TOLMAN'S SWEETING. milk, and keep the animal in a healthy condition. Sweet apples are fast becoming more highly Some persons value them as highly as they do valued than they have been heretofore, both for carrots for horses; we know that horses are the table, and as food for swine and milch cows. fond of them, and see no reason why they may A great many experiments have been made with not be profitably raised for that use. them in feeding these animals, and have resulted The sweeting figured above, according to Downfavorably. Boiled with pumpkins and mixed ing's account of it, is scarcely second-rate as a tawith meal, they are excellent in fattening swine. ble fruit, but it is one of the most popular of the Fed judiciously to milch cows, they increase the orchard sorts, from its great productiveness, its гим For the New England Farmer. THE ONE ACRE FARM. value as food for swine and cattle, as well as for baking. From nearly globular. Skin, when fully ripe, whitish yellow, with a soft blush on one side. Stalk rather long and slender, inclining to one side, and inserted in a rather wide, shallow, but regular cavity. Calyx set in a small basin, slightly depressed. Flesh quite white, rather firm, fine-grained, with a rich, sweet flavor. No- "One acre! and here you are taking the New vember to April. This fruit, a native of Rhode England Farmer, the Cultivator, Hovey's MagaIsland, considerably resembles the Danvers' Win-zine and the Horticulturist, and all because you ter Sweet of this State. "How much land have you got here in your lot, Mr. Briggs?" "I have one acre." have one acre of ground! How many such papers would you have to take if you had a hundred acres?" ONE OF THE HORSES.-"The Yankee Horse-Swap- "I shouldn't probably need any more than I per in Old Kentucky" must have been put into take now; you know, Mr. Chapman, one can 'go the "Drawer" with some ultimate design upon through with all the motions' on one acre as well the risibles of the readers of its multifarious con- as on a hundred." tents: "A man can throw away money without any, The Kentuckian, ready for a trade, exchanges if he has a mind to. For all the good you get his "Sorrel" for the pedler's "Old Grey:" but from such periodicals, you might as well, probafinding the latter indisposed to move a peg after bly, throw the money they cost into the fire; they he has secured him, he denounces the Yankee as are nothing but humbugs." in return. a swindler, who only laughs at and tantalizes him "I pay two dollars for the New England Farmer, one dollar for the Cultivator, three dollars Presently the cute pedler mounts his prize, for the Horticulturist, and two dollars for Hovey's but "Sorrel" is as immovable as the Mammoth Magazine-in all eight dollars." Cave. After trying a long time in vain to start "Eight dollars! enough to buy a 'tip-top' the obstinate animal, the Kentuckian consoles barrel of flour, and a leg of bacon; and then if him with: you read these periodicals, there is twice the "Stranger, you kin start him, ef you'll only amount of the money spent in time reading bring some shavin's and kindle a fire under him! them." That's the way I get him going in the morn- "I do usually read or hear read, almost every ings!" word there is in them; my boys and I take turns work.' in reading, and one reads aloud while the rest "best" variety of fruits had a place there, and the father and sons found pleasure and profit in the "Complete nonsense! no wonder your shop garden after being cooped up in the shop till the don't turn out any more boots in a day, than it "stent" was done, and the exercise was far more does!" profitable than the spasmodic, violent exercise tak"Perhaps we don't do as great days' works, en in games. some days, as some of our neighbors, but I guess Mr. Chapman, the other neighbor, was a man that in the course of the year, we turn out as of the "common stamp." He looked upon everymany according to the hands at work, as most thing new or uncommon as "folly" and "nondo." sense" and was ready to sneer at every one who "I suppose it is out of these publications you stepped aside from the common track. It looked get your foolish notions about so many kinds of simply silly to him, to see a man stay at home fruit trees. One of my boys came home a while from "muster" or "training" or "shows" and ago, and said Mr. Briggs had got lots and lots of spend his time in cultivating a garden; or, infruit trees and such things, that cost, I don't stead of loitering away the evening at the store, know how much, and wanted me to buy some smoking, and hearing or telling a deal of nothing grape vines, pear trees, and so on. I told him it or worse, to spend the evenings at home, reading was all foolishness and not to let me hear him say such "nonsense" as the Farmer and Horticulturanything about spending money so foolishly. You ist affords. have, I dare say, laid out ten or fifteen dollars, this spring.' "Yes nearly as much again; I have laid out twenty-five dollars for trees and garden fruits." "Twenty-five dollars! I wonder you are not on the town, or in jail at least, before now." Years pass and Mr. Briggs' "one acre farm" shows