initial commit of ebook 17512HEADmain

1 files changed, 6758 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/17512.txt b/17512.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..07d4b92
--- /dev/null
+++ b/17512.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,6758 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1, January 5,
+1884., by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1, January 5, 1884.
+       A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: January 14, 2006 [EBook #17512]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRAIRIE FARMER ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Susan Skinner and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+A Weekly Journal for
+
+THE FARM, ORCHARD, AND FIRESIDE.
+
+ESTABLISHED IN 1841.
+ENTIRE SERIES: VOL. 56--NO. 1.
+
+CHICAGO, SATURDAY, JANUARY 5, 1884.
+
+PRICE, $2.00 PER YEAR,
+IN ADVANCE.
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note: Some pages in the original had the corner torn off.
+Missing text has been marked [***].]
+
+[Transcriber's Note: The Table of Contents was originally located on
+page 8 of the periodical. It has been moved here for ease of use.]
+
+
+THE CONTENTS OF THIS NUMBER.
+
+AGRICULTURE--Tall Meadow Oat-Grass, Page 1; The Barbed-Wire
+Business, 1-2; A Rambler's Letter, 2; Let Us Be Sociable, 2; Seed Corn
+Again, 2; Field and Furrow, 3.
+
+LIVE STOCK--Mr. Grinnell's Letter, Page 14; Prices of 1883, 4;
+Docking Horses, 4; Items, 4.
+
+THE DAIRY--Lessons in Finance for the Creamery Patron, Page 5.
+
+VETERINARY--Fever, Page 5.
+
+HORTICULTURE--Ill. Hort. Society, Page 6; A Short Sermon on a
+Long Text, 6; Prunings, 6-7.
+
+FLORICULTURE--Gleanings by an Old Florist, Page 7; Am I a Scot
+or am I Not, Poetry, 7; Primitive Northwest, 7.
+
+EDITORIAL--Items, Page 8; Seed Samples, 8; The Pork Question in
+Europe, 8; Corn, Wheat, and Cotton, 8; Chicago in 1883, 9; Strong Drink,
+9; Questions and Answers, 9; Wayside Notes, 9; Champaign Letter, 9.
+
+POULTRY NOTES--Chat With Correspondents, Page 10; Feather Ends,
+10.
+
+THE APIARY--Keep Bees, Page 10; The New Bees, 10; Hive and
+Honey Hints, 10.
+
+SILK CULTURE--Women In Silk Culture, Page 11.
+
+HOUSEHOLD--The Schoolmarm's Story, Poem, Page 12; A Chat About
+the Fashions, 12; A Kitchen Silo, 12; Items, 12.
+
+YOUNG FOLKS--Talk about the Lion, Page 13; A Jack-knife Genius,
+13; Little Johnny, 13.
+
+BOOK NOTICES--Page 13.
+
+LITERATURE--Robin, Dear Robin, Poetry, Page 14; Mrs. Wimbush's
+Revenge, 14.
+
+HUMOROUS--The Carpenter's Wooing, Poetry, Page 15; Where the
+Old Maids Come From, 15; Items, 15.
+
+NEWS OF THE WEEK--Page 16.
+
+MARKETS--Page 16.
+
+
+
+
+TALL MEADOW OAT-GRASS.
+
+Prof. John W. Robson, State Botanist of Kansas, sends THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+an extract from his last report, concerning a tame grass for hay and
+pasturing which is new to that State. The grass has been on trial on an
+upland farm for two years, during which time he has watched it very
+closely. The Professor says, "It possesses so many excellent qualities
+as to place it in the front rank of all cultivated grasses." He
+enumerates from his notes:
+
+1st. The seed will germinate and grow as easily as common oats. 2d. It
+maintains a deep green color all seasons of the year. 3d. Its roots
+descend deeply into the subsoil, enabling this grass to withstand a
+protracted drouth. 4th. Its early growth in spring makes it equal to rye
+for pasturage. 5th. In the next year after sowing it is ready to cut for
+hay, the middle of May--not merely woody stems, but composed in a large
+measure of a mass of long blades of foliage. The crop of hay can be cut
+and cured, and stowed away in stack or barn, long before winter wheat
+harvest begins. 6th. It grows quickly after mowing, giving a denser and
+more succulent aftermath than any of the present popular tame grasses.
+
+For several years, he says, we have been looking for a grass that would
+supply good grazing to our cattle and sheep after the native grasses
+have become dry and tasteless. In the early portion of 1881, his
+attention was called to a tame grass which had been introduced into the
+State of Michigan from West Virginia. This forage plant was causing some
+excitement among the farmers in the neighborhood of Battle Creek. So he
+entered into a correspondence with a friend living there, and obtained
+ten pounds of seed for trial. The result has been satisfactory in every
+respect. The seed was sown April 1, 1881. It germinated quickly, and the
+young plants grew vigorously. During the whole summer they exhibited a
+deep-green color, and did not become brown, like blue-grass, orchard
+grass, or timothy. As soon as the spring of 1882 opened, growth set in
+rapidly, and continued till the latter end of May, at which period it
+stood from three to four feet high. At this time it was ready for the
+mower; but as the production of seed was the object in view, it was not
+cut till the second week in June. The plot of ground of about half an
+acre, on which ten pounds of seed were sown, produced three barrels of
+seed.
+
+He exhibited a little sheaf of this grass at the semi-annual meeting of
+the Kansas State Horticultural Society, where it excited much
+attention--the height, softness of the stem, length of blade, and sweet
+aroma surprised every one present.
+
+On the last day of August, he went into the plot with a sickle, and cut
+two handfuls of aftermath which measured twenty inches in growth. This
+he tied to a sheaf of the June cutting, and exhibited the same at the
+State Fair, where it attracted much attention and comment.
+
+Here, then, we have, he continues, a grass that will insure a "good
+catch" if the seed is fresh; that can endure severe drouth; that
+produces an abundant supply of foliage; that is valuable for pasture in
+early spring, on account of its early and luxuriant growth; that makes a
+valuable hay; that shoots up quickly after being cut; and affords a fine
+crop of aftermath for grazing during the late fall and winter months.
+
+The Professor is very anxious that the farmers of Kansas should test
+this grass during the season of 1883. Still, his advice is not to invest
+too largely in the experiment. Purchase from five to ten pounds of
+seed, and give it a fair trial, and he is confident that the experiment
+will be satisfactory.
+
+The name given to this valuable grass in the State of Michigan is
+"Evergreen," but this is only a local synonym. Its scientific name is
+Avena elatior; its common name, "Tall Meadow Oat-grass." Fearing that he
+might be mistaken in its nomenclature, he sent a specimen to Professor
+Carruth, State Botanist. This is his reply:
+
+    "Mr. J.W. Robson--Dear Sir: Yours mailed on the 22d, I
+    received last evening. I do not get my mail every day. The
+    specimen of grass you sent agrees perfectly with the Avena
+    elatior, of Wood, and the Arrenatherrum avenaceum, of Gray;
+    but I have never seen this grass before. I agree with you in
+    the scientific name, and also in the common name, 'Tall
+    Meadow Oat-grass.'
+
+    Yours truly, J.H. CARRUTH."
+
+The ground should be plowed in the fall, and early in the spring, as
+soon as the soil is in good tilth; sow broadcast two bushels (or
+twenty-eight pounds) of seed to the acre; cover well with the harrow,
+both lengthways and across the piece of ground sown. Should the ground
+prove weedy, cut the weeds down with the mowing machine in June, and
+leave them upon the surface, and they will afford shade to the young
+plants.
+
+This grass is extensively grown in Eastern Tennessee, and is very
+popular in that portion of the State. In some portions of Western
+Virginia it is largely grown for hay and for grass. It is known as tall
+meadow oat-grass in each of the States we have mentioned above.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The main building for the New Orleans Cotton Centennial Exposition next
+year will be 1,500 feet long and 900 feet wide, with 1,000,398 square
+feet of floor space, including Music Hall in the center, with a seating
+capacity of 12,000 persons. The design also provides for main offices,
+telegraph office, newspaper department, fire department, police,
+hospital, waiting-rooms, and life saving apparatus. The building will be
+the largest exposition building ever erected, except the one in London
+in 1862. The design adopted was the work of G.M. Jorgenson, of Meridian,
+Mississippi. There were ten competitors.
+
+
+
+
+JOSEPH F. GLIDDEN.
+
+The Barb-Wire Industry--Some Facts in its Early History not Generally
+Known--Its Growth.
+
+
+Joseph Farwell Glidden, "the Father of the Barb-Wire Business" of this
+country, is now a hale and hearty man of seventy-one. He was born at
+Charleston, N.H. When about one year old the family came West, to
+Clarendon, Orleans county, New York, and engaged in farming. The young
+lad, besides mastering the usual branches taught in the common schools,
+gave some time to the higher mathematics and Latin, intending to take a
+college course, an idea that he finally abandoned. He taught in the
+district schools for a few terms. In 1842 he came to Illinois and
+purchased a quarter section of land a mile west of what is now the site
+of the pleasant and prosperous town of DeKalb. With the exception of
+three years his life since then has been passed upon this farm and at
+DeKalb. He has from time to time added to his homestead, his farm now
+embracing 800 acres. His land is under excellent cultivation, a
+considerable portion of it having been thoroughly tiled, and his farm
+buildings are first-class. Mr. Glidden has been twice married. Two
+children were born of the first union, both dying in infancy. By his
+second marriage he has one daughter, now the wife of a Chicago merchant.
+
+[Illustration: JOSEPH FARWELL GLIDDEN.]
+
+Mr. Glidden has held several local offices of trust and honor and enjoys
+in a marked degree the esteem and confidence of the citizens of his
+neighborhood and county. The rapid accumulation of property of late
+years, through his barb-wire patents and business, gave him the means to
+gratify his feelings of public spirit, and in consequence the town of
+DeKalb has benefited greatly at his hands. Its leading hotel and many
+other buildings are the work of his enterprise. Mr. Glidden has never
+lost the simple manners of the farm. He is unostentatious, quiet,
+genial, and at his hotel makes everybody feel as much at home as though
+enjoying the hospitalities of his private house. His kindly, firm, and
+intelligent face is well shown in the accompanying portrait, though, as
+is usually the case, the hand of the artist has touched his features
+more lightly than has the hand of time.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Few names are now more widely known among the land holders of the
+country than that of Joseph F. Glidden, the unpretending gentleman whose
+life we have briefly sketched. It was his fortune to seize upon an idea,
+and push it to development, which has not only given him fame and
+fortune, but which has enriched many others and saved many millions of
+dollars to the farmers of America. He has not only founded a mammoth
+industry, but he has revolutionized an economic system of the world. By
+his ingenuity and perseverance the fencing system of a pastoral
+continent has been reduced to a minimum of expense and simplicity. Not
+that he individually has accomplished all this, but as the patentee of
+the first really successful barb-wire fence, he laid the solid
+foundation for it all.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The first application for a patent for the Glidden barb was filed
+October 27, 1873. For some weeks previous to this date Mr. Glidden had
+had in his mind the idea of a barb of wire twisted about the main wire
+of the fence, leaving two projecting points on opposite sides. He made
+some of these by hand with the aid of pinchers and hammer. He strung two
+wires between two trees and twisted them together with a stick placed
+between them. A pair of cutting nippers was the next addition to his
+"kit" of tools. His next means for twisting the two wires together was
+the grindstone--attaching one end of the wire to shaft and crank, the
+others being fastened to the wall of the barn. And here, as in most
+things great and small in this world, woman furnished the motor power.
+The strong arm of the good helpmeet, Mrs. Glidden, turned the grindstone
+that twisted the first wire that made the first Glidden barb fence that
+kept stock at bay in Illinois or the world. Then followed a device for
+twisting and barbing, and the application of horse power. Business
+expanded, and steam took the place of the horse, and inventive genius
+modified and improved the entire machinery, it being estimated that at
+least the sum of $1,000,000 has been expended in bringing the machinery
+for barb-wire making to its present state of perfection.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At about the same time that Mr. Glidden was wrestling with his ideas and
+devices, Mr. I.L. Ellwood was experimenting to accomplish a like result
+with a thin band of metal, the barbs cut and curved outward from the
+strip. In the meantime Mr. Glidden had put up a few rods of his
+hand-made barb-wire along the roadside at his farm. And here again the
+good genius of woman enters upon the scene. One Sunday Mr. Ellwood and
+his wife were driving along this road and attracted by the wire fence
+stopped to examine it. Mrs. Ellwood, much to the chagrin of her husband,
+remarked: "This seems to me a better device than your own, don't it to
+you?" It did not then, for the remark disappointed and angered him. But
+it set him to thinking and before the next morning he was of the same
+opinion. The two men meeting the next day it did not take long to
+compromise and unite. Mr. Ellwood dropped his own plans and accepted a
+half interest in the Glidden patents, and assumed the management of the
+business end of the concern, in which position he developed ability and
+tact possessed by few business men in this country.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The barb-wire fence met an unexpected and general demand. We know of few
+things like it in the history of manufactures. From this small
+beginning, scarce ten years ago more than fifty large establishments are
+now turning out this wire to meet an ever insatiate demand. The
+establishment of I.L. Ellwood (making the Glidden wire) at DeKalb is the
+most complete and extensive of them all. The building is 800 feet in
+length, and is supplied with about 200 machines for twisting and barbing
+the wire. It gives, when running full force, employment to about 400
+men, and turns out a car-load of wire each hour for ten hours per day,
+on an average, though this amount is considerably increased at certain
+times of the year. These figures, though not given us by Mr. Ellwood, we
+are satisfied do not overstate the production of this one factory. The
+progress of the barb-wire industry of the whole country is shown by the
+following record of the past nine seasons. In
+
+  1874 there were 10,000 lb made and sold.
+  1875 there were 600,000 lb made and sold.
+  1876 there were 2,840,000 lb made and sold.
+  1877 there were 12,863,000 lb made and sold.
+  1878 there were 26,655,000 lb made and sold.
+  1879 there were 50,337,000 lb made and sold.
+  1880 there were 80,500,000 lb made and sold.
+  1881 there were 120,000,000 lb made and sold.
+  1882 there were about 180,000,000 lb.
+
+The record for 1883 is not yet made up, but will probably show a
+corresponding increase.
+
+In 1876 Mr. Glidden disposed of his half interest in the concern of
+Glidden & Ellwood to the Washburn & Moen (wire) Manufacturing Company,
+of Massachusetts, receiving therefor $60,000 in cash and a royalty on
+the future goods manufactured, Mr. Ellwood retaining his interest. The
+new concern began the purchase of prior unused and conflicting patents
+involving itself in extensive litigation, but, sustained by the courts,
+soon gained control of almost the entire barb-wire business of the
+country. Nearly all wire-making companies are now running under license
+from the parent concern. The following is a list of the licensees of
+last year:
+
+  Pittsburg Hinge Co.--Limited, Beaver Falls, Pa.
+  H.B. Scutt & Co., Buffalo, N.Y.
+  Hawkeye Steel Barb Fence Co., Burlington, Iowa.
+  James Ayers and Alexander C. Decker, Bushnell, Ill.
+  Indiana Wire Fence Co., Crawfordsville, Ind.
+  Cedar Rapids Barb Wire Co., Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
+  Cincinnati Barbed Wire Fence Co., Cincinnati, Ohio.
+  Cleveland Barb Fence Co., Cleveland, Ohio.
+  Ohio Steel Barb Fence Co., Cleveland, Ohio.
+  Edwin A. Beers & Co., Chicago, Ill.
+  Crandal Manufacturing Co., Chicago, Ill.
+  Chicago Galvanized Wire Fence Co., Chicago, Ill.
+  Lyman Manufacturing Co., Chicago, Ill.
+  Daniel S. Marsh, Chicago, Ill.
+  Oscar F. Moore, Chicago, Ill.
+  National Wire Co., Chicago, Ill.
+  Herman E. Schnabel, Chicago, Ill.
+  Aaron K. Stiles and John W. Calkins, Chicago, Ill.
+  Thorn Wire Hedge Co., Chicago, Ill.
+  Baker Manufacturing Co., Des Moines, Iowa.
+  Superior Barbed Wire Co., DeKalb, Ill.
+  Jacob Haish, DeKalb, Ill.
+  Frentress Barbed Wire Fence Co., East Dubuque, Ill.
+  Grinnell Manufacturing Co., Grinnell, Iowa.
+  Janesville Barb Wire Co., Janesville, Wis.
+  Iowa Barb Wire Co., Johnstown, Pa.
+  William J. Adam, Joliet, Ill.
+  Lock Stitch Fence Co., Joliet, Ill.
+  Lambert & Bishop Wire Fence Co., Joliet, Ill.
+  Alfred Van Fleet & A.H. Shreffler, Joliet, Ill.
+  David G. Wells, Joliet, Ill.
+  Southwestern Barb Wire Co., Lawrence, Kan.
+  Arthur H. Dale, Leland, Ill.
+  Union Barb Wire Co., Lee, Ill.
+  Lockport Wire Fence Co., Lockport, Ill.
+  Norton & DeWitt, Lockport, Ill.
+  Iowa Barb Steel Wire Fence Co., Marshaltown, Iowa.
+  Omaha Barb Wire Co., Omaha, Neb.
+  H.B. Scutt & Co.--Limited, Pittsburg, Pa.
+  Missouri Wire Fence Co., St. Louis, Mo.
+  St. Louis Wire Fence Co., St. Louis, Mo.
+  J.H. Lawrence & Co., Sterling, Ill.
+  North Western Barb Wire Co., Sterling, Ill.
+  Novelty Manufacturing Co., Sterling, Ill.
+  Sandwich Enterprise Co., Sandwich, Ill.
+  Robinson & Hallidie, San Francisco, Cal.
+  The Hazard Manufacturing Co., Wilkes Barre, Pa.
+  Worcester Barb Fence Co., Worcester, Mass.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+When Glidden & Ellwood first began the sale of the Glidden fence, which
+was confined to the vicinity of DeKalb, they received 25 cents per pound
+for the barbed wire. Since then, as production has increased and the
+facilities for manufacturing have been multiplied and perfected, the
+price has gradually dropped, until now a farm can be well fenced for
+forty-five cents, or less, per rod, and to the incalculable advantage of
+the country over fencing by posts and boards, hedges or rails, as any
+one may see by a simple dollar and cent comparison of materials at his
+own door.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Barb-wire has done much for the city of DeKalb. It has built its fine
+business blocks and residences, and it has peopled it with industrious,
+thrifty citizens. It has made a home market for many of the products of
+the country 'round about. It should give a new name, "Barb City," to the
+bustling, busy town. There are three concerns now making barb-wire at
+this point. The one spoken of is the largest. Next is that of Jacob
+Haish, an extensive establishment, turning out an excellent wire, and
+the Superior, run by Mr. Hiram Ellwood, Mr. Glidden having a
+considerable interest in it.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. I.L. Ellwood is the owner of some 2,600 acres of land in the
+vicinity of DeKalb. Much of this land is naturally low and wet. The
+proprietor, with his accustomed energy and intelligence, has set
+vigorously to work to reclaim it. To this end he has already laid eighty
+miles of tile. He last year expended nearly $15,000 in this work. His
+poorest land is rapidly becoming his most productive. Mr. Ellwood has
+also turned his attention somewhat to horse-breeding, and he is now the
+owner of a fine stud of draft-horses, the equal of many better-known
+establishments of the kind in the State. Of his drainage operations we
+hope to speak more in detail in a future number.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Glidden told the writer that his first trial of his fence with stock
+was not undertaken without some misgivings. But he thought to himself,
+"It will stop them, at any rate, whether it kills them or not." So he
+took down an old board fence from one side of his barn-yard, and towards
+night when his stock came up, turned them into the yard as usual. The
+first animal to investigate the almost invisible barrier to freedom was
+a strong, heavy grade Durham cow. She walked along beside the wires for
+a little put her nose out and touched a barb, withdrew it and took a
+walk around the yard, approached the wires again and gave the barbs a
+lap with her tongue. This settled the matter, and she retired, convinced
+that the new-fangled fence was a success.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Barb-wire is now sent from this country to Mexico, South America, and
+Australia. It is also being manufactured in England under American
+auspices.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mr. Glidden, associating with himself a Mr. Sanborn, a young man of push
+and enterprise, has opened up an extensive cattle ranch in Potter and
+Randall counties, Texas. They have fenced with wire a tract thirty miles
+long by about fifteen miles broad, and have now upon it 14,000 head of
+cattle. Two twisted No. 11 wires were used for this fence, and the posts
+are the best that could be procured. The wire was taken 200 miles on
+wagons. The total cost of the completed fence was about $36,000.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Messrs. Glidden & Ellwood put up the first barb-wire ever used by a
+railway company--the Northwestern. So great was the caution of the
+company that the manufacturers built it themselves, agreeing to remove
+it if it proved unsatisfactory. The railway folks feared it would injure
+stock, the damages for which they would be forced to pay. It is needless
+to say that the fence was not removed. More than one hundred railway
+companies are now using the Glidden wire, and it stretches along many
+thousands of miles of track.
+
+
+
+
+A RAMBLER'S LETTER.
+
+
+I would like to call your attention to the fact that there is
+considerable cholera among swine in Dewey township, Ill., west from
+Joliet. Mr. Cooter lost about 130 hogs. Other farmers have suffered
+equally.
+
+I have been looking over the stock in this part of the country and find
+it excellent, as a general thing. Many of the farmers are breeders of
+fine Hereford cattle. They also own first-class horses. Some of them
+whom I called upon would like to know the address of State Veterinary
+Surgeon Dr. Paaren, and I should be pleased if you will give it in THE
+PRAIRIE FARMER.[A] I have often thought, Why is it that so many sons of
+wealthy farmers leave their homes for the purpose of either studying in
+some classical college, to learn a trade, or to become book-keepers and
+clerks in mercantile business. I think if farmers would take more
+interest in agricultural papers, instead of having their children
+fooling away their time on novels or comic stories and pictures, it
+would be better for both old and young. Let the parents buy a microscope
+and let the young folks examine insects and fungi of all kinds, and let
+them write their experiences down in a book whenever there is leisure
+time. Or let them write to THE PRAIRIE FARMER something in the line of
+farming, be it agriculture, horticulture, or about raising and caring
+for stock. In so doing the boys of our farming country will become proud
+of their noble profession and of their homes. They will gradually be, as
+every farmer should be, educated up to the times. There are few farmers
+who can afford to let their sons study in an agricultural university,
+but every one can surely afford to subscribe for an agricultural paper,
+it being one of the most profitable investments for himself and family.
+
+The ground is covered with snow to a small extent, and the roads are in
+a fine condition. The crops are all good here except corn, which is very
+poor indeed, even the crop in most cases is small. Farmers are not at
+all satisfied, and times are not at all encouraging.
+
+  H.A.P. WEISSBERGER.
+  WILL CO., ILL.
+
+[A] 355 Western Avenue (south), Chicago.
+
+
+
+
+A FARMER'S LIBRARY.
+
+
+As this is the season to make up our list of papers and magazines for
+the ensuing year, I will take a glance around my own cosy room set apart
+for a library.
+
+It is here that I do the most of my reading, writing, and planning; and
+although I pretend to be deeply engaged while ensconced in the large
+willow rocker, strictly forbidding entrance to my farmer office, yet the
+children and "Spot," my Gordon setter, will intrude, making things
+lively for awhile, driving my thoughts wool-gathering and breaking many
+a thread of thought that I had fondly hoped would place my name high on
+the roll of scribblers. It is a good thing to have the little innocent
+children and the dog to blame for these shortcomings, as they can not
+take issue with us on the question.
+
+But I started to talk about a farmer's library; and taking my own for a
+small sample, let us see how it looks.
+
+For the purpose of keeping my papers in order, I have prepared thin
+laths of tough wood dressed with the draw knife to a thin edge, the back
+being one fourth of an inch thick, leaving the lath one and a quarter
+inch broad; these are cut in lengths to suit the paper they are intended
+to hold. Take for instance THE PRAIRIE FARMER. I cut the lath just two
+inches longer than the paper is long, then cut notches half of an inch
+from each end, in which I tie the ends of a cord; this forms a loop to
+hang up the file. In this I file each paper so soon as read, by which
+means they are never lost or mislaid. When at the end of each three
+months the papers are taken from off the file, the oldest number is laid
+face down on a broad piece of plank and the number that follows laid
+face down on the top of the first, then they are squared evenly and a
+strong awl pierces three holes in the back edge through which a strong
+twine string is laced and tied firmly; this finishes the job, and the
+book thus simply and quickly made is placed on the shelf with its mates.
+This done the file is returned to its hook to await the next number.
+
+This is a simple plan for filing papers of any size, and any farmer can
+do it, there being no expense or outlay for material. On glancing up
+from the stand on which I am writing, the first objects that attract my
+notice are my breach loader, cartridge belt, and game-bag hanging on the
+wall; then by the side of the stove hangs the file of THE PRAIRIE
+FARMER, within easy reach of my left hand; next it swings the
+Country Gentleman, then comes the Forest and Stream, then Colman's Rural
+World, then the Drainage Journal; next Harper's Weekly, then Harper's
+Bazar. This is my wife's paper and she persists in hanging it among
+mine. Then comes Harper's Monthly and the Century, not forgetting the
+Sanitary Journal. On the other side of the room we find the Inter Ocean,
+Democrat, and several other political papers fairly representing both
+sides, also some standard books of valuable information; and last but
+not least, the PRAIRIE FARMER Map which you sent for my club.
+
+Now, this may be considered a pretty large outlay for a common farmer to
+make, but outside of life insurance, I consider it my best investment.
+
+In this selection I get the cream of all matters of practical importance
+to the farmer. From THE PRAIRIE FARMER I get the latest and most
+reliable information of the great central ruling markets of the West
+Chicago, which has saved me sundry times from three to five cents per
+bushel on wheat, sometimes paying the price of the paper twenty times
+over in one transaction. From the C.G. I get the Eastern markets, while
+Colman gives the St. Louis; and by a close study of the three a farmer
+can always make enough to pay for twenty or thirty dollars worth of good
+current literature for the use of his family. Then the F. and S. is
+always full of delightful reading for the boys, refining their cruel
+propensities, and teaching them to be kind to the feathered tribe which
+are the farmer's friends. By reading it they soon lay aside their traps,
+nets, and snares, with which they capture whole covies of the dear
+little Bob-whites, and disdain to touch a feather, only when on the
+wing, and then with their light, hammerless breach loader. Such reading
+as that ties the farmer's boys to country life, and makes them contented
+under the parental roof-tree until they are ready to build up homes of
+their own. The Journal tells them all about tile making and drainage, a
+very necessary accomplishment when they get their own homestead.
+
+The pictures in H.W. furnish a fountain of amusement for the little
+folks, and teach them--with a little help--many things that will be
+useful to them in life. As a matter of course the "Bezar" is for mother
+and the girls, and [***]
+consultations [***]
+before the fair, a [***]
+daughters, your [***]
+good when she insisted [***]
+be put on the list.
+
+A boy or a girl with [***]
+the Century in their hands, [***]
+room, with a bright clear lamp [***]
+has no thought of city life, or [***]
+In those bright pages the [***]
+outer world painted in all its various [***]
+so interesting and so fascinating [***]
+have no desire to see it in reality; in [***]
+they bring the brightest and best thought, [***]
+historic, and romantic to our hearth and home; furnishing food for the
+youthful minds, leaving no room for evil or discontented thoughts to
+enter. Then I say to every farmer who has children, get the magazines
+for them, they will save you a mountain of trouble.
+
+Then to balance things have one or two spicy news papers, which picture
+in horrid colors the blackest side of human life. This is necessary to
+guard the young against the riff-raff of humanity, such as tramps,
+sharpers, sewing machine and book agents, the lightning rod man, and a
+dozen other sharp swindlers that prey on the farmer and his family for
+an existence. The Sanitary Journal treats of health, purity, and
+cleanliness, and ought to be read and studied by all. Ah, I had almost
+forgotten THE PRAIRIE FARMER Map which hangs by the door. What can I say
+about it? that it is a handsome ornament for a living room or library?
+yes, but that is not all, it is useful. When it arrived I took it to the
+railroad office and compared it with the best map they had, also with a
+map made by the U.S. land office. I came away satisfied that it was
+reliable; it ought to be in the home of every farmer in this great
+country of ours, so that their children can learn and know what a grand
+heritage they have got. There is no excuse for being without it, as a
+few pounds of butter or dozens of eggs will procure it and a paper that
+will gladden the hearts of both old and young.
