FIELD AND GARDEN SEEDS.

The Subscriber has been so often requested to add Garden

Seeds to his assortment of Field Seeds, that he has at length con

Essays on Practical Agriculture, by Adam Beatty, of Kentucky.sented to do so, and now offers for sale a great variety, grown by responsible persons, and put up expressly for him. They are fresh, and he confidently thinks may be relied upon. A. B. ALLEN, No. 187 Water Street, N.Y.

States. We will import it in any quantity to order. A lighter kind can be had if desired, which will come something cheaper per foot. Of course it will not be as strong as the ox-hurdles.

THE STABLE.-No. 9.

WE recur again to the subject of biting, as our cut for this month illustrates another method of managing the biter. The instrument as shown serves a triple purpose, viz., it is a muzzle to prevent biting, crib-biting, and wind-sucking; no article about a stable is of more use, where there

are vices requiring its use. An inspection of it will render a description needless. It is of iron, and is to be attached to the leather of the headstall; it should be riveted on fast, to secure its constant use, where it is required.

biter out of the stable as well as in, then keep the muzzle on always. If he be not, then take it off when he is to be brought out.

The cross-bars in front of the mouth are close to the lips; this leaves the horse free to eat his hay and grain with the muzzle on; and will admit his eating grass if the pasture be not close-cropped or mown. His breathing is not at all affected, and is as free as without the muzzle.

The expense of this muzzle is small, and any smith may make it. The cross-bars should be riveted on, and not welded.

Crib-biting and wind-sucking are effectually prevented by this muzzle.

The crib-biter is so called because he seizes the.

manger (crib as it is called in the Saxon language, manger in French; crib being the word formerly swallows air. When the teeth are firmly grasped used to designate what manger now does), and on the manger (or any other object which is firm and the mouth can enclose), the horse arches his neck, settles back slightly on his quarters, and braces with his fore feet, and with a grunt swallows or gulps air into the stomach; this he will continue until he is filled. A crib-biter can never be in order; his belly will be distended, and his breathing restricted and laborious; he will be flatulent, and constantly breaking wind, and frequently attacked with colic. All these added will keep him ever lean; and the colic will at times unfit him for work entirely, and even endanger or deprive him of life.

Many valuable horses, as we have before mentioned, are incorrigible biters; and yet they are so valuable that they must be kept. Of this kind was imported Messenger, the source whence came our best strains of road horses. He killed at least two men, and yet was preserved. He did it by his teeth and fore feet. He caught them (his grooms) in his teeth, and forced them under his feet, when he bit and stamped them to death. Had his mouth been muzzled he would have been harmless, for no horse ever does mischief with his fore feet until he has first used his mouth, except, as is sometimes the case, when a stallion will rear on his hind legs and strike with his fore ones. Such as these last rarely ever bite, and never rear in the stable, and of course muzzles are useless to them. They are safe in the stable, and only dangerous out of it when they have length of bridle rein allowed them. If the groom keeps them close, by the head, they are harmless. Sometimes, however, it is necessary to give them their heads. To guard against their striking at such times there should be a thong in the head-stall of the bridle, which may, by a jerk of the rein, be forced into the skin. This will quickly bring the horse to the groom, and make him quiet, and will, after a few repetitions, teach him better manners. But even if the thong be not attached to the bridle, the groom can easily avoid such a striker; he rears at some distance from the groom; his movement is seen; he cannot readily move on his hind legs, and then but in one direction. If the groom steps aside, and jerks the bridle rein as the horse passes, he is brought to the ground, and is at command on shortening the rein. But if he first seizes with his mouth, and then strikes with his feet when within the grasp of his jaws, the groom is at once in the power of the horse, and teeth and feet soon do fatal execution. Against just such a danger the iron bar muzzle of Wind-suckers differ from crib-biters in this, our cut is a perfect preventive. The groom cannot they place the teeth closed against the manger (or be brought under the feet of the horse until within anything else that is near, if it be firm) and swalthe gripe of his jaws. Here the muzzle is the se-low the air, but not with so much grunting and curity. It is used in this manner-it is attached to the halter (which should always have a secure throat-latch); what in the halter is ordinarily a leather nose-piece, or strap, is in this muzzle iron; the side straps are of leather; to these should be sowed a buckle; the bits and reins of a bridle may be buckled on to them, and the halter then becomes A strap is frequently used to prevent wind-sucka bridle, with the muzzle on. If the horse be a ling and crib-biting. It is buckled around the neck

CRIB-BITER.-FIG. 46.