that he and his boys have not read "the papers" in vain. They had learned how to "set out" a tree, and how to "take care" of it after it was set out. Everything showed it received the right kind of food and care, and straightway began to bring forth fruits meet for good cultivaof tion. In a short time the wants of the family were more than supplied, and the surplus found a ready market with the neighbors at good prices. "I'm not afraid of either; I'll bet you the twenty-five dollars, I'll sell you that amount fruit from those things for which I paid the twenty-five dollars, in five years!"' "Done! I'll stand you; so your trees will cost you fifty dollars sure, in money, besides the time thrown away in setting them out and taking care of them." Those early apples so rich and tempting, when all other apples were so green and hard! and then such pears; they went as fast as the sun and house could ripen them, at three, four, or five "As for the time spent in setting them out, or cents apiece. Then such clusters of rich, ripe taking care of them, it is as good exercise as play-grapes-too tempting for the coldest to pass withing ball, wicket, or anything else. While we out a watering mouth. Mr. Chapman's family were setting them out, one of your boys came to were among the best customers for the tempting get my boys to go over to Mr. Moody's, where he fruit-first having learned their excellence by the said was to be a great time playing ball; and I liberality of Mr. Briggs, who never failed to send have no doubt, your boys spend just as much time a specimen of his best to his neighbor. playing, as mine do with our trees and so forth; and then something is done, but in playing, the strength is all laid out for nothing.' "Well, it don't cost anything to play ball, but trees cost money." The foregoing conversation occurred in the shop between two neighbors, both boot-makers, in a town not more than thirty miles from Bos ton. The fifth season came. It was a fruitful year. Apple, pear, peach, plum, and all other trees, were loaded with fruit. Keeping in mind his conversation with Mr. Chapman, Mr. Briggs had directed his family to set down every cent's worth of fruit sold to Mr. Chapman or his family. This year, as it happened, was a year of "extreme hard times." The boot business was at its lowest ebb; little work and very low wages-and yet Mr. Briggs, in whose shop the conversation the prices of every kind of provisions up to the took place, was a man of more than ordinary in- "highest notch," and money extremely tight." telligence for one of his advantages and circum- But there was one family that did not seem to stances in life. He had been a poor boy, and by be in the least affected by the hard times, low industry, observation and economy, had worked prices of labor, high prices of provisions, or the his way on in life and reared and well educated a scarcity of money; Mr. Briggs and his two oldest family of children, who, like himself, were industri- sons, all of them had a little "spare change" to ous and steady. For the few years past, he had let on short time "with interest" to their needy become interested in horticulture, and both for ex-neighbors. "Yes," said Mr. Briggs, "I have a "half" or a 'whole,' just as you like. ercise and amusement, had turned his attention to One day Mr. Chapman, who was short, applied cultivating his "one acre farm." His attention to Mr. Briggs for a "half" for a "quarter," was first called to this, by means of a "back num- meaning fifty dollars for three months. ber" of the New England Farmer which was put round some things bought at the store. Mr. Briggs found this so interesting, that he purchased "What, a hundred dollars by you these times! another number at the periodical depot, and then I don't see how it comes. You and your boys he became a "regular subscriber." His sons soon don't work any harder than I and my boys do, became interested in the same direction, and the and we can hardly get along; we are as saving interest of the father and sons increased to the and pinching as can be, too; times are so dreadpitch indicated in the foregoing conversation. ful hard,' and everything a family has to buy is In time, every inch of that acre of ground was so dreadful high, and wages so low; potatoes, a "brought under the spade," and almost every dollar a bushel, beef, fifteen cents a pound, pork, EXTRACTS AND REPLIES. Ah, I do remember something about it. You were to give me twenty-five dollars if you didn't get your twenty-five dollars back from me for the products of those trees and things! It will come very handy just now." EXPERIMENT IN BARKING A TREE. periment of cutting away the bark around the Bristol, N. H., 1854. ICE HOUSES-OLD PASTURES. "Don't be too fast, neighbor! I am afraid it MR. EDITOR-I wish to inquire through the wont 'come very handy just now.' That was what medium of your valuable paper, in regard to the I was dunning you for, that twenty-five dollars!" best method of constructing ice houses. I wish "What! you don't pretend to say we have had to keep ice the year round, or without fail until twenty-five dollars worth of stuff from your gar- the