+
+  ALEX ROSS.
+  CAPE GIRARDEAU, MO.
+
+
+
+
+LET US BE SOCIABLE.
+
+
+A happy new year to all of the readers of THE PRAIRIE FARMER, and may
+your labors of 1884 be crowned with success. Mr. Granger, what are you
+doing these long winter evenings? Can't you find time to write a few
+lines to the readers of THE PRAIRIE FARMER? You can send a little report
+from your county, at least. Come, let us be a little more sociable and
+talk more to each other through the columns of our paper. We can learn
+something by reading each other's views on different subjects. In my
+next I shall try and tell some of the careless fellows how to run a farm
+to make it pay. If I fail to give a little light on the subject perhaps
+some one else will try it. We are having what you might call winter,
+now. Snow is about six inches deep, but the weather is not very cold.
+The thermometer has not been below zero but once. Nearly all of the corn
+is gathered; only about one-third of the crop is sound enough to keep
+until next summer. Farmers are feeding their soft corn to hogs and
+cattle. In that way the soft corn will pay pretty well after all, for
+fat stock brings a good price. Stock cattle are wintering well, for feed
+in the fields is good, and most farmers have got plenty of good hay. The
+weather was so nice the first part of this month that the farmers did a
+large amount of plowing. Potatoes are plenty and cheap; worth from 30 to
+40 cents. Apples are scarce, and good ones bring a big price. Butter is
+worth from 25 to 30 cents.
+
+  S.O.A.
+  KNOX CO., ILL.
+
+
+
+
+SEED CORN AGAIN.
+
+
+There has been much complaint of soft corn in this section on account of
+planting foreign seed last spring, but it is all solid since the late
+cold spell.
+
+Those who planted seed of their own raising and got a stand have fair
+corn, while much of that which was raised from Kansas and Nebraska seed
+was caught by the frost when in the milk. Now we will be in just the
+same "fix" about seed next spring that we were last. This county has
+lost thousands of dollars this year in the corn crop alone, all of which
+might have been avoided by going through the fields before freezing
+weather and selecting seed and properly drying it before it froze.
+
+And now right here I want to say that the great secret of good farming
+is simply being punctual in attending to the small matters, and I
+"guess" Fanny Field would say the same about poultry.
+
+  Z.L. THOMPSON.
+  IROQUOIS CO., ILL.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+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._
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+FIELD AND FURROW.
+
+
+Says the Iowa Register: One hundred bushels of corn will shrink to
+ninety in the crib, and to an extent more than that, depending on the
+openness of the crib and the honesty of the neighbors.
+
+The agricultural editor of the New York Times says that no doubt many
+farmers who are intending to underdrain their farms would save money by
+employing an expert at the first to lay out the whole system and make a
+good beginning, and so avoid any possible mistake, which might cost ten
+dollars for every one paid for skilled advice.
+
+The New York Times says that lime seems to be a preventive of rot in
+potatoes in the cellar. Some potatoes that were rotting and were picked
+out of a heap of forty or fifty bushels were put into a corner and well
+dusted with air-slaked lime. They stopped rotting at once, and the
+decayed parts are now dried up. There is no disagreeable smell about
+them.
+
+Cincinnati Gazette: It is remarked that when young hogs are fed mainly
+on corn they stop growing at an early age and begin to grow fat; but
+that green food makes them thriftier and larger than dry grain. In fact,
+it is better to prevent all domestic animals from becoming very fat
+until they have attained a fair natural size, particularly breeding
+animals.
+
+A member of the Elmira Farmers' Club recently expressed the opinion that
+bad results would always be found with wheat sown on land into which the
+green growth of any crop had just been turned, although it was believed
+that buckwheat was the worst green manure. All green growth incorporated
+with the soil near the time of seeding will in all cases be found
+prejudicial to wheat.
+
+It is announced that Robert Clarke, of Cincinnati will have ready, in
+February, an extensive work on sorghum, containing the results of the
+latest experiments and experience of the most successful growers, as to
+the best varieties and their culture, and also the details of the latest
+and best machinery used in the economical manufacture of sirups and
+sugars therefrom. The work is by Prof. Peter Collier, whose name is a
+guarantee of the value of the book. It will be very fully illustrated.
+
+A Michigan man writes the Michigan Farmer: I have noticed tarred twine
+and willows recommended for binding corn stalks. I think I can propose a
+better substitute than either for those who are using a twine binder:
+save the strings from straw stacks this winter. They are less trouble
+than grass and never slip. Tie a knot in the end of the twine with your
+knee on the bundle, then slip the other end through in the form of a
+bow, take off your knee and the spring of the bundle will draw the knot
+tight. Pull the bow and use again.
+
+"Human labor," says Dr. Zellner, of Ashville, Ala., "is the most costly
+factor that enters into the production of cotton, and every consistent
+means should be adopted to dispense with it." And then the doctor, who
+has the reputation of having raised some of the finest samples ever
+grown in the South, describes how, by planting at proper distances, in
+checks five by three apart, one-half of the after labor of cultivating
+may be saved. About the same amount of plow work is said to be
+necessary, but not more than one-fourth as much work with the hoe as is
+required by cotton in drills.
+
+Prof. J.W. Sanborn: "Deep tillage in times of drought of surface-rooted
+crops, like corn, is an erroneous practice, founded on erroneous views.
+'Plowing out corn' not only involves too deep tillage in drought but
+adds to the mischief by severing the roots of corn, needed at such
+times. Our double-shovel plows work too deeply. Our true policy, in
+drought, for corn is frequent and shallow tillage. For this we now have
+after the corn gets beyond the smoothing harrow, no suitable implement
+on our markets, with a possible exception."
+
+Correspondent New York Tribune: Of the use of oatmeal for cows mention
+is not often made in this country; but when spoken of it is always with
+praise. That it is better than corn meal there can be no doubt; it is
+richer in both albuminoids and fat; and the usefulness of these two
+nutriments, and especially the former, for making milk is shown not
+only by the results of numerous careful experiments, but by the
+acknowledged usefulness of oil-cake meal. Where this meal is used freely
+there would be less use for oatmeal; but under some circumstances it
+might be advantageously substituted for the bran in the favorite mixture
+for cows of Indian meal and bran.
+
+The following paragraph appears in an English cotemporary: The
+introduction of a new industry connected with farming into Ireland will
+be hailed by everybody, and therefore we rejoice to learn that a company
+has been formed with the design of purchasing or renting nearly a
+million and a quarter acres of land in Ireland, and devoting them to
+beet culture, from which the sugar will be extracted in a manufactory
+erected on the land. The promoters of the new company expect that from
+the 120,000 acres which they propose cultivating they will produce
+400,000 tons of sugar in the year. Immense quantities of sugar extracted
+from the beet-root are manufactured on the continent and imported into
+these countries, and there is no reason whatever why Ireland should not
+have her finger in the sugar pie.
+
+In a paper before the Oxford (Ohio) Farmers' Club, on the subject "The
+Morality of the System of Grain Gambling," Mr. Wetmore said: There is a
+difference between speculation and investment. Putting money into an
+established industry is an investment. Putting it into a doubtful or
+untried business, with the hope of gaining much or risk of losing all,
+is speculation. The latter is infatuating as it increases the risk and
+yet turns to profit. Investments pay no high per cents. Speculations may
+pay much or lose all. Hence it is unsafe; and the farmer who makes his
+gains only by a yearly turn of his crops, should not try speculation,
+but may judiciously invest his surplus year by year in things of real
+value, as land or chattels. Invest the last dollar, but speculate only
+with loose change. No man can safely invest in a business with which he
+is not familiar.
+
+A lawful wire fence in Georgia is described by legislative enactment as
+composed of not less than six horizontal strands of barbed wire tightly
+stretched from post to post. The first wire no more than four and a half
+nor less than three and a half inches from the ground; the second wire
+not more than nine and a half nor less than eight and a half inches from
+the ground; the third wire not more than fifteen and a half nor less
+than fourteen and a half inches from the ground; the fourth wire not
+more than twenty-two and a half nor less than twenty-one and a half
+inches from the ground; the fifth wire not more than thirty-two nor less
+than thirty-one inches from the ground; the sixth wire not over
+fifty-five nor less than fifty-three inches from the ground. Posts to be
+not over ten feet apart, and every alternate post to be securely set in
+the ground. Provided, a plank not less than ten inches wide shall be
+used instead of two strands of wire at bottom of fence, it is also
+required that a railing shall be placed at equal distance between the
+two top wires, which shall answer the same purpose as a wire, and to
+extend from post to post in like manner.
+
+Correspondent Country Gentleman: I notice that your journal recently
+gave currency to the "saltpetre method" of extracting stumps, and W.H.
+White also recommends it in your columns. His method is to bore a hole
+in the stump in the fall of the year, fill in the hole with saltpetre,
+plug up till the following summer, then fill the hole with kerosene and
+fire the stump. It is alleged that the saltpetre and kerosene will so
+saturate the stump that it will be entirely consumed, roots and all.
+This recipe has been floating around the press for years. It is usually
+credited to the Scientific American, but that paper has several times
+denied its paternity. The uselessness of the process can easily be
+learned by trial. There are few more inflammable substances than pitch
+and turpentine. The roots of pine stumps are saturated with these, but
+it is impossible to burn them out. The addition of saltpetre would not
+help much. Yet there are seasons when the soil and air are so dry that
+hard wood stumps may be burned out without either saltpetre or kerosene.
+We had such a year in 1881, when corn and clover standing uncut in the
+field were burned. In some instances the curbing was burned out of wells
+during terrible forest fires that raged in Michigan. If tried in such a
+season the recipe would undoubtedly be successful. In any ordinary
+season it is "no good."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+No matter how wretched a man may be, he is still a member of our common
+species, and if he possesses any of the common specie his acquaintance
+is worth having.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+[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_
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+SEDGWICK STEEL WIRE FENCE
+
+[Illustration]
+
+IT is the only general-purpose Wire Fence in use, being a STRONG NET
+WORK WITHOUT BARBS. It will turn dogs, pigs, sheep and poultry, as well
+as the most vicious stock, without injury to either fence or stock. It
+is just the fence for farms, gardens stock ranges, and railroads, and
+very neat for lawns, parks, school lots and cemeteries. Covered with
+rustproof paint (or galvanized) it will last a life time. It is
+SUPERIOR TO BOARDS or BARBED WIRE in every respect. We ask for it a
+fair trial, knowing it will wear itself into favor. The SEDGWICK
+GATES, made of wrought iron pipe and steel wire, DEFY ALL COMPETITION
+in neatness, strength, and durability. We also make the best and
+cheapest ALL IRON AUTOMATIC OR SELF-OPENING GATE, also CHEAPEST AND
+NEATEST ALL IRON FENCE. BEST WIRE STRETCHER AND POST AUGER. For
+prices and particulars ask hardware dealers, or address, mentioning
+paper, SEDGWICK BROS. Manf'rs. Richmond. Ind.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[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," 1/4 oz. to 25 lb. $3.
+
+300 OTHER SIZES. Reduced PRICE LIST FREE.
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FIVE-TON WAGON SCALES $60
+
+[Illustration]
+
+All Iron and Steel, Double Brass Tare Beam. Jones _he_ pays the freight.
+All sizes equally low, for free book, address
+
+JONES OF BINGHAMTON,
+Binghamton, N.Y.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration]
+
+THE PROFIT FARM BOILER
+
+is simple, perfect, and cheap; the BEST FEED COOKER; the only dumping
+boiler; empties its kettle in a minute. OVER 5,000 IN USE; Cook your
+corn and potatoes, and save one-half the cost of pork. Send for circular.
+D.R. SPERRY & CO., Batavia, Illinois.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FARM IMPLEMENTS, Etc.
+
+
+THE CHICAGO DOUBLE HAY AND STRAW PRESS
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Guaranteed to load more Hay or Straw in a box car than any other, and
+bale at a less cost per ton. Send for circular and price list.
+Manufactured by the Chicago Hay Press Co., Nos. 3354 to 3358 State St.,
+Chicago. Take cable car to factory. Mention this paper.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Sawing Made Easy
+
+Monarch Lightning Sawing Machine!
+
+Sent on 30 Days test Trial.
+
+A Great Saving of Labor & Money.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+A boy 16 years old can saw logs FAST and EASY. MILES MURRAY, Portage,
+Mich. writes, "Am much pleased with the MONARCH LIGHTNING SAWING
+MACHINE. I sawed off a 30-inch log in 2 minutes." For sawing logs into
+suitable lengths for family stove-wood, and all sorts of log-cutting, it
+is peerless and unrivaled. Illustrated Catalogue, FREE. AGENTS WANTED.
+Mention this paper. Address MONARCH MANUFACTURING CO., 163 N. Randolph
+St., Chicago, Ill.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+BEST MARKET PEAR.
+
+[Illustration: KIEFFER]
+
+99,999 PEACH TREES All _best varieties_ of new and old Strawberries,
+Currants, Grapes, Raspberries, etc.
+
+EARLY CLUSTER
+
+New Blackberry, early, hardy, good. Single hill yielded 13 quarts at
+one picking. Send for FREE Catalogue.
+
+J.S. COLLINS, Moorestown, N.J.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MISCELLANEOUS.
+
+
+DIAMONDS FREE!
+
+We desire to make the circulation of our paper 250,000 during the next
+six months. To accomplish which we will give absolutely free a genuine
+FIRST WATER Diamond Ring, and the Home Companion for one year, for
+only $2.00. Our reasons for making this unprecedented offer are as
+follows;
+
+A newspaper with 200,000 subscribers can get 1c. per line per 1,000 of
+circulation for its advertising space, or $5,000 per issue MORE than
+it costs to produce and mail the paper. With but 10,000 or 20,000
+subscribers, its advertising revenues do not pay expenses. Only the
+papers with mammoth circulations make fortunes for their owners,
+DERIVED FROM ADVERTISING SPACE. For these and other reasons, we regard
+100,000 subscribers as being of more financial benefit to a paper than
+the paper is to the subscribers. With 100,000 or 200,000 bona-fide
+subscribers, we make $100,000 to $200,000 a year clear profit from
+advertising, above cost of publishing. Without a large circulation, we
+would lose money. Therefore, to secure a very large circulation, and
+thus receive high rates and large profits from advertising space, this
+ONLY EQUITABLE plan of conducting business is adopted.
+
+THE FIRST QUESTION TO BE ANSWERED IS,--is the diamond pure--a genuine
+stone?
+
+OUR ANSWER IS YES.
+
+The stone is GUARANTEED to be no Alaska Diamond, Rhine Pebble, or other
+imitation, but a
+
+WARRANTED GENUINE AND PURE DIAMOND.
+
+If it is not found so by the most careful and searching tests, we will
+refund the money, enter the subscriber's name on our list, and have the
+paper mailed to him free during its existence. To the publisher of this
+paper has been sent a guarantee from the manufacturing Jeweler, from
+whom we obtain these rings, that they are just as represented, so that
+readers may rely upon the promises being fulfilled to the letter.
+
+
+The second question is, IS THE PAPER A DESIRABLE FAMILY JOURNAL? YES.
+It contains contributions from the first writers of the times: fiction,
+choice facts, intellectual food of the most interesting, instructive and
+refined character. It is one of the
+
+LEADING PAPERS OF THE PROGRESSIVE WEST.
+
+We are determined to make it the most desirable and reliable paper in
+the United States; will spare no effort or money to achieve that object.
+Sample Copies sent free on application. Remit by draft, express, or new
+postal note, to
+
+THE HOME COMPANION.
+N.W. Cor. Fourth and Race Streets, Cincinnati, O.
+
+Don't fail to name the paper in which you see this advertisement.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+REMEMBER _that $2.00 pays for_ THE PRAIRIE FARMER _from this date to
+January 1, 1884; $2.00 pays for it 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._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+LIVE STOCK DEPARTMENT.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Stockmen. Write for Your Paper.
+
+
+MR. GRINNELL'S LETTER.
+
+
+Last week we briefly noted the fact that Hon. J.B. Grinnell, of Iowa,
+Secretary of the Committee of the National Cattle-Growers' Convention,
+appointed to secure legislation for the protection of live stock from
+contagious diseases, had issued a circular letter to the public. In this
+letter he discusses with his usual intelligence and ability the
+important question in hand. As it will form the basis of Congressional
+discussion and prove an important factor in shaping legislation, we give
+the letter space in our columns. Mr. Grinnell says:
+
+    To find a legitimate market for our surplus products is a
+    question of grave concern. After meeting home demands the
+    magnitude of foreign consumption determines in a large degree
+    the net profits of production. It thus becomes the especial
+    concern of the American agriculturist and statesman to find
+    the best market for meat products. The profits in
+    grain-raising for exportation, which impoverishes the soil,
+    are exceptional, while our animal industries enrich it,
+    augmenting the rural population in the line of true economy,
+    the promotion of good morals, and the independence and
+    elevation of the citizen. Under the laws of domestic animal
+    life gross farm products and rich, indigenous grasses are
+    condensed into values adapted to transportation across oceans
+    and to various climes with little waste or deterioration;
+    thus the brute a servant, becomes an auxiliary to the cunning
+    hand of his master, blending the factors which determine our
+    facilities for acquisition in rural life, and attractions
+    which stimulate enterprise, adventure, individual
+    independence, and contribute to National wealth.
+
+    THE MEAT PRODUCTS.
+
+    No nation has so large a relative portion of its wealth in
+    domestic animals, and none can show such strides in material
+    advancement during the present century. But what is our
+    foreign trade? The exports of provisions from the United
+    States during the last fiscal year were in value about
+    $107,000,000. Those in 1882 amounted to $120,000,000, equal
+    to a falling off in a single year of $13,000,000. Our exports
+    of manufactured articles for the last year aggregate
+    $211,000,000, against $103,000,000, a gain of $108,000,000 in
+    a single year. It was a reasonable expectation that our
+    animal exports would have increased in like ratio as the
+    manufactures, which would have enhanced the value of all
+    domestic animals and furnished, instead of a mortifying fact,
+    a proud exhibit.
+
+    The causes of a decline are not found in high prices at home
+    nor in inferior product; rather in suspicions of diseases,
+    and the clamor of interested parties which led to arbitrary
+    restrictions, oppressive quarantine regulations, and
+    forbidding beeves which were ripened for the highest markets
+    to pass beyond the shambles; and the egress of young immature
+    cattle on the English pastures. Pork products up to the
+    Chicago meeting were prohibited by France, and they are
+    inhibited now from Germany, our long-time valuable customer.
+    It was their whims, caprices, jealousies, commercial
+    restrictions and bans which decreased our exports and led the
+    Commissioner of Agriculture to call the Chicago meeting of
+    November.
+
+    The convention developed facts and was fruitful in results:
+    That there were solitary cases of pleuro-pneumonia, and
+    limited to the eastern border States; that Western herdsmen
+    had just cause of alarm on account of the shipment of young
+    stock West from the narrow pastures and dairy districts of
+    the East. It was shown that across the ocean there was a
+    morbid appetite for suspicions and facts which would justify
+    severe restrictions and an absolute inhibition of our
+    products.
+
+    The Cattle Commission formed by the Treasury Department gave
+    decided opinions and imparted valuable information, but they
+    were constrained to admit that they were powerless in an
+    emergency to stop the spread of contagious diseases, and that
+    it was a vain hope that there would be an increased foreign
+    demand for our cattle and meat without radical Congressional
+    enactment.
+
+    Skilled veterinarians, fancy breeders, political economists,
+    and savants from the East met the alarmed ranchmen,
+    enterprising breeders, and delegations and officials from
+    many agricultural and State associations, representing
+    millions of cattle and hundreds of millions of dollars,
+    resolved that a meeting should be held at Washington, and a
+    committee was appointed to secure appropriate legislation.
+
+    In the discharge of duties assigned to the Secretary I at
+    once repaired to Washington for consultation and to gather
+    pertinent facts. The heads of the State Treasury and
+    Agricultural Departments were awake to the necessity of early
+    and radical legislation. President Arthur evinced great
+    cordiality, and gave good proof of his interest by calling
+    attention in the annual message to the approaching meeting in
+    Washington, which I have called the 10th of January.
+
+    FACTS.
+
+    I have sent out in a circular to the committee the following
+    "head-land" facts of startling import, which should be well
+    considered:
+
+    1. That there is an investment of $1,008,000,000 in cattle as
+    estimated by the Department of Agriculture, representing
+    41,171,000 animals. That of swine is $291,000,000,
+    representing over 43,000,000 animals.
+
+    2. That losses annually on exportation of cattle and beef,
+    consequent upon restrictive regulations and the decreased
+    relative consumption of our beef, aggregates many millions of
+    dollars. We reach an approximate estimate by these facts
+    relative to our foreign trade as follows:
+
+    The exports of 1880-81 were 368,463 animals. Those of 1882-83
+    were 212,554--a loss of 155,009 animals, and in value a loss
+    of $11,506,000 in two years.
+
+    The exports of fresh beef for two years were less by
+    40,071,167 pounds, and by a value of $2,191,190. The value of
+    pork products decreased in the same time to the extent of
+    $35,679,093.
+
+    This shows a falling off of about $25,000,000 per annum for
+    two years, as compared with the receipts for the two
+    preceding years.
+
+    CONTAGION TO BE AVERTED.
+
+    It should be known that the pleuro-pneumonia often mentioned
+    as a scare or a myth by the thoughtless and optimist is a
+    stern reality. Its journeys and track of destruction among
+    cattle have been as marked as that of small pox and
+    cholera--contagious diseases which have so tearfully
+    decimated the human family. Lung diseases of the modern type
+    were known before the Christian era, and were considered by
+    Columella and other Latin writers. Australia resigned her
+    great herds to flocks of sheep, as did South Africa, never
+    yet recovered from the blow to her cattle industries.
+
+    England has been tardy in the publication of her losses by
+    lung-fever, yet it is a fact which forbids secrecy that
+    calamity has reached the enterprising breeders, and colossal
+    fortunes have been swept away by the cattle-plague. In our
+    own country it has been no more the policy of secretive
+    owners to publish facts than that of city authorities to
+    proclaim the prevalence of small-pox in the town. Still,
+    startling facts have sprung from original sources of inquiry.
+    A town meeting is called in the State of Connecticut,
+    terror-stricken owners in New Jersey, Maryland, and
+    Pennsylvania meet for council. Massachusetts had a Governor
+    twenty years ago bold in telling truth, which led to
+    searching investigations by experts and officers of the
+    State. With autocratic power they made a diagnosis of
+    diseases, which led to the stamping out of the infection by
+    law, and a truthful proclamation that the plague was stayed.
+
+    The sacrifice of 1,000 brutes at a cost to the Commonwealth
+    of about $70,000 was a trivial sum compared to the perils
+    that beset a State valuation of $7,000,000, for bovines, and
+    the cattle of the Nation, numbering 40,000,000, and worth
+    nearly $1,100,000,000.
+
+    The monarchies of the Old World have set us an example; even
+    Denmark, Norway, and Sweden have pioneered for the world by
+    sagacious acts and the stern enforcement of law in
+    prevention.
+
+    AN AMERICAN POLICY
+
+    worthy of us is not secrecy, but boldness--sacrifice
+    commensurate with exposure. This will lead to the formulation
+    of a bill by the Washington Convention, which Congress will
+    enact in the interest of individuals, the State, and for the
+    National protection. If State-Rights theorists bring
+    objections, the law may be so equitable to the States that
+    its ratification may be asked on the ground of a just
+    National policy and a right which inheres to the General
+    Government under the Constitution in the regulation of
+    commerce between the States. This implies a power to destroy
+    a contagious disease which if allowed to spread would arrest
+    all commerce in bovines between the States. A State may and
+    ought to waive the question of damage if it is fixed by a
+    neutral Commissioner, and the General Government and not the
+    State meets the losses to which unfortunate cattle owners
+    maybe subject. This will be the touchstone--trust by the
+    State and statesmanlike generosity by the Nation--that means
+    courage for the now fearful ranchman of the unfenced domain,
+    and the furnishing of a "clean bill of health" for our
+    products seeking a foreign market. Having evinced zeal in
+    doing justice, it can ask for justice--that the rights of our
+    meat-producers be respected under our
+
+    COMMERCIAL TREATIES.
+
+    Commerce means a mutual exchange, and having performed our
+    home duty will be in no mood to tolerate a whim or a caprice.
+    Non-intercourse has been proposed in Congress. That may be a
+    final resort when a conference, practical discussion, and
+    even arbitration have failed. A graver subject measured by
+    dollars may yet engage the statesman diplomat than the Geneva
+    arbitration, and we shall have no fair status in discussion
+    or arbitration until our meat and cattle are made healthy by
+    prevention and the best sanitary laws known to civilized
+    countries.
+
+    THE TIME IS AUSPICIOUS.
+
+    Cattle-raising as an attractive and profitable vocation is
+    now exciting a deep interest. A lull in politics forbids the
+    wants of our agriculturists, numbering 60 per cent of the
+    population, being waived out of notice and their voiced
+    demands drowned by partisan clamor. The treasury has hundreds
+    of millions in its vaults and a fraction of 1 per cent of our
+    surplus will only be required, under a just disbursement, to
+    isolate and destroy the diseases which fetter our commerce
+    and repress home enterprise.
+
+    A full and able convention at Washington is assured by the
+    responsive letters received. The State of Iowa will make her
+    requests to Congress by fine-stock meeting and other
+    associations, as becomes the State with $100,000,000 invested
+    in domestic animals.
+
+    Who can be indifferent in the face of our great perils, and
+    recounting the losses by foreign restrictions and inhibition?
+    We are emphatically a Nation of beef-eaters, and by the
+    extent of our domain and healthful climate are justly
+    entitled to the honored designation of the first producer
+    among civilized nations.
+
+    It is the question of healthful food for the masses, of
+    profitable tonnage for the railways, and of deep concern in
+    cultivating fraternal relations abroad, not less than a
+    question for the political economist in maintaining a good
+    trade balance-sheet. If we can impress our Congressional
+    delegations with the necessity of early and decisive
+    legislation, we shall have accomplished a noble work and have
+    earned the warm commendation of millions of citizens whose
+    interests have been neglected and whose vocation and property
+    have been imperiled.
+
+    For the committee by request of the Chicago Convention.
+
+    J.B. GRINNELL.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+During the first eleven months of 1883, no less than 411,992 animals in
+Great Britain were attacked by by foot-and-mouth disease. December
+opened with a greater number of ailing animals than did November.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+An Iowa farmer is experimenting with steamed clover hay for feeding
+hogs.
+
+
+
+
+PRICES OF 1883.
+
+
+The average price of Short-horns at the public sales in this country in
+1883, as reported by the auctioneers, was $205.56. The Breeder's Gazette
+figures up the number of cattle of the different breeds disposed of at
+public sales as follows:
+
+  Breeds.           | Number.    | Totals.     | Average.
+Short-horns         | 3,284      | $ 675,057   | $205.56
+Herefords           |   112      |    53,330   |  476.61
+Aberdeen-Angus      |   300      |   154,885   |  516.28
+Galloways           |   263      |   111,200   |  422.81
+Angus and Galloways |    44      |    16,865   |  383.13
+Holsteins           |   239      |    89,290   |  373.60
+Jerseys             | 1,688      |   690,405   |  409.01
+Guernseys           |    52      |    12,090   |  232.50
+Red Polled          |    15      |     4,435   |  295.70
+                    -------------------------------------
+    Totals          | 5,997      |$1,807,557   | $301.41
+
+Of the above Short-horns, 1,609 were sold in Illinois, 541 in Kentucky,
+and 1,134 in other States. In Illinois the average price received was
+$222.23; in Kentucky, $271.01, and in other States, $149.73. Of the beef
+breeds there were sold $4,018, the total receipts were $1,015,772,
+making the general average $253.80. Of the dairy breeds 1,979 were sold
+at an average of $400.10.
+
+It will be seen that the average for Short-horns is less than that for
+either of the other breeds though, of course, the number sold is greatly
+in excess of the others. In 1882 the average for Short-horns was but
+$192.10, and in 1881 but $158, so that on the whole the breeders are
+perfectly satisfied with the way the business is running.
