds would give a novel brilliancy to the skies, by reflecting
the light of the setting sun, and during the day an unusual hazy
appearance of the sky would probably be perceived.

This hypothesis of Mr. Lockyer was remarkably borne out by facts that
actually occurred. The Java eruptions occurred August 26 and 27. On
August 28, from the islands in the Indian Sea, near the African coast,
Mauritias, Rodriguez, and the Seychelles, very singular sunsets and
sunrises were observed, though not directly resembling those seen later,
and a strange haze appeared, through which the sun seemed to be white
and dim as the moon. On August 31, in the same latitude as these
islands, in North Brazil, remarkable sunlight effects were observed, the
sun appearing of a deep blue tint; the next evening similar appearances
were seen in Venezuela. On September 1, also, a remarkable sunset was
reported visible from the Gulf Coast, and one from Trinidad, Spain, at
the same date. September 5, another was seen near Honolulu, in the
Pacific ocean. This line of strange sunsets ran directly east and west.
Another line ran from southeast to northwest, beginning with Ceylon and
Madras and ending with England. Following this, the phenomena seemed to
spread themselves over the whole portion of the earth’s surface,
appearing at various points during four whole months. The points of
difference between the earlier and later appearances were closely
defined by Mr. Lockyer. At first the coarse particles suspended in the
air obscured the sun’s light entirely, as was the case in the
neighborhood of Java immediately following the earthquake. These
disappearing, the sun seemed white and dim; the dust being still more
thinned out, the blue and red molecules caused the appearance of a blue
sun, and at last there was just enough of the finest dust left suspended
to be carried by the various wind currents hither and thither and
produce at the time of the setting of the sun, those singular reflected
lights, which, at first almost unnoticed, became, when observed, the
wonder of the world.

It may be admitted that there are gaps in the evidence supporting this
last hypothesis, but it has the merit of probability, and must be
accepted as the best theory of the brilliant sunsets yet offered.

    A. C. C.

       *       *       *       *       *

CHOCOLATES.

GOLD MEDAL, PARIS, 1878.

[Illustration]

BAKER’S
BREAKFAST COCOA.

Warranted _absolutely pure Cocoa_, from which the excess of Oil has been
removed. It has _three times the strength_ of Cocoa mixed with Starch,
Arrowroot or Sugar, and is therefore far more economical. It is
delicious, nourishing, strengthening, easily digested, and admirably
adapted for invalids as well as for persons in health.

SOLD BY GROCERS EVERYWHERE.

W. BAKER & CO., Dorchester, Mass.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration]

YOUR NAME printed on 50 Cards ALL NEW designs of _Gold Floral,
Remembrances, Sentiment, Hand Floral_, etc., with _Love, Friendship_,
and _Holiday Mottoes_, 10c. 7 pks. and this elegant Ring, 50c., 15 pks.
& Ring, $1.

[Illustration]

12 NEW “CONCEALED NAME” Cards (name concealed with hand holding flowers
with mottoes) 20c. 7 pks. and this Ring for $1. Agents’ sample book and
full outfit, 25c. Over 200 new Cards added this season. Blank Cards at
wholesale prices.

NORTHFORD CARD CO. Northford, Conn.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

To Our Readers.

THE PRAIRIE FARMER is the OLDEST, MOST RELIABLE, and the LEADING
AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL OF THE GREAT NORTHWEST, devoted exclusively to the
interests of the Farmer, Gardener, Florist, Stock Breeder, Dairyman,
Etc., and every species of industry connected with that great portion of
the People of the World, the PRODUCERS. Now in the Forty-Fourth Year of
its existence, and never, during more than two score years, having
missed the regular visit to its patrons, it will continue to maintain
supremacy as A STANDARD AUTHORITY ON MATTERS PERTAINING TO AGRICULTURE
AND KINDRED PRODUCTIVE INDUSTRIES, AND AS A FRESH AND READABLE FAMILY
AND FIRESIDE JOURNAL. It will from time to time add new features of
interest, securing for each department the ablest writers of practical
experience.

THE PRAIRIE FARMER will discuss, without fear or favor, all topics of
interest properly belonging to a Farm and Fireside Paper, treat of the
most approved practices in AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, BREEDING, ETC.;
the varied Machinery, Implements, and improvements in same, for use both
In Field and House; and, in fact, everything of interest to the
Agricultural community, whether in FIELD, MARKET, OR HOME CIRCLE.

IT WILL GIVE INFORMATION UPON THE PUBLIC DOMAIN, WESTERN SOILS, CLIMATE,
ETC.; ANSWER INQUIRIES on all manner of subjects which come within its
sphere; GIVE each week, full and RELIABLE MARKET, CROP, AND WEATHER
REPORTS; PRESENT the family with choice and INTERESTING LITERATURE;
amuse and INSTRUCT THE YOUNG FOLKS; AND, in a word, aim to BE, in every
respect, AN INDISPENSABLE AND UNEXCEPTIONABLE farm and fireside
COMPANION.

       *       *       *       *       *

Terms of Subscription and Club Rates:

ONE COPY, 1 YEAR, postage paid      $ 2.00

TWO COPIES, “   “  “                  3.75

FIVE  “  “   sent at one time         8.75

TEN   “  “   sent at one time, and
        one to Club getter           16.00

TWENTY “  “   sent at one time, and
               one to Club getter    30.00

Address

The Prairie Farmer Publishing Co.,
Chicago. Ill.

       *       *       *       *       *

MEDICAL.

Weak Nervous Men

[Illustration]

Whose DEBILITY, EXHAUSTED POWERS, premature decay and failure to
perform LIFE’S DUTIES properly are caused by excesses, errors of
youth, etc., will find a perfect and lasting restoration to ROBUST
HEALTH and VIGOROUS MANHOOD in

THE MARSTON BOLUS.

Neither stomach drugging nor instruments. This treatment of NERVOUS
DEBILITY and PHYSICAL DECAY is uniformly successful because based on
perfect diagnosis, NEW AND DIRECT METHODS and absolute THOROUGHNESS.
Full information and Treatise free.

Address Consulting Physician of
MARSTON REMEDY CO., 46W. 14th St., New York.

       *       *       *       *       *

TWO LADIES MET ONE DAY.

[Illustration]

One said to the other “By the way how is that Catarrh of yours?” “Why
it’s simply horrid, getting worse every day.” “Well, why don’t you try
‘DR. SYKES’ SURE CURE,’ I know it will cure you!” “Well, then I will,
for I’ve tried everything else.”

Just six weeks afterward they met again, and No. 1 said, “Why, how much
better you look, what’s up? Going to get married, or what?” “Well, yes,
and it’s all owing to ‘DR. SYKES’ SURE CURE FOR CATARRH;’ oh, why
didn’t I know of it before? it’s simply wonderful.”

Send 10 cents to Dr. C.R. Sykes, 181 Monroe street, Chicago, for
valuable book of full information, and mention the “Two Ladies.”

       *       *       *       *       *

30 DAYS’ TRIAL

DR. DYE’S

[Illustration]

ELECTRO-VOLTAIC BELT, and other ELECTRIC APPLIANCES are sent on 30
Days’ Trial TO MEN ONLY, YOUNG OR OLD, who are suffering from NERVOUS
DEBILITY, LOST VITALITY, WASTING WEAKNESSES and all those diseases of a
PERSONAL NATURE, resulting from ABUSES and OTHER CAUSES. Speedy relief
and complete restoration to HEALTH, VIGOR and MANHOOD GUARANTEED. Send
at once for Illustrated Pamphlet free. Address

VOLTAIC BELT CO., MARSHALL, MICH.

       *       *       *       *       *

I CURE FITS!

When I say cure I do not mean merely to stop them for a time and then
have them return again, I mean a radical cure. I have made the disease
of FITS, EPILEPSY or FALLING SICKNESS a life-long study. I warrant my
remedy to cure the worst cases. Because others have failed is no reason
for not now receiving a cure. Send at once for a treatise and a Free
Bottle of my infallible remedy. Give Express and Post Office. It costs
you nothing for a trial, and I will cure you. Address Dr. H.G. ROOT, 183
Pearl St., New York.

       *       *       *       *       *

THE MODERN HORSE DOCTOR.

CONTAINING Practical Observations on the Causes Nature and Treatment of
Diseases and Lameness in Horses, by GEO. H. DADD, M.D. Will be
sent upon receipt of price, $1.50; or free to any sender of three
subscribers to this paper, at $2 each, by

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

500 VIRGINIA FARMS & MILLS

FOR SALE AND EXCHANGE. —> Write for free REAL ESTATE JOURNAL.

R.B. CHAFFIN & CO., Richmond, Virginia.

       *       *       *       *       *

STANDARD BOOKS.

ROPP’S CALCULATOR AND DIARY.

Practical Arithmetic made EASY, SIMPLE, and CONVENIENT for all, by this
unique and wonderful work. Is worth its weight in gold to everyone not
quick in figures. Contains nearly 100,000 BUSINESS Calculations, SIMPLE
and PRACTICABLE Rules and ORIGINAL Methods—the CREAM of this great and
useful science—which makes it possible and EASY for ANY ONE, even a
child, to make CORRECT and INSTANTANEOUS computations in GRAIN, Stock,
Hay, Coal, Cotton, Merchandise. INTEREST, Percentage, Profit and Loss,
Wages, Measurement of Lumber, Logs, Cisterns, Tanks, Granaries,
Wagon-beds, Corn-cribs, Cordwood, Hay-stacks, Lands, Carpenters’,
Plasterers’, and Masons’ work, besides THOUSANDS of other practical
problems which come up every day in the year. Will prove of GREAT
BENEFIT, almost A NECESSITY, in the hands of every FARMER, Mechanic, and
Tradesman.

It is neatly printed, elegantly bound, accompanied by a RENEWABLE Diary,
SILICATE Slate, PERPETUAL Calendar, and VALUABLE POCKET-BOOK, all
combined, for the price of a COMMON diary.

Fine English Cloth               $ .50
Fine English Cloth, with flap      .75
Fine Roan Leather, with flap      1.00

Sent postpaid to any address on receipt of price.

Address PRAIRIE FARMER PUB. CO.,
CHICAGO ILL.

       *       *       *       *       *

How to Paint

A new work by A PRACTICAL PAINTER, designed for the use of TRADESMEN,
MECHANICS, MERCHANTS, FARMERS, and as a guide to PROFESSIONAL PAINTERS.
Containing a Plain, Common-Sense Statement of the methods employed by
Painters to produce satisfactory results in PLAIN and FANCY PAINTING of
every description, including FORMULAS for MIXING PAINT in OIL or WATER,
Tools required, etc. This is just the book needed by any person having
anything to paint and makes

“EVERY MAN HIS OWN PAINTER.”

Full directions for using WHITE LEAD LAMP BLACK—IVORY BLACK—
PRUSSIAN BLUE—ULTRAMARINE—GREEN—YELLOW—BROWN—VERMILLION—
LAKE—CARMINE—WHITING—GLUE—ASPHALTUM—PUMICE STONE, and
SPIRITS OF TURPENTINE—OILS—VARNISHES—FURNITURE VARNISH—MILK
PAINT—PREPARING CALCIMINE.

Paint for Outbuildings

—WHITEWASH—Paste for PAPER HANGING—HANGING PAPER—GRAINING IN
OAK, MAPLE, MAHOGANY, ROSEWOOD, BLACK WALNUT—STAINING—GILDING—
BRONZING—TRANSFERRING—DECALCOMANIA—MAKING RUSTIC PICTURES—
PAINTING FLOWER-STAND—MAHOGANY POLISH—ROSEWOOD POLISH—
VARNISHING FURNITURE—WAXING FURNITURE—CLEANING PAINT—

Paint for Farming Tools

for MACHINERY, and for HOUSEHOLD FIXTURES

To Paint a Farm Wagon

—to RE-VARNISH A CARRIAGE—to make PLASTER CASTS. The work is neatly
printed, with illustrations wherever they can serve to make the subject
plainer, and it will save MANY TIMES its cost yearly. Every family
should possess a copy. Price, by mail, postpaid, $1. Forwarded free to
any sender of two subscribers to this paper at $2 each. Address

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

STANDARD WORKS.