first of October, and have not yet been able. den." How should an ice house be constructed, and What should be its situation in regard to other buildings? "More than that from that very twenty-five what of? dollars' worth of trees and other things! Here is an account of everything you have bought and paid for; of course, it don't include what I have sent you, gratis." You will confer a favor upon an old subscriber by giving full information on this point, as I consider ice of great use in the management of a "And you have certainly not been stingy. Why, this bill amounts to thirty-seven dollars! it dairy. is not possible!" What is the best method of reclaiming old pas Cheshire Co., Oct. 6, 1854. "It is just so; you have had over twenty bush-tures? whether by top dressing or otherwise? els of apples, and three bushels of pears, and those alone come to twenty-five dollars." "I own up the 'corn;' draw the note for seventy-five." T. REMARKS.-In vol. 3d of the New England Farmer for 1851, at pages 25 and 388, may be "No, I guess we will let that twenty-fivé go. found particular directions for the construction of I only mention it to show you that there may be ice houses. Will Mr. L. HURLBUT, of Winchesgood sense in new things, sometimes. Now I will bet the twenty-five dollars over again, that my ter, Conn., be kind enough to send us an account store-bill has not been, the past season, half as of one which he has constructed and tested? large as yours, though I have had one the more in my family." "If I had not been so badly taken in before, I would stand you; but I guess it wont be safe." "We have raised our own potatoes, corn, peas, beans, and all other garden vegetables. Our eggs are always fresh and in abundance from the nest; and for more than two years we have not been without ripe fresh fruit." "How can that be?" In vol. 4 of the Farmer, pages 305 and 446, the subject of reclaiming old pastures is thoroughly discussed, and all that we could well say about them may be found there. FYLER'S BUTTER-WORKING CHURN. MR. FARMER-I was at the New Hampshire State Fair, at Keene, and was well pleased with many things, but saw nothing that attracted more attention than about 15 lbs. of butter in the Me"Well, by the first of June we have strawber- chanics' Hall, standing in one of Fyler's butterries ripe, and soon after, cherries; then raspber- working churns, made by Hall & Holmes of Bratries, currants, gooseberries, and so forth; and long tleboro, Vt. The butter was all worked, salted before these are gone, the early apples, pears and and rolled in two rolls in the churn, without being peaches; then, grapes, later pears and apples; touched with the hands. It was well done and of and these continue all winter, and apples till July, excellent quality, as hundreds can testify, and I when the early fruits again connect the luscious am informed it was all completed in 17 minutes. I am glad to learn that the Committee awarded "Well, I declare, that is something I never all to the proprietors, that the rules of the Societhought of; but it takes so much time and bother to get these things started-then it is an ever- have used one of these churns in my dairy during ty would permit. I mention this fact because I lasting job to take care of them.' "It needs no more time and money than you recommended, which is not common in these the past season, and know them to be all they are throw away on things that amount to nothing days. A NEW ENGLAND FARMER. circle!" at all, and with abundance of fruit, you save the Walpole, N. H., 1854. expense of a heavy meat bill, which is not healthy ELLY LAND. in hot weather. No doctor has been called to GREEN GAGE PLUM TREES-CLIMBING ROSES-GRAYstep foot into my door for over four years past! Fresh, ripe fruits are sure remedies for all ailments, and they are not hard to take." Mr. Chapman put the "fifty" into his "weaselskin," and left with a flea in his ear." A. B. B. MR. BROWN:-Will you inform me at what price I can procure grafted, well-formed and thrifty Green Gage plum trees, of three years' growth? (a.) HOW SHALL I START FOREST TREES? Also, what you consider the choicest variety of Climbing Rose, and at what price I can procure MR. EDITOR-I have a piece of old, clean a stock of the same suitable to transplant. By ground, that I think would grow pine timber the choicest variety, I mean a high climber, and well if I could get it started from the seed. Will one whose flowers surpass all others in fulness of you or some of your correspondents who may leaf, beauty and brilliancy of color? (b.) know, inform me through your paper how to What can I do with a little stony patch of proceed in procuring the seed, planting, and after land I have, covered with the plant known only management, and oblige to me as the indestructible "House-leek." Not Johnson, Vt., 1854. a fig do I care for the stony patch, but they so disfigure my premises, and trouble my vision, I would they were away. (c.) Respectfully, Leverett, Mass., Sept. 26, 1854. S. W. B. C. W. REMARKS. Some of the experienced will please reply. SOWING CLOVER SEED. FRIEND BROWN:-I wish to inquire through the seeded eight acres of good land with herds grass, Farmer, respecting sowing clover seed. I have sowing in September; now can I sow clover early in the spring upon this seeding with advantage to the first crop of hay? REMARKS.