+
+The dairy breeds did remarkably well in 1883, the Holsteins coming up
+well to the Jerseys, but the latter leads greatly in point of numbers.
+
+The pure bred cattle business of the country as indicated by these sales
+is exceedingly prosperous.
+
+In Great Britain the Short-horn sales were less numerous than last year,
+or, in fact, any year since 1869, but the average was better than since
+1879. In 1880 the average for 1,738 head was $225, while in 1881 and
+1882 the average further declined to $175. In 1883 the average was close
+upon $230, but, upon the other hand, the number of animals sold fell to
+1,400. The highest price paid was 1,505 guineas, for a four-year-old cow
+of the fashionable Duchess blood, which was purchased by the earl of
+Bective at the sale of Mr. Holford's herd in Dorsetshire. The
+Australians purchased largely at the Duke of Devonshire's annual sale in
+1878, and this year American and Canadian buyers bid briskly for animals
+of the Oxford blood. These were the only two sales at which the average
+reached three figures, the next best being that of a selection from Mr.
+Green's herd in Essex, when forty-one lots averaged $360 each, or less
+than half secured by the Duke of Devonshire's Short-horns.
+
+
+
+
+DOCKING HORSES.
+
+
+An English veterinary society has lately been discussing the question of
+docking the tails of horses. The President looked upon docking as an act
+of cruelty. By docking, the number of accidents from the horse holding
+the rein under the tail was greatly increased, for the horse has less
+power of free motion over the tail. If a short dock is put over the
+rein, the animal has so little control of the tail that he can not
+readily liberate the rein. The "stump" is sensitive, the same as the
+remaining part of an amputated finger. In the majority of cases he
+considered docking entirely unnecessary.
+
+On the contrary, Doctor Axe (rather a suggestive name for an advocate of
+docking) thought the practice improved the looks of a horse, thus
+rendering it more salable. His sentimentality did not allow him to argue
+this question of increased value. He did not think docking increased
+accidents. Statistics, not assertions, were needed to establish facts of
+this kind. As to the remark of the President, that the shortened tail
+could not be so easily freed from the rein, he said it would depend on
+who was driving; an expert would more quickly disengage the rein from a
+docked tail. It may be true, he said, that there was more flexibility in
+an uncut tail because its more flexible portion had not been removed;
+but the docked tail had not the same power of covering and fixing down
+the rein that the long tail possessed. The long retention of a certain
+degree of sensibility after amputation was a known fact, but neither
+this, nor the operation itself, involved much pain. He detailed the
+structures divided, and said that they possessed a low degree of
+sensation. He would be glad to see horses have the free use of all their
+members, if practicable, and would leave them their tails if the removal
+of them could not increase the animal's comfort, value, or power of
+being safely used, but he would not do anything to lessen the value of
+horses without good reason.
+
+It seems that prosecutions for docking, under
+the cruelty to[***]
+common in England [***]
+convictions are not [***]
+in the discussion [***]
+vigorous prosecutions are [***]
+
+We notice that with [***]
+and docking are on the increase [***]
+of this country. Fortunately [***]
+beasts, public sentiment in this [***]
+against the barbarous act; still [***]
+is it that fashion has not yet so [***]
+the taste of the majority of people [***]
+convince them that docking adds to [***]
+beauty of the noble animal. But the rage is now to imitate the English
+in nearly all manners and customs, and it may not be long before the
+miserable fashion will gain new headway with us.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Too much care can hardly be taken in packing pork so as to have it keep
+through the season. The chief requisites are pure salt and freeing the
+meat from every taint of blood. The pieces of pork should be packed as
+closely as possible. After a few weeks if any scum rises on the surface
+of the brine it should be cleaned out and the brine boiled so that all
+impurities may be removed. If pork is to be kept all summer twice
+boiling the brine may be necessary. For some reason a barrel that has
+once held beef will never do for a pork barrel, though the rule may be
+reversed with impunity.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+One of the firm of Galbraith Brothers Janesville, Wis., is now in
+Scotland to make selection for an early spring importation of
+Clydesdales. While making mention of this we may say that Messrs.
+Galbraith though disposing of twenty-one head of Clydesdales at the late
+sale in Chicago, have yet on hand an ample supply of superior horses of
+all ages from sucklings upward. They will be pleased to receive a visit
+from intending purchasers of this class of stock, and from all
+interested in the breed.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The first lot of Dr. W.A. Pratt's Holsteins, from quarantine, recently
+arrived at Elgin. The Doctor informs us that the animals are in prime
+condition and choice in every respect. He says he is preparing to open a
+ranch near Manhattan, Kansas, for the breeding of high grade Holsteins
+and Short-horns. He will also keep on this ranch a choice herd of
+pure-bred Holsteins for supplying the growing Western demand for this
+very popular dairy stock.
+
+
+
+
+PUBLICATIONS.
+
+
+_The Free Seed Distribution alone of the Rural New Yorker is worth at
+catalogue prices more than $3.00. This journal and the Rural, including
+its Seed Distribution, will be sent for $3.00. For free specimen copies,
+apply to 34 Park Row, New York. The Rural New-Yorker is the Leading
+National Journal of Agriculture and Horticulture._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+_The Rural New-Yorker has over 600 contributors, among them the most
+distinguished writers of America and England. It is the complete Journal
+for the country home and for many city homes as well. Free specimen
+copies 34 Park Row, N.Y._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE RURAL NEW-YORKER
+
+The great national farm and garden journal of America, with its
+Celebrated Free Seed Distribution, and
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+one year, post-paid, all for only $3.00. It is a rare chance. Specimen
+copies cheerfully sent gratis. Compare them with other rural weeklies,
+and then subscribe for the best. Apply to
+
+34 PARK ROW, NEW YORK.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+THE DAIRY.
+
+Dairymen, Write for Your Paper.
+
+
+LESSONS IN FINANCE FOR THE CREAMERY PATRON.[A]
+
+
+Any business to be permanent must make reasonable returns for the
+capital employed and give fair compensation for the labor bestowed upon
+it, otherwise it will be abandoned, or if continued at all it will be
+done under the protest of economic law. In addition to the ordinary
+circumstances attaching to business enterprise, the creamery business is
+essentially and peculiarly co-operative. It thrives with the thrift of
+all concerned--owner and patrons. It fails only with loss to all. The
+conditions of success, therefore, to the patrons are included in the
+conditions of success to the creamery, and vice versa.
+
+The object of this paper is to suggest some of these conditions and some
+of the instances of violation of them.
+
+It is hardly necessary to discuss the case in which peculiarity of soil
+or climate, the greater profitableness of some other kind of industry,
+or other reason, would so restrict the size and number of dairy herds as
+to make the locality a barren dairy region. Notwithstanding the splendid
+achievements of the dairy industry it is safe to say that it may not be
+profitable in any and every locality. Given the soil, the climate, the
+water, the people intelligent and disposed toward the exacting duties of
+this business, there are still many questions to be considered and many
+mistakes to be avoided.
+
+It has been a pet idea in this country that competition is the
+corrective of all industrial evils. Competition without doubt holds an
+important place among the industrial forces, but may be carried so far
+as to defeat the very objects it is adapted to subserve, when
+intelligently encouraged. Carried to the extent of employing two persons
+or more to do the work of one, of absorbing capital without the full
+employment of it, it becomes destructive and expensive. We find, for
+instance, in many towns, a large number of commercial establishments
+doing business at an immense profit on single transactions, but the
+transactions are so few and so divided up among struggling competitors,
+that neither secures a profitable, nor even a respectable, business.
+With choice cuts of meat from twelve to eighteen cents a pound and
+butcher's stock at three and four cents, we often see butcher shops
+multiply, but the price of meat usually remains the same. Indeed, the
+very increase of middle man establishments beyond the employment of
+these to their full capacity, and the consequent full utilization of the
+capital and labor employed, is a sure loss to somebody, and if it does
+not all go to the producer it is almost always shared by him.
+
+One of the greatest burdens which the creamery business has to carry
+to-day is the excessive number of its creameries beyond legitimate
+demands. The co-operative idea, so far as it enters into this business,
+implies the most profitable use possible of the resources employed in it
+both of patron and creamery owner, and a fair and equitable distribution
+of the profits. Said a large creamery owner to me recently, "I find
+the comparative value of my butter steadily decreasing from year to
+year. I have the same territory, the same butter-makers, the same
+patrons, substantially, but my butter is not up in quality and price as
+it used to be. I ascribe it to the excessive competition prevailing in
+it, i.e., it is one of its results. I have lost my influence over
+patrons in securing the best quality of cream. If I make any criticism
+of their modes or practices they say to me, 'Mr. ----, if you do not
+want my cream I will let the other creamery have it. Do just as you like
+about it; take it or leave it.'" But the loss of one or two cents a
+pound on the net proceeds of a season means five or ten per cent of its
+value, or of the entire season's results enough difference to make any
+community in a few years rich or poor, thrifty or unthrifty, according
+to the circumstances in the case.
+
+Further: the idea of co-operation implies the doing of equal and exact
+justice to all included within the co-operative limits. This, an
+excessive and unprincipled competition greatly interferes with. It can
+properly be demanded by every fair and honest patron of a creamery that
+every other patron should be as fair and honest as himself. Indeed, this
+is an essential part of the implied contract. But in the case of
+excessive competition no restraints can be imposed and no penalties can
+be made to follow attempts to violate the principles of equity, except
+the possible inconvenience of changing from one creamery to another. The
+straight and honorable patron is powerless; the owner of the creamery is
+powerless; and the co-operative element is rendered a nullity.
+
+Further: the co-operative element, in the relations of creamery and
+patrons, requires that the price of milk or cream shall vary with the
+market price of the finished product. Contracts for the future are mere
+speculation, as a rule. If the transaction is large and the turn of the
+market unfavorable to the creamery, ruin is liable to come to the
+business, and loss and disaster follow to all concerned. If the turn of
+the market should be the other way, among the numerous patrons there is
+sure to be more or less dissatisfaction and a more or less breaking up
+of the condition of friendly reciprocity which should exist between
+creamery and patron. Patrons may damage their own interest by exacting
+too much from the creamery as well as by accepting too little, and a
+greedy grasping after an unreasonable share of the profit on the part of
+the creamery owner is sure to bring retaliation, disturb cordiality of
+feeling, and bring loss to all concerned.
+
+The remedy for most of these evils can only come from intelligent and
+wise action on the part of the creamery patrons of a given locality.
+They should study to prevent an unseemly and expensive competition.
+They, as the encouraging source, will surely in the end pay the expense
+of it. It has been said that no people in the world enjoy paying taxes
+like Americans, provided they are only indirect, sugar coated, and with
+some plausible pretense. It would seem, however, that even American
+dairymen could see that the maintenance of superfluous creameries,
+superfluous teams for hauling cream and milk, superfluous men for
+manufacturing and handling the product is an extra expense of which they
+will surely bear their full share; if not at once, they will do so
+before the outcome is reached.
+
+Another thing the patrons of creameries may properly take note of is
+that the expense of manufacturing butter in all well regulated
+creameries is nearly the same, and the value of the product does not
+widely differ. When a creamery therefore claims large and peculiar
+advantages, and offers a price for milk or cream markedly above the
+ordinary price paid for it by other creameries, you may be sure there is
+something illegitimate about it. It may be done to drum up business, to
+beat a rival, or it may be a downright swindle, it surely will not be
+lasting, and the operator intends at some time to recoup for himself.
+
+It is to be remembered that the dairy business is not one which can be
+taken up and laid down hastily without greater or less inconvenience,
+expense, and loss. Like most other branches of agriculture, it must be
+engaged in with the purpose of a steady, long, strong pull in order to
+be a success. It has the advantage of springing directly from the earth
+without fictitious help, props, or governmental protection, so-called.
+It taxes no other industry for its own benefit, and has expanded to its
+present magnificent proportions in spite of the burdens laid upon it
+from outside sources.
+
+But it is written "And Satan came also." Nothing could more aptly
+describe the full influence of adulteration which has come upon this
+industry. It has come clothed in deceit and fraud, the very habiliments
+of the devil. It can be exterminated no more than sin itself. It must be
+fought by exposing its nature; by stamping upon it its own features.
+Wise legislation, I believe, will be in the direction of Government
+inspection and the sure and prompt punishment of fraud. The interest of
+the creamery patron is more deeply involved in this matter than that of
+any other class, just as in other branches of production the perils and
+losses by fraud, deterioration, and adulteration ultimately fall back
+upon the producer of the raw product. The apathy now existing among the
+producers of milk and cream is ominous of evil, and discouraging to
+those who are working in the interest of unadulterated goods. We have no
+doubt that the time will come when not only the adulteration of butter,
+but the adulteration of other food products as well, will only be
+carried on under the stamp and inspection of Government supervision.
+
+The thoughts I have presented are intended to be suggestive rather than
+dogmatic, and I leave the subject with the hope that the intelligence of
+the average dairyman may be as active in tracing and comprehending the
+subtler principles of trade and commerce relating to the products of his
+labor as he is in comprehending the more immediate facts of his calling,
+such as breeding, seeding, and the handling of the raw products of his
+herd.
+
+[A] Paper read before the Illinois Dairymen's Convention by C.C. Buell,
+of Rock Falls.
+
+
+
+
+VETERINARY.
+
+
+FEVER.
+
+
+Many kinds of horse fevers have been described by antiquated veterinary
+writers; but most exist only in the imagination of the writers, or have
+been manufactured out of the mistaken analysis of human fevers. All the
+real fevers of the horse may be comprised in two,--the idiopathic, pure
+or simple fever, constituting of itself an entire disease, and the
+symptomatic fever, occasioned by inflammatory action in some particular
+part of the body, and constituting rather the attendant of a disease
+than the disease itself.
+
+Though idiopathic fever is comparatively infrequent in occurrence, it
+unquestionably meets the attention of most persons who have extensive
+stable management of horses, and its general tendency to degenerate into
+local inflammation and symptomatic fever, seems to arise far less from
+its own nature than from foul air, vicissitudes of temperature, and
+general bad management. If idiopathic fever is not easily reduced, the
+blood accumulates in the lungs, the viscera, or some other internal part
+of the body, and provokes inflammation; or, if a horse, while suffering
+under this fever, be kept in a foul or ill-ventilated stable, or be
+exposed to alternations of heat and cold, he speedily becomes locally
+inflamed from the action of the filth or exposure. The symptoms of
+idiopathic fever are shivering, loss of appetite, dejected appearance,
+quick pulse, hot mouth, and some degree of debility; generally, also,
+costiveness and scantiness of urine; sometimes, likewise, quickness of
+breathing, and such pains of the bowels as accompany colic. Idiopathic
+fever, if it does not pass into inflammation, never kills, but is
+generally always curable.
+
+Cattle are subject to both idiopathic and symptomatic fever, very nearly
+in the same manner as the horse, and require, when suffering them, to be
+very similarly treated. The idiopathic fever of cattle has, in many
+instances, an intermitting character, which may easily be subdued by
+means of ordinary care; and, in other instances, has a steady and
+unintermitting character, and is exceedingly liable to resolve itself
+into pleurisy, enteritis, or some other inflammatory disease. The
+symptomatic fever of cattle is strictly parallel to the symptomatic
+fever of horses, and is determined by the particular seat and nature of
+the exciting inflammation. But besides these fevers, cattle are subject
+to two very destructive and quite distinct kinds of fever, both of an
+epizootic nature, the one of a virulent and the other of a chronic
+character,--the former inflammatory and the latter typhoid. Numerous
+modifications of these fevers, or particular phases of them, are more or
+less extensively known among our readers as black-leg, bloody murrain,
+etc. The fever which in many instances follows parturition, particularly
+in the cow, is familiarly known as calving fever, or milk fever; and the
+ordinary fevers of sheep, swine, dogs, upon the whole, follow the same
+general law as the ordinary fevers of the horse, and are classifiable
+into idiopathic and symptomatic.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MISCELLANEOUS.
+
+
+[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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+AGENTS WANTED EVERYWHERE to sell the best FAMILY KNITTING MACHINE ever
+invented. Will knit a pair of stockings with HEEL and TOE COMPLETE,
+in 20 minutes. It will also knit a great variety of fancy-work for which
+there is always a ready market. Send for circular and terms to the
+TWOMBLY KNITTING MACHINE CO., 163 Tremont Street, Boston, Mass.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+500 VIRGINIA FARMS & MILLS
+
+FOR SALE AND EXCHANGE. Write for free REAL ESTATE JOURNAL.
+
+R.B. CHAFFIN & CO., Richmond, Virginia.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE BIGGEST THING OUT.
+
+ILLUSTRATED BOOK SENT FREE.
+
+(NEW) E. NASON, & CO., 120 Fulton St., New York.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+A MYSTERY OF THE SEA.
+
+THE FATE WHICH OVERTOOK THE "CITY OF BOSTON."--CAPTAIN MURRAY'S IDEAS
+AND EXPERIENCES.
+
+
+A few years ago, the City of Boston sailed from harbor, crowded with an
+expectant throng of passengers bound for a foreign shore.
+
+She never entered port.
+
+The mystery of her untimely end grows deeper as the years increase, and
+the Atlantic voyager, when the fierce winds howl around and danger is
+imminent on every hand, shudders as the name and mysterious fate of that
+magnificent vessel are alluded to.
+
+Our reporter, on a recent visit to New York, took lunch with Captain
+George Siddons Murray, on board the Alaska, of the Guion line. Captain
+Murray is a man of stalwart built, well-knit frame and cheery, genial
+disposition. He has been a constant voyager for a quarter of a century,
+over half of that time having been in the trans-Atlantic service. In the
+course of the conversation over the well-spread table, the mystery of
+the City of Boston was alluded to.
+
+"Yes," remarked the Captain, "I shall never forget the last night we saw
+that ill-fated vessel. I was chief officer of the City of Antwerp. On
+the day we sighted the City of Boston a furious southeast hurricane set
+in. Both vessels labored hard. The sea seemed determined to sweep away
+every vestige of life. When day ended the gale did not abate, and
+everything was lashed for a night of unusual fury. Our good ship was
+turned to the south to avoid the possibility of icebergs. The City of
+Boston, however, undoubtedly went to the north. Her boats,
+life-preservers and rafts were all securely lashed; and when she went
+down, everything went with her, never to re-appear until the sea gives
+up its dead."
+
+"What, in your opinion, Captain, was the cause of the loss of the City
+of Boston?"
+
+"The City of Limerick, in almost precisely the same latitude, a few days
+later, found the sea full of floating ice; and I have no doubt the City
+of Boston collided with the ice, and sunk immediately."
+
+Captain Murray has been in command of the Alaska ever since she was put
+in commission and feels justly proud of his noble ship. She carries
+thousands of passengers every year, and has greatly popularized the
+Williams & Guion line. Remarking upon the bronzed and healthy appearance
+of the Captain, the reporter said that sea life did not seem to be a
+very great physical trial.
+
+"No? But a person's appearance is not always a trustworthy indication of
+his physical condition. For seven years I have been in many respects
+very much out of sorts with myself. At certain times I was so lame that
+it was difficult for me to move around. I could scarcely straighten up.
+I did not know what the trouble was, and though I performed all my
+duties regularly and satisfactorily, yet I felt that I might some day be
+overtaken with some serious prostrating disorder. These troubles
+increased. I felt dull and then, again, shooting pains through my arms
+and limbs. Possibly the next day I would feel flushed and unaccountably
+uneasy and the day following chilly and despondent. This continued until
+last December, when I was prostrated soon after leaving Queenstown, and
+for the remainder of the voyage was a helpless, pitiful sufferer. In
+January last, a friend who made that voyage with me, wrote me a letter
+urging me to try a new course of treatment. I gladly accepted his
+counsel, and for the last seven months have given thorough and
+business-like attention to the recovery of my natural health; and to-day
+I have the proud satisfaction of saying to you that the lame back, the
+strange feeling, the sciatic rheumatism which have so long pursued me,
+have entirely disappeared through the blood purifying influence of
+Warner's Safe Rheumatic Cure which entirely eradicated all rheumatic
+poison from my system. Indeed, to me, it seems that it has worked
+wonders, and I therefore most cordially commend it."
+
+"And you have no trouble now in exposing yourself to the winds of the
+Atlantic?"
+
+"Not the least. I am as sound as a bullet and I feel specially thankful
+over the fact because I believe rheumatic and kidney disease is in the
+blood of my family. I was dreadfully shocked on my last arrival in
+Liverpool to learn that my brother, who is a wealthy China tea merchant,
+had suddenly died of Bright's disease of the kidneys, and consider
+myself extremely fortunate in having taken my trouble in time and before
+any more serious effects were possible."
+
+The conversation drifted to other topics, and as the writer watched the
+face before him, so strong in all its outlines, and yet so genial, and
+thought of the innumerable exposures and hardships to which its owner
+had been exposed, he instinctively wished all Rheumatic Cure which
+entirely eradicated who are suffering from the terrible rheumatic
+troubles now so common might know of Captain Murray's experience and the
+means by which he had been restored. Pain is a common thing in this
+world, but far too many endure it when they might just as well avoid it.
+It is a false philosophy which teaches us to endure when we can just as
+readily avoid. So thought the hearty captain of the Alaska, so thinks
+the writer, and so should all others think who desire happiness and a
+long life.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+AND
+
+YOUTH'S COMPANION
+
+ONE YEAR, $3 FOR THE TWO.
+
+It is not required that both papers be sent to one address, nor to the
+same post-office.
+
+
+  Address PRAIRIE FARMER PUB. CO.,
+  150 Monroe Street, Chicago.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+HORTICULTURAL
+
+Horticulturists, Write for Your Paper.
+
+
+ILLINOIS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY.
+
+The ad-interim committee of the Illinois State Horticultural Society for
+the northern part of the State reported through Mr. O.W. Barnard and
+Arthur Bryant, Jr. Mr. Barnard had found the orchards thrifty and
+healthy. The yield of apples had not been large this season, but
+orchardists generally felt encouraged in regard to the future of their
+orchards. He had found the high clay soils preferable for the apple. Mr.
+Bryant reported the apple crop small. Some orchards had borne good
+crops, especially of the Ben Davis. In others, this variety had failed.
+
+
+ORCHARD CULTURE.
+
+Mr. W.T. Nelson, of the committee on orchard culture, recommended the
+planting of orchards on high, sloping ground. In the rather low and
+level country in which he lived (Will county) orchard trees lasted but
+fifteen or twenty years. But few varieties seem to do well in any
+locality. He would advise men about to set out orchards to ascertain
+what varieties do well in their particular locality, and then plant no
+others. He would not prune young orchards. He recommended the tiling of
+orchards.
+
+
+HIGH OR LOW, LAND.
+
+Mr. Nelson's report opened up the subject of high or low lands for
+orchards. Mr. Robinson got more apples from trees on low lands than from
+elevated sites. Prof. Budd did not commit himself to either theory, but
+remarked that some varieties do best on low lands, while others
+preferred the higher situations. Parker Earle thought that this theory
+of low lands for our apple orchards was contrary to the past teachings
+of the society. In his opinion high grounds are preferable. The subject
+was a complicated one for Prof. Burrill. He had seen many low ground
+orchards that bore good crops this year. There are many modifications
+that effect the crop. It is not merely the elevation of orchard sites.
+It was his belief that high ground, all things considered, is the best.
+Mr. Robinson was not enthusiastic about the tile drainage of orchards.
+Our trees need more water than they usually get. They do not suffer from
+too much water, but from dry summers and rolling land. Mr. Spalding, of
+Sangamon county, had found his nursery trees poorest when planted on a
+depressed surface. He tiled extensively. His subsoil was a clay loam.
+Nine years ago he laid tile 3-1/2 feet deep and 30 feet apart. He did
+not believe in manuring young trees. Too rapid growth is not wanted.
+Trees in Illinois grow as much in one year as they do in two years in
+the State of New York, where they raise more fruit than we do. The most
+rapid growing trees are the tenderest. He does not force the growth of
+his orchard trees. He is satisfied nurserymen have manured their young
+stock too much. The question of high or low land was not settled. It was
+hard for members to give up the old theory that high lands are best for
+orchards in Illinois; but it may be set down as a fact that the matter,
+as first brought to public discussion through THE PRAIRIE
+FARMER by B.F. Johnson, Esq., of Champaign, is having wide
+discussion among our fruit men. It will result in close future
+observation and closer scrutiny of past results. Without doubt this is
+the leading new horticultural question of the day. It requires a careful
+collection of facts and a broad generalization. The theories and
+teachings of the past are nothing if facts are opposed to them.
+
+
+FRUIT GROWERS AND FRUIT SELLERS.
+
+Mr. Ragan, of Indiana, read a suggestive paper upon the relation of the
+fruit-grower to the commission man and the transportation companies. The
+paper led to considerable discussion. Mr. Earle always sells his fruit
+through a commission house. Without the commission men market-fruit
+growers could not do business. He found no difficulty in getting
+honorable men to do business with. When he got a good man he stuck to
+him. The commission man is just as important a factor in the fruit
+business as the grower or consumer. He believes in a liberal percentage
+for commissions. Dealers can not do an honest business for nothing. He
+is willing to pay ten per cent to the man who sells his fruit to the
+best possible advantage, and who makes prompt and honest returns. The
+cheap commission man is to be avoided. The proper handling of fruit by
+intelligent dealers at fair rates is what we want. He ships small fruits
+in full quart boxes. Uses new boxes every time. Wants no returned
+crates. To get best returns we must have neat packages. Stained drawers,
+baskets, old barrels, and the like do not help to sell fruit. He would
+advise shipping black and red raspberries in pint boxes; blackberries
+and strawberries in quart boxes. He picks his berry plantations every
+day during the ripening season. Sundays not excepted. No man who is not
+prepared to work seven days in the week during the picking season, or
+who can not get help to do the same, will succeed in the raising and
+marketing of small fruits. He has this year paid two cents per quart for
+picking blackberries and strawberries, and the same for pints of
+raspberries. It requires from five to ten pickers to the acre. He likes
+women or grown-up girls to do this work. As to varieties he likes
+Longfellow and Sharpless. They ripen slowly and everyday picking is not
+so necessary. Mr. Pearson said the apple growers in his locality find
+that judgment must be used in marketing apples. The Lord made little
+apples and we must do the best we can with them. A neighbor had small
+apples and the shippers grumbled at them. The neighbor would not stand
+this and shipped his apples to Chicago and had them sold on their
+merits. The result was satisfactory. An Iowa buyer came down there and
+offered 50 cents per bushel for apples without regard to size, etc., and
+he got them and shipped them in boxes to Muscatine where they were made
+into jelly, dried fruit, etc. We can have no cast iron rules in regard
+to marketing, but must be governed by circumstances. This year it was
+better for his people to sell as they come, without the trouble of hand
+picking, sorting, and careful packing. We must act like intelligent men
+in this business as in all others. Circumstances alter cases. Good
+common sense is a prime requisite. Mr. Miller agreed with Mr. Earle
+about packages for marketing fruit. He uses white wood boxes from
+Michigan.
+
+
+MULCHING AND MANURING.
+
+Mr. Earle was questioned about the use of castor bean pomace for
+strawberries. He uses it mixed with wood ashes. It is capital on poor
+land. He likes unleached ashes in both strawberry and orchard culture.
+He pays six cents per bushel for them. The castor bean pomace is good
+for anything in the poor soils of Southern Illinois. He uses about half
+a ton to the acre. Spreads with a Kemp spreader. Five hundred pounds per
+acre will show excellent results. Has tried a tablespoonful of the
+mixture to the strawberry plant when setting out. Has tried salt to kill
+grubs in asparagus beds, but found it to kill the weeds and most of the
+asparagus, while the grubs seemed to enjoy the application. Did not find
+it of much value as a manure. Bone dust had shown no particular results.
+Superphosphates acted much like the bean pomace. Does not think coal
+ashes of much value. He uses the pomace as early in the spring as
+possible. Sometimes he plows it under and sometimes applies after the
+plants are set, and cultivates it in. One application answers for two
+years' cropping. He fruits a strawberry plantation but two years, and he
+sometimes thinks one year sufficient. He does not agree with some of his
+neighbors that mulching has resulted unfavorably. Does not think the
+mulch has increased the noxious insects. Knows of a plantation not
+mulched at all, that suffered more than any other this year from the
+tarnished plant bug.