By PETER HENDERSON

Gardening for Profit,

A WELL-KNOWN WORK ON

Market and Family Gardening

Gardening FOR Pleasure

A guide to the amateur in the Fruit, Vegetable, and Flower Garden, with
full directions for the Green-House, Conservatory, and Window Garden.

PRACTICAL FLORICULTURE,

A guide to successful Propagation and Cultivation of Florists’ Plants.

PRICE, $1.50 EACH, BY MAIL, POSTPAID.

Address
PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

TALKS ON MANURES

By JOSEPH HARRIS, M. S.

Author of “_Walks and Talks on the Farm_,” “_Farm Crops_,” “_Harris on
the Pig_,” _etc._

While we have no lack of treatises upon artificial fertilizers, there is
no work in which the main stay of the farm—the manure made upon the
farm is treated so satisfactorily or thoroughly as in this volume.
Starting with the question,

“WHAT IS MANURE?”

the author, well known on both sides of the water by his writings, runs
through in sufficient detail every source of manure on the farm,
discussing the methods of making rich manure; the proper keeping and
applying it, and especially the

USES OF MANURE,

and the effects of different artificial fertilizers, as compared with
farm-yard manure, upon different crops. In this he makes free use of the
striking series of experiments instituted years ago, and still
continued, by Lawes and Gilbert, of Rothamsted, England. The

REMARKABLE TABLES

in which the results of these experiments are given, are here for the
first time made accessible to the American farmer. In fact, there is
scarcely any point relating to fertilizing the soil, including suitable
manures for special crops, that is not treated, and while the teachings
are founded upon the most elaborate scientific researches, they are so
far divested of the technical language of science as to commend
themselves to farmers as eminently “practical.” It is not often that the
results of scientific investigations are presented in a manner so
thoroughly popular. 12mo. Price, postpaid, $1.50.

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO. Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

HOUSE PLANS FOR EVERYBODY.

By S. B. REED, Architect.

One of the most popular Architectural books ever issued, giving a wide
range of design from a dwelling costing $250 up to $8,000, and adapted
to farm, village, and town residences. It gives an

Estimate of the Quantity of Every Article Used

in the construction, and probable cost of constructing any one of the
buildings presented. Profusely illustrated. Price, postpaid, $1.50.
Address

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago

       *       *       *       *       *

NOW Is the time to Subscribe for THE PRAIRIE FARMER. Price only $2.00
per year is worth double the money.

       *       *       *       *       *

REMEMBER _that_ $2.00 _pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _one year, and the
subscriber gets a copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED
STATES, FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any
first-class weekly agricultural paper in this country._

       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

HOUSEHOLD.

    For nothing lovelier can be found
    In woman than to study _household_ good.—_Milton._


AN HUMBLE CONFESSION.

    Who is that little woman there,
    With laughing eyes and dark-brown hair,
    And physiognomy so fair?
      My wife.

    Who’s not as meek as she appears,
    And doesn’t believe one-half she hears,
    And toward me entertains no fears?
      My consort.

    Who wakes me up on every morning,
    About the time the day’s dawning,
    My protestations calmly scorning?
      My spouse.

    Who marks my clothes with India ink,
    And darns my stockings quick as a wink,
    While I sit by and smoke and think?
      My frau.

    Who asks me every day for money,
    With countenance demure and funny,
    And calls me “pretty boy” and “honey?”
      My little woman.

    Who runs this house both night and day,
    And over all exerts her sway;
    Who’s boss o’ this shanty, anyway?
      My better half!

        —_San Francisco Call._



PYRAMIDAL WOMEN.


It has long been a social mystery, over which conservatives and radicals
have puzzled alike, why the gifted men and women of our race should
spring almost exclusively from the intermediate ranks of life. The
solution is found in Piazzi Smyth’s metaphor of the Great Pyramid. A
circumscribed routine of pleasure on one hand, of toil on the other,
equally engrosses the time and thoughts of the dwellers at either end.
It is only in the middle of the pyramid that one is free to live up to
the standard of the hideless coffer, the sarcophagus measure, the
measure of a man!

Of the feminine attainers to this measure, says a writer in the American
Queen, the women who are taking up their lives and living them fully in
all their length and breadth and dignity, as lives must be lived to
reach the cosmic standard of the pyramidal man, there is found one
pre-eminent type in that woman of letters against whom a hard battle is
being waged to-day.

To woman emancipated, freed from veil and harem, elevated from her
primal position when she was but the toy and tool of man’s passion, this
age of civilization points with a pride whose justifiableness has yet to
be proved. Exterior liberty she has gained indeed; but in the face of
the fact that this universal crusade against women of letters is but the
determination to hold the old shackles on heart and brain, what is her
alleged emancipation but a lengthening of the chain which still binds
her in moral and mental bondage.

“The shrieking sisterhood,” be it said in justice to the sex, represent
a small minority. Few and far between are the women who would usurp
man’s place on platform or at poll; still fewer and farther apart the
advocate of woman’s right to drop her petticoat for the untrammeled
freedom of the trousers. But the great-hearted woman, yearning for
recognition as paramount forces of social regeneration—the great-minded
women taking up the problems of life and grappling with them for the
sake of their weaker sisters—these are many, confined and silenced
within the gilded bars which society is daily drawing closer and
stronger about them. This narrowing of woman’s sphere, this withholding
her from anything but a mission purely physical, is but a different form
of the old barbarism whose alleged destruction is the boast of the
present day; and the time is not far distant when the wrong must be
acknowledged and amended, or retrogression brand the age for which we so
proudly claim progression! Let the hackneyed cry of woman’s intellectual
inferiority prove its truth, conclusively, as it has not yet been
proved, or let it be silenced forever! The cranial differences existent
between the sexes, upon which the theoristic foundation of their
respective superiority and inferiority of intellect has been laid, are,
in truth, the exponents of sexual intellectual equality, science having
proclaimed them the visible proofs of that mutual dependence and
adaptability which, sexually, mind has for mind, as body for body. Let
this truth be no longer denied; let present social theories hold their
sway, and in a generation of pigmies, moral, mental, and physical, our
race, in all its glorious potentialities, must sink ignominiously into
oblivion. This is an important fact, of which society seems to have lost
sight—that upon the women of to-day and of to-morrow the coming man is
wholly dependent, type being the transmitter of type, according to its
kind. The increase of female education has naturally awakened women to a
recognition of all her latent intellectual possibilities, and hence the
growth of feminine ranks in that wide field whose battles are fought
with a weapon “mightier than the sword.” The recruits of to-day are not
all Mrs. Brownings nor George Eliots, but the world will lose infinitely
in good and strength and sweetness if the budding Adelaide Proctors and
Mrs. Burnetts are blighted by the propagation of that harsh masculine
doctrine which, stripped of its pretty sophisms, is resolved into the
bare assertion that a woman of talent is a woman unsexed! This doctrine,
false, shallow, and unjust, is the enemy with whom woman is battling
to-day.

May the pyramidal prophecy soon be verified when “all things shall be
compared in pure truth and righteousness.” Then the conflict shall be
ended and the intellectual growth of woman be revealed, the heightener,
enricher, purifier of that emotional development which is the essence of
ideal womanhood—an essence thrilling as deeply and tenderly the hearts
of the humble followers in her footsteps as it thrilled the hearts of
that greatest of woman poets, who sang:

    What art can a woman be good at? Oh, vain!
    What art is she good at but hurting her breast
    With the milk-teeth of babes and a smile at her pain?

pointing in the zenith of her fame to the divine right of maternity as
the supreme, holiest and sweetest potentiality of womanhood.



GIVE THE BABIES WATER.


A recent editorial article in the New York Medical Record contains the
following pertinent remarks on the value of water in the treatment of
sick infants:

“With the exception of tuberculosis, no disease is so fatal in infancy
as intestinal catarrh occurring especially during the hot summer months,
and caused, in the majority of cases, by improper diet. There are many
upon whom the idea does not seem to have impressed itself, that an
infant can be thirsty without, at the same time, being hungry. When
milk, the chief food of infants, is given in excess, acid fermentation
results, causing vomiting, diarrhœa, with passage of green or
yellowish-green stools, elevated temperature, and the subsequent train
of symptoms which are too familiar to need repetition. The same thing
would occur in the adult, if drenched with milk. The infant needs no
food, but drink. The recommendation of some writers, that barley-water
or gum-water be given to the little patients in these cases, is
sufficient explanation of their want of success in treating this
affection. Pure water is perfectly innocuous to infants, and it is
difficult to conceive how the seeming prejudice to it ever arose. Any
one who has ever noticed the avidity with which a fretful sick infant
drinks water, and marks the early abatement of febrile and other
symptoms, will be convinced that water, as a beverage, a quencher of
thirst, a physiological necessity, in fact, should not be denied to the
helpless member of society. We have often seen an infant which had been
dosed ad nauseam for gastro-intestinal irritability, assume, almost at
once, a more cheerful appearance, and rapidly grow better, when treated
to the much-needed draught of water. If any prescription is valuable
enough to be used as routine practice, it is, ‘Give the babies water.’”



WORK FOR LITTLE FINGERS.


To make a pretty little pitcher, cut off the small end of an egg, then
carefully remove the yolk and white of the egg; next take a narrow strip
of colored paper and paste it around the edge of the opening, making the
paper pinked in one place so as to look like the mouth of a pitcher.
Then paste a strip around the other end of the egg so that it will stand
alone; to finish the pitcher paste on a strip of paper bent in the shape
of a handle. Cups may be made in the same manner by cutting away more of
the shell than would be cut in making a pitcher. Pretty air castles are
made by cutting egg shells in half, building the cut edges with colored
paper or cloth, and fastening to them bright colored cord or silk by
which to suspend them. These air castles look pretty when suspended from
brackets, hanging lamps, etc. The pitchers, cups and air-castles may be
improved by being ornamented with small pictures pasted on them.

       *       *       *       *       *

Breakfast Cocoa, as a beverage, is universally conceded superior to all
other drinks for the weary man of business or the more robust laborer.
The preparations of Walter Baker & Co., have long been the standard of
merit in this line, and our readers who purchase “_Baker’s Breakfast
Cocoa_” will find it a most healthful, delicious and invigorating
beverage.

       *       *       *       *       *

A man passes for what he is worth. Very idle is all curiosity concerning
other people’s estimate of us, and idle is all fear of remaining
unknown. If a man knows that he can do anything—that he can do it
better than any one else—he has a pledge of the acknowledgment of the
fact by all persons. The world is full of judgment days, and into every
assembly that man enters, in every action he attempts, he is gauged and
stamped.

       *       *       *       *       *

If you would enjoy quiet content, drop all airs and pretenses.

       *       *       *       *       *

EDUCATIONAL.

UNIVERSITY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK

AMERICAN VETERINARY COLLEGE,
141 WEST 54TH ST., NEW YORK CITY.

The regular course of lectures commences in October each year. Circular
and information can be had on application to

A. LIAUTARD, M.D.V.S.,
Dean of the Faculty.

       *       *       *       *       *

BREEDERS DIRECTORY.

The following list embraces the names of responsible and reliable
Breeders in their line, and parties wishing to purchase or obtain
information can feel assured that they will be honorably dealt with:

SWINE.