—(a.) The price of such plum trees as you want may range from 50 cents to $1. (b.) There are a hundred varieties of climbing roses, at least. The one which we should select, might appear indifferent to you. There is a large Fall seeding is a "book notion" in this commuvariety of the Prairie climbers; also of the Multi-nity. Any information upon the subject will oblige others as well as myself. flora, Hybrid, Evergreen, Boursault, and AyrBrandon, Vt., 1854. E. M. SMITH. shire. The few kinds common about our dwellings, (and these perhaps are as good as any,) are, REMARKS.-Sow five or six pounds of clover seed among the Prairies, the Baltimore Belle, and to the acre on the snow late in March. You can Queen of the Prairies; among the Multifloras, see the seed on the snow, and will be able to sow the Alba, or White, and the Fragrans; and in the it quite even. Boursault, the Red, which is half double, and another which is red and white. But to answer WARTS ON CATTLE. MR. EDITOR-I should be glad to receive as 1. What is the cause of warts on cattle? your question more directly, if you desire but one, take the Michigan, or as it is called, the Queen of the Prairie. This rose is remarkable for its perfectly hardy growth, flourishing equally as well I have two beautiful heifers whose milk veins in Canada at the North, and in Texas at the are entirely covered with what I suppose to be South. It grows with great rapidity, exceeding warts, and the same have made their appearance all other roses of this family, covering an entire nearly all over the surface of the belly, and also upon the udder. A part of them might be rearbor in a short space of time. It blooms, also, moved with a knife, but a larger part of them after most other summer roses are gone, its flowers cover much surface while they project but slightoccurring in large clusters of different shades. ly. (c.) Cover your gravelly patch with meadow A few years ago, these same kind of warts so mud and manure, and plow in-then in the kill her, and if you can give a cause and a cure troubled one of my heifers that I was obliged to spring sow clover or buckwheat, and when in ior this disease you will do a great favor to your bloom plow that in. Repeat this operation two reader. SCURVY PIGS. Б. Р. В. REMARKS.-The cause of warts on cattle is not or three times, then plow deep, manure highly, Dedham, Oct., 1854. and lay down to grass. In two or three years you will get a lawn, by mowing frequently, clearly known-perhaps it is the want of proper which is more ornamental than any other one action in the skin. The knife should not be used, thing about the house. only to pare them slightly before applying the cautery. A pencil of the nitrate of silver touched MR. EDITOR:-As you are so liberal in answer- to them daily, for several days, will often disperse ing the inquiries of the inexperienced, I should be glad to be informed through the columns of your paper, of some way to remove scurvy from pigs badly diseased in that way. AN INEXPERIENCED FARMER. Wayland, Sept. 30. REMARKS.-Wash them clean, and rub slightly with buttermilk or grease; give them a dry bed, always in a warm place, and plenty of wholesome food. We never saw a pig yet so incorrigible as to withstand this treatment, and keep scurvy long. them. We have found homoeopathic treatment highly successful with horses and cattle. For dry warts give dulcamara, and in some cases sulphur ; for ulcerated warts, arsenicum. A REMEDY FOR MAGGOTS IN ONIONS. When the onions are first affected, sprinkle them with ley made of ashes; about half as found very strong as is commonly used for soap. It has been effectual. ORIGIN OF THE POTATO.-So far as is known, the root is indigenous to this country, whence it was carried to England, in 1586, by Sir Walter now imported. My advice to the farmer then is Raleigh, and planted in his garden. Not being to begin at home. J. L. EDGERTON. Georgia, sufficiently acquainted with the plant, he was Vt.-Country Gentleman. DOMESTIC GUANO. near consigning it to destruction in consequence of finding the potato apple, or fruit of the plant, bitter and unpalatable, and it was in digWHY IS A GARDEN FRUITFUL? ging them up that the edible potato was discovThe almost universal opinion is, because it is ered. The plant throve rapidly in the British more highly manured than fields, and therefore Isles, but especially in Ireland. The potato al- has a richer soil. Yet this is not always the case. luded to in Shakspeare, as being common in the There are other things to be attended to, in order reign of Queen Elizabeth, was the convolvolus to render the soil prolific. One is to pulverize the batata, of which Burnett says:-"Not only were soil; though this may seem a small matter to its tender roots, and young leaves and shoots, many of our would-be farmers. But it is owing eaten as pot-herbs, but they were candied, and to the finely pulverized condition of the beds of a made into various