+
+
+CENTRAL DISTRICTS.
+
+Mr. Vickroy reported for Central Illinois. In August of the present year
+he visited the orchards in the vicinity of Champaign, among them the
+noted Hall fruit farm, near Savoy. He found the orchards in fair
+condition. Many were sheltered by belts of trees. He observed that in
+the lower or bottom land he found in connection with drainage, the best
+orchards and the healthiest trees, and that on the more rolling or
+higher grounds the trees were not as hardy nor did not bear as well. His
+observations led him to believe in the draining of orchards, although it
+was opposed to his previous education and of the teachings he had
+received in this society. He regarded the experimental orchard which he
+visited at Champaign a failure, for the very reason that it was on too
+high ground; that the trees were dying, and many were not bearing. There
+were, however, some varieties that showed good fruit. In his visit
+referred to, he found the following varieties of apples did well in this
+latitude:
+
+Fall Varieties--First, Snow; second, Standard; third, Maiden Blush;
+fourth, Colvert; fifth, Baker Sweet; sixth, Pound Sweet; seventh, Fall
+Romanite.
+
+Winter Varieties--First, Minkler; second, Rawles' Genet; third, Willow
+Twig; fourth, Little Romanite; fifth, English Russet; sixth, Ben Davis;
+seventh, Michael Henry Pippin; eighth, Jonathan; ninth, Gravenstein;
+tenth, Rome Beauty.
+
+In varieties in pears he gave the Howell and the Bartlett. In grapes he
+recommended the Martha in white grapes.
+
+
+GRAPES.
+
+Mr. E.A. Riehl, of Alton, read a very exhaustive and complete report on
+grapes and grape culture, including the so-called grape rot. The
+suggested remedies were bagging and training vines up on elevated wires,
+so the sun and air could get freely to the fruit. This point was
+combated by Dr. Shroeder. Grapes ripen best in the shade. Another
+gentleman suggested that with the wire system as suggested by Mr. Riehl,
+the grapes are shaded by the foliage in all the hottest part of the day.
+
+
+INSECTS.
+
+Prof. Forbes gave a learned and scientific dissertation on contagious
+diseases of insects, and a number of germinal diseases, and experimental
+and successful attempts to kill them. The Professor showed that nausea
+is contagious and may be transferred by diseased worms, and that
+therefore the spread of disease in worms would considerably lessen the
+danger to plants and fruits from their inroads. These facts, said the
+Professor, give us reason to hope that we have discovered another means
+of defense from destructive insects.
+
+Mr. Earle will try pyrethrum next season for the tarnished bug. Prof.
+Budd gave a brief sketch of latest methods of killing off noxious
+insects as followed by J.N. Dixon, of the State of Iowa, one of the
+greatest fruit farmers in that State or in the Northwest. He destroys
+the insect by sprinkling the trees with water diluted with arsenic,
+using one pound of white arsenic to 200 gallons of water. This has
+proven a great success and is not at all expensive. Some members
+objected to the use of arsenic on account of its poisonous properties.
+London-purple or Paris-green were recommended by some. Some members did
+not like to have hogs running in their orchards; others found them a
+benefit if but few were permitted. They did a good work. If the orchard
+is overstocked with them they do harm. They root about the trees and rub
+against them. It is not an uncommon thing for them to kill the trees in
+the course of a couple of years.
+
+
+FRUIT COMMITTEES.
+
+Dr. Schroeder, member of the committee on pear culture, made no formal
+report, but in brief remarks urged the general planting and raising of
+the kind of fruit as being profitable and productive. Mr. Samuel
+Edwards, of Mendota, chairman of committee on currants, read a very
+interesting report on currants and gooseberries, in which it appeared
+that the cultivation of this fruit was neglected and was on the decline.
+Dr. A.L. Small, of Kankakee, made a report on plums, in which he
+recommended the general planting of this fruit, he making a specialty of
+plum trees, and regarded the plum as a fruit that was coming more in
+demand and popular, and one that readily adapts itself to the many kinds
+of climates and soils.
+
+Mr. Weir also read a paper on plums and plum culture. He recommended the
+Chickasaw because it is hardy and not liable to have its blossoms
+injured by a late spring, like many fruits. He named the Newman and Wild
+Goose among other so-called seedlings that were very good. He expressed
+the opinion that there was but one distinct species of plum in the
+United States.
+
+
+FLORICULTURE.
+
+Mrs. Mary J. Barnard, of Manteno, from the committee on floriculture,
+strongly urged the cultivation of house-plants, not only as beautifiers,
+but to give the most pleasant occupation to every lady of the family.
+She referred to the earlier flowers of summer especially--the crocus,
+snow-drop, lily of the valley, tulips. Next to these came the annuals;
+with little trouble these could be had for months. The wild flowers of
+the prairies were spoken of, and she suggested that we should obtain
+seed of the flowers and raise such as we wish. The paper was a good one
+and was well received. Mr. Baller, a florist of Bloomington, said that
+of late the demand for plants had fallen off. The reason given was that
+there was an increased general knowledge among the people. At the
+present, the chief demands are for hot-house, cut flowers, and
+monthlies. The reason given for the falling off of the demand for plants
+was the fact that plants were more easily raised since the introduction
+of base-burners. This, he thought, could be still further increased by
+having a double sash, and the building of bay windows on the south and
+east of the houses. He reported, however, that there was still a good
+market for hot-house flowers among the rich for decorating purposes,
+funerals, etc.
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER will, from time to time, consider other
+papers and discussions at this meeting, for there was much more of
+interest said and done than can be condensed into a simple running
+report. We advise farmers to send one dollar to the Secretary and
+receive therefor a copy of the Transactions when issued.
+
+
+
+
+A SHORT SERMON ON A LONG TEXT.
+
+
+The text will be found in Leviticus 16: 21-22-23; but whether its
+application can be found is uncertain. Horticulturists are prone to find
+scape-goats to carry their sins of omission and commission; and they
+load these--a great burden--upon them, and send them off to be lost in
+the wilderness. Providence is most usually chosen by them for this
+purpose. Most of their mistakes and failures--sins, let us call
+them--are ascribed to Providence; and He is expected to carry the
+burden. But I strongly urge they remain our own after all.
+
+I am led to these conclusions by the fact that among the many failures
+in fruit culture there are some splendid successes; and that these
+successes occur with those, as a rule, who are guiltless of these sins;
+and that just in proportion to the magnitude of the guilt is the success
+insured. In other words--that almost invariably are our failures to be
+attributed to our own want of skill and our neglect--most generally the
+latter. Here and there we note cases of marked success--of heavy crops
+and large returns for care and labor invested. These are mostly on a
+small scale; as for instance, one man produces from at the rate of 200
+to 300 bushels of strawberries per acre, on a few rods of ground.
+Another, his neighbor, gets about as many quarts. The conditions of soil
+and climate are about the same. Now is Providence to be charged with
+this disparity? Certainly not. The same care, the same intelligent
+management, and the same amount of labor bestowed, would have produced
+as favorable results in the one case as in the other.
+
+And so, as to larger tracts. I hold that what my neighbor can do on a
+dozen square rods, he and I both ought to be equally able to do on five
+or ten, or twenty times as large a tract. But, you say, these large
+yields are the results of extraordinary care. True, they are; and that
+proves my theory--that extraordinary care will produce extraordinary
+results. What one man can do once, he can do again and all the time; and
+we all can do the same. Extraordinary care may be defined as the care
+necessary to produce good results, and if that care were always applied
+it would cease to be extraordinary.
+
+I myself saw in my neighbor's field a crop of strawberries, on two rows,
+which at the safest and closest calculation I could make, yielded at the
+rate of over 300 bushels per acre. He had but the two rows; had given
+them extraordinary care--had kept them clear of grass and weeds--and the
+ground mellow--and had mulched them with forest leaves. Those two rows
+were in a field of several acres in size. The same care in planting, in
+cultivating, in mulching, and the whole tract would have produced
+corresponding results. That same year, my crop, on soil equally as good,
+reached a yield of less than one-fifth in amount. Why this difference?
+Providence favored him and didn't favor me, I might say, if I felt
+disposed to make a scape-goat of Providence for my misdeeds. But I do
+not believe that Providence did anything of the sort. The fault was my
+own; and I have no right to attempt to shift the responsibility. And it
+was not want of knowledge either. We, none of us, do as well as we know
+how. Our failures are mostly the results of sheer neglect. Mistakes, we
+incline to call them. Let us call them sins, and repent of them; and not
+endeavor to do as Aaron did, pack them off into the wilderness. When we
+bring ourselves to thus correct our mistakes, our crops will be
+increased threefold, and Providence will no longer be made a scape-goat
+for us.
+
+T.G.
+
+
+
+
+PRUNINGS.
+
+
+The strawberry was introduced into England from Flanders in 1530.
+
+Gardeners in London, England, are always ready to buy toads. The regular
+market price for them ranges from $15 to $25 per hundred.
+
+Soap-suds are a valuable fertilizer for all forms of vegetation;
+especially serviceable for small fruits, and in the fruit garden proper
+will never be wasted.
+
+An Italian claims to have discovered that by drenching the foliage of
+grapevines with a solution of soda the filaments of the mildew fungus
+will be shriveled, while the leaves will remain uninjured. A Wisconsin
+nurseryman, however, advises the use of flowers of sulphur, which he
+believes a good remedy, also, when applied to the vines and when added
+to the soil surrounding them.
+
+A correspondent of the Germantown Telegraph says that he has found salt
+a valuable remedy for rust on blackberry vines, and concludes: "I have
+applied two or three handfuls on the surface of the ground, immediately
+over the roots, when the plants were badly rusted; in two or three weeks
+the disease had disappeared, and the plants had made a good growth. I
+believe moderate applications of salt, sown broadcast over a blackberry
+patch, would be of great benefit as a fertilizer and health renewer."
+
+Gardener's Monthly: In the discussions on forest culture, little is said
+of the willow, which forms a very interesting department. The white
+willow, Salix Candida, is often used for coarse work. S. Vinnunatis and
+S. Russelliana, are the most commonly used in the Eastern United States,
+under the name of Osier, or basket willow, and S. Forbyana, a variety of
+S. rubra, or the red willow is often used for fine work. In the Editor's
+recent visit to the Northwest a number of fine species were noted which
+would evidently be worth introducing for basket-making purposes.
+
+The Germantown Telegraph says: "To grow good crops of blackberries the
+soil should be good and especially deep, for the roots run down
+wonderfully when possible for them to do so; and as the growing fruit
+requires its greatest nourishment in the usually dry month of August, it
+is an advantage to have deep soil for the roots to draw a supply from. A
+deep, sandy soil will generally grow the best crop of berries, while a
+clay soil tends to produce rust. Good cultivation, good soil, and a
+judicious use of manure make stout and vigorous canes, with a crop of
+berries in increased ratio."
+
+Indiana correspondent Orange County Farmer: I have had a good deal of
+experience in propagating currants. I always plant my currant cuttings
+in the fall as soon as the leaves fall off. They will make durable roots
+two to four inches long the same fall, while the buds remain dormant.
+They will make double the growth the next season if set in the fall, and
+they should be set in ground that will not heave them out by the effects
+of frost and should be covered just before winter sets in with coarse
+litter. Remove the covering early in the spring and examine the cuttings
+to see if any of them hove, and if so, press them down again. Should
+they heave up an inch or more, if well pressed down, they will start and
+make better growth than cuttings set in the spring. In either case,
+however, the cuttings should always be made in the fall.
+
+A Rural New Yorker correspondent gets down to the real art of grape
+eating. Hear him tell how to manipulate the fruit: No! the man who holds
+the grape between his thumb and dexter finger and squeezes or shoots the
+pulp into his throat, does not know how to enjoy the fruit, and is not
+likely to appreciate the good qualities of a fine grape. Let the berries
+follow each other into the mouth in rapid succession until three or four
+are taken, while with each insertion the teeth are brought together upon
+the seeds without breaking them. The acid of the pulp is thus freed to
+mingle with the saccharine juice next the skin, and a slight
+manipulation by the tongue separates the seeds and skins from the
+delicious winey juices; after this has tickled the palate, skins and
+seeds may be ejected together. Close to the skin lies a large part of
+the good flavor of the grape.
+
+On the subject of protecting trees from mice, R.W. Rogers, in Ohio
+Farmer says: "As the season is near at hand when farmers will have to
+look to the protection of their young fruit trees from ground mice, I
+send you my method if you deem it worthy of publishing. It is as
+follows: Take old tin fruit cans, put them on the fire until the parts
+that are soldered have become heated, when they will come apart. Take
+the body of the can and encircle it around the tree, letting the sides
+lap each other, and press firmly in the ground before it has become
+frozen. The mice coming in contact with the tin will turn them in
+another direction. It is far better than mounding up or tramping snow
+about them. Most any farmer can gather up enough for a good sized
+orchard, and make them pay compound interest, which otherwise would be a
+nuisance or pitched out of the back window."
+
+
+
+
+FLORICULTURE.
+
+Gleanings by an Old Florist.
+
+
+ARTIFICIAL MANURES AND OTHER MATTERS.
+
+The successful raisers of many kinds of flowers use, more or less, some
+kind of what might be called artificial stimulants other than the
+ordinary manuring of the soil at the time the plant is set out, whether
+it be in pot culture or in the open benches. This is no new thing under
+the sun; not a few who have been in the habit, and found great results,
+have tried to keep a monopoly, and have been more or less close-mouthed
+in the matter. Perhaps one of the oldest forms of this feeding extra
+stimulants to their pets was in the form of liquid manure made from
+various materials, as horse, sheep, cow, and other manures. They are
+sometimes prepared with ever so much mystery in the matter of quantity,
+time of preparation, quantity given, etc., all of which was supposed to
+have its influence. Of one thing, however, there was certain, tangible
+evidence that many of these persons managed, if for exhibition, to carry
+off the best premiums; and if for the market were pretty sure to command
+the best prices, and what is more, obtain the greater results
+financially.
+
+Soot, guano, ammonia, and in later years, material obtained from the
+immense slaughter-houses, such as blood and other offal in a highly
+concentrated form, find, perhaps, nowadays, more advocates; principally
+because the first-mentioned list contains articles that give off very
+offensive odors while being applied, so that the more fastidious are
+loath to use them. What may not be very offensive to the plodding
+florist would be highly so to the more refined, or when the general
+public comes more into contact with the crops while being so applied. In
+almost all of the cases where the ingredients mentioned are used they
+are diluted with a large quantity of water, except in the case of the
+droppings of the animals; the latter are often used by florists in the
+form of a very heavy mulch, depending upon the ordinary watering to
+carry down to the roots such parts of the dressing as would dissolve in
+the water, and thus give extra stimulant, and at a time when it would do
+the most good, because, ordinarily, the more water necessary the greater
+the growth going on, and vice versa, if plants are in a state of rest,
+either from a finished growth or from lowness of temperature, but little
+water would be needed, and but little benefit from the mulch, except
+such as undoubtedly arises from the ammonia itself in the manure
+permeating the atmosphere, which again, however, would be the most
+active when heavy watering was necessary, simply because of the high and
+humid temperature.
+
+For obvious reasons the votaries of window gardening will use those
+giving off little or no unpleasant odors. Others again make the soil so
+rich in the first instance that much less of what may be called
+artificial manures are required during growth. But without some skill in
+this matter it is not safe, for if much of the material is not
+thoroughly decayed (which, however, has then lost most of its volatile
+ingredients) it is, in the common vernacular of the gardener, too rank
+to give good growth and results, whether it be in fruits, flowers, or
+foliage. For example, in Henderson's horticulture he recommends, as the
+best soil for potting, loam and hops. He says, "Not the least simple of
+these operations is the preparation of our potting soil. We have, we may
+say, only one heap--a big one it is--but it contains only two
+ingredients, rotted sods, from a loamy pasture, and rotted refuse hops
+from the breweries, in about the proportion of two of the sods to one of
+hop. One-year-old rotted manure, if the hops cannot be obtained." It is
+evident upon its face that so large a proportion as one-third of a fresh
+manure or hops would be disastrous; but well rotted, and with care
+otherwise in temperature and other desiderata, it would be a highly
+stimulating soil. This was in 1869. We well recollect the commotion the
+hop business caused in the horticultural world at the time, as Henderson
+recommended it for plunging pots in, setting pots on mulching outdoors,
+and almost every purpose. And did he not grow the best of stuff and
+himself practice what he preached. Spent hops in this city were eagerly
+sought after and used, apparently with great success, in almost every
+florist's establishment as well as market garden. What before was a
+nuisance to the breweries was eagerly sought after; like most things,
+however, it had its day, and is now seldom seen again. We might,
+however, say that its decline undoubtedly arose from its unpleasant
+features, as it drew myriads of insects in its train and often emitted a
+very unpleasant odor. Its great value consists in that it is the seed of
+the hop plant, all seeds contributing by far the greatest value in
+manures.
+
+In the green-house the object aimed at, is the greatest possible results
+from limited area. Of the atmosphere the gardener has almost absolute
+control--no siroccos, biting frost, or destructive winds interfere. He
+can beat nature all to pieces in growing plants faultless in shape and
+in quantity of flowers, but his soil is of limited extent for the roots
+to wander in. To counteract this, he can give in other forms just as
+much and no more nutrition as is necessary to effect his purpose, and
+here comes in this artificial supply of manurial agents.
+
+Mr. DeVrey, the successful superintendent of Lincoln Park, uses horn
+shavings. This is the cleanest and most pleasant material that we ever
+recollect to have seen used for the purpose, it is the refuse in the
+factories where the horns from the slaughterhouse are steamed and
+manipulated into the numerous objects they are applied to, not the least
+being into knife and fork handles, and the like. It is in the form of
+thin shaving of half an inch to an inch in length, quite dry and light,
+entirely free from odor. He takes all they make, and this year has a ton
+of the material for which he pays at the rate of three cents per pound.
+The method of using is simply to mix with the soil at the time of
+potting, giving it, to the common eye, as oil specked all through with a
+white flaky substance. Its effect is very visible in a clear, healthy
+growth, given off gradually, and as it is quite common where vast
+quantities of plants are required to be grown in small pots, when there
+appears to be a necessity of some new stimulant, it should be given by
+the amateur in a larger pot. This is done by shaking nearly all the soil
+from the roots and re-potting again if possible in the same sized pots,
+thus doing away with all artificial watering, and yet having healthy,
+luxuriant growth all the time.
+
+A pound of the material, which is light, will be enough for a
+wheelbarrow of potting soil. After all, the question is not so much the
+exact material employed of a number of similar agents, as it is with the
+intelligence brought to bear so as to apply at the right time the right
+quantity, and under the best possible circumstances.
+
+EDGAR SANDERS.
+
+
+
+
+SCIENTIFIC.
+
+
+AM I A SCOT, OR AM I NOT?
+
+  If I should bring a wagon o'er
+  From Scotland to Columbia's shore,
+  And by successive wear and tear
+  The wagon soon should need repair:
+  Thus, when the tires are worn through,
+  Columbia's iron doth renew;
+  Likewise the fellies, hubs, and spokes
+  Should be replaced by Western oaks;
+  In course of time down goes the bed,
+  But here's one like it in its stead.
+  So bit by bit, in seven years,
+  All things are changed in bed and gears,
+  And still it seems as though it ought
+  To be the one from Scotland brought;
+  But when I think the matter o'er,
+  It ne'er was on a foreign shore,
+  And all that came across the sea
+  Is only its identity.
+
+  I came, a Scotchman, understand,
+  By choice, to live in this free land,
+  Wherein I've dwelt, from day to day,
+  'Till sixteen years have passed away.
+  If physiology be true,
+  My body has been changing too;
+  And though at first it did seem strange,
+  Yet science doth confirm the change;
+  And since I have the truth been taught,
+  I wonder If I'm now a Scot?
+  Since all that came across the sea
+  Is only my identity.
+
+--_Wm. Taylor, in Scientific American._
+
+
+
+
+PRIMITIVE NORTHWEST.
+
+
+Mr. C.W. Butterfield contributes an article on the Primitive Northwest,
+to last number of the American Antiquarian. He says that early in the
+seventeenth century French settlements, few in number, were scattered
+along the wooded shores of the river St. Lawrence in Canada. To the
+westward, upon the Ottowa river, and the Georgian bay, were the homes of
+Indian nations with whom these settlers had commercial relations, and
+among some of whom were located Jesuit missionaries. In the year 1615,
+Lake Huron was discovered. To it was given the name of the Fresh Sea
+(Mer Douce). But, as yet, no white man had set foot upon any portion of
+what now constitutes the States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan,
+Wisconsin, and Eastern Minnesota. And thereafter, for nearly a score of
+years this whole region remained, so far as the visitation of white men
+was concerned, an undiscovered country; and such it continued down to
+the year 1684. However, previous to this date, something had been
+learned by the French settlers upon the St. Lawrence, of this (to them)
+far off land; but the information has been obtained wholly from the
+Indians. This knowledge was of necessity crude and, to a considerable
+extent, uncertain. Such of it as has been preserved is properly treated
+of under the following heads: First, as to what had been gleaned
+concerning the physical aspects of the country; second, as to what had
+been brought to light relative to the various tribes inhabiting this
+region.
+
+Previous to 1634, nothing had been learned of Lake Erie, Lake St. Clair,
+or Lake Michigan although it was understood there was some kind of a
+water-way connecting the Fresh Sea (Lake Huron) with Ontario. A little
+knowledge had been gained of a great body of fresh water lying beyond
+the "Mer Douce," "a grand lac," so called by the French--now known as
+Lake Superior. The length of this superior lake with that of the Fresh
+Sea (Lake Huron), the Indians declared was a journey of full thirty days
+in canoes. At the outlet of the great lake was what was described by the
+savages, as a considerable rapid, to which the French gave the name of
+"Sault de Gaston," the present Sault St. Marie, in the St. Mary's river,
+the stream, which, it is well known, flows from Lake Superior into Lake
+Huron.
+
+Accounts also had been received from the Indians prior to the year last
+mentioned, of a lake of no great size, through which flowed a river
+discharging its waters into the Fresh Sea (Lake Huron). These were
+reports of Lake Winnebago and Fox river, in what is now the State of
+Wisconsin. As the French upon the St. Lawrence had no knowledge as yet
+of Lake Michigan, they imagined the location of this small lake, and its
+river was beyond, and to the northwest of Lake Huron and that they
+emptied into it; Green Bay into the head of which Fox river really
+flows, being (like Lake Michigan) wholly unknown to them.
+
+It had further been reported by the Indians before this date that there
+was a mine of copper on an island in what has been mentioned as probably
+Lake Winnebago; doubtless, however, this island should have been located
+in Lake Superior. A specimen of native copper had as early as 1610, been
+exhibited by an Indian to an interested Frenchman upon the St. Lawrence,
+and an account given by him as to the rude method employed by the
+savages in melting that metal. But other islands besides the one
+containing the copper mine had been brought to the knowledge of the
+French settlers. A large one southeast of the "Sault de Gaston" being
+described, and two smaller ones, to the south of it. These islands were,
+it is suggested, the Great Manitoulin, Drummond, and Little Manitoulin,
+of the present day.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Dr. Leeds has said that spices were adulterated to a great extent, but
+only such substances were added as were purely non-poisonous. Mustards
+were never found to be pure. Vinegars were also highly adulterated.
+Competent officers, who shall be specialists, should be appointed in
+each State to examine manufactured and natural foods to detect
+adulteration. So far these examinations have been made by college
+professors. The State Boards of Health should take the matter in hand
+and see that it has the proper attention.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A French periodical, La Culture, gives the following simple method for
+testing the purity of water. In an ordinary quart bottle three parts
+filled with water dissolve a spoonful of pure white sugar, cork it well
+and put it in a warm place. If at the end of forty-eight hours the water
+becomes turbid and milky there can be no doubt of its impurity, but if
+it remains limpid it may be considered safely drinkable.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+AND
+
+YOUTH'S COMPANION
+
+ONE YEAR, $3 FOR THE TWO
+
+It is not required that both papers be sent to one address, nor to the
+same post-office.
+
+Address PRAIRIE FARMER PUB. CO.,
+150 Monroe Street Chicago.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Political talk is generally very eloquent, but it lacks the
+insignificant element of truthfulness. A great deal of the buncombe of
+politics reminds us of the lines of Lord Neaves, not long since
+deceased:
+
+[Transcriber's note: This is where the article ends in the original and
+the lines in question are not to be found in the rest of the
+periodical.]
+
+
+
+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, etc., should be addressed to_ THE
+PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING COMPANY, _Chicago, Ill._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Prairie Farmer
+
+ENTERED AT THE CHICAGO OFFICE AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER.
+
+CHICAGO, JANUARY 5, 1884.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Transcriber's Note: Original location of Table of Contents.]
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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 x
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+1841.     1884.
+
+The Prairie Farmer
+
+PROSPECTUS FOR 1884.
+
+SEE INDUCEMENTS OFFERED
+
+SUBSCRIBE NOW.
+
+For forty-three years THE PRAIRIE FARMER has stood at the front
+in agricultural journalism. It has kept pace with the progress and
+development of the country, holding its steady course through all these
+forty-three years, encouraging, counseling, and educating its thousands
+of readers. It has labored earnestly in the interest of all who are
+engaged in the rural industries of the country, and that it has labored
+successfully is abundantly shown by the prominence and prestige it has
+achieved, and the hold it has upon the agricultural classes.
+
+Its managers are conscious from comparison with other journals of its
+class, and from the uniform testimony of its readers, that it is
+foremost among the farm and home papers of the country. It will not be
+permitted to lose this proud position; we shall spare no efforts to
+maintain its usefulness and make it indispensable to farmers,
+stock-raisers, feeders, dairymen, horticulturalists, gardeners, and all
+others engaged in rural pursuits. It will enter upon its forty-fourth
+year under auspices, in every point of view, more encouraging than ever
+before in its history. Its mission has always been, and will continue to
+be--
+
+To discuss the most approved practices in all agricultural and
+horticultural pursuits.
+
+To set forth the merits of the best breeds of domestic animals, and to
+elucidate the principles of correct breeding and management.
+
+To further the work of agricultural and horticultural organization.
+
+To advocate industrial education in the correct sense of the term.
+
+To lead the van in the great contest of the people against monopolies
+and the unjust encroachments of capital.
+
+To discuss the events and questions of the day without fear or favor.
+
+To provide information concerning the public domain, Western soil,
+climate, water, railroads, schools, churches, and society.
+
+To answer inquiries on all manner of subjects coming within its sphere.
+
+To furnish the latest and most important industrial news at home and
+abroad.
+
+To give full and reliable crop, weather, and market reports.
+
+To present the family with pure, choice, and interesting literature.
+
+To amuse and instruct the young folks.
+
+To gather and condense the general news of the day.
+
+To be, in brief, an indispensable and unexceptionable farm and home
+companion for the people of the whole country.
+
+The style and form of the paper are now exactly what they should be. The
+paper used is of superior quality. The type is bold and clear. The
+illustrations are superb. The departments are varied and carefully
+arranged. The editorial force is large and capable. The list of
+contributors is greatly increased, and embraces a stronger array of
+talent than is employed on any similar paper in this country. We
+challenge comparison with any agricultural journal in the land.
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER is designed for all sections of the country.
+In entering upon the campaign of 1884, we urge all patrons and friends
+to continue their good works in extending the circulation of our paper.
+On our part we promise to leave nothing undone that it is possible for
+faithful, earnest work--aided by money and every needed mechanical
+facility--to do to make the paper in every respect still better than it
+has ever been before.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+SPECIAL NOTICE
+
+To each Subscriber who will remit us $2.00 between now and February 1st,
+1884, we will mail a copy of THE PRAIRIE FARMER FOR ONE YEAR, AND ONE
+OF OUR NEW STANDARD TIME COMMERCIAL MAPS OF THE UNITED STATES AND
+CANADA--showing all the Counties, Railroads, and Principal Towns up to
+date. This comprehensive map embraces all the country from the Pacific
+Coast to Eastern New Brunswick, and as far north as the parallel of 52
+deg., crossing Hudson's Bay. British Columbia; Manitoba, with its many
+new settlements; and the line of the Canadian Pacific Railway, completed
+and under construction, are accurately and distinctly delineated. It
+extends so far south as to include Key West and more than half of the
+Republic of Mexico. It is eminently adapted for home, school, and office
+purposes. The retail price of the Map alone is $2.00. Size, 58 x 41
+inches. Scale, about sixty miles to one inch.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+READ THIS.