Chester Whites.

W. A. Gilbert              Wauwatosa Wis.

       *       *       *       *       *

SCHEIDT & DAVIS, DYER, LAKE CO., IND., breeders
of Victoria swine. Originators of this famous breed.
Stock for Sale. Write for circular A.

       *       *       *       *       *

REMEMBER _that_ $2.00 _pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _one year, and the
subscriber gets a copy of_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER COUNTY MAP OF THE UNITED
STATES, FREE! _This is the most liberal offer ever made by any
first-class weekly agricultural paper in this country._

       *       *       *       *       *

LIVE STOCK, ETC.

HOLSTEINS
AT
LIVING RATES.

DR. W. A. PRATT,
ELGIN, ILL.,

Now has a herd of more than one hundred head of full-blooded

HOLSTEIN’S

mostly imported direct from Holland. These choice dairy animals are for
sale at moderate prices. Correspondence solicited or, better, call and
examine the cattle, and select your own stock.

       *       *       *       *       *

LABEL

[Illustration]

Dana’s White Metallic Ear Marking Label, stamped to order with name, or
name and address and numbers. It is reliable, cheap and convenient.
Sells at sight and gives perfect satisfaction. Illustrated Price-List
and samples free. Agents wanted.

C. H. DANA, WEST LEBANON, N. H.

       *       *       *       *       *

10 JERSEY BULLS FOR SALE.

All of fine quality, solid color and bk. points. Ages, from six to
eighteen months. Sons of Mahkeenae, 3290; brother of Eurotus, 2454, who
made 778 lbs. butter in a year, and out of cows of the best butter
blood, some having records of fourteen and fifteen lbs. per week. No
fancy prices.

A. H. COOLEY, Little Britain Orange Co., N. Y.

N. B.—If I make sales as formerly will send a car with man in charge to
Cleveland, getting lowest rates.

       *       *       *       *       *

SCOTCH COLLIE

SHEPHERD PUPS,

—FROM—

IMPORTED AND TRAINED STOCK

—ALSO—

NEWFOUNDLAND PUPS AND RAT TERRIER PUPS.

Concise and practical printed instruction in Training young Shepherd
Dogs, is given to buyers of Shepherd Puppies; or will be sent on receipt
of 25 cents in postage stamps.

For Printed Circular, giving full particulars about Shepherd Dogs,
enclose a 3-cent stamp, and address

N.H. PAAREN,

P.O. Box 326, CHICAGO. ILL.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

Don’t be Humbugged With Poor, Cheap Coulters.

[Illustration]

All farmers have had trouble with their Coulters. In a few days they get
to wabbling, are condemned and thrown aside. In our

“BOSS” Coulter

we furnish a tool which can scarcely be worn out; and when worn, the
wearable parts, a prepared wood journal, and movable thimble in the hub
(held in place by a key) can be easily and cheaply renewed. WE GUARANTEE
OUR “BOSS” to plow more acres than any other three Coulters now used.

OUR “O. K.” CLAMP

Attaches the Coulter to any size or kind of beam, either right or left
hand plow. We know that after using it you will say it is THE BEST TOOL
ON THE MARKET. Ask your dealer for it.

Manufactured by the BOSS COULTER CO.,
Bunker Hill, Ills.

       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration]

Greatest Offer Ever Made

SEEDS

$2.65 FOR $1.00

A COMPLETE
VEGETABLE GARDEN
ALL THE BEST VARIETIES

We claim our Seeds are Unsurpassed. Their vitality and purity being
tested before sending out. We OFFER $665.00 IN CASH PRIZES FOR 1884
Competition open to all. See Catalogue for particulars. We desire that
all may compete for these prizes, and give our seeds a fair trial,
feeling sure of MAKING A PERMANENT CUSTOMER OF EVERY PURCHASER, and to
INTRODUCE them into thousands of new homes will send free by mail on
receipt of ONE DOLLAR amounting at regular prices to $2.65, OUR SPECIAL
INTRODUCTION BOX OF SEEDS, containing large size packets of all BEST NEW
and STANDARD VARIETIES, as follows: 3 Remarkable Cabbages. _Johnson &
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       *       *       *       *       *

[Illustration: SNOW WHITE FLOUR
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SALZER’S NEW WHEAT.]

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       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

OUR YOUNG FOLKS


THE LEGEND OF THE STORKS AND THE BABIES.

    Have you heard of the valley of Babyland,
      The realm where the dear little darlings stay,
    Till the kind storks go, as all men know,
      And oh, so tenderly bring them away?
    The paths are winding and past all finding
      By all save the storks, who understand
    The gates and the highways and the intricate byways
      That lead to Babyland.

    All over the valley of Babyland
      Sweet flowers bloom in the soft green moss.
    And under the blooms fair, and under the leaves there,
      Lie little heads like spools of floss.
    With a soothing number, the river of slumber
      Flows o’er a bed of silver sand,
    And angels are keeping watch o’er the sleeping
      Babes of Babyland.

    The path to the valley of Babyland
      Only the kingly, kind white storks know.
    If they fly over mountains or wade thro’ fountains—
      No man sees them come and go;
    But an angel, maybe, who guards some baby,
      Or a fairy, perhaps, with her magic wand,
    Brings them straightway to the wonderful gateway,
      That leads to Babyland.

    And there in the valley of Babyland
      Under the mosses and leaves and ferns,
    Like an unfledged starling they find the darling,
      For whom the heart of a mother yearns.
    And they lift him lightly and tuck him tightly
      In feathers as soft as a lady’s hand,
    And off with a rock-a-way step they walk away
      Out of Babyland.

    As they go from the valley of Babyland
      Forth into the world of great unrest,
    Sometimes weeping he wakes from sleeping
      Before he reaches his mother’s breast.
    Ah, how she blesses him now she caresses him:—
      Bonniest bird in the bright home band,
    That o’er land and water the kind stork bro’t her
      From far off Babyland.

        —_Ella Wheeler._



A CHAT ABOUT HALIFAX.


As I promised you I will try and tell you a little about Halifax.

Halifax is, as you all know, the capital of Nova Scotia, which is one of
the provinces of British North America, and thus is under the dominion
of the Queen. It is just what I should imagine a real old English city
to be—very odd and antiquated, and yet picturesquely beautiful, and
altogether a most charming place in which to spend a summer.

Never shall I forget the stroll I took alone the second morning after my
arrival. The day was one of those rarely perfect ones in July. All
nature seemed wrapped in a dreamy repose; the heat of the sun was
tempered by the soft sea breezes blowing from the grand old ocean not
many leagues away, whose roar sounded like the voice of many waters,
soothing, restful, and sweet.

It happened that my wanderings led me in to some of the older portions
of the city where the houses are many of them two hundred years old. And
such funny, queer old houses. They seemed, somehow, to have a slanting
look to them; it may have been, however, that it was because the streets
were so hilly, and such a contrast to our flat, level prairies.

Right in the midst of the city, among the stores (shops they call them)
and houses one comes suddenly upon the graveyards—some of them not now
in use, but still left there. What interested me was the flat
tombstones. When a little girl my father used to tell me of how the
children would take their dolls to the cemetery and play upon and under
the grave stones. Do I hear you exclaim, “What, play _under_ a grave
stone!” I do not wonder, for it seemed a funny thing to me, but it was
quite clear when I saw how the marble slabs were placed. Instead of
standing in an upright position, as you have always seen them, they were
laid flat and raised some distance from the ground (high enough for a
child to crawl under comfortably) by means of little marble posts. I
used often to roam through these cemeteries with a dear old gentleman
who would tell me stories of the brave young sailor boys buried there,
far away from their own loved English homes.

Halifax is one of the most strongly fortified cities in America, and at
every turn one meets the red coated soldiers in the streets—when they
are not on duty. What would interest our boys would be to see a sham
battle; the officers and soldiers all in uniform, eager and active as
for a real encounter with the enemy.

One day I went to visit the strongest fort the city contains. It is
called Citadel Hill, and overlooks and commands the harbor; which by
the way, is considered one of the finest in the world. This Citadel is
merely an immense hill, covering nearly half a mile of ground and
situated in the very heart of the city. When you have climbed to the top
you come upon a large opening, and looking down see a long flight of
iron steps leading to the ground, many, many feet below. The hill is
excavated and stored with arms and ammunition of all kinds, and great
cannons, that look so cruel. All along the outer edge of this excavation
were little rooms in which the married soldiers lived with their
families. I pitied the little children that had to live in this way,
without any home feeling—never knowing at what moment their father
might be called away, for a soldier’s life is necessarily a roving one.

This hill would make a grand coasting place in the winter, and one which
I have no doubt the little Blue Nose boys and girls often avail
themselves of. In Halifax not only the boys and girls, but the men and
women also, make much more of winter sports than we do. The large and
elegant skating rink I hear has just been opened and, the regimental
band have given a grand concert in honor of the occasion.

Snow-shoeing used to be indulged in largely, but in the city the custom
is, I believe, somewhat falling off. I do not think you Western boys and
girls could hardly imagine what odd, pretty suits the girls make to go
skating and snow-shoeing in. The one I saw was made of two large white
flannel bed-blankets, with a bright scarlet and blue border. The suit
consisted of a skirt, circular-like cloak, and cap with a long side flap
to it, which hung nearly to the shoulder. My cousin dressed herself all
up in her pretty rig and then got down her wooden snow-shoes and buckled
them on. She looked like a winter fairy all ready for an Arctic
expedition.

I must confess I could hardly understand how she could manage to walk in
the great unwieldy looking shoes, which were nearly five times as large
as an ordinary shoe, but she assured me it was great fun and easily
done.

I heard an amusing story there about a minister who wished to be
married, but who lived a long distance from the neighboring minister,
and the snow was very deep, and there was but one pair of snow-shoes.
Not wishing to wait until spring he hit upon a novel plan which was
this:

That his ladylove should stand upon the back of his snow-shoes, clasp
her arms tightly around her future lord’s waist, and thus be carried
safely to the neighboring kirk, which she accordingly did. You see this
required no real effort on the lady’s part, only, I should judge, a
great deal of pluck and nerve power, as well as love. However the story
is that they accomplished the journey in safety and were duly married.

One of the prettiest drives in Halifax can be had in a place called the
park (what we would call a park proper they call the gardens). This
park, situated in the southern part of the city and overlooking an arm
of the ocean, has twenty miles of smooth, beautiful roads winding
around, and circling in and out among the trees. The roads were made by
the soldiers, who received for their work twenty-five cents a day
besides their regular army pay. There is also another strong fort in
this park. There are, I think, nine forts, strongly garrisoned in and
about the city.

I wonder if any of THE PRAIRIE FARMER boys and girls have the same
desire that I had when living away out West, where I never saw water,
much less a ship, to go through a large ocean steamship. If you have I
hope that some day you may be able to have your wish gratified as I had
mine.

One morning my friend said, “Will you go to a concert this afternoon or
go and visit the ships?” “The ships of course,” I cried, and to the
ships we went. The “Scotia” was just in on her way from Liverpool to New
York, crowded with passengers. It was noon when we went on board, and
the long tables were being laid out in the salon. Most of the cabin
passengers were out “doing” the city so we saw only the steerage
passengers. Now I had heard much of the steerage passengers, but really
never imagined them to be such a poor, miserable looking set of beings.
They sat around almost anywhere with a plate of soup or a dish full of
other unpalatable appearing food and ate as though they did not care
much whether they lived or died. I longed to speak to the children and
the downcast looking mothers, but they were nearly all of foreign birth,
and would not have understood me if I had.

Many of the better class of passengers were in the little side rooms at
their private meals, but we only caught side glimpses of them passing
through. It was a very pleasant sensation to sit in the handsome saloon
and almost imagine yourself to be sailing, sailing away in the great
noble ship to the land of your dreams and fancies.