The crib-biter cannot swallow air unless he has his teeth grasped on something. This the muzzle of the cut prevents, and yet he can feed. By this, then, a crib-biter's habit may be broken up, and he be rendered sound and useful.

gulping. The results are the same. For the windsucker the muzzle is a remedy. The nose strap should be of leather, and should be buckled tight, so that he cannot force his nose so far down as to place the teeth against the bars; for if he can, he will wind-suck as well with it as without it.

GRASS AND HAY.-SCOTCH LACTOMETER OR CREAM-GAUGE.

close to the head. It certainly prevents the vice, but it endangers the horse, and when long used is sure always to bring on derangement of the windpipe; by its use roaring and inflammation of the throat and such diseases are frequently produced. The muzzle is a better preventive, and is free of danger in every respect. There are horses, however, that will wind-suck without placing their teeth against the manger. Such horses can be controlled only by the strap, and on them it must be used. With it they are in danger, but may be useful; without it they are useless, and of course worse than worthless, for they consume and pay

not.

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and one quarter of land. The second crop was cut the fifth day of September. From this crop there was 1 ton, 8 cwt., 17 lbs., from the same land, making in the whole 6 tons, 18 cwt., 7 lbs."

Mr. Bowles, we understand, first prepared his land some years ago for a crop of Indian corn, and raised one hundred and sixteen bushels to the acre.

SCOTCH LACTOMETER OR CREAM

GAUGE.

THE object of this instrument is to ascertain the proportion which the cream bears to the milk, of any particular cow, or the produce of a whole We have now brought our stable articles to a dairy. If new milk is poured into graduated glass they have had some influence with the public, milk will be so clearly defined, that its depth may close for the present, and are happy to say, that tubes, and allowed to remain, the division between the cream which floats upon the surface of the especially in their arrangements for proper ventilation. Several gentlemen in this city and else- be easily measured; and should the milk from any where, have availed themselves of hints thrown out cow produce more cream than that of another, the in these numbers, and have constructed new stables difference will be seen by the divisions or marks on on a plan highly to be commended. We shall these tubes. The lactometer consists, then, of two probably give illustrations and descriptions of one or more glass tubes, half an inch or more in or two of these hereafter. To conclude, we say, diameter, and eleven inches long, fitted into an upgive your horses plenty of fresh air, but keep them right wooden frame; each tube having a fine line out of the cold, damp currents; and, furthermore, drawn round it, ten inches from the bottom; three sweeten the atmosphere in the stables, and around inches from the line downward it is graduated into inches and tenths of inches. At the time of milkthe premises, by sprinkling plaster of Paris, or charcoal dust, or both, over the straw and floor, and ing each tube is to be filled up to the top line with in the manure. These substances fix the ammonia new milk. After standing twelve hours, the quanarising therefrom, and are in themselves highly fer- tity of cream which floats upon the surface will be tilizing, so that they not only render the atmo-shown by the scale of inches and tenths; each sphere pure around, but add to the value of the madivision representing one per cent. of the whole. nure heap. By following our directions, disease will scarcely be known in stables, and they will no longer be considered as nuisances in the vicinity of a gentleman's residence..

GRASS AND HAY.

As the season for securing the hay crop is at hand, we solicit from our friends who are curious, yet economical, in matters of this kind, to give us condensed statements of well-tested experiments of their mode of culture, and of curing this valuable crop. The following extract of a letter from Mr. Isaac Bowles, of Winthrop, Me., to the Awarding Committee of the Kennebec Co. Agricultural Society, will show what may be done, even among our eastern neighbors, when proper means are employed:

FIG. 47.

If the amount given at one milking be a gallon, or eight pints, and the thickness or depth of cream The soil on which my crop of hay grew, is a which floats upon the surface of the milk in the very deep yellow loam, with a clayey rocky sub-tube, occupies 14 divisions, or one inch and foursoil. In the spring of 1841 it was plowed, and tenths of the scale, multiply the number of pints in about forty loads of compost manure were evenly a gallon, 8, by the depth of the cream, .14, and the spread over the piece, and planted to corn. In the result will be the produce of cream of that gallon, spring of 1842 it was plowed and sowed to wheat. namely, 1.12, or one pint and twelve hundredths of I sowed 30 lbs. of red and white clover and one a pint. peck of herds grass seed. On the 26th of June, 1843, my hired help cut the grass of the first crop, which had not at this time arrived to heading out, and the fifth day after, it was dry enough to haul to the barn. The quantity of hay was ascertained by putting up the cocks as near of an equal size as we could judge. One or more, not larger than an average lot, of the same, was weighed, and computing the whole number of cocks by that, found these contained 5 tons, 9 cwt, 90 lbs., on one acre

Care must be observed to fill the tubes as soon as the milk is taken from the cow; for, should any delay take place, a portion of the cream will have risen towards the surface. The milk to be tested should be taken from the middle of the pail, which may be done by dipping a small pot below the froth.