+
+Another Special Offer.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"The Little Detective."
+
+Weighs 1/4 oz. to 25 lbs.
+
+Every housekeeper ought to have this very useful scale. The weight of
+article bought or sold may readily be known. Required proportions in
+culinary operations are accurately ascertained. We have furnished
+hundreds of them to subscribers, and they give entire satisfaction.
+During January, 1884, to any person sending us THREE SUBSCRIBERS, at
+$2.00 each, we will give one of these scales, and to each of the three
+subscribers Ropp's Calculator, No. 1.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A meeting of farmers interested in ensilage will be held at 55
+Beekman street, New York, Wednesday, January 23, at 12 o'clock. All
+interested in the subject are invited to attend.
+
+
+The Iowa State Horticultural Society will hold its annual
+meeting at Des Moines, January 15-18. Prof. J.L. Budd, Ames, will
+forward programmes on application. The usual reductions in railway and
+hotel fares are expected.
+
+
+Professor S.R. Thompson, Superintendent of the Nebraska
+Agricultural College farm, has been chosen to represent Nebraska at the
+meeting to be held at Washington, D.C., next week, for the purpose of
+taking action in regard to contagious diseases of cattle. He requests
+stock men and all others interested in the cattle industries of his
+State to correspond with him, and make such suggestions as they may
+think proper for guidance at the meeting.
+
+
+Since its organization in 1853 to 1882 inclusive, the managers
+of the Illinois State Fair have offered the following amounts in
+premiums for live stock: Cattle, $70,406; horses and mules, $81,825;
+sheep, $24,450; swine, $25,320; poultry, $8,214;--total $210,215, which
+must be considered pretty substantial encouragement. The total offered
+in premiums for all classes of exhibits has been $303,961. Thus a little
+more than two thirds of the entire amount has been given to the breeders
+and importers of stock.
+
+
+The officers of the Northwestern Dairymen's Association say
+that every indication warrants the conclusion that the coming convention
+at Mankato, Minn., commencing February 12, will prove the grandest
+success in the history of the association. A full array of the best
+dairy talent of the entire Northwest will be present. The purpose is
+both in the arrangement of the programme and in the conduct of the
+discussions, to make of the coming convention an institute for study and
+instruction which no intelligent and progressive farmer can afford to
+miss.
+
+
+The Missouri State Board of Agriculture asks the aid of one
+competent man in every township in the State to give it estimates of
+crops, etc., in his vicinity. The aim is to give as full and reliable
+statistics for crop reports as it is possible to collect. The State
+provides but $1,250 for the general expenses of the Board, and it is
+thus dependent upon voluntary aid in the matter. The Board will defray
+all expenses of postage and stationery. Competent persons willing to
+undertake this work for the public good should address J.W. Sanborn,
+Secretary, Columbus, Mo. Such persons will receive, free, the monthly
+and annual reports of the Board.
+
+
+In March of last year Secretary Fisher, of the Illinois State
+Board of Agriculture, submitted his report for 1882 to Gov. Hamilton.
+This report has just made its appearance. It has taken the State printer
+ten months to get the volume printed and bound for distribution, a work
+that any respectable job office in Chicago would have turned out in four
+weeks without any extra exertion. The report is valuable, of course, but
+it would have been worth a deal more had it appeared last April. Such
+papers as the report of Prof. Forbes, State Entomologist, for instance,
+might have been of immense benefit to the people of the State if the
+information it contains regarding noxious insects had reached them in
+early spring.
+
+
+
+
+SEED SAMPLES.
+
+
+We have letters from several parties desiring us to publish an offer
+they make to send packages of seed corn and other seeds to any one
+applying and inclosing stamps to pay for trouble and postage. Some of
+these parties also send samples of the seed. There is one great
+difficulty in the way of publishing this class of communications. Once
+we begin, the door is open to the practice of petty frauds upon our
+readers which we have no right to encourage or allow. Now we are almost
+certain that all these writers, thus far, are honorable men, who wish to
+confer a favor upon their brother farmers, and who do not wish to gain a
+farthing in the transaction. But some of them are personally unknown to
+us, and we do not feel like vouching for their responsibility, still
+less so because it is difficult to tell who will next propose a similar
+scheme. There is to be a brisk trade in seed corn during the next four
+months, and parties having a well tested article will find no difficulty
+in disposing of it at good prices, providing they can convince people
+they have exactly what they claim. The way to do is to advertise the
+seed corn in the regular way, giving as references such men as the
+postmaster, justice of the peace, banker, etc., as may be most
+convincing and convenient. We are as anxious as any one can be to see
+the people supplied with well ripened and well cared-for corn grown in
+the proper latitude, and we are equally anxious to guard them against
+imposition.
+
+
+
+
+THE PORK QUESTION IN EUROPE.
+
+
+The question of admitting American pork into France is not yet settled.
+The Corps Legislatif is again "all tore up" by rash statements made by
+member M. Paul Bert, who has published a letter at Paris in which he
+argues that the use of our pork must result in disease, and that a
+general outbreak may be feared at any moment, so long as the products of
+diseased swine are offered in French markets. He endeavors to strengthen
+his position by pretending to quote from Dr. Detmers, Department of
+Agriculture Inspector at the Chicago Stock Yards. He alleges that
+Detmers has reported that diseased and dying hogs are sold daily in
+Chicago, and then shipped as pork, bacon, and lard to Havre and
+Bordeaux. To this audacious or mendacious charge Dr. Detmers replies as
+follows:
+
+    The statement made by M. Paul Bert, as contained in a cable
+    dispatch from Paris, is not only a perversion of facts, but a
+    falsehood cut from whole cloth. I never certified, wrote, or
+    said that dead hogs are shipped to packing-houses, or that
+    these carcasses are shipped abroad. All I ever said in regard
+    to transportation of diseased or dead hogs is contained in my
+    official reports to the Commissioner of Agriculture,
+    Washington, and can be found in his annual reports of 1878
+    and 1879, on pages 355 and 418 respectively, where it is
+    accessible to everyone. I simply called attention to the
+    transportation of diseased and dead hogs to the rendering
+    tanks--entirely distinct from packing houses--as affording a
+    means of spreading the then prevailing disease--swine plague,
+    or so-called hog cholera.
+
+    M. Paul Bert seems to be a true demagogue, otherwise he would
+    not resort to a falsehood to please his constituents. I never
+    in any manner, directly or indirectly, stated or intimated
+    that packers are or ever were in collusion with dealers in
+    diseased live stock. Moreover, the laws and regulations of
+    the Chicago Stock Yards are such as to render it absolutely
+    impossible that a dead hog should be smuggled into them, and
+    if an animal should die while in the yards it is at once
+    delivered to a soap-grease rendering establishment outside of
+    the Stock Yards, and can not possibly get into a
+    packing-house.
+
+This reply came too late to have any effect upon French legislation, and
+the decree of prohibition has been re-enacted. So far we notice no
+marked effect upon the prices of pork products in this country, but
+later it must result in depression. We notice the leading papers of the
+United States are advocating the retaliatory measures proposed months
+ago by THE PRAIRIE FARMER against European States interdicting
+the importation of our meat products. We refer to the prohibition of
+French and German adulterated and poisonous wines and liquors, and dry
+goods and silk goods colored with poisonous dyes. It must come to this
+at last if such totally unreasonable legislation against American
+products is to continue in those countries.
+
+
+
+
+CORN, WHEAT, AND COTTON.
+
+
+The preliminary crop estimates by the Statistician of the Department of
+Agriculture have been completed. He says the average yield of corn per
+acre for 1883 was within a fraction of twenty-three bushels, which is 12
+per cent less than the average for a series of several years past. The
+quality is another thing.
+
+It is doubtless true, Mr. Dodge says, that the quality of the corn north
+of parallel forty is worse than for many years, increasing practically
+the amount of shortage indicated by the number of bushels. As the whole
+corn grown in 1883 in Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Dakota, added
+to half that grown in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska, would
+make 400,000,000 bushels only--a fourth of the whole crop--so that the
+possible depreciation of 40 per cent in all of it would be equivalent to
+a 10 per cent reduction in the value of the entire crop. The Illinois
+Department agents make the quality 31 per cent less than the average in
+this State. An effort will be made later, after the worst of the crop
+has been fed, to ascertain the feeding value of the year's product. It
+is not proposed, however, to reduce the product to the equivalent of
+merchantable corn, or "sound" corn, as no crop ever is free from
+immaturity or imperfection. There always are some Northern fields caught
+by frost, some neglected acres, some choked with weeds or flooded by
+over-flows, and so on--corn, which is mainly "nubbins." What is intended
+without reference to panic or exaggeration is to find out the exact
+truth and then tell it. There is nothing gained, be it to farmers or
+consumers, the Statistician adds, in suppressing truth on the one hand
+or exaggerating the losses on the other. One feature of corn-growing in
+1883 should prove a lesson to the farmers of the country; that is, the
+general use of seed corn in the West, grown in lower latitudes. The
+planting of Nebraska seed in Minnesota and Kansas seed in Illinois, has
+demonstrated the folly of attempting to acclimatize the Southern maize
+in the more Northern districts. Much loss from frost would have been
+avoided had the seed been carefully selected from the best corn grown in
+the immediate neighborhood.
+
+The wheat crop is estimated, as before, slightly in excess of
+400,000,000 bushels.
+
+The cotton product, as shown by the December returns, is about 6,000,000
+bales. There will be another investigation after the close of the cotton
+harvest and the shipment of a large portion of the crop, when precise
+results will be approached more nearly than has been possible hitherto.
+
+The Department evidently feels a little "nettled" over the criticisms
+that have been made upon its estimates of the last two corn crops. Again
+we must protest that the amount of harvested corn in the West will fall
+considerably below Mr. Dodge's figures. Whether or not the Department
+sees fit to "reduce the product to the equivalent of merchantable corn"
+such an estimate would be of interest, and when it gives the result of
+the feeding quality of the corn, there will be something of a basis
+furnished for such a calculation, especially as we shall have by that
+time a pretty accurate account of the exported corn of the crop of 1883
+and the amount "in sight," as the grain merchants say. It is true that
+there is nothing gained to consumers by "suppressing truth on the one
+hand or exaggerating losses on the other" but there is something lost to
+consumers by overestimating yields at about the time the harvest is
+ready and when speculators can use Government estimates to force down
+prices.
+
+The statistical machinery of the Department of Agriculture is far from
+perfect, but it is the best the Government has supplied it with, and it
+is not wise or fair to criticise its estimates too severely, based, as
+they often must be, upon inadequate returns. The most that can be said
+is that the Department should be exceedingly careful not to err on the
+side that may result in injury to the producers, for, as we understand
+it, it was created solely to advance their interests.
+
+
+
+
+CHICAGO IN 1883.
+
+
+Compared with the other great cities of the Union, and even with
+previous years in her own history, Chicago had a prosperous business
+year in 1883. The total trade of the year foots up $1,050,000,000, which
+is a slight gain over that of 1882. The receipts of flour were 4,403,982
+barrels; wheat, 20,312,065 bushels; corn, 74,459,948 bushels; oats,
+37,750,442 bushels; rye, 5,662,420; barley, 10,591,619. Of cattle there
+were received 1,878,944 head; hogs, 5,640,625; sheep, 749,917; horses,
+15,255; dead hogs, 55,656. Of seeds, 122,582 tons; broom corn, 15,038
+tons; butter, 53,987 tons; hides, 34,404 tons; wool, 20,122 tons;
+potatoes, 13,000,000 bushels; coal, 4,042,356 tons; hay, 50,000 tons;
+lumber, 1,848,817,000 ft.; shingles, 1,154,149 M.; salt, 1,096,587
+barrels; cheese 23,590 tons. The total value of farm products of all
+kinds is estimated at $402,000,000, which is $20,000,000 above the
+valuation of that of 1882. The products of Chicago manufactures are
+valued at $325,000,000. In 1881 the receipts of hogs amounted to
+6,474,844 head, and in 1882, 5,817,504 head. The wholesale mercantile
+trade has fallen off somewhat, as it has all over the country, owing to
+depression that seems to be universal. In manufactures the city is
+making wonderful development. In growth she is still unchecked and
+without a rival in the world among large cities and business centres.
+
+
+
+
+STRONG DRINK.
+
+
+We often see in the papers the amount in dollars and cents, that strong
+drink costs the people of this country. Some one has been making out
+similar statistics for Great Britain, and finds that if the total house
+rent is added to the rent of farms in the three divisions of the Kingdom
+the total is $30,000,000 less than is usually spent for drink. Add
+together the cost of the linen goods, cotton goods, coal, tea, coffee,
+sugar, milk, butter and cheese and the total is only $45,000,000 in
+excess of the sum spent in drink. And this is only the direct cost. The
+indirect expense of drink--the crime and misery entailed, the cost of
+prisons and almshouses, criminal courts and trials, the loss from
+idleness, incapacity, blunders, sickness--towers above these figures in
+colossal magnitude. Counting all these things it may be said of both
+countries that strong drink costs more than sufficient to supply the
+personal needs--food, clothing, and homes--of all the people. It is
+indeed a fearful showing.
+
+
+
+
+ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS.
+
+
+CHARLES DE LONG, Artesia, Miss.--THE PRAIRIE FARMER has the reputation
+of knowing all about the prairies, north and south, and, therefore, I
+appeal to it to tell me whether the Japan persimmon will be likely to be
+hardy in this section, some portions of which is, as you probably know,
+a prairie country?
+
+ANSWER.--The Japan persimmon, Diospyros kaki, is, as we understand it,
+an evergreen of sub-tropical origin, and will not be likely to fruit
+satisfactorily far north of the region of the orange. Like the fig, in
+your latitude, it may stand what frosts you have and, like it, attain
+considerable growth, but you will seldom get a crop. We know
+enterprising nurserymen are telling us it will grow and fruit as far
+north as Washington; but we were told the same story about the
+eucalyptus, which proved to be no more hardy than the orange. Our
+authorities for these opinions may be regarded as first-class--no less
+than LeBon Jardinier, who says it can not be grown and successfully
+fruited outside the region of the orange. Recently, at a horticultural
+exhibition at Nice, France, there was a fine show of the kakis
+contributed by a gardener in the vicinity of Toulon, of which the
+official report gives this account: "Among the newer exotics were the
+kakis, of Japan, grown at Toulon. The fruit is about the size of an
+average apple, a bright, orange-red in color, and the tree is very
+productive. The Japanese make a great account of it, both as a fruit,
+when ripe, and as a source for obtaining tannin, in its green state. It
+appears to accommodate itself remarkably well to the climate of
+Provence, and especially merits to be introduced into Algeria, where it
+will even do better in all reasonable probability.". In respect to the
+appearance of the fruit, it more nearly resembles in shape and size a
+bell pepper, than an apple, but the color is orange-red, as described.
+It is pretty sure to cut a great figure among the fruit products of
+Florida, where its successful cultivation will lend additional
+attractions to that already seductive State.
+
+MRS. SARAH Y. STAPLES, DALLAS, TEXAS.--I do not ask you for a remedy for
+the roup, with which my fowls have been recently affected; but for a
+course of treatment to follow to prevent its return?
+
+ANSWER--The roup may be brought upon healthy fowls if they are shut up
+in narrow and unventilated quarters at night, and of days turned out in
+cold or wet weather. And it will almost certainly follow if they are
+confined under glass, as they sometimes are in winter, in abandoned
+green-houses. In the first place, see fowls have a dry and airy roosting
+place, but where they will be out of a draft or cold currents. Feed once
+daily in the morning, the following compounded rations. Raw onions one
+part, pork-cracklins one part, and bread or boiled potatoes one part,
+chopped tolerably fine, but do not wet the mixture before feeding. If
+you can substitute a few bits of garlic for twice the measure of onions,
+it will be all the better for the health of the fowls, but they might
+taint the taste of the eggs. If fowls are fed this mixture once daily,
+it don't matter much what the other food is, whether corn or small
+grain, though for laying mill-screenings or shrunken wheat is best.
+
+ASA GRAY, ROCKFORD, ILL.--I have seen it stated the daily rations of the
+cowboys of the Southwest, in certain sections and during some months,
+was confined to raw beef, rock salt, and red peppers. How is it?
+
+ANSWER.--We don't know. Will someone familiar with cowboys and their
+manner of living report. However, all things considered, the ration is
+not a bad one, for the reason that raw beef digests in half the time of
+beef well cooked, and the large, sweet pepper of the Southwest deprived
+of its seeds is not near as hot in the mouth as it is commonly
+represented.
+
+R. ROOT, CLARKSVILLE, IOWA. 1. Does the basket willow have to be
+cultivated like a field crop? 2. Is there more than one kind, and if so
+which is best? 3. What kind of soil is best adapted to its cultivation?
+
+ANSWER.--1. In some respects, yes; the land having to be given over to
+them exclusively. In France the cuttings are planted from twelve to
+fifteen inches apart in order to obtain long and slender shoots. 2.
+There are half a dozen cultivated in Europe, the best two being the
+Salix rubra or red Osier, and the Salix vitellina or yellow Osier. But a
+hardier variety, Salix viminalis, is commonly preferred in this country
+where the cultivation, though often undertaken, has never been very
+successful, from the fact that American labor can not compete with the
+labor of women and children in Europe. 3. In cool climates having a
+moist atmosphere the Osier willow is successfully grown where ordinary
+crops thrive, but in warmer and drier sections low and moist land must
+be chosen. Indeed the whole tribe of willows love cool, moist
+situations, and the richer the soil the stronger and quicker the growth.
+We should be glad to hear from correspondents who cultivate, or who live
+where the Osier is grown and prepared for market, the details of the
+whole industry.
+
+B.F.J.
+
+
+
+
+WAYSIDE NOTES.
+
+BY A MAN OF THE PRAIRIE.
+
+
+I don't know that I really ought to take any credit to myself for it,
+but I hope I have done something toward increasing the number of farmer
+correspondents for the hale old PRAIRIE FARMER. I can't help
+noticing, as I do with pleasure, that the number is increasing.
+Furthermore, the correspondents all write well, I mean, simply; they
+seem to have something to say, and say it in a manner that can be
+readily understood. Their writings are instructive, too. Well, I hope
+this writing fever, like most others, will prove highly contagious, and
+have a run through the entire PRAIRIE FARMER family. I know
+from experience the malady is not a dangerous one. At least it don't do
+the writers any harm; if the readers can stand what I say, I am
+satisfied. The editor may boil down our communications, or chop them up
+and serve them in any style he chooses, so that he presents all the good
+we mean to say, and we will be satisfied. Will we not,
+fellow-contributors?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Rufus Blanchard, for many years a leading map publisher of Chicago, told
+me the other day, that in 1838 he was farming in Union county, Ohio.
+That year he grew about 1,000 bushels of oats, some 250 bushels of
+wheat, and raised 100 hogs. He sold his oats for eleven cents per
+bushel, his wheat for twenty-five cents, and his hogs for one cent and a
+quarter per pound. He hauled his grain to Columbus, forty miles, to
+market, and took his pay in salt. I remarked that this was pretty rough
+farming. "On the contrary," said he, "in those days we were happy as
+clams. We had all the pork we wanted without cost, for our hogs fattened
+themselves on the mast of the woods. We paid by toll for grinding our
+wheat into flour. The woods supplied us with deer, turkeys, and many
+other kinds of game. Our clothing was homespun. We had plenty of corn
+meal and cheaply grown vegetables, and helped each other in sickness or
+accident. If a neighbor's log house burned down, we all joined together
+in putting him up a better one than he had before. We had pretty good
+schools and interesting religious meetings without expensive pew rents
+or style in dress. We visited each other and had plenty of sound
+amusement. I never was so happy or so well contented in my life," he
+added, and I believe him, for his face is wrinkled with care and
+saddened by misfortune. It don't do, you see, to get too far removed
+from this simple, natural life.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+I am looking out for a little colder weather. The pond is not yet frozen
+sufficiently for us to cut ice as we want it. But both my neighbor and
+myself have gotten all things in readiness for the harvest. I like an
+open winter pretty well, but I do want ice.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It seems to me that Dr. Detmers is always going off "half-cocked." He
+once did the foreign cattle shipping interest great harm by an
+ill-advised and unwarranted dispatch concerning the prevalence of
+pleuro-pneumonia at the Chicago Stock Yards, and now I notice that his
+alleged statements regarding diseased hogs and the disposal of them at
+the same point have furnished the French Corps Legislatif an excuse for
+enacting the decree prohibiting the introduction of American pork
+products into France. Isn't it about time the Department of Agriculture
+at Washington sat a little down on this man who writes too much with his
+pen? Not that I would silence any man who sticks to facts, no matter
+whose soap-bubble he pricks; but a simple alarmist who rushes into print
+mainly for the pleasure it gives him to see his name in print, and to
+know that he is talked about, deserves to be squelched. For aught I
+know, though, Dr. Detmers has been misrepresented by the wily Frenchmen.
+What has Dr. Loring to say on the subject?
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+But, after all, as I think the editor of THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+himself said some months ago, this foreign agitation of the live stock
+question may result in great good, inasmuch as it must lead to proper
+legislation in this country against the introduction and spread of
+contagious diseases among animals. It is without doubt the basis of the
+proceedings at the Chicago cattle-growers' convention in November last,
+and of the present movement for immediate Congressional action upon the
+matter. The difficulty abroad will, I believe, prove short-lived.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER FROM CHAMPAIGN.
+
+With the exception of two days, the 22d and 23d, which were stormy and
+gave us ten to twelve inches of snow, followed by a little sleet and
+rain, the latter half of December has been as delightful as the first
+half was, though a good deal colder. The sleighing since the 17th has
+never been better; and as there is ten inches to a foot of solid snow
+now lying on the ground, it is likely to last some time longer. The
+sleet and rain formed a crust an inch and a half thick, and though it is
+not very strong, it, together with the compact snow, makes getting down
+to the grass beneath quite out of the question, and stock have to depend
+on the stalk fields or be fed hay and corn.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+This will make a heavier draft upon the grain and hay in reserve than
+has been anticipated by those who depend on carrying their stock through
+mostly on grass, and be sure to lessen the surplus and raise the price
+of corn, oats, and hay accordingly. Corn in the field is drying out so
+fast under the influence of the dry, cold weather, stock do not refuse
+soft corn as they did after the first sharp frost in November and
+December. It is now seen that it would have been better to have left all
+the soft and some of the immature corn in the field, than to have husked
+and cribbed it as many did and lost more than would be believed, if
+reported, by mould and rot.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+At any rate the fall wheat is safe so long as the present covering of
+snow lasts, and this more than compensates for the loss of winter
+pasture. The snow, as near as I can learn, covers all Illinois, except a
+few counties on the west, and as usual, is quite as heavy in the
+timbered regions of which Vandalia is near the center, as in Northern
+Illinois. So far the cold season considerably resembles the winter of
+1878-79, and let us hope it will continue to the end, that we may have
+light snows and many of them, good sleighing and moderate temperature
+through January and February.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+It has mystified me, as I have do doubt it has many others, why European
+Governments have had so much to say about trichinae in the hog, of which
+we have had scarcely any, and so little of hog cholera, of which we have
+had a good deal. But the mystery is now cleared up. The sickness and
+losses from hog cholera, have either by error or intention been reported
+to the several European Governments as results of almost universal
+trichiniasis, and they have acted accordingly. That it should be so,
+seems surprising, but that it is so, we have the proof in the following
+paragraph from a late number of the Journal D'Agriculteur Pratique. The
+writer, Dr. Hector George, one of the regular contributors, in a long
+article opposing rescinding the order prohibiting the importation of
+American pork products into France, first quotes the report of the
+Chicago Board of Health, that 8 per cent of hogs slaughtered in Chicago
+are afflicted with trichinae, goes on to say: "This per cent, however
+considerable it may be, is far inferior to the reality if we judge from
+an official dispatch addressed to Earl Granville by Mr. Crump, English
+Consul at Philadelphia." in 1880 trichiniasis destroyed 700,000 hogs in
+Illinois alone. According to an official report by Dr. Detmers to the
+Government of the United States, the hogs sick or dead from trichiniasis
+are hurried to the packing houses and are thereafter prepared and
+immediately sent off to Europe.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+M. Paul Bert, from whom we have recently heard on the same subject and
+in the same strain, no doubt got his inspiration from the article in the
+Journal D'Agriculteur Pratique after which he probably read the official
+report of Dr. Detmers, to whom he refers, and like Dr. George, either
+did not understand or intentionally misconstrued it for political
+purposes. Perhaps what Dr. Detmers did report was bad enough and
+extravagant enough, but it had exclusive reference to hog cholera then
+prevalent, as any one can satisfy himself who will turn to the reports
+or the Department of Agriculture for the several years 1879, 1880, and
+1881. B.F.J.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+A RECORD OF UNFASHIONABLE CROSSES IN SHORT-HORN CATTLE PEDIGREES; a book
+of 240 pages; the only work of the kind in existence. Send for a
+circular. F.P. & O.M. HEALY, Bedford, Taylor Co., Iowa.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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._
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+POULTRY NOTES
+
+Poultry-Raisers. Write for Your Paper.
+
+
+CHAT WITH CORRESPONDENTS.
+
+
+Notwithstanding the fact that I have repeatedly said I would not answer
+questions unless they came through THE PRAIRIE FARMER the
+people who, by ways and means best known to themselves, have managed to
+obtain my address, keep right on asking questions by mail at a rate that
+would drive me frantic if anything could. But nothing ever troubles me
+long at a time, so I take your disregard of my wishes good naturedly, as
+I take everything else that I can't help, and in the future I will
+answer all questions whether they come through THE PRAIRIE
+FARMER or not, sometime. To be sure "sometime" is not very
+definite, but it is the best I can do. My poultry letters are "too
+numerous to mention" and it requires no small amount of time to answer
+them all; but I won't growl about that if you will only be patient and
+not grumble if you don't get an answer "by return mail," or "in the next
+paper." All questions of general interest will be answered in these
+columns as soon as possible, while those that require an immediate
+answer will be attended to by mail. Poultry raisers who desire
+information that I can give, and who have not my address, can address
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER. However, let me ask you not to write except
+when necessary, and then please put your questions as plainly as
+possible, and "be as brief as the nature of the subject will permit."
+
+And when you are writing to me don't use postal cards. Postal cards are
+only intended for the briefest of business messages, but lots of people
+use them for nearly all their correspondence. I know one man who writes
+love letters on postal cards. Most women and some men manage to make one
+side of a 5 x 3 inch postal card do duty for four pages of commercial
+note. They will write up and down and across lots and on the bias until
+the whole thing is so hopelessly mixed and tangled up that if the
+mystery of a woman's ways, or the fate of Charlie Ross were solved upon
+one of these cards all the "experts" in the world could not unravel it.
+A penny saved may be as good as a penny earned, and I have no objections
+to your saving it in a legitimate way, but when it comes to saving it at
+the expense of my time, patience, and eye-sight, I object most
+decidedly. Hereafter I will not answer postals; I will not even read
+them.
+
+An Iowa woman writes: "If it is true that vaccination prevents chicken
+cholera, how does it happen that fowls which had the genuine chicken
+cholera last season took the disease again this season and died from the
+effects of it? This happened on our place." I have puzzled my brains on
+the same thing but I am not scientific enough to explain things that I
+don't know anything about, so I leave that conundrum to be answered by
+some of the learned people who have the whole theory of chicken cholera
+at their tongues' end.
+
+Several correspondents want to know how to get rid of rats in
+poultry-houses. One man says that he firmly believes that there are more
+rats than chickens in his poultry-house, and although he has tried half
+a dozen different kinds of rat-traps he rarely catches anything in them.
+
+I never found rat-traps much good; some of them would catch one or two,
+but after that the rest of the tribe would fight shy of all such devices
+for their undoing. A well trained rat terrier proved to be the best
+rat-trap we ever had on the premises, and for the poultry raiser who
+likes dogs a good ratter would be a good investment. Or you can use some
+one of the "exterminators" that may be obtained at the drug stores.