There are many more things of interest about this pretty city I would
like to touch upon, but I fear my space is already occupied, so will
have to say good-by for this week.

    MARY HOWE.



THE LITTLE LEGISLATURES.


Most of these are in session again over the land. I do not mean those
law-making bodies which meet annually at the State capitols to undo what
they had done before, or otherwise make work for the courts and lawyers.
But I allude to those little assemblies of young folks—lads and
lasses—that weekly meet in the winter season in all the thousand and
one school-houses and rural halls throughout our country. Legislatures
did I call them? Not quite legislatures; but training schools in which
legislators are made; and it is in these that our rising youth are
qualifying themselves to govern the country that is so soon to be
theirs.

Little as we may think of it, these assemblies, under whatever name they
may be known—lyceums, societies, clubs, or “legislatures,”—are a power
in the land; they do far more than most people think in forming the
characters and fixing the opinions of the great multitude of boys and
girls who participate in them. They are to-day more numerous than ever
before, though they have been abroad in the land for more than half a
century. Many of the leading actors on the world’s stage at the present
day owe their position to the influence of one or more of these little
associations of which they formed a part in their boyhood days. The
writer of this could not count on his fingers the number of his
associates in boyhood, who have risen out of these schools to positions
of honor and trust in the country.

But there is a marked feature belonging to them now that did not exist a
half century ago, the result of a vast change that has been made in
public sentiment within that period. Then they were confined only to the
boys; now the girls participate in them almost, if not quite, as freely
as their brothers; and it must be confessed that in a great majority of
cases the result has been beneficial to both sexes. The fogyism of that
day stoutly protested that hens should not be permitted to crow, yet
they persisted in learning the art, and conservatism has been forced to
acknowledge that they can crow vociferously and to good effect. And
these institutions have proven to be good crowing schools to girls.

Let these associations be encouraged in every school district; but care
should be taken by the elder class that they be properly organized and
conducted in an orderly manner. Youthful zeal and ardor will be apt to
break out into rudeness and disorder, unless held in check by the aged
and experienced. Let the older, then, wherever these associations exist,
see to it that they are prudently managed—else instead of blessings
they will become evils in the community.

The points to which these efforts should be mainly directed, should
be—first, plain rules for their government; second, a strict adherence
to them when adopted; a diversity of exercises—not too much debate, and
not too many essays; fourth, the avoidance of all personal matters; and
fifth, a judicious selection of subjects. With these points held well in
view, and with a serious desire for improvement, these institutions can
not but be useful; otherwise they should be discontinued.

Farmers everywhere ought to encourage the formation of these
institutions in their respective neighborhoods, and aid their sons and
daughters in carrying them forward. Give them your countenance and your
counsel.

    T. G.



WALKING CANES.


The material of which walking sticks are made is as various as can
well-nigh be conceived of. Many are imported woods—some from the
tropics, China and the East Indies. The celebrated Whongee canes are
from China, where they are well known and celebrated for the regularity
of their joints, which are the points from which the leaves are given
off, and the stems of a species of phyllosiachys, a gigantic grass,
closely allied to the bamboo. The orange and lemon are highly prized,
and are imported chiefly from the West Indies, and perfect specimens
command enormous prices. The orange stick is known by its beautiful
green bark, with fine white longitudinal markings, and the lemon by the
symmetry of its proportions, and both prominence and regularity of its
knobs. Myrtle sticks also possess a value, since their appearance is so
peculiar that their owner would seldom fail to recognize them. They are
imported from Algeria. The rajah stick is an importation. It is the stem
of a plant and a species of calamus. It is grown in Borneo, and takes
its name from the fact that the Rajah will not allow any to go out of
the country unless a heavy duty is paid. These canes, known as palm
canes, are distinguished by an angular and more or less flat appearance.
Their color is brownish, spotted, and they are quite straight, with
neither knob nor curl. They are the petioles of leaf stalk of the date
palm. Perhaps the most celebrated of the foreign canes are the Malacca,
being the stems of the calamus sceptonum, a slender climbing palm, and
not growing around Malacca, as the name would seem to indicate, but
imported from Stak, on the opposite coast of Sumatra. Other foreign
canes are ebony, rosewood, partridge or hairwood, and cactus, which,
when the pith is cut out, presents a most novel appearance, hollow and
full of holes.

       *       *       *       *       *

Shortly after Miss Alcott’s “Little Women” was published a quiet-looking
lady entered a Boston circulating library and asked a lady clerk to pick
her out “a good book that would rest and amuse her.” Naturally “Little
Women” was offered, and declined. “It’s very nice; you’d like it,” urged
the clerk. “I should not care to read it,” said the other. “But at least
look at it.” “No,” came the answer, firmly and with an odd smile; “it is
not a book that I should care to read.” Then the clerk, pretty angry,
walked away to the chief librarian and cried: “There’s a woman down
there wants a book, and if you want her waited on somebody else must do
it. I won’t.” “Why, why not?” “Why, she says ‘Little Women’ isn’t good
enough for her to read.” “Do you know who that lady is?” “No, and I
don’t care.” “Well, I’ll tell you. That is Louise M. Alcott. Now go and
get her a book.”

       *       *       *       *       *

A Michigan girl told her young man that she would never marry him until
he was worth $100,000. So he started out with a brave heart to make it.

“How are you getting on George?” she asked at the expiration of a couple
of months.

“Well,” George said hopefully, “I have saved up $22.”

The girl dropped her eyelashes and blushingly remarked: “I reckon that’s
near enough, George.”

       *       *       *       *       *


Illinois Central Railroad.

The elegant equipment of coaches and sleepers being added to its various
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       *       *       *       *       *

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[Illustration]

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       *       *       *       *       *

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[Illustration]

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SPECIAL PRICES TO THE TRADE.

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Send for Illustrated Catalogue and Price List; free.

HIRAM SIBLEY & CO., SEEDSMEN.
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       *       *       *       *       *

Philadelphia LAWN MOWERS

Are used on all the celebrated Chicago Parks. They are light running,
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TRADE SUPPLIED.

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       *       *       *       *       *

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for 10c. Cut this out. CLINTON BROS. & Co., Clintonville, Ct.

       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

LITERATURE.


LOGIC.

_I. Her respectable papa’s._

    “My dear, be sensible! Upon my word,
    This—for a woman, even—is absurd.
    His income’s not a hundred pounds, I know;
    He’s not worth loving.”—“But I love him so.”


_II. Her mother’s._

    “You silly child, he is well-made and tall;
    But looks are far from being all in all.
    His social standing’s low, his family’s low,
    He’s not worth loving.”—“And I love him so.”


_III. Her eternal friend’s._

    “Is that he picking up the fallen fan?
    My dear! he’s such an awkward, ugly man!
    You must be certain, pet, to answer ‘No.’
    He’s not worth loving.”—“And I love him so.”


_IV. Her brother’s._

    “By Jove! were I girl!—through a horrid hap—
    I wouldn’t have a milk-and-water chap.
    The man has not a single spark or ‘go.’
    He’s not worth loving.”—“Yet I love him so.”


_V. Her own._

    “And were he everything to which I’ve listened;
    Though he were ugly, awkward (and he isn’t),
    Poor, lowly-born, and destitute of ‘go,’
    He is worth loving, for I love him so.”

        —_Chambers’ Journal._



DON’T WAIT.


    If you have gentle words and looks, my friends,
      To spare for me—if you have tears to shed
    That I have suffered—keep them not, I pray,
      Until I hear not, see not, being dead.

    For loving looks, though fraught with tenderness,
      And kindly tears, though they fall thick and fast,
    And words of praise, alas! can naught avail
      To lift the shadows from a life that’s past?

    And rarest blossoms, what can they suffice,
      Offered to one who can no longer gaze
    Upon their beauty! Flow’rs in coffins laid
      Impart no sweetness to departed days.



THE CURFEW HEROINE.


The story that is the basis of the well-known poem, “Curfew Shall Not
Ring To-night,” told in prose is as follows:

It lacked quite half an hour of curfew toll. The old bell-ringer came
from under the wattled roof of his cottage stoop and stood with
uncovered head in the clear sweet-scented air. He had grown blind and
deaf in the service, but his arm was as muscular as ever, and he who
listened this day marked no faltering in the heavy metallic throbs of
the cathedral bell. Old Jasper had lived through many changes. He had
tolled out the notes of mourning for good Queen Bess, and with tears
scarcely dry he had rung the glad tidings of the coronation of James.
Charles I. had been crowned, reigned, and expiated his weakness before
all England in Jasper’s time, and now he who under army held all the
common wealth in the hollow of his hand, ruled as more than monarch, and
still the old man with the habit of a long life upon him rang his matin
and sorrow.

Jasper stood alone now, lifting his dimmed eyes up to the softly dappled
sky.

The wall of his memory seemed so written over—so crossed and recrossed
by the annals of the years that had gone before, that there seemed
little room for anything in the present. Little recked he that
Cromwell’s spearsmen were camped on the moor beyond the village—that
Cromwell himself rode with his guardsmen a league away; he only knew
that the bell had been rung in the tower when William the Conqueror made
curfew a law, had been spared by Puritan and Roundhead, and that his arm
for sixty years had never failed him at even-tide.

He was moving with a slow step toward the gate, when a woman came
hurriedly in from the street and stood beside him; a lovely woman, but
with a face so blanched that it seemed carved in the whitest of marble,
with all its roundness and dimples. Her great, solemn eyes were raised
to the aged face in pitiful appeal, and the lips were forming words that
he could not understand.

“Speak up, lass, I am deaf and can not hear your chatter.”

“For heaven’s sake, Jasper, do not ring the curfew bells to-night.”

“What! na ring curfew? You must be daft, lassie.”

“Jasper, for sweet heaven’s sake—for my sake—for one night in all your
long life forget to ring the bell! Fail this once and my lover shall
live, whom Cromwell says shall die at curfew toll. Do you hear? my
lover, Richard Temple. See, Jasper, here is my money to make your old
age happy. I sold my jewelry that the Lady Maud gave me, and the gold
shall be yours for one curfew.”

“Would you bribe me, Lily De Vere? Ye’re a changeling. Ye’re na the
blood of the Plantagenets in ye’re veins as ye’re mother had. What,
corrupt the bell-ringer under her majesty, good Queen Bess? Not for all
the gold that Lady Maud could bring me! Babes have been born and strong
men have died before now at the ringing of my bell. Awa’! Awa’!”

And out on the village green with the solemn shadows of the lichens
lengthening over it, a strong man awaited the curfew toll for his death.
He stood handsome, and brave, and tall—taller by an inch than the
tallest pikeman who guarded him.

What had he done that he should die? Little it mattered in those days,
when the sword that the great Cromwell wielded was so prone to fall,
what he or others had done. He had been scribe to the late lord up at
the castle, and Lady Maud, forgetting that man must woo and woman must
wait, had given her heart to him without the asking, while the gentle
Lily De Vere, distant kinswoman and poor companion of her, had, without
seeking, found the treasures of his true love and held them fast. Then
he had joined the army and made one of the pious soldiers whose evil
passions were never stirred but by sign or symbol of poetry. But a
scorned woman’s hatred had reached him even there. Enemies and deep
plots had compassed him about and conquered him. To-night he was to die.

The beautiful world lay as a vivid picture before him. The dark green
wood above the rocky hill where Robin Hood and his merry men had dwelt;
the frowning castle with its drawbridge and square towers, the long
stretch of moor with the purple shadows upon it, the green, straight
walks of the village, the birds overhead, even the daisies at his feet
he saw. But ah! more vividly than all, he saw the great red sun with its
hazy veil lingering above the trees as though it pitied him with more
than human pity.