sweet-meats." garden that it possesses a highly absorbent power to attract the moisture of the atmosphere-a source of fertility that many farmers scarcely seem aware that they possess. If the soil of the EDITORS OF COUNTRY GENTLEMEN-I wish to field was as carefully worked, and fresh earth consay a few things more about guano. I suppose stantly exposed to the atmosphere, as in the wellthe present annual importation of guano into the attended garden, the land would increase each United States will not fall much short of two hun- year in fertility. Let the rule be, plow deep, dred thousand tons, at an expense of at least ten cultivate well, pulverize lumps and sods, return million of dollars. Think of that, gentlemen far- your straw to the soil, and you may carry off an mers, ten million of dollars annually exported immense quantity of food, and have fertile soil from the United States for foreign manures. But still. Plants, in their nature, are organized bethis two hundred thousand tons, imported into ings. By means of their roots they take up food the United States, is but a mere mite of what is from the soil, and often the very food which the demanded by the American farmers. Probably soil has taken up, by its power of absorption, from not one farmer in 100,000 is supplied from this the atmosphere, and which power is increased to source. But, if these numbers startle you, then an almost indefinite extent, by separating the partake the least possible computation that facts will ticles of which it is composed. The acts of plowallow, and say that we need one thousand times ing and harrowing are a part of the process of more instead of one hundred thousand, to supply manuring. The act of stirring the earth, in times the present demand, and then it will require two of drought, serves as a watering of the plants. hundred million tons, at an expense of ten or The moisture thus absorbed is loaded with fertiliztwelve thousand million of dollars. These figures, ing properties. If, then, you would have your gentlemen, will alarm you; but be assured it is fields as fertile as a garden, you must not depend no fanciful sketch. Let all the American farmers upon manure alone, but pulverize freely, not upon be supplied with foreign manures according to the surface, but deep below it.-Dollar Newspaper. their necessities, as the privileged farmers are, and more than this would be realized. But what are the American farmers to do? The entire SQUIRRELS IN THE WOODS. lands of the entire country are rapidly deprecia- There are few things more pleasing than to lie ting in fertility. To crop them as the farmers upon the grass on a sunny day in summer, and now do is a ruinous course. But to buy foreign watch the squirrels in the trees above you. Peermanures would only end in national bankruptcy. ing up, you will espy, on one of the tree stems, a Come, now, let us reason together on the sub- little brown, monkeyfied-looking rat, with a sort ject, and see what can be done. Every family of of rabbit's head, and a foxy tail as long as its body four persons, might with no trouble or expense, and curling over it, and ecce my lord squirrel! except to keep neat and clean about the house, Down he comes, leaping from branch to branch manufacture one ton of guano. The excrement clawing, racing so fast, and now he reaches the of the family, together with the dirty slop, now turf and sits upon his hind legs, and looks this all wasted, would more than make one ton, way and that, and listens. Do not move, or he is whether we regard the quantity or quality of the off; do not wink so much as an eyelid. "All material. But, if we include in this account, all right?" his merry brown eyes seem to ask. Yes, the materials necessary to absorb all the liquid, all right; for a nut drops from between his teeth the amount would be swelled to two tons, even to into his fore paws, and giving his mighty conse every family of four persons. But, if we take quential tail an extra curl, he makes ready for the lowest estimate, eight hundred thousand per- breakfast. That is another sight-the way in sons might make annually from their own house, which a squirrel deals with a nut. First of all he two hundred thousand tons of guano, a sum equal shakes and rattles it, that he may be sure there is to all that is now imported into the United States, something inside; then he twists it round and at an expense of some ten or twelve millions of round in his paws, till he gets the narrow end updollars. And the excrement of one hog, a cow permost, for he knows that at the upper end the and a horse, with the poultry-yard, would cer- shell is the thinnest; then he begins to grate tainly produce another ton. I do not know ex- and file till he has worked his way through, actly the population of the State of New York, getting noisier and noisier as the hole grows but my opinion is that more guano could be man- bigger; and then come intervals of quiet, which ufactured from the families alone, exclusive of all mean that his teeth are in the kernel, and that he the wasted urine of the animals, than all that is is eating all within reach; for a squirrel never has |