+Remove your fowls to some other building, prepare the poison according
+to directions, and place it in the poultry-house. The best kinds to use
+are those that make the rats thirsty and cause them to die immediately
+after drinking; water can then be left in the hen house and the dead
+rats will be found close by. When you have rat poison in the house see
+that it is properly marked and put out of reach of children and careless
+hired girls; and always see that all remnants of bait are taken care of.
+
+A Nebraska man wants to know why his hens don't lay. Says they are
+mostly early pullets, have a fairly comfortable poultry house, all the
+grain they will eat twice a day, and plenty of fresh water at all times.
+
+It seems to me that "all the grain they will eat twice a day" is rather
+overdoing the grain business. Have some of that grain ground, mix with
+boiled vegetables and feed warm every morning; also give green food and
+raw bone, and my word for it your hens will soon "lay like sixty."
+
+FANNY FIELD.
+
+
+
+
+FEATHER ENDS.
+
+
+Plymouth Rock pullets are not always early layers, for they
+often grow for ten or twelve months before laying, though some say as
+early as six months after being hatched. The best plan the keep Plymouth
+Rocks is to get the pullets hatched as early as possible. April is as
+late as should be desired, but a Plymouth Rock cock crossed on common
+hens will produce pullets that may be hatched later.
+
+N.Y. Times: A poultry-house should be large enough to be airy,
+but if it is kept strictly clean and sweet it will do no harm to be
+somewhat crowded. A house 24 feet long, 10 feet wide, 5 feet high behind
+and 8 feet in front, and having four roosting poles, all on a level and
+only a foot from the floor, will hold 60 to 80 fowls. This manner of
+arranging the roosts prevents a good deal of quarreling to get on the
+top perch.
+
+Poultry-rearing for export appears to be largely on the increase in
+Germany; and Rummelsburg, near Berlin, boasts of the largest goose
+market probably in the world. There arrive daily at that station on an
+average forty cars with geese and ducks. Every car contains about 1,500,
+thus making about 400,000 birds shipped every week, or an annual total
+of 20,000,000. The largest portion of these birds are reared and
+fattened in the surrounding provinces, and thence dispatched to all
+parts of Germany, England, Belgium, France, Switzerland, and other
+European countries.
+
+Farmers' Call: Turkeys do not require as warm quarters in
+winter as do other fowls. They will rest on a cherry tree when the
+mercury is frozen solid in the thermometer bulb, and then fly down in
+the morning and wade through the snow to cool off. This is a hint to the
+turkey raiser. Do not confine the turkeys in quarters too warm and
+close, and be sure that they have three or four hours' exercise each day
+in the open air. The turkey is really a hardy fowl and easily wintered
+if you do not pet it too much. Be a little unkind to it in cold weather.
+About all the shelter they will need is a wind-break. Give them plenty
+of highly nutritious food.
+
+Mr. Harrison Weir writes: "What the farmers should do is
+this--they should produce their poultry of the finest quality, poultry
+of the stamp of the old Dorking--plump birds, thick-skinned birds,
+small-boned birds, and birds with little offal--fat them well, truss
+them well, and send them to market. The white-legged beauties would take
+the highest price, and, if well seen to, would very soon drive the
+foreign fowls from our markets, and English gold would gladden the home
+of the English henwife. I may mention that a neighboring farmer intends
+rearing 3,000 chickens next spring, all to be off his ground before the
+beginning of May, when the cattle will come out. He expects to get 75c.
+a head, and I believe he will, and it will pay him if he does."
+
+Poultry houses should be whitewashed inside and out. For the
+inside we add two tablespoonfuls of carbolic acid or a pound of sulphur
+to a pailful of the wash (to kill vermin); do not be afraid of putting
+on too much, but apply the wash to every corner and crevice in the
+building. If you have plank floors, clean them off nicely and put on
+three or four inches of fresh earth. Dirt floors should be dug up the
+depth of one foot. Wash your windows (if you have any in your house, and
+if not you ought to have them), so that the fowls can see daylight, and
+in bad weather they will enjoy the confinement of the poultry houses
+much better. Wash off the roosts with kerosene oil at least once a week.
+Take every nest box and wash inside and out, and put in clean straw,
+sprinkling upon it some sulphur or loose tobacco. Observe these rules,
+and your fowls will do better and keep healthier. We find this good
+advice floating about and do not know its source. The hints are worth
+remembering.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE THROAT.--"_Brown's Bronchial Troches_" act directly on the organs
+of the voice. They have an extraordinary effect in all disorders of the
+throat.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+THE APIARY
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+KEEP BEES.
+
+
+The beginning of the new year is a general time of settling accounts and
+making resolutions for the future. The head of many a family is overcast
+with gloom as he ascertains the true state of his affairs, and perceives
+how little he has to show from the past year of toil. His family may
+have been industrious in a general way, and yet been consumers only, and
+not producers. We knew a farmer's family where there were three
+daughters just budding into womanhood. On inquiring of the mother what
+she had to sell to clothe her daughters with, she answered, Not a thing.
+Have you no butter, eggs, fowls, honey, or bees-wax to sell from this
+good farm? No, nothing. These girls were not idle! Oh no. They pounded
+the organ, and the result was music as sweet as filing a saw; crocheted,
+darned lace, and helped mother. When their father went to town they
+asked him to bring them a pair of shoes, a bustle, or a necktie, with no
+thought or care. And all the while the neighbors said "he was hard run."
+
+There are few farmers' families that are so situated that they can not
+care for a few colonies of bees. They not only need the sweets they
+gather, but these industrious insects help to fertilize the bloom of
+their orchards and meadows. Nature has appointed this insect, and it
+alone, to do this work for her.
+
+Honey can be used in many ways as a substitute for sugar--in canning
+fruit, making cookies, and for other culinary purposes.
+
+We would advise all those contemplating bee-keeping to start on a small
+scale, if they have had no previous training. Two colonies are plenty,
+and then let their knowledge increase in the same ratio as do their
+bees. The next thing in order, after purchasing bees, should be a good
+standard work on apiculture; and study it well. A person should be full
+of theory, and then they are ready for practice. Those who are
+energetic, willing to work, intelligent and willing, eager to learn,
+observing, persevering, and attentive to their work, will rarely ever
+fail in apiculture.
+
+We have heard farmers say that bees will not flourish with the same care
+given to other farm stock, and that they have not time to attend to
+them. We would recommend to all such to try the experiment of procuring
+a colony or two of beautiful Italians, in some good movable frame hive,
+and present them to the family, with abundance of bee literature, and
+see if they are not taken care of, especially if the almighty dollar
+puts in an appearance.
+
+MRS. L. HARRISON.
+
+
+
+
+THE NEW BEES.
+
+
+Prof. Cook, at the late Michigan Convention of Bee-keepers, spoke in
+this wise on the topic of the New Bees:
+
+"I have had no experience with the Cyprian bees, but I think more and
+more of the Syrian. I find no trouble to handle them, and take my large
+class of students, new to the business, right into the apiary. These
+thirty or forty students daily manipulate the bees, doing everything
+that the bee-keeper ever needs to do, and rarely ever get stung. I find
+that the comb honey of the Syrians is excellent, that the bees go
+readily into the sections. We did not get all our sections so that they
+could be crated without the use of the separators; but I am not sure but
+that it was more our fault than the fault of the bees. They are very
+prolific, breeding even when there is no nectar to gather, and they
+often gather when other bees are idle. I have this fall secured from Mr.
+Frank Benton a Carniolan queen, and shall try crossing the Carniolans
+with the Syrians. Perhaps we can thus secure a strain with the
+amiability of the Carniolan, and the business of the Syrians."
+
+
+
+
+HIVE AND HONEY HINTS.
+
+
+Mr. Willingford, of Carlingford, Ontario, who had a crop of
+several tons of honey this year, has taken it to England for sale.
+
+Manufacturers of tobacco, of pickles, of cakes and cookies,
+confectioners, and pork-packers are now using honey more extensively
+than ever in the preparation of their specialties.
+
+A singular instance of bee-swarming occurred a short time ago
+in Singapore harbor, on board the British steamer Antonio, which at the
+time was lying entirely outside the shipping in the roads. A swarm of
+wild bees from the shore suddenly located themselves directly under the
+sternpost of a boat lying above the deck, and all attempts to drive them
+away proved unavailing, the chief officer being very severely stung in
+endeavoring to get rid of them. They held to their position for several
+days, and were eventually destroyed after the steamer had hauled
+alongside the wharf.
+
+Rev. L.L. Langstroth recently said: When I commenced
+bee-keeping, a sting caused much swelling, but in time this trouble
+passed away. Several years passed, during which I handled no bees, and
+when I again attempted it, I found myself more susceptible to the poison
+than ever, but by continuing to work with the bees, disregarding the
+stings, my former indifference returned.
+
+Ohio bee-keepers will discuss the following questions at the
+Columbus meeting on the 14-16: How to winter bees successfully. How many
+brood-frames are necessary in one hive? What can be done to prevent
+adulteration of honey? How to create a home market for honey. How many
+colonies can be kept in one locality? Can we do without separators? What
+shall we do with second swarms? Which is the most salable
+section--one-half, one, or two pounds? Which are best--deep or shallow
+frames? Is it advisable to have a standard-size frame for all
+bee-keepers?
+
+Many are inquiring the proper way to let bees out on shares, so
+as to have both parties satisfied. I do not know any such way, for the
+most I have known in regard to letting bees out on shares resulted in
+both parties being dissatisfied. But it all depends on what the
+agreement is; and perhaps you had better have it down in writing. One
+case I have recently heard of, the agreement was to divide the profits.
+Well, it so happened that there was no profit, but there was a pretty
+big loss; and as no provision had been made for this state of affairs,
+each one felt disposed to put the loss on to the shoulders of the other.
+I decided it would be about fair to divide the loss; but very likely
+circumstances might make this not the right way after all. So says the
+editor of Gleanings. It strikes us that he is all right, but if he had
+said to bee-keepers "use the same common sense as to contracts that
+people do in other kinds of business," he would have covered the whole
+ground.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+AND
+
+YOUTH'S COMPANION
+
+ONE YEAR, $3 FOR THE TWO.
+
+It is not required that both papers be sent to one address, nor to the
+same post-office.
+
+Address PRAIRIE FARMER PUB. CO.,
+150 Monroe Street, Chicago.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+RAILROADS.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+A MAN WHO IS UNACQUAINTED WITH THE GEOGRAPHY OF THIS COUNTRY WILL SEE BY
+EXAMINING THIS MAP THAT THE
+
+CHICAGO, ROCK ISLAND & PACIFIC R'Y
+
+By the central position of its line, connects the East and the West by
+the shortest route, and carries passengers, without change of cars,
+between Chicago and Kansas City, Council Bluffs, Leavenworth, Atchison,
+Minneapolis and St. Paul. It connects in Union Depots with all the
+principal lines of road between the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. Its
+equipment is unrivaled and magnificent, being composed of Most
+Comfortable and Beautiful Day Coaches, Magnificent Horton Reclining
+Chair Cars, Pullman's Prettiest Palace Sleeping Cars, and the Best Line
+of Dining Cars in the World. Three Trains between Chicago and Missouri
+River Points. Two Trains between Chicago and Minneapolis and St. Paul,
+via the Famous
+
+"ALBERT LEA ROUTE."
+
+A New and Direct Line, via Seneca and Kankakee, has recently been opened
+between Richmond Norfolk, Newport News, Chattanooga, Atlanta, Augusta,
+Nashville, Louisville, Lexington, Cincinnati Indianapolis and Lafayette,
+and Omaha, Minneapolis and St. Paul and intermediate points.
+
+All Through Passengers Travel on Fast Express Trains.
+
+Tickets for sale at all principal Ticket Offices in the United States
+and Canada.
+
+Baggage checked through and rates of fare always as low as competitors
+that offer less advantages.
+
+For detailed information, get the Maps and Folders of the
+
+GREAT ROCK ISLAND ROUTE,
+
+At your nearest Ticket Office, or address
+
+R.R. CABLE,
+Vice-Pres. & Gen'l M'g'r,
+
+E. ST. JOHN,
+Gen'l Tkt. & Pass. Agt.
+
+CHICAGO.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+SILK CULTURE.
+
+
+WOMEN IN SILK CULTURE.
+
+
+The feminine portion of our population is getting to be mighty
+independent. Instead of waiting, Micawber-like, for something (a man) to
+turn up they are going to work to turn it up themselves. They would
+rather make a living for themselves than have a man to make it for them.
+They are teaching schools, operating telegraph instruments and
+telephones, clerking, keeping books of account, type-writing, doing
+short-hand reporting, lecturing, preaching, practicing law, and some
+have so far fallen from grace as to be editing papers. But many of these
+occupations present closed doors to our country girls and women. Many of
+these can not leave their country homes, and these occupations, with the
+exception of school teaching, can not be carried on in the country.
+Others, who could leave home, are chary of braving the wiles and
+temptations of the city, and their friends are still more loth to have
+them go. The great need is some work, light, respectable, and yet fairly
+remunerative, which our country lassies can carry on at home. School
+teaching is possible, but teaching country district schools is the most
+thankless of all drudgery, and, besides, a majority of our young women
+are not able to endure the worry and close confinement. If it can be
+made successful, sericulture offers by far the best opportunity to
+country girls to earn their own pin money, or even their own living. It
+can be engaged in at home; it is light, pleasant, and interesting work;
+and there is no doubt that American silk can be produced of such a
+quality that there will be a brisk demand for it at good prices. But if
+all this be true the question at once presents itself, Why have not
+American women engaged largely in sericulture?
+
+The answer is that they have been appalled at the very outset by the
+alleged expense of the undertaking. The promoters of the enterprise took
+to writing books. There was an excuse for this amounting almost to a
+necessity. To engage in silk culture, a person must be possessed of some
+special knowledge. It is no harder than poultry or bee-keeping, but a
+person to succeed at these must have some expert knowledge, and as
+sericulture was a new thing, beginners must have books containing what
+they needed. But these authors made the business much more difficult and
+expensive than it should be. First of all, they laid it down as one of
+the Medes and Persian laws of sericulture, that the worms must have
+mulberry leaves to subsist upon. Mulberry sprouts are costly to begin
+with; then the trees must grow at least two years, and should grow five
+years, before the leaves are used. This, of itself, was enough to deter
+but a very few from silk culture. But they made it appear, also, that
+very expensive appliances for a cocoonery were necessary, and only the
+most costly breeds of worms should be used, entailing greater expense
+and difficulty. The books were, and for that matter are, filled with dry
+scientific details of the internal construction of the worm and of its
+habits--details which only confused the learner and which, though giving
+an author material from which to deduce rules of instruction, should
+have been omitted from the book and their place supplied with the rules
+deduced. In short, it seemed to be the prime object to make sericulture
+as hard and forbidding as possible, and to deter the people from it
+rather than to induce them to engage in the work. For this very reason
+there has been considerable popular indifference to it, and from the
+agricultural press it has not received that attention which so promising
+an industry deserves. I would not be so unjust as to leave the reader to
+infer that all authors on sericulture have been thus guilty. There have
+been some very few who from the very start have presented it in as easy
+and practicable a light as was consistent with successful work. Nor
+would I be ready to assert that those who have said it could not be made
+financially profitable without mulberry groves, fancy priced worms, and
+expensive appliances, have done so from base motives. Yet it would
+appear as if not a few could be justly indicted of this; for they have
+mulberry sprouts, fancy priced worms, and costly appliances to sell. And
+perhaps it occurred to them that if they deterred the people generally
+from taking hold of it, they would have less opposition and competition.
+
+But be this as it may, the fact is that it is not necessary to have
+mulberry groves, costly appliances, or even fancy priced worms (though
+good worms only should be reared), in order to profitably engage in
+sericulture. I know of no business presenting so promising an opening
+that requires less capital. And I say this, having no axe to grind in
+any way, simply for the sake of those girls and women who might make
+money by it, and who would do so if they only knew the facts. I have no
+book, no sprouts, no worms, nothing whatever, to sell.
+
+I have said that the leaves of the mulberry are not essential to silk
+growing. If this be true the greatest obstacle in the way of sericulture
+becoming a great national industry will have been removed. And that it
+is true is proven by the experience of not a few practical silk-growers.
+Without exception those who have tested the matter say that the leaves
+of the Osage-orange are equal to those of the mulberry, and some say
+they are better. My position brings me into correspondence with the
+leading specialists in agricultural pursuits, and among others with many
+practical silk-growers. To-day I received letters from three
+silk-growers, one in Illinois, one in Kansas, and one in California.
+Each had fed the leaves of the Osage-orange exclusively for the last two
+years, and with the best results. One said there was no doubt that they
+were at least equal to the leaves of the mulberry, and the other two
+pronounced them superior. One of our best authorities on sericulture,
+Prof. Barricelli, has shown by means of chemical analyses and other
+scientific data, that as nourishment for silk-worms the Osage is
+superior to the mulberry. In fact, nine-tenths of the practical
+silk-growers of the West, those who are making it not only practicable
+but profitable, are now feeding Osage leaves exclusively. This should be
+known by the people at large. There can be no monopoly of the
+Osage-orange. No one can demand of the expectant silk culturist
+exorbitant prices for Osage sprouts. In very few localities will it be
+necessary to plant the Osage even. We have an abundance of Osage hedges,
+particularly in the West. In such localities the silk culturist will be
+at no expense whatever for food for the worms, and will not be under
+even the necessity of waiting a couple of years for it to grow. When
+this is more fully understood by the girls and women of the country, we
+may expect silk culture to assume the importance of a profitable
+national industry.
+
+JOHN M. STAHL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+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. We will send on
+Thirty Days' Trial, TO MEN, YOUNG OR OLD, who are suffering from NERVOUS
+DEBILITY, LOST VITALITY, and 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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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. In deed,
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+PUBLICATIONS
+
+THE YOUTH'S COMPANION
+
+FOR 1884.
+
+THE COMPANION presents below the Announcement of its Fifty-Seventh
+Volume. Its unusual character, both in the range of its topics, and its
+remarkably brilliant list of Contributors, will, we trust, be accepted
+as a grateful recognition of the favor with which the paper has been
+received by more than 300,000 subscribers.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Illustrated Serial Stories.
+
+A Story of English Rustic Life, by Thomas Hardy.
+The Foundling of Paris, by Alphonse Daudet.
+A Boys' Story, by J.T. Trowbridge.
+The Covenanter's Daughter, by Mrs. Oliphant.
+A Story of Adventure, by C.A. Stephens.
+My School at Orange Grove, by Marie B. Williams.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Science and Natural History.
+
+Eccentricities of Insanity, by Dr. W.A. Butler.
+Common Adulterations of Food, by Dr. J.C. Draper.
+The Home Life of Oysters, and other Natural History Papers, by
+    Arabella B. Buckley.
+Wonders in Ourselves; or the Curiosities of the Human Body, by Dr.
+    Austin Flint, Jr.
+Insect Enemies of the Garden, the Orchard and the Wheat-Field, by
+    A.S. Packard, Jr.
+Demons of the Air and Water. A fascinating Series of Papers on
+    Sanitary Science, by R. Ogden Doremus.
+The Youth Of the Brain, "Speech in Man," "Animal Poisons and their
+    Effects," and Other Papers, by Dr. W.A. Hammond.
+Strange Ways Of Curing People. A Description of Curious
+    Sanitaria,--the Peat, Mud, Sand, Whey, and Grape Cures, by William
+    H. Rideing.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Encouragement and Advice.
+
+Hints for Poor Farmers, by C.E. Winder.
+The Failures of Great Men, by James Parton.
+A Dietary for Nervous People, by Dr. W.A. Hammond.
+Hints for Country House-Builders, by Calvert Vaux.
+The Gift Of Memory, and Other Papers, giving Instances of Self-Help,
+    by Samuel Smiles.
+A New Profession for Young Men. The Opportunities for Young Men as
+    Electrical Engineers, by Thomas A. Edison.
+At the Age Of Twenty-One. A Series of Papers showing what Great Men
+    had accomplished, and what they proposed doing, at that period of
+    their lives, by Edwin P. Whipple.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Original Poems.
+
+BY ALFRED TENNYSON,
+VICTOR HUGO,
+THE EARL OF LYTTON,
+J.C. WHITTIER,
+T.B. ALDRICH,
+DR. CHARLES MACKAY,
+And Many Others.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Illustrated Adventure and Travel.
+
+Shark-Hunting, by T.B. Luce.
+Four Amusing Stories, by C.A. Stephens.
+Outwitted. An Indian Adventure, by Lieut. A. Chapin.
+A Honeymoon in the Jungle, by Phil. Robinson.
+Wrecked Upon a Volcanic Island, by Richard Heath.
+Stories of the Cabins in the West, by E.J. Marston.
+Adventures in the Mining Districts, by H. Fillmore.
+The Capture of Some Infernal Machines, by William Howson.
+Breaking in the Reindeer, and Other Sketches of Polar Adventure, by
+    W.H. Gilder.
+An American in Persia, by the American Minister Resident, Teheran,
+    S.G.W. Benjamin.
+China as Seen by a Chinaman, by the Editor of the Chinese American,
+    Wong Chin Foo.
+Stories Of Menageries. Incidents connected with Menagerie Life, and
+    the Capture and Taming of Wild Beasts for Exhibition, by S.S. Cairns.
+Boys Afoot in Italy and Switzerland. The Adventures of two English
+    boys travelling abroad at an expense of one dollar a day, by Nugent
+    Robinson.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Reminiscences and Anecdotes.
+
+Stage-Driver Stories, by Rose Terry Cooke.
+Stories of Saddle-Bag Preachers, by H.L. Winckley.
+My First Visit to a Newspaper Office, by Murat Halstead.
+Queen Victoria's Household and Drawing-Rooms, by H.W. Lucy.
+Child Friendships of Charles Dickens, by his Daughter, Mamie
+    Dickens.
+Our Herbariums; Adventures in Collecting Them, by A Young Lady.
+My Pine-Apple Farm, with incidents of Florida Life, by C.H. Pattee.
+Bigwigs of the English Bench and Bar, by a London Barrister, W.L.
+    Woodroffe.
+At School with Sir Garnet Wolseley, and the Life of a Page of Honor in
+    the Vice-Regal Court of Dublin, by Nugent Robinson.
+Student Waiters. Some Humorous Incidents of a Summer Vacation in the
+    White Mountains, by Child McPherson.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE EDITORIALS OF THE COMPANION, without having any bias, will give
+clear views of current events at home and abroad. THE CHILDREN'S PAGE
+will sustain its reputation for charming pictures, poems, and stories
+for the little ones.
+
+ISSUED WEEKLY. SUBSCRIPTION PRICE, $1.75. SPECIMEN COPIES FREE.
+
+SPECIAL OFFER.--To any one who subscribes now, and sends us $1.75, we
+will send the Companion free to January 1st, 1884, and a full year's
+subscription from that date.
+
+Address,
+
+PERRY MASON & CO.,
+41 TEMPLE PLACE, BOSTON, MASS.
+
+_Please mention where you read this Advertisement._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+HOUSEHOLD.
+
+    For nothing lovelier can be found
+    In woman than to study _household_ good.--_Milton._
+
+
+THE SCHOOL-MARM'S STORY.
+
+    A frosty chill was in the air--
+      How plainly I remember--
+    The bright autumnal fires had paled,
+      Save here and there an ember;
+    The sky looked hard, the hills were bare,
+    And there were tokens everywhere
+      That it had come--November.
+
+    I locked the time-worn school-house door,
+      The village seat of learning.
+    Across the smooth, well trodden path
+      My homeward footstep turning;
+    My heart a troubled question bore,
+    And in my mind, as oft before,
+      A vexing thought was burning.
+
+    "Why is it up hill all the way?"
+      Thus ran my meditations:
+    The lessons had gone wrong that day
+      And I had lost my patience.
+    "Is there no way to soften care,
+    And make it easier to bear
+      Life's sorrows and vexations?"
+
+    Across my pathway through the wood
+      A fallen tree was lying;
+    On this there sat two little girls,
+      And one of them was crying.
+    I heard her sob: "And if I could,
+    I'd get my lessons awful good,
+      But what's the use of trying?"
+
+    And then the little hooded head
+      Sank on the other's shoulder.
+    The little weeper sought the arms
+      That opened to enfold her.
+    Against the young heart, kind and true,
+    She nestled close, and neither knew
+      That I was a beholder.
+
+    And then I heard--ah! ne'er was known
+      Such judgment without malice,
+    Nor queenlier council ever heard
+      In senate, house or palace!--
+    "I should have failed there, I am sure,
+    Don't be discouraged; try once more,
+      And I will help you, Alice."
+
+    "And I will help you." This is how
+      To soften care and grieving;
+    Life is made easier to bear
+      By helping and by giving.
+    Here was the answer I had sought,
+    And I, the teacher, being taught
+      The secret of true living.
+
+    If "I will help you" were the rule.
+      How changed beyond all measure
+    Life would become! Each heavy load
+      Would be a golden treasure;
+    Pain and vexation be forgot;
+    Hope would prevail in every lot,
+      And life be only pleasure.
+
+--_Wolstan Dixey._
+
+
+
+
+A CHAT ABOUT THE FASHIONS.
+
+
+Although the lady readers of THE PRAIRIE FARMER have probably
+by this time made up the heavier part of their winter wardrobe, still a
+few suggestions may not be out of place, for the "fashions" is a subject
+of which we seldom tire.
+
+In discussing the subject of silk and silk-culture at the late Woman's
+Congress, Mrs Julia Ward Howe said that "although silk is said to be
+depreciating in value, and is not quite as popular as formerly, yet we
+must confess it lies very near the feminine heart," at which statement
+an audible smile passed over the audience, as each one acknowledged to
+herself its truth.
+
+We are glad to see that wrappers are becoming quite "the thing" for
+afternoon home wear, and a lady now need not feel at all out of place
+receiving her callers in a pretty, gracefully made wrapper. The Watteau
+wrapper is made of either silk or brocaded woolen goods, conveniently
+short, the back cut square at the neck, and folded in a handsome Watteau
+plait at the center, with a full ruche effect. A yolk portion of silk
+fills in the open neck and is sewed flatly underneath to the back. The
+side seams are curved so that a clinging effect is produced at the
+sides. Jabbots of lace extending down the front, and a prettily bowed
+ribbon at the right shoulder, with a standing collar at the neck, and a
+linen choker collar give the finishing touches to the toilette.
+
+Velvets and velveteens seem to be taking the place of silk, and are
+really quite as cheap. In fact, velveteens are cheaper, as they are so
+much wider. A suit of velveteen is fashionable for any occasion--for
+receptions, church or street costume. The redingote or polonaise is very
+stylish and pretty, especially for a tall, rather slight person. For a
+young miss the close-fitting frock coat, with pointed vest effectively
+disclosed between the cut-away edges of the coat fronts, is much worn.
+The latter curve away from the shoulders and are nicely rounded off at
+their lower front corners. An underarm dart gives a smooth adjustment
+over each hip, and in these darts are inserted the back edges of the
+vest. Buttons and buttonholes close the vest, but the coat fronts do not
+meet at all. The coat and long-pointed overskirt can be made of any
+heavy material, but the vest should be of silk; a deep box-plait on the
+bottom of the underskirt made of silk to match the vest will make the
+suit very stylish and pretty.
+
+There ought to be great satisfaction among the wearers of bonnets and
+hats this season, because they can so easily have what they want--big or
+little, plain or decorated, as they please. For a person with dark hair,
+gold braid loosely put around the edge of a velvet capote is very
+becoming. Bunches of tips are worn much more than the long, drooping
+plumes, though both are fashionable; while birds--sometimes as many as
+three on a hat--are often preferred to either. We notice upon the street
+a great many elegantly dressed ladies with but a single band of wide
+velvet ribbon fastened somewhat carelessly around the bonnet and tied in
+a bow under the chin. Unique it may be, but undoubtedly the taste of the
+wearer, would be the verdict of the passer by. In fact, one can scarcely
+be out of the fashion in the choice of a bonnet or hat, but care should
+be taken that it be just the thing for the wearer, and that it be
+properly put on.
+
+I firmly believe in the doctrine that "good clothes tendeth toward
+grace." What woman can not talk better when she knows she looks well?
+She can then forget herself and lose all self-consciousness, which is a
+state most devoutly to be desired by all women--particularly our young
+women. So, girls, study your costumes, especially the "superfluities,"
+or "furbelows," as they are wont to be called; make yourselves look as
+pretty as you possibly can--and then forget yourselves.