He was a God fearing and a God serving man. He had long made his peace
with heaven. Nothing stood between him and death—nothing rose
pleadingly between him and those who were to destroy him but the sweet
face of Lily De Vere, whom he loved. She had knelt at Cromwell’s feet
and pleaded for his life. She wearied heaven with her prayers, but all
without avail.

Slowly now the great sun went down. Slowly the last rim was hid beneath
the greenwood. Thirty seconds more and his soul would be with God. The
color did not forsake his cheeks. The dark rings of hair lay upon a warm
brow. It was his purpose to die as martyrs and brave men die. What was
life that he should cling to it? He almost felt the air pulsate with the
first heavy roll of the death knell. But no sound came. Still facing the
soldiers with his clear gray eyes upon them he waited.

The crimson banners in the west were paling to pink. The kine had ceased
their lowing, and had been gathered into the rick yards.

All nature had sounded her curfew, but old Jasper was silent!

The bell-ringer, with his gray head yet bared, had traversed half the
distance between his cottage and the ivy-covered tower when a form went
flitting past him, with pale, shadowy robes floating round it, and hair
that the low western lights touched and tinted as with a halo.

“Ah, Huldah, Huldah!” the old man muttered; “how swift she flies? I will
come soon dear. My work is almost done.”

Huldah was the good wife who had gone from him in her early womanhood,
and for whom he had mourned all his long life. But the fleeting form was
not Huldah’s. It was Lily De Vere, hurried by a sudden and desperate
purpose toward the cathedral.

“So help me God, curfew shall not ring to-night! Cromwell and his
dragoons come this way. Once more I will kneel at his feet and plead.”

She entered the ruined arch. She wrenched from its fastening the carved
and worm-eaten door that barred the way to the tower. She ascended with
flying and frenzied feet the steps; her heart lifted up to God for
Richard’s deliverance from peril. The bats flew out and shook the dust
of centuries from the black carving. As she went up she caught glimpses
of the interior of the great building, with its groined roof, its
chevrons and clustered columns; its pictured saint and carved image of
the virgin, which the pillages of ages had been spared to be dealt with
by time, the most relentless vandal of all.

Up—still—up—beyond the rainbow tints thrown by the stained glass
across her death-white brow; up—still—up—past open arch, with griffin
and gargoyles staring at her from under bracket and cornice, with all
the hideousness and mediæval carving; the stairs, flight by flight,
growing frailer beneath her young feet; now but a slender network
between her and the outer world; but still up.

Her breath was coming short and gasping. She saw through an open space
old Jasper cross the road at the foot of the tower. Oh, how far! The
seconds were treasures which Cromwell, with all his blood-bought
commonwealth, could not purchase from her. Up—ah—there, just above her
with its great brazen mouth and wicked tongue, the bell hung. A worm
eaten block for a step, and one small white had clasped itself above the
clapper—the other prepared, at the tremble, to rise and clasp its mate,
and the feet to swing off—and thus she waited. Jasper was old and slow,
but he was sure and it came at last. A faint quiver, and the young feet
swung from their rest, and the tender hands clasped for more than their
precious life the writhing thing. There was groaning and creaking of the
rude pulleys above, and then the strokes came heavy and strong. Jasper’s
hand had not forgot its cunning, nor his arm its strength. The tender,
soft form was swung and dashed to and fro. But she clung to and caressed
the cold, cruel thing. Let one stroke come and a thousand might
follow—for its fatal work would be done. She wreathed her white arms
about it, so that with every pull of the great rope it crushed into the
flesh. It tore her, and wounded and bruised; but there in the solemn
twilight the brave woman swung and fought with the curfew, and God gave
her victory.

The old bell-ringer said to himself: “Aye, Huldah, my work is done. The
pulleys are getting too heavy for my old arms; my ears, too, have failed
me. I dinna hear one stroke of the curfew. Dear old bell! it is my ears
that have gone false, and not thou. Farewell old friend.”

And just beyond the worn pavement a shadowy form again went flitting
past him. There were drops of blood upon the white garments, and the
face was like the face of one who walked in her sleep, and her hands
hung wounded and powerless at her side. Cromwell paused with his
horsemen under the dismantled May-pole before the village green. He saw
the man who was to die at sunset standing up in the dusky air, tall as a
king and beautiful as Absalom. He gazed with knitted brow and angry eye,
but his lips did not give utterance to the quick command that trembled
on them, for a girl came flying toward him. Pikeman and archer stepped
aside to let her pass. She threw herself upon the turf at his horse’s
feet; she lifted her bleeding and tortured hands to his gaze, and once
more poured out her prayer for the life of her lover; with trembling
lips she told him why Richard still lived—why the curfew had not
sounded.

Lady Maud looking out of her latticed window at the castle, saw the
great protector dismount, lift the fainting form in his arms and bear
her to her lover. She saw the guards release their prisoner, and she
heard the shouts of joy at his deliverance; then she welcomed the night
that shut the scene out from her envious eye and sculptured her in its
gloom.

At the next matin bell old Jasper died, and at curfew toll he was laid
beside the wife who had died in his youth, but the memory of whom had
been with him always.

    —_Bulletin, Haverhill, Mass._

       *       *       *       *       *

Work every hour, paid or unpaid, see only that thou work, and thou canst
not escape thy reward. Whether thy work be fine or coarse, planting corn
or writing epics, so only it be honest work, done to thine own
approbation, it shall earn a reward to the senses as well as to the
thought. No matter how often defeated, you are born to victory. The
reward of a thing well done is to have done it.

       *       *       *       *       *

No one loves to tell a tale of scandal but to him that loves to hear it.
Learn, then, to rebuke and silence the detracting tongue by refusing to
hear. Never make your ear the grave of another’s good name.

       *       *       *       *       *

There is nothing by which I have through life more profited than by the
just observations, the good opinions, and sincere and gentle
encouragement of amiable and sensible women.

       *       *       *       *       *

Self-control is promoted by humility. Pride is a fruitful source of
uneasiness. It keeps the mind in disquiet. Humility is the antidote to
this evil.

       *       *       *       *       *

Those beings only are fit for solitude who like nobody, are like nobody,
and are liked by nobody.

       *       *       *       *       *

A noble heart, like the sun, showeth its greatest countenance in its
lowest estate.

       *       *       *       *       *

OUR New Clubbing List FOR 1884.

The PRAIRIE FARMER IN CONNECTION WITH OTHER JOURNALS.


We offer more liberal terms than ever before to those who desire to
take, in connection with THE PRAIRIE FARMER, either of the following
weekly or monthly periodicals. In all cases the order for THE PRAIRIE
FARMER and either of the following named journals must be sent together,
accompanied by the money; but we do not require both papers to be sent
to the same person or to the same post-office.

We send specimen copies only of THE PRAIRIE FARMER.

Our responsibility for other publications ceases on the receipt of the
first number; when such journals are not received within a reasonable
time, notify us, giving date of your order, also full name and address
of subscriber.


WEEKLIES.

                                 Price of  The two
                                 the two.    for

Harper’s Weekly                      $6 00  $4 60
Harper’s Bazar                        6 00   4 60
Harper’s Young People                 3 50   2 55
New York Tribune                      4 00   2 50
Toledo Blade                          4 00   2 20
Chicago Times                         3 25   2 50
Chicago Tribune                       3 50   2 50
Chicago Inter-Ocean                   3 15   2 50
Chicago Journal                       3 25   2 50
Peck’s Sun                            3 75   3 00
Milwaukee Sentinel                    3 00   2 50
Western Farmer (Madison, Wis.)        3 00   2 00
Burlington Hawkeye                    4 00   3 00
The Continent (Weekly Magazine)       6 00   5 00
Detroit Free Press, with Supplement   4 00   2 50
Detroit Free Press, State edition     3 50   2 20
Louisville Courier-Journal            3 75   3 00
St. Louis Globe-Democrat              3 00   2 15
St. Louis Republican                  3 00   2 15
Scientific American                   5 20   4 15
Interior (Presbyterian)               4 50   3 60
Standard (Baptist)                    4 70   3 60
Advance (Congregational)              5 00   3 35
Alliance                              4 00   3 00
New York Independent                  5 00   4 00
Christian Union                       5 00   4 00
Boston Pilot (Catholic)               4 50   3 50
American Bee Journal                  4 00   3 50
Florida Agriculturist                 4 00   2 75
Breeder’s Gazette                     5 00   3 50
Witness (N. Y.)                       3 50   3 00
Methodist (N. Y.)                     4 00   3 50
Chicago News                          3 00   2 50
Globe (Boston)                        3 00   2 75
Youth’s Companion, new subs           3 75   3 00
Youth’s Companion, renewals           3 85   3 25
Weekly Novelist                       5 00   4 25
Ledger (Chicago)                      3 00   2 90
American Bee Journal                  4 00   3 25


MONTHLIES.

Harper’s Monthly                     $6 00 $4 50
Atlantic Monthly                      6 00  4 50
Appleton’s Journal                    5 00  4 25
The Century                           6 00  4 50
North American Review                 7 00  5 50
Popular Science Monthly               7 00  5 50
Lippincott’s Magazine                 5 00  4 50
Godey’s Lady’s Book                   4 00  3 00
St. Nicholas                          5 00  3 50
Vick’s Illustrated Magazine           3 25  2 25
Am. Poultry Journal (Chicago)         3 25  2 75
American Bee Journal                  3 00  2 25
Gardener’s Monthly                    4 00  3 00
Wide Awake                            4 50  3 00
Phrenological Journal                 4 00  3 00
American Agriculturist                3 50  2 50
Poultry World                         3 25  2 75
Arthur’s Home Magazine                4 00  3 00
Andrews’ Bazar                        3 00  2 40
Frank Leslie’s Popular Monthly        5 00  4 00
Frank Leslie’s Sunday Magazine        5 00  4 00
Frank Leslie’s Ladies’ Magazine       4 50  4 00
Our Little Ones                       3 50  3 00
Peterson’s Magazine                   4 00  3 30
Art Amateur                           6 00  5 00
Demorest’s Magazine                   4 00  3 00
Dio Lewis’ Monthly                    4 50  3 50

For clubbing price with any publication in the United States not
included in the above list send us inquiry on postal card.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

“FACTS ABOUT
Arkansas and Texas.”

A handsome book, beautifully illustrated, with colored diagrams, giving
reliable information as to crops, population, religious denominations,
commerce, timber, Railroads, lands, etc., etc.

Sent free to any address on receipt of a 2-cent stamp. Address

H.C. TOWNSEND,
GEN. PASSENGER AGT., ST. LOUIS, MO.

       *       *       *       *       *

SCRIBNER’S LUMBER AND LOG-BOOK

OVER HALF A MILLION COPIES SOLD.

The most full and complete book of its kind ever published. Gives
correct measurement of all kinds of lumber, logs, plank, cubical
contents of square and round timber, stave and heading bolt tables,
wages, rent, board, capacity of cisterns, Cord-wood tables, interest,
etc., and has become the Standard Book throughout the United States and
Canada.

Be sure and get the New Edition, with Doyle’s Log Table. Price, 35
cents, by mail, postpaid.

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING. CO., Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

FOR SALE.

Pure bred Bronze Turkeys and Pekin Ducks. Also eggs in Season.

MRS. J. F. FULTON,

Petersburg. Ills.

       *       *       *       *       *



[Illustration]

HUMOROUS


OLD SHOES.