+
+I wish all our lady readers might have been here the holiday week, for
+the stores were perfect bowers of beauty. It was a pretty sight in
+itself to watch the crowds of happy-faced children, with their little
+pocket-books in their hands, at the various counters buying presents for
+father, mother, brothers, and sisters. Children always enjoy Christmas
+more when they can make, as well as receive, presents. So I hope all our
+little readers were made happy by both giving and receiving.
+
+I am sorry I could not give you a more satisfactory talk on the
+fashions, but our space is limited this week. I hope the ladies will not
+forget that our "Household" department is open to them, and that they
+will contribute anything that may be of interest to the others.
+
+MARY HOWE.
+
+
+
+
+A KITCHEN SILO.
+
+
+The farmer's wife in the Netherlands has long been using a sort of a
+silo. Probably she had been doing so for long years before M. Geoffrey
+began experimenting with preserved stock food in France. The Netherland
+housewife's silo consists of an earthenware jar about two feet tall.
+Into one of these jars in summer time she places the kidney bean; in
+another shelled green peas; in another broad beans, and so on. Making a
+layer about six inches deep in each. She sprinkles a little salt on top
+and presses the whole firmly down. Then she adds another layer and more
+salt. She leaves a light weight on top to keep all well pressed down and
+exclude the air, in the intervals between pickings for often the harvest
+of a single day will not fill the jar. When full, she puts on a heavier
+weight, and covers all with brown paper. She thus has green vegetables
+preserved for winter. The ensilage is said to be "more or less good,
+according to taste."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CHICKEN SALAD: Two common sized fowls, one teacup of good salad
+oil, half a jar of French sweet mustard, the hard-boiled yolks of ten
+eggs, half a pint of vinegar, one teaspoonful of cayenne pepper, eight
+heads of celery, one teaspoon of salt or a little more if required. Cut
+and mix the chicken and celery and set away in a cool place. Mash the
+eggs to a paste with the oil, then add the vinegar and other things, mix
+thoroughly, but do not pour it over the salad until about half an hour
+before serving, as the celery may become wilted.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+SOFT GINGERBREAD: One cup butter and two cups sugar well worked
+together, three eggs well beaten in, one cup New Orleans molasses, one
+cup good sweet milk and five cups of flour into which has been stirred
+one teaspoonful baking powder, not heaped, two tablespoonfuls ground
+cinnamon and one tablespoonful ground ginger. Bake in small dripping
+pans not too full, as they will rise.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Mixture of two parts of glycerine, one part ammonia, and a
+little rose water whitens and softens the hands.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+OUR BOOKS.
+
+
+BOOKS FREE!
+
+
+Good books are valued by intelligent men and women more than silver and
+gold. They are treasures in every home. They are to the mind what light
+and heat are to plants. They
+
+_STORE THE MIND WITH USEFUL KNOWLEDGE_;
+
+the mind directs the hands. An intelligent man has an advantage over one
+who is ignorant, whether he is a farmer, or mechanic, or merchant, and
+is surer of success in his occupation. Think how
+
+_LOSSES OF TIME AND MONEY MAY BE SAVED_
+
+by having some book at hand containing just the information desired in
+some line of the rural industries. We offer an excellent opportunity for
+any one to obtain BOOKS FREE for himself or family, and also for
+societies, farmers' clubs, and associations to make additions to a
+library, or to start one.
+
+These books comprise standard works, and the latest and best books for
+
+Farmers,    Stockmen,
+  Dairymen,   Fruit-Growers,
+    Gardeners,   Florists,
+      Poultrymen,  Apiarists,
+        Silk-Culturists,  Housekeepers,
+          Architects,    Etc., Etc.
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING COMPANY will give to any person,
+association, or club, who will obtain and send subscribers to THE
+PRAIRIE FARMER (including both new subscribers and renewals), at the
+regular price of the paper ($2) each, any of the books contained in our
+Book List on the following terms:
+
+For THREE subscribers, books to the amount of $1.50.
+
+For FOUR subscribers, books to the amount of $2.00.
+
+For FIVE subscribers, books to the amount of $2.50.
+
+For SIX subscribers, books to the amount of $3.00.
+
+For SEVEN subscribers, books to the amount of $3.50.
+
+For EIGHT subscribers, books to the amount of $4.00
+
+For TEN subscribers, books to the amount of $5.00.
+
+_FOR TWELVE SUBSCRIPTIONS AND UPWARD_,
+
+A DOLLAR'S WORTH OF BOOKS FOR EVERY TWO SUBSCRIPTIONS SENT AT $2.00
+EACH.
+
+All books given under these offers will be delivered at our office, No.
+150 Monroe street.
+
+If it is desired that they shall be forwarded by express, they will be
+packed and delivered at the express office by us, the receiver to pay
+cost of carriage.
+
+Sent by mail to any part of the United States or Canada, the postage
+will be seven cents on each dollar's worth of books.
+
+It is necessary that parties to whom the books are given shall remit us
+the postage before the books are sent.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+A Dictionary Free!
+
+This is no catchpenny affair, but a valuable lexicon. It is the popular
+
+AMERICAN DICTIONARY,
+
+on the basis of Webster, Worcester, Johnson, and other eminent American
+and English authorities. It contains over 32,000 words, with accurate
+definitions, proper spelling, and exact pronunciation; to which is added
+a mass of valuable information. It is enriched with 400 illustrations.
+
+REMEMBER,
+
+every subscriber at the regular price of THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+gets this Dictionary FREE, if preferred to our commercial map.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+HERE IS ANOTHER.
+
+ROPP'S CALCULATOR
+And Account Book for 1884.
+
+This is the most useful thing in the way of a memorandum book and
+calculator ever issued. It is a work of nearly 80 pages of printed
+matter and an equal number of blank leaves, ruled, for keeping accounts.
+The contents include a vast array of practical calculations, 100,000 or
+more in number, arranged for reference like a dictionary, so that a
+farmer or business man may turn to the figures, and find the answer to
+any problem in business.
+
+There are three kinds. We use No. 3. Full leather; assorted colors, with
+flap, slate pocket, and a renewable account book, ruled with divisions
+or headings especially adapted to farmers' use. The retail price of
+this book in leather is $1. We will send it FREE to every
+subscriber to THE PRAIRIE FARMER who sends us $2. Or we will
+send THREE copies of No. 1, the cheaper issue.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+AND YET ANOTHER.
+
+AMERICAN ETIQUETTE AND RULES OF POLITENESS.
+
+It is the latest and best standard work recommended and endorsed by all
+who have read it. The acknowledged authority. Beautifully and
+appropriately illustrated; handsomely and substantially bound. It
+contains 38 chapters, treating on all subjects relating to etiquette. We
+send this book--plain edition, to any subscriber desiring it who sends
+$2.00 for THE PRAIRIE FARMER year, or for two subscribers to
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER at $2 each, we will send American Etiquette
+bound in English cloth, burnished edges.
+
+Our large and varied premium list will be issued in a few days. Send for
+it.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MISCELLANEOUS.
+
+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 THE 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._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CLUB RATES.
+
+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-Second 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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+OUR YOUNG FOLKS
+
+
+A TALK ABOUT THE LION.
+
+
+We wonder how many of THE PRAIRIE FARMER boys and girls have
+seen the lion, "king of beasts," as he is called. Perhaps not all of you
+as yet, though many of you doubtless will as the years roll on--and, by
+the way, you will find that the older you grow the more quickly will
+they speed away. So be careful in this, the beautiful springtime of your
+lives, to so cultivate and make ready the garden of your minds that the
+coming manhood and womanhood may not only find you with well developed
+arms and limbs and muscles, ready to face the world and to help lift
+some of its burdens, but also with a mind that has kept even pace with
+the body--because of constant _growth_.
+
+We think we will have to depart from our usual natural history articles
+some day, and have a talk with the boys and girls on this subject of
+growth--growth in its largest, broadest sense, the mind, soul, and body
+all growing together into the stature of a perfect man.
+
+But to return to the lion. This animal is the largest of the cat family
+and is found, only in Asia and Africa. The Asiatic lion is not so large
+nor so fierce as the African, and has a much smaller mane. The mane of
+the African lion is long and thick, and gives the animal a very noble
+appearance; the female, however, has no mane. The lion is always of one
+color, that is, without spots or stripes, generally tawny, though the
+mane is dark sometimes nearly black. The lion gets its full growth when
+seven or eight years old, and lives usually about twenty-five years,
+though some have been known to live much longer in menageries.
+
+These animals see much better in the night than in the day, so they
+generally hide away during the day and search for food in the gray dawn
+of the morning. They feed chiefly on antelopes, zebras, giraffes, and
+wild cattle. It is said that the lion rarely attacks man, only in cases
+of extreme hunger; indeed, they seem somewhat afraid of man. Dr.
+Livingstone says that when the lion meets a man in daylight it will stop
+two or three seconds to stare at him, then turn slowly round and walk
+off a few steps, looking over its shoulder, then begin to trot, and when
+at last he thinks he is no longer seen will bound away like a hare. The
+Doctor says also, that the roar of the lion is very like the cry of the
+ostrich, but the former roars only at night, however, while the latter
+cries only by day.
+
+Did you not think it wonderful when you saw for the first time, perhaps,
+a keeper walk boldly into the lions' cage, when in their natural state
+they are so very fierce and wild? Well, we think it is wonderful,
+although the keepers tell us that they are easily tamed.
+
+In ancient times they were used in many more ways than they are now.
+Hanno, the Carthaginian general, had a lion to carry his baggage, and
+Mark Antony often rode through the streets of Rome in a chariot drawn by
+lions. A short time ago we read a story of a slave named Androclus, who,
+while hiding away from his master in the deserts of Africa, cured a lion
+of lameness by pulling a thorn out of its foot. The slave was afterward
+caught, carried to Rome, and condemned to be eaten by the wild beasts.
+He was thrown into a lion's den, but the beast, instead of killing him
+fawned upon him and showed the greatest delight at seeing him; Androclus
+was surprised to find that it was the same lion whose foot he had cured
+in the desert. The Emperor, it is said, was so much pleased at the sight
+that he gave the slave his pardon, and presented him also with the lion,
+after which he used to lead the great beast tamely through the streets,
+held simply by a little chain.
+
+In modern times, also, lions have been known to exhibit strong
+friendship for man. In 799, two lions in the Jardin des Plantes (Garden
+of Plants), at Paris, became so fond of their keeper that when he was
+taken sick they gave signs of the greatest sorrow, and when he recovered
+and came back to them they rushed to meet him, roaring with joy,
+meanwhile licking his hands and face.
+
+Perhaps you have read of Theodorus, King of Abyssinia (he killed himself
+in 1868), who used to keep several tame lions in his palace and treated
+them almost like dogs.
+
+Travelers tell us, too, that these great animals often show fondness for
+other animals, as, for instance, an old lioness belonging to the Dublin
+Zoological Gardens was taken sick, and was greatly annoyed by the rats.
+At last a little terrier dog was put into the cage, but was received by
+the lioness with a surly growl; finally when the old animal saw the
+little dog could kill her enemies, the rats, she coaxed him to her, and
+petted and fondled him, so that they soon became great friends.
+
+The lion is a mammal of the order carnivora, or flesh-eating animals.
+
+The word lion comes from the Latin leo, Greek leon, lion.
+
+Would you like me to tell you next week about a bear I saw upon the
+hills of Nova Scotia, near the scene of Longfellow's beautiful
+Evangeline, a few months ago?
+
+MARY HOWE.
+
+
+
+
+A JACK-KNIFE GENIUS.
+
+
+St. Louis Post-Dispatch: William Yohe claims to be the champion
+jack-knife artist of the day, although he was born in St. Louis and not
+Yankeedom. A reporter heard of this professional lacerator of pine
+sticks and sought him out. It was not until the inside of an unused
+Methodist church at Kirkwood, this county, was reached that Mr. Yohe and
+his knife was cornered. The knife was slashing cigar-boxes to pieces at
+railway speed when the reporter opened up with: "Are you the man who
+makes an automatic world's fair and St. Louis Exposition with a knife?"
+
+"No, that isn't what I call it. I am making what I call the Missouri
+Pacific and Strasburg Cathedral Automatic Wonder, with the Golden Ark of
+the Covenant. It will contain over 180,000 pieces and will have 1,100
+moving and working figures."
+
+All around the gaunt and dismantled church were piles of cigar-boxes and
+laths and myriads of nicely-carved pieces of wood, apparently portions
+of models of buildings. The whittler was a small man, with keen eyes and
+ready tongue and about thirty-six years of age. In the course of an
+hour's conversation he said in substance: "I didn't know that I was
+anything extra of a whittler until about 1869, when, in a small way, I
+made some models. I was in Texas working at millwrighting. The first
+large piece I ever made was a model of a Bermuda castle. Afterward I
+made Balmoral Castle, Bingen Castle, Miramar Castle, and the Texas State
+Capitol at Austin. Solomon's Temple contained 12,268 pieces and had
+1,369 windows. It is now on exhibition in Texas. The Austin Capitol
+Building has 62,844 pieces and 561 moving people. Every room and
+department in the building was given, with all the officers and
+legislators. Everybody was represented, down to the man sawing wood in
+the basement for the furnaces. All the figures were moved by a wooden
+engine, which was run by sand falling on an overshot wheel. I made this
+piece at odd moments in 1881.
+
+"I have just hired this church and begun steady work. I shall sleep and
+eat in this church until about May 1, next. The material? Yes, it does
+take considerable. I have already used up 967 cigar boxes and 300 laths.
+It will take in all 1,800 cigar boxes, 500 laths, and 500 feet of
+lumber. The cigar boxes I get for one cent each. I used no tools except
+my knife."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Little Johnny Botts found a garter snake in the park the other
+day and he brought it home and hid it in the piano. When his sister's
+young man opened the instrument that evening to play "For Goodness Sake"
+he thought he had 'em and yelled like a Piute on the war-hath. They
+won't believe in Johnny's innocence somehow, and his father said that
+after dinner he'd attend to his case. When the family sat down to table
+Johnny solemnly entered the room in his stocking feet and carrying a
+pillow which he placed on his chair before sitting down. "What new
+monkey shine is that?" growled old Botts. "S-s-s-h, pa," said Johnny
+anxiously; "I was playing fireworks with Billy Simson this afternoon and
+I swallowed a torpedo." "Did, eh?" "Yes, and if anything should touch me
+kinder hard I might go off and all bust up."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THREE THOUSAND DOLLARS
+
+in prizes is offered by the YOUTH'S COMPANION for the best
+short stories either for boys, for girls, humorous stories, or stories
+of adventure, to be sent them before May 20th, 1884. The terms and
+conditions of the competition are issued in a circular--for which all
+who desire to compete are invited to send.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Sin is very much like the ordinary North American mule. It may
+be very tame and docile at the front, but in the rear there is always a
+sly kick hidden away and you'd better be on your guard.
+
+
+
+
+OUR BOOK TABLE
+
+BOOKS RECEIVED.
+
+
+ARIUS THE LIBYAN: AN IDYL OF THE PRIMITIVE CHURCH. Author unknown. NEW
+YORK: D. Appleton & Co. CHICAGO: Jansen, McClurg & Co. 12mo. Cloth.
+Price, $1.50.
+
+This is a romance of the church in the latter part of the third and the
+beginning of the fourth centuries. The scene is laid near Cyrene, A.D.
+265. It is an exquisitely written idyl of primitive Christian life, and
+can not fail to attract a great deal of attention, especially now that
+the public mind is being turned in the direction of early church
+history. It deals in a powerful, yet simple, manner with that subtle
+question, the Trinity of the Godhead, and gives the reader many new
+thoughts in connection with it. The characters portrayed awaken an
+unusual degree of interest, being as they are, persons eminent in
+history, both secular and religious. As one follows the story to its
+close he can not but agree with the author, that Arius, the hero and
+arch-heretic of the Nicene age, was "one of the grandest, purest, least
+understood, and most systematically misrepresented characters in human
+history." The latter portion of the book brings out, prominently, the
+real character of Constantine, stigmatized by Arius as "that unbaptised
+pagan, the flamen of Jupiter." The noble plan of the book and the grave
+importance of the questions that agitate the characters, combine to make
+it a valuable production to both believer and skeptic.
+
+
+THE ORGANS OF SPEECH. By G.H. Von Meyer, Professor In Ordinary of
+Anatomy at the University of Zurich. NEW YORK: D. Appleton &
+Co. CHICAGO: Jansen, McClurg & Co. 12 mo. Cloth. Price $1.75.
+
+This book is the forty-sixth volume in the international scientific
+series, and needs no better introduction than the well-known name of the
+author. The subject of the organs of speech and their application in the
+formation of articulate sounds is treated in a masterly and exhaustive
+manner. The object of the author has been not merely "to enter into the
+field of discussion upon the various modifications of sounds, * * but to
+bring forward a sufficient number of examples in confirmation of the
+laws explained," in which purpose he has most admirably succeeded. The
+work contains forty-seven wood cuts, and will be a valuable addition to
+any library. We would recommend it especially to teachers of vocal music
+and declamation.
+
+
+FIFTY YEARS' RECOLLECTIONS. By Jeriah Bonham PEORIA, ILL.: J.W.
+Franks & Sons. Sold by subscription.
+
+This is a carefully compiled work, giving the author's observations and
+reflections on the historical events of Illinois for the past fifty
+years, it also gives very interesting and full biographical sketches of
+many of the prominent men who have, during this time, figured in the
+affairs of the State, so far as Mr. Bonham's personal acquaintanceship
+and recollections extend. The sketches, condensed, yet complete, of the
+sixteen Governors of Illinois, from Shadrach Bond, the first Governor,
+down to the present time are especially interesting. The book will be
+enjoyed by the old settlers of the State on account of its personal
+reminiscences, which are all true, not drawn from the imagination.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The Youth's Companion, Boston, is another famous, and deservedly so,
+American juvenile publication. It has attained an immense circulation.
+Among its contributors are a score or more of the most talented American
+authors. It is edited with great care and ability. See advertisement on
+another page.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+From W.D. Hoard, a report of the proceedings of the eleventh annual
+Dairymen's Association of Wisconsin, held at Elk Horn, January 31 and
+February 1-2, 1883. The pamphlet was compiled by D.W. Curtis, Secretary
+of the association, Fort Atkinson, Wis.
+
+The second edition of Bee-Keeping for Profit: A New System of Bee
+Management, by Mrs. Lizzie E. Cotton, West Gorham, Me. Illustrated.
+Price, $1.00.
+
+Seventeenth annual report of the Northwestern Dairymen's Association,
+with addresses and discussions delivered at the meeting held at Mankato,
+Minn., February 14-16, 1883. R.P. McGlincy, Secretary, Elgin, Ill.
+
+The Florida Annual. Edited by C.K. Munroe, 140 Nassau st., New Fork.
+Price, 50 cts.
+
+How to Become a Good Mechanic. The Industrial Publication Co., New York.
+Price, 15 cents.
+
+Tennessee Crop Report for November, 1883, with the report of the
+Tennessee Weather Service. 49 South Market st., Nashville, Tenn.
+
+From C.V. Riley, Bulletin No. 3 of U.S. Department of Agriculture:
+Division of Entomology. Contains reports of observations and experiments
+in the practical work of the Division, made under the direction of the
+entomologist. With plates.
+
+Landreth's Rural Register and Almanac. Philadelphia, Penn.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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:
+
+CATTLE.
+
+Jersey.
+
+Mills, Charles F.....................Springfield, Illinois
+
+HORSES.
+
+Clydesdales.
+
+Mills, Charles F.....................Springfield, Illinois
+
+SWINE.
+
+Berkshire.
+
+Mills, Charles F.....................Springfield, Illinois
+
+Chester Whites.
+
+W.A. Gilbert......................Wauwatosa Wis.
+
+SHEEP.
+
+Cotswold.
+
+Mills, Charles F. ............. Springfield, Illinois
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+LIVE STOCK, Etc.
+
+DR. W.A. PRATT.
+
+IMPORTER AND BREEDER OF
+
+THOROUGHBRED HOLSTEIN CATTLE
+
+100 head on hand Oct. 1st.
+
+DR. W.A. PRATT, Elgin, Ill.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+80 CARDS
+
+BEST QUALITY.
+
+New designs in Satin and Gold finish, with name, 10 cts. We offer $100
+for a pack of cards any nicer work, or prettier styles.
+
+_Samples free._ Eagle Card Works, New Haven, Ct.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MISCELLANEOUS.
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FAY GRAPES
+
+CURRANT
+
+HEADQUARTERS
+
+ALL BEST NEW AND OLD.
+
+SMALL FRUITS AND TREES. LOW TO DEALERS AND PLANTERS.
+STOCK First-Class. Free Catalogues. GEO. S. JOSSELYN, Fredonia, N.Y.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+LITERATURE
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+ROBIN, DEAR ROBIN!
+
+
+    Robin, dear Robin, could you come back to me,
+      Back to the hame you'll never mair see,
+    Could you sit down at evening and crack wi' me,
+      Oh, what a proud, happy woman I'd be!
+    On the white hearth the fire should burn clearly,
+      Nothing of comfort or rest you should lack,
+    And I would always be kindly and cheery,
+      Could you come back to me--could you come back.
+
+    Oh, Robin, Robin, I've miss'd you fu' sairly,
+      Morning, and evening, and a' the day long;
+    Many have treated me unca unfairly:
+      O for your arm so tender and strong:
+    If once again in your love I could hide me,
+      Little I'd care though all else I should lack
+    Sairly I'm needing your wisdom to guide me,
+      Oh, my lost darling, if you could come back!
+
+    Never again with frowns would I greet you;
+      Never again to your love be unkind;
+    Ever with kisses and smiles I would meet you;
+      Oh, in the days that are gone I was blind!
+    Oh, I was selfish, and foolish, and fretful,
+      Now I remember--remember in vain;
+    But I would never be cross or forgetful,
+      Could you come back to me, darling, again!
+
+    No, you will never come back to me--never!
+      But I shall come to you, Robin, some day.
+    Then you will ken a' my loving endeavor,
+      Just to grow better since you went away.
+    Yes, you will ken, in that happy to-morrow,
+      I hae been true to you, darling--sae true!
+    Asked my heart always, in joy or in sorrow,
+      "Will it please Robin, the thing that I do?"
+
+    Oh, in that wonderfu', wonderfu' meeting,
+      What shall I say to him? what will he say?
+    We shallna weary life's story repeating,
+      Seeing the end o' the sorrowfu' way.
+    With such a hope, then, how could I say truly,
+      "Robin, dear Robin, come back unto me!"
+    Heart, answer the thought sae wild and unruly,
+      "Robin, dear Robin, I shall come unto thee!"
+
+--_Harper's Weekly._
+
+
+
+
+MRS. WIMBUSH'S REVENGE.
+
+(_Concluded from last week._)
+
+
+It was a large picnic party. Mr. Charles Brookshank had drawn Mrs.
+Wimbush's arm through his own, and strolled away from the rest.
+
+"How delightful it would be if one could know the language of birds, as
+folks did in the old Hindu fairy tales! Would it not, Mr. Brookshank?"
+
+"My dear Mrs. Wimbush, they do nothing the whole day long but make love
+and cry 'Sweet, sweet!' I would I were a bird, to make love in music."
+
+The widow sighed, but it was more like a purr of pleasure.
+
+"What did I know of love till you came here?" continued Mr. Charles.
+"Absolutely nothing--except," he added, with reservation, "in a
+professional way. And then we lawyers generally see the dark side of the
+picture--the damages and the decrees nisi. But your visit has brightened
+my whole life. O Mrs. Wimbush, you can not have been blind to my secret!
+You have seen it written legibly in my face, and have not interposed to
+check its development. I see you understand me, just as by intuitive
+fine feeling you can penetrate the meaning of Mendelssohn's Songs
+without Words. Mrs. Wimbush, you have already far advanced toward
+learning the birds' language. I may rely upon your consent?"
+
+"Charles, this happiness is indeed too much," ejaculated the widow.
+
+"You need never be separated from your daughter Carry. A home for one is
+a home for both; and I will cherish her while I live."
+
+"But, Charles dear, she may marry."
+
+"Marry, ma'am? Bless my soul, of course she will! She will marry me! She
+has said so, don't you see?"
+
+Mrs. Wimbush never said another word, but fell flat down upon the grass.
+
+"What on earth has got the woman?" thought Mr. Charles. "She couldn't
+have taken it worse if I had proposed to murder her daughter."
+
+In their walk they had strayed through the trees close to the outskirts
+of another picnic party. Mr. Charles immediately ran to ask some fair
+volunteer to come to the assistance of Mrs. Wimbush, who had fainted. At
+hearing the name, an active middle-aged lady sprang up and followed him.
+It was Mrs. Marrables. The sight of her mother brought Mrs. Wimbush
+round quicker than any smelling bottle could have done. She sat up.
+
+"Mother, Mr. Brookshank; Mr. Brookshank, my mother, Mrs. Marrables."
+They bowed. "Have the goodness to leave us together, Mr. Charles." He
+bowed and obeyed. "Mother," said Mrs. Wimbush, "what on earth brought
+you here? I thought you were at Taunton."
+
+"No, dear. I have been at Bournemouth three weeks, I came merely for
+change. Only last week I heard of your being here, and should have
+called, but have been so much occupied, and I felt sure of meeting you
+somewhere, and thought the surprise might be the more agreeable. We've
+had a most delightful picnic with the Mount Stewart folks. But what was
+all this fainting about? One would think Mr. Brookshank had been
+proposing to you."
+
+"He certainly made me a proposal mother, but I was quite unprepared for
+it, and was overcome."
+
+"What an imaginative and sensitive-minded girl you must be, Matilda! You
+make me feel quite young. When will you be old enough to attend to
+business? You will accept him, of course? Well, do as you please; you
+may reckon on my consent, you know. But I must get back to my party, and
+perhaps you had better rejoin yours. Ta-ta."
+
+Jilted for her daughter! It wasn't pleasant. When Mrs. Wimbush got home,
+she blew up Carry for being so sly.
+
+"Well, mamma," said Carry, "of course I thought you knew all about it. I
+never made any secret of the affair. I knew very well that you had
+rejected Mr. Tom, but I could not possibly suppose that was any reason
+why I should refuse Charles. Of course he is older than I am, but he is
+only five-and-thirty, and has a good position; and I am sure we shall
+always give you a welcome; Charles said so."
+
+"Well," thought Mrs. Wimbush, "he has money, and it will be all in the
+family; that's at least a comfort."
+
+The effect of the little episode of the last chapter was that the
+brothers were made friends, and Tom recovered his spirits, and could
+laugh heartily at what he had before supposed was his brother's rivalry.
+
+Mrs. Wimbush repented her that she had rejected Mr. Tom. Her repentance
+produced a salutary desire on her part to make atonement for the past.
+She would have him yet. When a widow says so much as that about a man,
+let him 'ware hawk.
+
+A month went by, and behold Mrs Wimbush and Mr. Tom Brookshank seated
+tete-a-tete at an evening party, where the music which was going on was
+sufficiently loud to render private conversation inaudible save to those
+to whom it was addressed.
+
+"I fear," said the widow, affecting an absent manner, "I treated you
+very unkindly, Mr. Tom. You took me so entirely by surprise, that,
+really, I--hardly know what I said. I have been very unhappy about
+it--very."
+
+"Forgotten and forgiven," whispered Mr. Tom.
+
+"How generous of you! you make me so glad! because now that your brother
+Charles is going to marry my daughter, we shall be in some sort related,
+and I could not bear you to think unkindly of me."
+
+"No," said Mr. Tom, fidgeting a little, "I shall never do that."
+
+"How droll!" said the widow. "Let me see, what will the relationship be?
+You will be my son-in-law's brother, and consequently I shall be your
+mother-in-law once removed. You will have a mother younger than
+yourself, Mr. Tom. I hope you will not presume upon her youth to be a
+bad boy."
+
+"All this is very true," he answered; "but I see the relationship in a
+far different light. I shall be your father-in-law, and consequently my
+own brother's grandfather-in-law."
+
+"You mistake, Mr. Tom. Don't you see that Carry--"
+
+"No mistake at all about it, ma'am, for I've promised to marry your
+mother, Mrs. Marrables!"
+
+"Monster!" cried Mrs. Wimbush aloud, and went off shrieking.