    How much a man is like old shoes!
    For instance, both a soul may lose;
    Both have been tanned; both are made tight
    By cobblers; both get left and right;
    Both need a mate to be complete,
    And both are made to go on feet.
    They both need heeling, oft are sold,
    And both in time all turn to mold.
    With shoes the last is first; with men
    The first shall be last; and when
    The shoes wear out they’re mended new:
    When men wear out they’re men-dead, too.
    They both are trod upon, and both
    Will tread on others, nothing loath.
    Both have their ties, and both incline
    When polished in the world to shine:
    And both peg out—and would you choose
    To be a man or be his shoes?



AN OBSTINATE WIFE.


The other night a policeman who was patrolling High street east, heard a
whistle blown, followed by shouts for “police!” and after a run of half
a block he came to a halt in front of a house where a second-story
window was raised and a man had half his length over the sill.

“What’s the row?” demanded the officer.

“Some purglars vhas in mein house!” was the answer.

“How do you know?”

“I hears ’em make a noise more ash six times!”

“Where are they?”

“Down in der kitchen!”

“Have you been down to look around?”

“No! no! I tells my vhife to go, but she won’t stir! She shumps into
bedt und covers oop her headt, und I vhas left to do all der fighting
und be kilt! Dot’s der kind of a vhife she vhas!”

The officer investigated, to find that cats were responsible for the
noises, and as he retired the householder was calling to his wife:

“Mary, if you go down I shtand on der stairs mit a light und a shot-gun
und shoot eafery burglar like tunder.”



WANTED WEATHER-STRIPS.


“Didn’t I leave an order here three days ago for weather-strips?”
demanded an indignant citizen of the proprietor of a Woodward avenue
store yesterday.

“Yes, sir, you did.”

“And didn’t you say you would send a man to put them on?”

“I did.”

“And he was sick, I suppose?”

“No, sir; he went up there two days ago.”

“And put on the strips?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where?”

“On the front and side doors, of course.”

“On the doors—of course—who in Halifax ordered them on the doors of
the house? I wanted them strips for the barn doors!”

“You did?”

“Certainly I did. Do you suppose I want draughts of air sweeping in on
my poor horses this kind o’ weather?”



IT’S A TELEPHONE.


A well-to-do but unsophisticated back-woodsman was in the city lately,
attending the Fat Stock Show, and brought along his wife and daughters
to see the sights and do some shopping. Among other places they visited
was Mandel’s new store, and after wandering around the first floor for a
while the party came to a stop near the elevators.

One of the daughters was first to discover the cars moving silently up
and down, receiving and discharging their cargoes of passengers. She
jerked her father’s coat sleeve to direct his attention to the
phenomenon, and in a tone that was audible to the clerks in the
neighborhood asked:

“What’s that, paw—that thing going up and down, with sofys in it?”

The old man gave the elevator a long, calm, deliberate, scrutinizing
stare, and exclaimed with joy:

“By gosh! it’s a telephone! the first I ever saw!”



AN EMERGENCY.


A few days ago a man with a weak and humble expression, and wearing a
summer suit of clothes, applied to one of the railroad passenger agents
for a dead-head pass to Toledo.

“Why when do you want to go to Toledo?”

“To get married.”

“And you haven’t any money?”

“Not above twenty-five cents.”

“Hadn’t you better be worth your fare to Toledo before taking a wife on
your hands to support?”

“You don’t understand the case,” protested the man. “I’m going to marry
a widow worth at least $5,000, and the first thing I shall do will be to
remit you the price of a ticket. I’m poor, and the widow knows it, but
she marries me for love.”

He protested so long and earnestly that he was finally passed down the
road. Two days elapsed, and then a letter was received from him saying:

“Heaven bless you for your kindness? Reached here all right, and married
the widow according to programme. It turns out that she isn’t worth a
copper. In this emergency may I ask you to pass us both to Detroit,
where I have hopes of striking a job?”

       *       *       *       *       *

The fellow who went into a sink hole clear to his nose remarked that it
wasn’t much, as he had only gotten in up to his sneeze, and he had gum
boots on.

       *       *       *       *       *

“We have struck smoother road, haven’t we?” asked a passenger of a
conductor on an Arkansas railway. “No.” replied the conductor. “We have
only run off the track.”

       *       *       *       *       *

Has it ever occurred to you that the initials N. J. stand not only for
New Jersey, but New Jerusalem? There’s the same uncertainty of
significance in certain words beginning with H—one of which is Heaven.

       *       *       *       *       *

“You are the most stuck-up chap I ever saw,” remarked a young lady to a
youth whom she met at a taffy pull. To which he replied: “And you are
just as sweet as you are candid.” Another leap-year horror.

       *       *       *       *       *

“Rebecca,” said Mose Schaumberg, an Austin merchant prince to his wife.
“I vants you to gif me your photograph.” “Und vat in the vorld do you
vant mit mine photograph?” inquired the wife. “I vants to paste it on
mine pipe. Times vas so pad dad I vants to preak mineself of smoking,”
answered Mose.

       *       *       *       *       *

“Your visits remind me of the growth of a successful newspaper,” said
Uncle Jabez, leaning his chin on his cane, and glancing at William
Arthur, who was sweet on Angelica. “Why so?” inquired William. “Well,
they commenced as a weekly, grew to be a tri-weekly, and have now become
daily, with a weekly supplement.”

       *       *       *       *       *

They were returning home from the theatre and had nearly reached her
home, when the young man observed: “Isn’t the weather cold and raw?” She
must have misunderstood him. “Raw,” she said, rather hesitatingly. “Yes,
I like them raw, but,” she continued, looking sweetly in his eyes,
“don’t you think they are nicer fried?” What could he do?

       *       *       *       *       *

One more unfortunate: Mamma (a widow of considerable personal
attractions)—“I want to tell you something, Tommy. You saw that
gentleman talking to grandmamma in the other room. Well, he is going to
be your new papa. Mamma’s going to marry him.” Tommy (who recollects
something of the life his old papa used to lead)—“D-d-does he know it
yet mamma?”

       *       *       *       *       *

“Doctor,” said our young man to a jocular dentist, “I hear you’ve been
saying that I’ve got a mouth that always reminds you of the mouth of the
Mississippi. Is that so?” “Of course not, my dear boy,” said Burton. “I
never said anything so cruel. All I said was that when I was reaching
for one of your rear snags I always felt safer when I had a
life-preserver around me.”

       *       *       *       *       *

Queen Victoria took the second prize at the York show with a yearling
heifer from her Balmoral farm, and she kicked like a steer because she
didn’t get the first. The heifer did, not Victoria. Er himperial majesty
kicked too, because the first prize is one shilling thruppence, while
the second is only one shilling tuppence happeny, but her protest of
course was made in a most majestic and lady-like manner.—_Hawkeye._

       *       *       *       *       *

Some of the richest men in Austin started in life in a very modest way,
and are still plain, unpretentious people, but their sons put on a great
deal of style. One of the latter, who was better posted about other
people’s affairs than his own family’s remarked sneeringly to an
acquaintance: “Your father was nothing but a simple stonemason.” “I know
where you got that information,” quietly remarked the other. “From whom
did I get it?” “From your father.” “How do you know that?” “Because
your father used to be my father’s hod-carrier.”

       *       *       *       *       *

It is a base slander upon the goat to say he eats tomato can labels and
circus poster and old hoop skirts and things because he likes them. He
is driven to this coarse, and not very nutritious fare, by hard times
and destitution. When he can stand on his hind legs and eat his
luxurious way along a clothes-line, all the circus posters in the world
can’t lure him away from the night shirt and the par boiled sheet. Be
just to the goat. And how he does love a coil of manilla rope or a
rubber door mat. The fact is, the goat is gifted with a fine rather
epicurean taste, and if we could afford to feed him the things he is
fond of he would never touch a tomato can.—_Hawkeye._

       *       *       *       *       *

SPECIAL OFFER.

$67 FOR $18!

[Illustration]

A Superb New Family Sewing Machine!

Combining all the most recent improvements, and now selling for $65, is
offered by THE PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING COMPANY to subscribers to THE
PRAIRIE FARMER

FOR $18,

including one year’s subscription to the paper.

This exceptional offer will remain open for a few days only.

       *       *       *       *       *

STANDARD BOOKS

NOW READY FOR DISTRIBUTION.

VOLUMES ONE AND TWO
OF THE
NATIONAL REGISTER NORMAN HORSES

The most reliable, concise, and exhaustive history of the horse in
general, and by far the most complete and authentic one of the Norman
horse in particular, ever published in the United States.

PRICES:

Volume I.........................................$ 2.00

Volume II........................................  1.50

When the two volumes are sent in one package to one address, $3.00.
Sent, postpaid, on receipt of price.

Address your orders to

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago


       *       *       *       *       *

QUINBY’S
NEW BEE-KEEPING,
THE MYSTERIES OF BEE-KEEPING EXPLAINED

Combining the results of fifty years’ experience with the latest
discoveries and inventions and presenting the most approved methods,
forming

A COMPLETE GUIDE
—TO—
SUCCESSFUL BEE-CULTURE

By L. C. ROOT, Practical Apiarian

With 100 Illustrations.

By mail, prepaid, $1.50. Address
PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

WINTER GREENERIES AT HOME

By Rev. E. A. JOHNSON, D. D.

A WORK ON WINTER GARDENING, GIVING THE RESULTS OF ACTUAL PRACTICE.

The author for several years past has found recreation in beautifying
his study with plants; his work has resulted in so much enjoyment to
himself and his friends that he has been induced to tell what he did and
how he did it. The book is not a mere dry set of directions, but its
teachings are presented in the pleasant form of letters to some young
ladies, who, having witnessed the author’s success, have asked his
instruction, and this allows a genial personality to pervade the work,
and makes it withal readable as well as instructive. It is a most
excellent guide to successful winter gardening, as suited to American
homes, with our peculiar domestic surroundings, and those who follow its
teachings will reach a satisfactory measure of success. The engravings
include several representations of the author’s study. Finely
illustrated 12mo. Price, postpaid, $1.

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

ONE CENT

invested in a postal card and addressed as below

WILL

give to the writer full information as to the best lands in the United
States now for sale; how he can

BUY

them on the lowest and best terms, also the full text of the U.S. land
laws and how to secure

320 ACRES

of Government Lands in Northwestern Minnesota and Northeastern Dakota.

ADDRESS:

JAMES B. POWER,
Land and Emigration Commissioner,
ST. PAUL, MINN.

       *       *       *       *       *

MEDICAL.

DISEASE CURED
Without Medicine.

_A Valuable Discovery for supplying Magnetism to the Human System.
Electricity and Magnetism utilized as never before for Healing the
Sick._

THE MAGNETON APPLIANCE CO.’s

MAGNETIC KIDNEY BELT!

FOR MEN IS

WARRANTED TO CURE
_Or Money refunded_, the following diseases without medicine:—_Pain in
the Back, Hips, Head, or Limbs, Nervous Debility, Lumbago, General
Debility, Rheumatism, Paralysis, Neuralgia, Sciatica, Diseases of the
Kidneys, Spinal Diseases, Torpid Liver_, GOUT SEMINAL EMISSIONS,
IMPOTENCY, ASTHMA, HEART DISEASE, DYSPEPSIA, CONSTIPATION, ERYSIPELAS,
INDIGESTION, HERNIA OR RUPTURE, CATARRH, PILES, EPILEPSY, DUMB AGUE,
ETC.

When any debility of the GENERATIVE ORGANS occurs, LOST VITALITY,
LACK OF NERVE FORCE AND VIGOR, WASTING WEAKNESS, and all those Diseases
of a personal nature, from whatever cause, the continuous stream of
Magnetism permeating through the parts, must restore them to a healthy
action. There is no mistake about this appliance.

TO THE LADIES:—If you are afflicted with LAME BACK, WEAKNESS OF THE
SPINE, FALLING OF THE WOMB, LEUCORRHŒA, CHRONIC INFLAMMATION AND
ULCERATION OF THE WOMB, INCIDENTAL HEMORRHAGE OR FLOODING, PAINFUL,
SUPPRESSED, AND IRREGULAR MENSTRUATION, BARRENNESS, AND CHANGE OF LIFE,
THIS IS THE BEST APPLIANCE AND CURATIVE AGENT KNOWN.

For all forms of FEMALE DIFFICULTIES it is unsurpassed by anything
before invented, both as a curative agent and as a source of power and
vitalization.

Price of either Belt with Magnetic Insoles, $10, sent by express C.O.D.,
and examination allowed, or by mail on receipt of price. In ordering
send measure of waist, and size of shoe. Remittance can be made in
currency, sent in letter at our risk.

The Magneton Garments are adapted to all ages, are worn over the
under-clothing (NOT NEXT TO THE BODY LIKE THE MANY GALVANIC AND
ELECTRIC HUMBUGS ADVERTISED SO EXTENSIVELY), and should be taken off at
night. They hold their POWER FOREVER, and are worn at all seasons of the
year.

Send stamp for the “New Departure in Medical treatment WITHOUT
MEDICINE,” with thousands of testimonials.

THE MAGNETON APPLIANCE CO.,
218 STATE STREET. CHICAGO, ILL.

NOTE.—Send one dollar in postage stamps or currency (in letter
at our risk) with size of shoe usually worn, and try a pair of our
Magnetic Insoles, and be convinced of the power residing in our other
Magnetic Appliances. Positively no cold feet when they are worn, or
money refunded.

       *       *       *       *       *

PUBLICATIONS.

MARSHALL M. KIRKMAN’S BOOKS ON RAILROAD TOPICS.

DO YOU WANT TO BECOME A RAILROAD MAN

IF YOU DO, THE BOOKS DESCRIBED BELOW POINT THE WAY.

The most promising field for men of talent and ambition at the present
day is the railroad service. The pay is large in many instances, while
the service is continuous and honorable. Most of our railroad men began
life on the farm. Of this class is the author of the accompanying books
descriptive of railway operations, who has been connected continuously
with railroads as a subordinate and officer for 27 years. He was brought
up on a farm, and began railroading as a lad at $7 per month. He has
written a number of standard books on various topics connected with the
organization, construction, management and policy of railroads. These
books are of interest not only to railroad men but to the general reader
as well. They are indispensable to the student. They present every phase
of railroad life, and are written in an easy and simple style that both
interests and instructs. The books are as follows:

“RAILWAY EXPENDITURES—THEIR EXTENT,
OBJECT AND ECONOMY.”—A Practical
Treatise on Construction and Operation.
In Two Volumes, 850 pages.                         $4.00

“HAND BOOK OF RAILWAY EXPENDITURES.”—Practical
Directions for Keeping
the Expenditure Accounts.                           2.00

“RAILWAY REVENUE AND ITS COLLECTION.”—And
Explaining the Organization of
Railroads.                                          2.50

“THE BAGGAGE, PARCEL AND MAIL TRAFFIC
OF RAILROADS.”—An interesting work
on this important service; 425 pages.               2.00

“TRAIN AND STATION SERVICE.”—Giving
The Principal Rules and Regulations governing
Trains; 280 pages.                                  2.00

“THE TRACK ACCOUNTS OF RAILROADS.”—And
how they should be kept. Pamphlet.                  1.00

“THE FREIGHT TRAFFIC WAY-BILL.”—Its
Uses Illustrated and Described. Pamphlet.            .50

“MUTUAL GUARANTEE.”—A Treatise on Mutual
Suretyship. Pamphlet.                                .50

Any of the above books will be sent post paid on receipt
of price, by

PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO.,
150 Monroe St.          CHICAGO, ILL.

Money should be remitted by express, or by draft check or post office
order.

       *       *       *       *       *

MAP

Of the United States and Canada, Printed in Colors, size 4 × 2½ feet,
also a copy of THE PRAIRIE FARMER for one year. Sent to any address for
$2.00.

       *       *       *       *       *



GENERAL NEWS.


Boston people propose to have a crematory.

Michigan fruit buds are reported but little damaged by the late
freezing.

Ex-Governor John Letcher, of Virginia, is dead.

Kansas corn is being shipped to Wabash, Ind. It sells for 65 cents per
bushel.

Gould is reducing the pay of employes along his Southwestern system
fifty per cent.

The Virginia House has passed the joint resolution asking Senator Mahone
to resign.

The Russian authorities have refused to allow a monument of Luther to be
erected at Riga.

The lines of the National Telegraph Company have been absorbed by the
Baltimore and Ohio.

Last Saturday night Europe experienced one of the severest gales ever
known on that Continent.

The issue of silver dollars for the week ending Jan. 26, was 110,000;
corresponding period last year 263,000.

E. M. W. Mackey, the Republican Member of Congress for South Carolina,
died at Washington, Monday morning.

Mr. Blaine has introduced into the Senate a bill for the free
circulation of newspapers within the States where published.

Fred Douglas, the eloquent African, has astonished the natives by
marrying a white woman. He is about 70, she 46 years old.

The bodies of the Jeannette victims have reached Moscow, where the
American residents placed flowers and wreathes on the biers.

The Chicago Opera-House Company, with a capital of $600,000, has been
incorporated at Springfield by Charles Henrotin, Edward Koch, and
others.

The Brigham Young Academy, at Provo, Utah, valued at $30,000, was burned
Sunday evening. There were four hundred students in the building. No
lives lost.

There are now 7,794 ocean steamers belonging to the different nations.
About one half the ocean sailing vessels belong to England. Their total
number is 36,194.

The famous Smithson college building at Logansport, Indiana, which is
said to be the handsomest structure of its kind in the State, is to be
purchased and turned into a normal school.

Articles of incorporation have been filed at New York for the Merchants’
Telegraph and Cable Company; capital stock $13,000,000, with power to
increase that sum to, but not beyond $20,000,000.

The discovery of tin at King’s mountain, Cleveland county, N. C., is
announced. This is the first discovery of this metal in the United
States. The State chemist will make a careful examination.

O. A. Carpenter, suspected of the murder of Zora Burns, at Lincoln,
Ill., has been indicted by the grand jury, and is now in jail. It is
said that sufficient new evidence to convict him has come to light.

It is believed that an agreement has been reached at Pittsburg between
the striking glass-workers and the employers. Great concessions are said
to have been made on both sides. The strike has lasted five months.

The sergeant-at-arms of the House of Representatives presents bills for
$3,461 for escorting the remains of Representative Haskell to Kansas.
Among the items is one of $201 for a lunch before starting from
Washington.

The newspapers say that one of the jurors in the Emma Bond case spends
considerable time in crying; another runs from his house when visitors
approach it, and a third has been dismissed by a beautiful woman to whom
he was engaged.

The Hay-Shippers’ Association is getting up a petition to the Canadian
Government in regard to the excessive duties charged on hay exported to
the United States. It is understood that the Government will present the
matter to the Washington authorities.

In the French Chamber of Deputies, Monday, Minister Ferry expressed the
opinion that to ameliorate the labor crisis in Paris would be a
difficult task. The exports were 1,200,000,000 francs in excess of the
imports, he said, and within five years 6,000,000 francs had been
expended on buildings for which tenants could hardly be obtained.

Young James Nutt was acquitted of the murder of Dukes on the ground of
insanity. An after examination of his condition resulted in a
declaration that he is no longer insane. The case is one of wide
celebrity. Public opinion justifies the verdict. The President,
Secretary Chandler, and ex-Secretary Blaine, also indorse the action of
the jury.



[Illustration]

MARKETS.


FINANCIAL AND COMMERCIAL.

OFFICE OF THE PRAIRIE FARMER.}
CHICAGO. Jan 29, 1884.       }


Business at the Chicago banks is by no means brisk, and it is not
anticipated that it will be until after the first of February.

Bonds and stocks are more active than for some time. In New York there
has been a great boom in what are known as the Villard stocks. It is
said that Gould and associates are boosting these stocks and squeezing
the shorts unmercifully.

The number of failures reported in the United States during the past
seven days was 287, and for Canada 30, a total of 317, against 425 for
the previous week, a reduction of 108. The greatest reduction in
failures is at the East.

Money in Chicago is worth 5@6 per cent on call.

Eastern exchange is firm at 60@70c per $1,000.

Government securities are as follows:

4’s coupons, 1907           |Q. Apr.| 123¼
4’s reg., 1907              |Q. Apr.| 123¼
4½’s coupon, 1891        |Q. Mar.| 114⅛
4½’s registered, 1891    |Q. Mar.| 114⅛
3’s registered              |Q. Mar.| 100


GRAIN AND PROVISIONS.

The Chicago grain markets were quiet on Monday. Wheat took the lead and
the market closed about half a cent higher than on Saturday. Foreign
advices were favorable; rain was reported in California, and the New
York quotations were better.

Receipts of grain of all kinds were comparatively light.

Flour was quiet at the following quotations:

Choice to favorite white winters                   $5 40@5 50
Fair to good brands of white winters                4 75@5 00
Good to choice red winters                          5 25@5 50
Prime to choice springs                             4 75@5 00
Good to choice export stock, in sacks, extras       4 25@4 50
Good to choice export stock, double extras          4 50@4 65
Fair to good Minnesota springs                      4 50@4 75
Choice to fancy Minnesota springs                   5 25@5 75
Patent springs                                      6 00@6 50
Low grades                                          2 25@3 50

WHEAT.—Red winter, No. 3, 90½; car lots of spring, No. 2, in store
sold at 91@91¼c; No. 3, do. 85@86.

CORN.—Moderately active. Car lots No. 2, 52½@52½c; rejected,
43@44; new mixed, 48@50c.

OATS.—No. 2 in store, closed 32½@32¾.

RYE.—May, in store 57@58.

BARLEY.—No. 2, 55@60 in store; No. 3, f.o.b. 53c.

FLAX.—Closed at $1 44 on track.

TIMOTHY.—$1 30@1 33 per bushel. Little doing.

CLOVER.—Quiet at $5 50@6 for prime.

HUNGARIAN.—Prime 65c.

BUCKWHEAT.—75@85c.

MILLET.—40@50c.

PROVISIONS.—Mess pork, February, $14 75@14 78 per bbl; Green hams,
10½c per lb. Short ribs, $7 65 per cwt.

LARD.—February, $8 95@8 97.


LUMBER.

Lumber unchanged. Quotations for green are as follows:

Short dimension, per M              $ 9 50@10 00
Long dimension, per M                10 00@11 50
Boards and strips, No. 2             11 00@13 00
Boards and strips, medium            13 00@16 00
Boards and strips, No. 1 choice      16 00@20 00
Shingles, standard                    2 10@ 2 20
Shingles, choice                      2 25@ 2 30
Shingles, extra                       2 40@ 2 60
Lath                                  1 65@ 1 70


COUNTRY PRODUCE.

NOTE.—The quotations for the articles named in the following list are
generally for commission lots of goods and from first hands. While our
prices are based as near as may be on the landing or wholesale rates,
allowance must be made for selections and the sorting up for store
distribution.

BRAN.—Quoted at $15@15 25 per ton.

BEANS.—Hand picked mediums $2 05@2 10. Hand picked navies, $2 15@2 20.

BUTTER.—Dull and without change. Choice to extra creamery, 33@36c per lb.;
fair to good do 25@32c; fair to choice dairy, 23@28c; common to choice
packing stock fresh and sweet, 18@22c; ladle packed 10@13c; fresh made,
streaked butter, 9@11c.

BROOM-CORN.—Good to choice hurl 6½@7½c per lb.; green self-working
5@6c; red-tipped and pale do 4@5c; inside and covers 3@4c; common short
corn 2½@3½c; crooked, and damaged, 2@4c, according to quality.