+
+The music stopped, and there was a great fuss. But above all the others
+was heard the voice of Mrs. Marrables. "Don't be alarmed, pray. She is
+subject to it; she went off just like that the other day at a picnic.
+Poor young thing, a very little upsets her. Let me come to my little
+gu-url, then."
+
+They moved her into another room. Presently Mrs. Wimbush opened her
+eyes. "Mother! how dare you come near me! Go away, do! You ought to be
+ashamed of yourself, at your time of life!"
+
+"My time of life! Why, I'm only fifty-four--about ten years older than
+Tom. How can you talk so to your mother!"
+
+"Mother, if you don't leave the room, I will. It's really disreputable
+to have you for a mother. You've never done me any credit."
+
+"My dear, I am so glad to think you feel well enough to leave the room
+that I will remain."
+
+Mrs. Wimbush got up and went home.
+
+Jilted, first for her daughter, and next for her mother! This was too
+much. Mrs. Wimbush went to church as regularly as any one, but revenge,
+after all, is very sweet.
+
+Six weeks afterward Mrs. Wimbush recovered sufficient fortitude to go
+and call on her mother.
+
+"Well, child, I'm glad you are going to be friendly; there is nothing
+like harmony in a family circle. Let us consider the relationships into
+which we are about to enter, that we may rightly judge of our
+responsibilities and duties. I and my granddaughter are going to marry
+two brothers--the consequence is, she and I will be sisters-in-law. But
+as you are mother of my sister-in-law, you will nearly be my
+mother-in-law, which is a very singular relationship for a daughter to
+sustain toward her mother, especially when she is not the wife of one's
+father-in-law. Now, as"--
+
+"Wait a moment, dear mamma; I've news for you; I'm going to marry old
+Unguent! Old Mr. Brookshank has asked me to be his wife, and I've
+consented. The consequence is, I shall be head of the family, and
+bona-fide mother-in-law to you all. I don't think we need trouble about
+harmony, for we shall be a united family, more so than any I know of."
+
+Before her marriage, Mrs. Marrables set to work to draw up a table of
+the relationships involved by the three weddings. It is an extensive
+work in three volumes, and when our readers see The Brookshank Family
+advertised, they will know what it means.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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   4 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 00
+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                        3 75   3 00
+Weekly Novelist                          5 00   4 25
+Ledger (Chicago)                         3 00   2 90
+
+
+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                    6 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
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+NOW Is the time to Subscribe for THE PRAIRIE FARMER. Price only
+$2.00 per year. It is worth double the money.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+FREE! FREE!!
+TO ANY ADDRESS IN THE WORLD!
+
+"THE RED RIVER VALLEY" "ILLUSTRATED."
+
+AN ELEGANT EIGHT-PAGE PAPER
+
+Full of the Most Desirable Information.
+Send for "Publication P" to
+
+JAMES B. POWER, LAND COM'R
+St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba Ry.,
+St. PAUL. MINNESOTA
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MAPS.
+
+RAND, McNALLY & CO.'S
+NEW RAILROAD
+--AND--
+COUNTY MAP
+--OF THE--
+UNITED STATES
+--AND--
+DOMINION OF CANADA.
+
+Size, 4 x 2-1/2 feet, mounted on rollers to hang on the wall. This is an
+
+ENTIRELY NEW MAP,
+
+Constructed from the most recent and authentic sources.
+
+--IT SHOWS--
+_ALL THE RAILROADS,_
+--AND--
+EVERY COUNTY AND PRINCIPAL TOWN
+--IN THE--
+UNITED STATES AND CANADA.
+
+A useful Map in every one's home, and place of business. PRICE, $2.00.
+
+Agents wanted, to whom liberal inducements will be given. Address
+
+RAND, McNALLY & CO.,
+Chicago, Ill.
+
+By arrangements with the publishers of this Map we are enabled to make
+the following liberal offer: To each person who will remit us $2.25 we
+will send copy of THE PRAIRIE FARMER One Year and THIS MAP
+POSTPAID. Address
+
+PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO.,
+CHICAGO, ILL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+DRAINAGE.
+
+PRACTICAL FARM DRAINAGE.
+
+WHY, WHEN, and HOW TO TILE-DRAIN
+--AND THE--
+MANUFACTURE OF DRAIN-TILE.
+
+By C.G. ELLOITT and J.J.W. BILLINGSLEY
+
+PRICE, ONE DOLLAR.
+
+For sale by
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO.,
+150 Monroe St., Chicago, Ill.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE SHEPHERD'S MANUAL
+A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE SHEEP.
+
+Designed Especially for American Shepherds
+BY HENRY STEWART.
+
+Finely Illustrated
+
+PRICE, $1.50, by mail, postpaid. Address
+
+PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING CO., Chicago.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+HUMOUROUS
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+THE CARPENTER'S WOOING.
+
+    "Oh, beam my life, my awl to me!"
+      He cried, his flame addressing--
+    "If I 'adze such a love as yours,
+      I'd ask no other blessing!"
+    "I am rejoist to hear you speak,"
+      The maiden said with laughter--
+    "For tho' I hammer guileless girl,
+      It's plane what you are rafter.
+    Now if file love you just a bit,
+      What further can you ax me?
+    Can--will you be content with that,
+      Or will you further tacks me?"
+    He looked handsaw her words were square--
+      "No rival can displace me--
+    Yes, one more favor I implore,
+      And that is, dear Em, brace me!"
+
+    She came full chisel to his arms;
+      It really made him stair
+    To have her make a bolt for him
+      Before he could prepare.
+    He tried to screw his courage up,
+      And did his level best
+    To nail the matter then and there,
+      While clasped unto her breast.
+    Says he: "It augers well for me,
+      All seems to hinge on this;
+    And, what is mortise plane to see
+      The porch child wants a kiss."
+    He kissed her lip, he kissed her cheek,
+      And called her his adoored--
+    He dons his claw-hammer next week,
+      And she will share his board.
+
+_--Detroit Free Press._
+
+
+
+
+WHERE THE OLD MAIDS COME IN.
+
+
+"Do you know, sir," inquired an American tourist of his companion, while
+doing England, "can you inform me the reason for the fresh, healthful
+appearance of the English people? Their complexion is far superior to
+ours, or our countrymen over the herring pond."
+
+"Well, I know what Prof. Huxley says."
+
+"And what reason does he advance?"
+
+"Well, Huxley says it is owing to the old maids."
+
+"Owing to old maids! You surprise me."
+
+"Fact. Huxley figures it out this way. Now, you know the English are
+very fond of roast beef."
+
+"But what has that to do with old maids?"
+
+"Go slow. This genuine English beef is the best and most nutritious beef
+in the world, and it imparts a beautiful complexion."
+
+"Well, about the old maids?"
+
+"Yes, you see the excellence of this English beef is due exclusively to
+red clover. Do you see the point?"
+
+"All but the old maids. They are still hovering in the shadows."
+
+"Why, don't you see? This red clover is enriched, sweetened, and
+fructified by bumble bees."
+
+"But where do the old maids come in?" said the inquisitive American,
+wiping his brow wearily.
+
+"Why, it is as plain as the nose on your face. The only enemy of the
+bumble bee is the field-mouse."
+
+"But what have roast beef, red clover, bumble-bees, and field-mice got
+to do with old maids?"
+
+"Why, you must be very obtuse. Don't you perceive that the bumble-bees
+would soon become exterminated by the field-mice if it were not for--"
+
+"Old maids?"
+
+"No, if it were not for cats, the old maids of Old England keep the
+country thoroughly stocked up with cats, and so we can directly trace
+the effects of the rosy English complexions to the benign cause of
+English old maids, at least that's what Huxley says about it, and that's
+just where the old maids come in. Science makes clear many mysterious
+things."
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+"Those picture cards I brought back from Boston," remarked Mrs.
+Partington, in a pensive mood. "They are momentums of the Art Loan
+Imposition."
+
+Don't give up in despair, girls. Naomi didn't marry until she was five
+hundred and eighty years old--and then she was sorry she hadn't waited a
+century longer.
+
+"Is you gwine to get an overcoat this winter?" asked a darkey of a
+companion. "Well I dunno how dat's gwine to be," was the reply. "I'se
+done got my eye on a coat, but de fellah dat owns it keeps his eye on it
+too."
+
+Her nephew had just come home from his day school. "What have you been
+learning this morning?" asked Mrs. Ramsbottom. "Mythology, aunt,"
+answered the little man, "all about the heathen gods and goddesses."
+"Then I must brush up my memory," said Mrs. Ramsbottom, "and ask you a
+question or two. Now, first, who was Juniper?"
+
+"What is a limited monarchy, Johnny?" "Well, my idea of a
+limited monarchy is, where the ruler don't have much to rule." "Give an
+example?" "An example! Lemme see! Well, if you was bossin' yourself, for
+instance."
+
+It was at the close of the wedding breakfast. One of the guests
+arose, and, glass in hand, said: "I drink to the health of the
+bridegroom. May he see many days like this." The intention was good, but
+the bride looked as though something had displeased her.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ILLINOIS CENTRAL RAILROAD.
+
+The elegant equipment of coaches and sleepers being added to its various
+through routes is gaining it many friends. Its patrons fear no
+accidents. Its perfect track of steel, and solid road-bed, are a
+guarantee against them.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+AND
+
+YOUTH'S COMPANION
+
+One year, $3 for the two.
+
+It is not required that both papers be sent to one address, nor to the
+same post-office.
+
+Address PRAIRIE FARMER PUB CO.,
+150 Monroe Street. 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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+AGENTS WANTED, Male and Female, for Spence's Blue Book, a most
+fascinating and salable novelty. Every family needs from one to a dozen.
+Immense profits and exclusive territory. Sample mailed for 25 cts in
+postage stamps. Address J.H. CLARSON, P.O. Box 2296, Philadelphia, Pa.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+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, LEUCORRHOEA, 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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER is the Cheapest and Best Agricultural Paper
+published. Only $2.00 per year.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+SCALES.
+
+U.S. STANDARD SCALES,
+MANUFACTURED EXPRESSLY FOR
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER
+
+_Every Scale Guaranteed by the Manufacturers, and by Us, to be Perfect,
+and to give the Purchaser Satisfaction._
+
+The PRAIRIE FARMER Sent Two Years Free
+
+To any person ordering either size Wagon Scale at prices given below.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+2-Ton Wagon or Farm Scale (Platform 6 x 12 feet), $35; 3-Ton (7 x 13),
+$45; 5-Ton (8 x 14), $55. Beam Box, Brass Beam, Iron Levers, Steel
+Bearings, and full directions for setting up.
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER SENT 1 YEAR FREE!
+
+To any person ordering either of the following Scales, at prices named
+below.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The Housekeeper's Scale--$4.00
+
+Weighing accurately from 1/4 oz. to 25 lbs. This is also a valuable
+Scale for Offices for Weighing Mail Matter. Tin Scoop, 50c. extra; Brass
+75c. extra.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The Family Scale--$7.00.
+
+Weighs from 1/4 oz. to 240 lbs. Small articles weighed in Scoop, large
+ones on Platform. Size of Platform, 10-1/2 x 13-1/2 in.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+The Prairie Farmer Scale--$10.00
+
+Weighs from 2 oz. to 320 lbs. Size of Platform 14 x 19 inches. A
+convenient Scale for Small Farmers, Dairymen, etc.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Platform Scales--4 Sizes.
+400 lbs., $15; 600 lbs., $20; 900 lbs., $24; 1,200 lbs., $28; Wheels and
+Axles, $2 extra.
+
+In ordering, give the Price and Description given above. All Scales
+Boxed and Delivered at Depot in Chicago. Give full shipping directions.
+Send money by Draft on Chicago or New York Post Office Order or
+Registered Letter. Address
+
+THE PRAIRIE FARMER PUBLISHING COMPANY, CHICAGO, ILL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+MISCELLANEOUS
+
+[Illustration]
+
+THE STANDARD REMINGTON TYPE-WRITER is acknowledged to be the only
+rapid and reliable writing machine. It has no rival. These machines are
+used for transcribing and general correspondence in every part of the
+globe, doing their work in almost every language. Any young man or woman
+of ordinary ability, having a practical knowledge of the use of this
+machine may find constant and remunerative employment. All machines and
+supplies, furnished by us, warranted. Satisfaction guaranteed or money
+refunded. Send for circulars. WYCKOFF, SEAMANS & BENEDICT, 38 East
+Madison St, Chicago, Ill.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+GIVEN AWAY $10,000 IN PREMIUMS TO AGENTS Ladies or Gentlemen, selling
+our NEW BOOK For particulars write for Circular C. RAND, McNALLY & CO.,
+CHICAGO.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+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.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+GENERAL NEWS.
+
+
+The Emma Bond case has been given to the jury.
+
+Queen Victoria will go to Baden Baden in February.
+
+The war feeling in France against China is increasing.
+
+Four colored men were lynched at Yazoo, Miss., on Saturday
+last.
+
+Serious trouble is threatened between the Orangemen and the
+Catholics of Ireland.
+
+The works of the Lambert & Smith Wire Fence Company, at Joliet,
+Ill., burned last week.
+
+Mr. Villard is sick from nervous prostration. Rumor says he is
+financially embarrassed.
+
+It is expected that the Directors of the Suez Canal Company
+will pay a dividend of 18 per cent this year.
+
+John D. Leslie, a grain-dealer of Elkhart, Indiana, was ruined
+by handling corn which failed to pass inspection.
+
+Gen. Grant fell upon the sidewalk in New York, the other day,
+and hurt his hip severely. He is recovering.
+
+N.G. Ordway, Governor of Dakota, is charged with accepting
+bribes in making appointments of County Commissioners.
+
+Holloway, the great pill man of England, is said to be worth
+$25,000,000. He spends $250,000 per year in advertising.
+
+The extensive sewerage system which Boston has been several
+years in constructing is at last finished, at a cost of $4,500,000.
+
+Bradner Smith & Co, and the National Printing Company, Chicago,
+were partially burned out on Sunday. Loss about $200,000.
+
+Among the distinguished dead of the year may be mentioned
+Chambord, Gambetta, Gortschakoff, Alexander H. Stephens, Karl Marx,
+Schultze-Delitzsche, Turgeneff, and Prof. Anthon.
+
+It is reported that the Salters' Company, one of the largest
+and most successful of the London guilds, has decided to dispose of its
+Irish lands, and is now offering them to tenants on twenty years' time.
+
+During the year 1883, up to the close of business Saturday
+night, 7,243,969 gallons of spirits were produced in the Chicago
+distilleries. The total receipts of internal revenue in the first
+district of Illinois for the year were $8,774,890.
+
+The outcry over the houses of the poor has spread to Paris.
+Alarming statistics are published of the increase of overcrowding and
+the consequent spread of disease, and no less than 650 schemes of reform
+have been presented to the Municipal Council. The deaths between 1870
+and 1883 have increased per 100,000 inhabitants from 48 to 96 in
+typhoid-fever, from 53 to 101 in diphtheria, from 11 to 74 in small-pox,
+from 30 to 43 in measles, and from 7 to 18 in scarlet-fever.
+
+Alarm has been created in French commercial circles by rumors
+that the American Congress will make reprisals for the prohibition by
+France of the importation of American salted meats by passing a law
+increasing the duties on French wines or providing for the seizure of
+French adulterations. The National, of Paris, says: "France must expect
+that the Reprisals bill now before Congress, which was first directed
+against Germany, will now be turned against France."
+
+P.T. Barnum has just made his will. In order that there might
+be no question as to his sanity upon which to ground contests after his
+death, he had eminent physicians examine him, and secured their
+attestation that he was of sound mind. The will and its codicils cover
+more than 700 pages of legal cap, closely written, and disposes of real
+estate and personal property of the value of $10,000,000 to twenty-seven
+heirs. The property is in New York, Brooklyn, Bridgeport, Colorado, and
+several other places. Mr. Barnum values his interest in the Barnum and
+London Shows at $3,500,000. He gives largely to charitable institutions.
+
+The number of lives lost by the more noticeable accidents of
+last year give a total of 125,000, or over 342 for each of the 365 days
+of 1883. These colossal figures are attained principally through the
+results of three calamities--Ischia, Java, and Syria. Aside from the
+earthquakes the year was unequaled in shipwrecks, cyclones, fire-scenes,
+and mining horrors. Over thirty people were killed for each day in
+January, the Newhall fire, the Russian circus horror, and the Cimbria
+shipwreck being the principal of thirty calamities during the month.
+Three hundred and ninety-eight people went down in the Cimbria alone.
+Two hundred and seventy people burned in the circus at Berditcheff. The
+panic later on at Sunderland, England, caused the death of 197 children
+and 150 workmen were drowned like rats in the tub called the Daphne on
+the Clyde. There were 1,697 murders, 107 executions, 135 lynchings, and
+727 suicides.
+
+
+
+
+MARKETS
+
+MARKET REPORTS.
+
+
+OFFICE OF THE PRAIRIE FARMER,
+CHICAGO. Jan. 2, 1884.
+
+
+FINANCIAL AND COMMERCIAL.
+
+The general bank business of Chicago last week was rather dull. But few
+new business contracts were made as everyone was waiting for the New
+Year to begin before extending business.
+
+In the loan market money was quoted throughout the week at 6@7 per cent
+interest.
+
+Eastern exchange opened Saturday at 25c off between banks, but
+subsequently sales were made at 25c per $1,000 premium. The market
+closed at 25@30c per $1,000 premium.
+
+Railway stocks in New York with the exception of Northern Pacific were
+firm on Saturday.
+
+Government securities remain unchanged at last week's quotations.
+
+4's coupons. 1907              Q. Apr.      123
+4's reg., 1907                 Q. Apr.      122
+4-1/2's coupon, 1891           Q. Mar.      114
+4-1/2's registered, 1891       Q. Mar.      114
+3's registered                 Q. Mar.      100
+
+
+GRAIN AND PROVISIONS.
+
+More was done on the Board of Trade in corn and hog products at the
+close of the week than in wheat and other grains. The bears had
+decidedly the best of it on Saturday. Wheat receipts were liberal and
+everybody seemed willing to sell. Outside orders to purchase were
+exceedingly light. There were many transactions in corn but prices
+showed a gradual decline.
+
+FLOUR was quiet at about the following rates.
+
+Choice to favorite white winters              $5 25@5 50
+Fair to good brands of white winters           4 75@5 00
+Good to choice red winters                     5 00@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 75@5 25
+Choice to fancy Minnesota springs              5 50@5 75
+Patent springs                                 6 50@7 00
+Low grades                                     2 25@3 50
+
+WHEAT.--Red winter, No. 2 99@95c: car lots of spring, No. 2, sold at
+93-3/4@97-3/4c; No. 3, do, 77-1/2@81c.
+
+CORN.--Fluctuating but active. Car lots No 2, 57-3/4@58c; rejected,
+46-1/2; new mixed, 48@48-1/4c.
+
+OATS.--No. 2 in store, closed 32@33.
+
+RYE.--May, in store 54@59.
+
+BARLEY.--No. 2, 66@67c; No. 3, 44c.
+
+FLAX.--Closed at $1 41.
+
+TIMOTHY.--$1 23 per bushel. Little doing.
+
+CLOVER.--Quiet at $5 90@6 15 for prime.
+
+PROVISIONS.--Mess pork, January $14 02-1/2 per bbl; May, $14 52. Green
+hams, 8-3/8c. per lb. Short ribs, $7 40 per cwt.
+
+LARD.--January, $8 75; February, $9 07-1/2.
+
+
+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.
+
+BEANS.--Hand picked mediums $2 10@2 15. Hand picked navies. $2 20@2 25.
+
+BUTTER.--Dull and without change. Choice to extra creamery, 32@35c per
+lb.; fair to good do 26@30c; fair to choice dairy, 25@30c; common to
+choice packing stock fresh and sweet, 20@25c; ladle packed 10@13c; fresh
+made, streaked butter, 9@11c.
+
+BRAN.--Quoted at $11 87-1/2@13 50 per ton; extra choice $13.
+
+CHEESE.--Choice full-cream cheddars 12-1/2@13c per lb; medium quality do
+9@10c; good to prime full cream flats 13@13-3/4c; skimmed cheddars
+9@10c; good skimmed flats 6@7c; hard-skimmed and common stock 3@4c.
+
+EGGS.--In a small way the best brands are quotable at 26@27c per dozen;
+24@25c for good ice house stock; 16@20c per pickled.
+
+HAY.--No 1 timothy $8 50@9 50 per ton; No 2 do $7 50@8 00; mixed do
+$6 50; upland prairie $8 00@9 50; No 1 prairie $5 50@6 50; No 2 do
+$4 50@5. Small bales sell at 25@50c per ton more than large bales.
+
+HIDES AND PELTS.--Green-cured light hides 8c per lb; do heavy cows 8c;
+No 2 damaged green-salted hides 6c; green-salted calf 12@12-1/2 cents;
+green-salted bull 6 c; dry-salted hides 11 cents; No. 2 two-thirds
+price; No. 1 dry flint 14@14-1/2c. 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 22@26c per lb; Pacific coast
+of 23@26c; fair to good Wisconsin 15@20c: Wisconsin 1882's 8@12c.
+
+POULTRY.--Prices for live lots were: Turkeys 12@13c per lb; chickens,
+7@8c; ducks 8@10c per lb.; geese 8@10c per lb. for full feathered.
+Dressed turkeys sell at 1@2c per lb more than live offerings.
+
+POTATOES.--Good to choice 35@40c per bu. on track; common to fair
+25@30c. Illinois sweet potatoes range at $3@3 50 per bbl for yellow.
+Baltimore stock at $2 25@2 75, and Jerseys at $5. Red are dull and
+nominal.
+
+TALLOW AND GREASE.--No 1 country tallow 7@7-1/4c per lb; No 2 do
+6-1/4@6-1/2c. Prime white grease 6@6-1/2c; yellow 5-1/4@5-3/4c; brown
+4-1/2@5.
+
+VEGETABLES.--Cabbage, $8@12 per 100; celery, 35@40c per per doz bunches;
+onions, $1 00@1 25 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                            27,295     11,368
+Hogs                              89,505     22,450
+Sheep                              9,417      4,856
+
+CATTLE.--The above figures show a falling off of 18,850 head from the
+previous week's receipts. This contraction on the part of shippers is
+said to have been on account of advice from the commission men who argue
+that the unusual demand during Christmas week following the previous
+large supply would not be very large. Dressed-beef operators bought
+freely and there was a general advance in prices. The quality of the
+beef was not first-class. The highest price paid for the best was $6 65
+per cwt. Sales were principally at $5@6. Common lots brought $4 25@4 95.
+Some poor ones went at $4. Cows for butchers sold at $3@4, and inferior
+lots at $2@2 90. Bulls brought from $2 to $4 75. A few car loads of
+Texans sold at $3 50@4 50 per cwt. Veal calves brought $4@7 for 100 lbs.
+Milch cows were lower as the supply has been large. There was a falling
+off of about $10 per head; they sold for $25 to 55 per head.
+
+HOGS.--During the past week they formed a strong combination to break
+the market, all the 20 packing houses doing business here agreeing to
+buy only a stipulated number of hogs each day. The plan worked as was
+anticipated, and although the receipts for the week dropped to 89,000
+against 187,470 during the previous week, there was a steady decline
+from day to day. Shippers were good buyers, taking on an average 5,500
+hogs daily, but city packers bought only about 11,000 or 12,000, leaving
+at times upwards of 28,000 or 30,000 unsold at the close of the day.
+Choice hogs declined only moderately, but other descriptions were very
+weak. Up to date there have been packed in the West this season about
+100,000 head more than to same time last year. The market closed on
+Saturday at $4 65@5 90 for heavy; $4 60@5 30 for light, and $3 25@4 60
+for skips and culls.
+
+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 1-1/2c per lb for
+weights of 200 and over and [Transcriber's Note: blank in original] for
+weights of less than 100 lbs.
+
+SHEEP.--The demand has been brisk and prices for good lots advanced
+fully 25c per cwt. The receipts have fallen off greatly. Sales were made
+of common to choice at $2 50@4 65. No fancy droves were received, and
+they were nominal at $4 75@5.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+COMMISSION MERCHANTS.
+
+J.H. WHITE & CO.,
+PRODUCE COMMISSION
+
+106 S. Water St., Chicago.
+
+Refers to this paper.
+
+
+
+MISCELLANEOUS.
+
+
+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.
+
+
+
+CHEAP FARMS.
+
+NEAR MARKETS.
+
+The State of Michigan has more than 4,500 miles of railroad and 1,600
+miles of Lake transportation, schools and churches in every county,
+public buildings all paid for, and no debt. Its soil and climate combine
+to produce large crops, and it is the best fruit State in the Northwest.
+Several million acres of unoccupied and fertile lands are yet in the
+market at low prices. The State has issued a NEW PAMPHLET containing a
+map and descriptions of the soil, crops and general resources of _every
+county_ in the State, which may be had free of charge by writing to the
+
+COMM'R OF IMMIGRATION, Detroit. Mich.
+
+
+
+MONEY TO LOAN TO FARMERS
+
+in Illinois on Mortgage security at 6 per cent interest, with privilege
+of yearly payments. Call on or address
+
+BURNHAM, TREVETT & MATTIS,
+Champaign, Ill.
+
+
+
+PATENT Procured or no charge. 40 p. book patent-law free. Add.
+W.T. FITZGERALD, 1006 F St., Washington, D.C.
+
+
+
+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.
+
+
+
+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.
+
+  BUIST'S
+  SEEDS
+  ARE THE BEST.
+
+WARRANTED TO GIVE SATISFACTION OR MONEY RETURNED, SPECIAL-INDUCEMENTS
+FOR MARKET GARDENERS. OUR VALUABLE CATALOGUE OF 192 PAGES FREE TO ALL.
+
+  SEED GROWER
+  ROBERT BUIST, JR.
+  PHILADELPHIA, PA.
+
+
+
+"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.
+
+
+
+[Illustration: FERRY'S SEED ANNUAL FOR 1884]
+
+Will be mailed FREE TO ALL applicants and to customers of last year
+without ordering it. It contains illustrations, prices, descriptions and
+directions for planting all Vegetable and Flower Seeds, Plants, etc.
+INVALUABLE TO ALL.
+
+D.M. FERRY & CO.
+DETROIT, Mich.
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+LYON & HEALY
+State & Monroe Sts., Chicago.
+
+Will send prepaid to any address their
+
+BAND CATALOGUE,
+
+for 1883, 600 pages, 210 Engravings of Instruments, Suits, Caps, Belts,
+Pompons, Epaulets, Cap-Lamps, Stands, Drum Major's Staffs, and Hats,
+Sundry Band Outfits, Repairing Materials, also includes Instruction and
+Exercises for Amateur Bands, and a Catalogue of Choice Band Music.
+
+
+
+KNABE PIANOFORTES.
+
+UNEQUALLED IN
+Tone, Touch, Workmanship and Durability.
+
+WILLIAM KNABE & CO.
+Nos. 204 and 206 West Baltimore Street,
+Baltimore. No. 112 Fifth Avenue, N.Y.
+
+
+
+AGENTS make over ONE hundred per cent. profit selling the
+
+REFLECTING SAFETY LAMP
+
+which can be sold in every family. Gives more light than three ordinary
+lamps. SAMPLE LAMP SENT FOR FIFTY CENTS IN STAMPS. We have other
+household articles. Send for circulars.
+
+FORSEE & MCMAKIN, CINCINNATI, O.
+
+
+
+SEEDS! PLANTS--Catalogue Free.
+
+A.E. SPALDING,
+AINSWORTH, IOWA.
+
+
+
+PIG EXTRICATOR
+
+To aid animals in giving birth. Send for free circular to WM. DULIN,
+Avoca, Pottawattamie Co., Ia.
+
+
+
+FREE
+
+_By return mail_, Full Description MOODY'S NEW TAILOR SYSTEM of Dress
+Cutting MOODY & CO. CINCINNATI, O.
+
+
+
+CARDS
+
+50 SATIN FINISH CARDS, New Imported designs, name on and Present Free
+for 10c. Cut this out. CLINTON BROS. & Co., Clintonville, Ct.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 1,
+January 5, 1884., by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRAIRIE FARMER ***
+
+***** This file should be named 17512.txt or 17512.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/5/1/17512/
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Susan Skinner and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.