CHEESE.—Choice full-cream cheddars 13½@14c per lb.; medium quality do
10@11c; good to prime full cream flats 13½@14c; skimmed cheddars
9@10c; good skimmed flats 7@9c; hard-skimmed and common stock 3@4c.

EGGS.—In a small way the best brands are quotable at 34@35c per dozen,
fresh; 25@28c for good ice house stock; 20@25c per pickled.

FEATHERS.—Quotations: Prime live geese feathers 52@54c per lb.; ducks
25@35c; duck and geese mixed 35@45c; dry-picked chicken feathers body
6@6½c; turkey body feathers 4@4½c; do tail 55@60c; do wing 25@35c;
do wing and tail mixed 35@40c.

HAY.—No 1 timothy $ 9@10 per ton; No 2 do $8 00 @8 50; mixed do $7@8;
upland prairie $8 00@10 75; No 1 prairie $6@7; No 2 do $4 50@5 50. Small
bales sell at 25@50c per ton more than large bales.

HIDES AND PELTS.—Green-cured light hides 8¼c per lb.; do heavy cows
8c; No 2 damaged green-salted hides 6c; green-salted calf 12@12½
cents; green-salted bull 6c; dry-salted hides 11 cents; No. 2 two-thirds
price; No. 1 dry flint 14@14½c. Sheep pelts salable at 28@32c for the
estimated amount of wash wool on each pelt. All branded and scratched
hides are discounted 15 per cent from the price of No. 1.

HOPS.—Prime to choice New York State hops 25@26c per lb.; Pacific coast
of 23@26c; fair to good Wisconsin 15@20c.

HONEY AND BEESWAX.—Good to choice white comb honey in small boxes
15@17c per lb.; common and dark-colored, or when in large packages
12@14c; Beeswax ranged at 25@30c per lb., according to quality, the
outside for prime yellow.

POULTRY.—Prices for good to choice dry picked and unfrozen lots are:
Turkeys 13@14c per lb.; chickens 9@10c; ducks 12@13c; geese 9@11c. Thin,
undesirable, and frozen stock 2@3c per lb less than these figures; live
offerings nominal.

POTATOES.—Good to choice 30@34c per bu. on track; common to fair
25@28c. Illinois sweet potatoes range at $4@5 per bbl for yellow.

TALLOW AND GREASE.—No 1 country tallow 7@7¼c per lb.; No 2 do
6¼@6½c. Prime white grease 6@6½c; yellow 5¼@5¾; brown
4½@5.

VEGETABLES.—Cabbage, $12@18 per 100; celery, 25@35c per doz bunches;
onions, $1 25@1 50 per bbl for yellow, and $1 for red; turnips, $1 35@1 50
per bbl for rutabagas, and $1 00 for white flat.

WOOL.—from store range as follows for bright wools from Wisconsin,
Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, and Eastern Iowa—dark Western lots
generally ranging at 1@2c per lb. less.

Coarse and dingy tub                   25@30
Good medium tub                        31@34
Unwashed bucks’ fleeces                14@15
Fine unwashed heavy fleeces            18@22
Fine light unwashed heavy fleeces      22@23
Coarse unwashed fleeces                21@22
Low medium unwashed fleeces            24@25
Fine medium unwashed fleeces           26@27
Fine washed fleeces                    32@33
Coarse washed fleeces                  26@28
Low medium washed fleeces              30@32
Fine medium washed fleeces             34@35

Colorado and Territory wools range as follows:

Lowest grades                          14@16
Low medium                             18@22
Medium                                 22@26
Fine                                   16@24

Wools from New Mexico:

Lowest grades                          14@16
Part improved                          16@17
Best improved                          19@23

Burry from 2c to 10c off; black 2c to 5c off.


LIVE STOCK MARKETS.

The total receipts and shipments for last week were as follows:

                                    Received. Shipped.
Cattle                                37,991   19,093
Calves                                   405      102
Hogs                                 114,732   38,855
Sheep                                 19,746   14,806

CATTLE.—The receipts have been large for a few days, and prices have
declined about 25 cents per hundred since Thursday of last week. The
grade has been far from first-class, but few of them weighing over
1,400 lbs. The export demand for really choice stock was greater than
the supply. Common to choice lots sold to shippers at $5@6 70, with some
sales as low as $4 75.

Quotations closed as follows:

Fancy heavy fat cattle                      Nominal.
Choice to prime steers                    $ 6 70@ 7 15
Good to choice steers                       6 25@ 6 65
Fair to good shipping steers                5 65@ 6 20
Common to medium steers                     4 75@ 5 00
Butcher’s steers                            4 65@ 5 10
Cows, common to good                        3 25@ 4 70
Common canning cattle                       2 25@ 3 20
Stockers                                    3 80@ 4 50
Feeders                                     4 50@ 5 10
Milch cows, per head                       25 00@55 00
Veal calves, per 100 lbs.                   4 00@ 7 50

HOGS.—Most of the packing houses are closed, yet there are a few
packers competing with the shippers. Prices are now about 30 cents lower
than last year at this time. Receipts were about 16,000 head on Sunday
and Monday. The number of hogs left over last night was very small. The
market, however, was rather weak, except for choice, well-fattened hogs.
Sales of rough packing hogs were made at $5 50@5 95; good to choice
heavy, $6@6 55; light, $5 40@6; skipps and culls, $3 75@5 35.

Note.—All sales of hogs are made subject to a shrinkage of 40 lbs for
piggy sows and 80 lbs for stags. Dead hogs sell for 1½c per lb for
weights of 200 and over and [Transcriber’s Note: blank in the original]
for weights of less than 100 lbs.

SHEEP.—The supply was good, yesterday, and also on Sunday, there being
7,500 head, against 3,400 for the same days a week ago. The average
grade was poor. Sales ranged from $3 05 to $6 for common to prime.
Common lots suffered a decline.

       *       *       *       *       *

J. H. WHITE & CO.,
PRODUCE COMMISSION

106 S. Water St., Chicago.

Refers to this paper.

       *       *       *       *       *

DAIRY SUPPLIES, ETC.

THE CHICAGO CREAMERY.

The 1st claim of the Chicago Creamery and Rectangular Can is, that the
can has from 250 to 332 more of cooling surface than any round can in
use.

2d. It will cool milk to temperature of water surrounding it in ONE
HOUR.

3d. It will raise ALL THE CREAM in ten hours with the water 50 to 55
degrees; no round can can do this in ten hours with ice.

4th. No round or square can containing 4½ gallons of milk, or over,
will give as much cream from 100 pounds of milk as this Rectangular.

With the use of ice all the cream is raised in from one to two hours.

WE WARRANT all this, and will test the same before any chemist in
Chicago, paying all expenses of the test, if any competing Creamery can
show as good results.

OUR TERMS

Are reasonable. We solicit the attention of all butter-makers, confident
that we can aid them in getting more profit from their cows than they
are now doing.

SPERBECK & STOUT,
_21 W. RANDOLPH ST., CHICAGO._

       *       *       *       *       *

PIG EXTRICATOR

To aid animals in giving birth. Send for free circular to WM. DULIN,
Avoca, Pottawattamie Co., Ia.

       *       *       *       *       *

SEWING SILK.

CORTICELLI SEWING SILK,

[Illustration]

LADIES, TRY IT!

THE BEST SEWING SILK MADE.

EVERY SPOOL WARRANTED.

FULL LENGTH, SMOOTH AND STRONG.

Ask your storekeeper for Corticelli Silk.

       *       *       *       *       *

MISCELLANEOUS.

FARMERS

Do you want to change your run-out seed-wheat for something fresh and
vigorous? Then try the

SASKATCHAWAN FIFE

An improved variety of the old Scotch Fife, a spring wheat grown from
seed brought down from the Saskatchawan Valley in Manitoba. It is
enormously productive. Everywhere it has been exhibited it has taken the
highest premium for excellence as a pure, hard milling wheat. The Hon.
C. A. Pillsbury, at the head of the great Pillsbury Flouring Mills,
Minneapolis, says of it:

“I consider it the best and purest Fife Wheat to-day in the Northwest.
No such milling wheat has been received at our mills since we have been
in the milling business.”

Write to

W. J. ABERNETHY & CO.,
    MINNEAPOLIS,

Originators and Proprietors, for their 16-page pamphlet, giving its
history and prices.

       *       *       *       *       *

TRY DREER’S GARDEN SEEDS

which have been planted by some growers for 45 years.

[Illustration]

The quality is the first consideration secured by the most careful
selection. The prices, the lowest consistent with sterling merit.
DREER’S GARDEN CALENDAR FOR 1884, offering Vegetable, Flower and Field
Seeds, Plants, Bulbs, and everything for the garden, mailed FREE.

HENRY A. DREER, 714 CHESTNUT STREET, PHILADELPHIA.

       *       *       *       *       *

PEACH TREES

A LARGE STOCK OF LEADING VARIETIES—CHEAP.

First, second and third sizes all splendidly rooted. The two smaller
sizes well adapted for distant shipments. Also a FULL ASSORTMENT of
NURSERY STOCK, including GREENHOUSE PLANTS, FLOWER AND VEGETABLE SEEDS

Catalogue FREE; send for one. Correspondence solicited. 30th Year. 500
Acres. 21 Greenhouses.

THE STORRS & HARRISON CO.

PAINESVILLE, LAKE COUNTY, OHIO.

       *       *       *       *       *

FOREST TREE SEEDS!

I offer a large stock of Walnuts, Butternuts, Ash, and Box Elder Seeds,
suitable for planting. All the growth of 1883. I control the entire
stock of the

SALOME APPLE,

a valuable, new, hardy variety. Also a general assortment of Nursery
stock. Send for catalogue, circular, and price lists. Address

BRYANT’S NURSERY, Princeton, Ill.

       *       *       *       *       *

IT WILL PAY TO GET our 1884 catalogue of SMALL FRUITS, all kinds. FORD’S
EARLY SWEET CORN, sweetest best. Early Colton Apple, best quality, hardy
in Wisconsin.

OUR NEW POTATO

Lee’s Favorite, extremely early, best quality, most productive, 265 lbs.
grown from one. Catalogue free.

Address, FRANK FORD & SON Ravenna, Ohio

       *       *       *       *       *

FARMERS AND HOUSEKEEPERS

Send $1 for a new SPANISH recipe for preserving eggs, guaranteed to keep
them two to three years. Address BOX 326, SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS.

       *       *       *       *       *

DEITZ SEED CORN

Early Mammoth double-eared yellow FIELD CORN, the BEST of 20 years’
selection. 3 lbs by mail, paid, $1; one peek here, $1; 1 bus. $3; 5 bus.
$10; 100 bus. $150. Sample 10c.

G. A. DEITZ, Chambersburg, Pa.

       *       *       *       *       *

SPECIALTY FOR 1884.

200 bush. Onion sets, 20,000 Asparagus roots, Raspberry and Strawberry
roots, and Champion Potatoes. Italian Bees a specialty. Send for price
list for 1884.

SEND EARLY TO A. J. NORRIS, Cedar Falls, Iowa.

       *       *       *       *       *

LANG’S LIVE SEEDS.

NORTHERN GROWN, THOROUGHLY TESTED. Flower Vegetable and Field. 20,000
Catalogues free. Send names of your friends.

FRED. N. LANG, Baraboo, Wis.

       *       *       *       *       *

MARLBORO RED RASPBERRY

Send to the originators for history and terms. A. S. Caywood & Son,
Marlboro, N. Y.

       *       *       *       *       *

COCOONS AND RARE INSECTS bought.
Write to K. H. SCHURICHT, 112 Monroe St., Chicago.



*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 5, February 2, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside" ***

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