MUCK is the mother of the meal chest.-Old Scotch Saying.

172

NEW YORK FARMERS' CLUB.

NEW YORK FARMERS' CLUB. THIS branch of the American Institute continues to hold its meetings, as usual, on the first and third Tuesdays of each month, free of charge. At the last three sessions various topics were discussed, among which were the feeding and management of stock, and the nature and application of Indian corn and other grains.

Soiling, &c.-Dr. H. A. Field stated that he had found during summer, that it was a bad practice to change the food of cattle often. From feeding on clover, or oats cut green, and putting them suddenly upon green corn-stalks, he found that his cows became thin. His method of soiling them was as follows: To select a piece of land neither wet nor very dry, and make it as rich as possible by manuring, at the same time studying economy. In September, sow rye-double seed it—it will come early in spring; then sow oats, clover, and the common field pea, which will be of a heavy growth. After the rye is off, sow Indian corn broad-cast; cut the stalks while they are green and tender, before it has tasseled. You can have two, and even three or more, such crops of corn in a season, by beginning early and continue to sow for several weeks in succession. Thus, you can sow rye in September, oats, peas, and clover, early in spring, and corn in early summer. If this green food should cause diarrhoea, give the cows for a while dry feed. In this way you can keep up your green crops from snow to snow! He said that four of his cows which were stabled in winter, and soiled in summer, after this plan, had yielded about $300 worth of milk the year past, sold to certain hotels in summer, for two and a half cents a quart, and for four cents a quart in winter. Two cows which gave only five quarts daily each, produced eleven quarts each after being stabled and well fed.

Remedy for the Heaves.-Mr. Hancock presented the following recipe for thick-windedness or heaves in horses :

perature of the Andes where the finest fields of this plant occur, varies from 64° to 82°F., where there is no frost, no cold weather, nor dry summer heats, where it must have six months of favorable wea ther to perfect its growth. From various experiments made in different parts of Europe, it will not bear frost, and very dry weather is equally fatal to it; and besides, it is a difficult crop to preserve through the winter, owing to its great proneness to decay. Consequently it would be ill adapted to the northern, and in most seasons, to the middle sections of the Union. Should this plant ever succeed in the United States, as a field crop, the mountainous parts of the Carolinas, Georgia, and of Texas, will probably be the theatre of operations.

Composition of Corn, &c.-Mr. Browne presented specimens of several varieties of Indian corn, accompanied by a diagram showing the chemical proportions of the various kinds of corn, beans, peas, &c., from original experiments made by Dr. C. T. Jackson, of Boston. He also repeated several of the experiments, as illustrated by the diagram, and showed the proportions of starch, dextrine, and phosphates, contained in the corn, with the view of proving that the ingredients of which the different varieties are composed, are not uniform, and consequently the analysis of one kind alone cannot be of much practical advantage when applied to the whole. In splitting open, longitudinally, some kernels of Tuscarora corn, and dropping upon them a small quantity of the tincture of iodine, nearly all of their bulk was instantaneously changed from a pure white to an intense blue, indicating the presence of starch, with here and there a deep port wine colored speck, which defined the parts composed of dextrine. In treating some rice corn and pop corn in the same manner, only slight traces of starch were manifested, showing, conclusively, that the proportions of the ingredients of which the two varieties are composed, are widely different. Again, in soaking some split Take 180 grains of tartar emetic, and divide it kernels of sweet corn in a solution of sulphate of into three equal doses of 60 grains each. Mix one copper (blue vitriol), the chits or parts containof them in wet bran, and give it to the horse. Re-ing the germs, were changed to a bright green, peat the dose once in two days, and his disease will be greatly alleviated, if not perfectly cured. Arracacha.-Mr. Meigs read an interesting paper on the arracacha, an umbelliferous plant, found wild in the elevated regions of equatorial America, where it is also cultivated for the sake of its root. Corn Oil.-The horny or flinty portions of corn, In the Andes of Popayan, Los Pastos, and New Mr. B. remarked, when viewed in their sections Granada, it is as extensively grown there as the under a good microscope, will be found to consist potato, and is far more productive than that plant, of a great number of six-sided cells filled with a yielding, according to some statements, sixteen tons fixed oil, which has been successfully employed for of roots to an acre, while the potato does not ave- the purposes of illumination. He said that he had rage more than nine or ten tons. It is said, how-been informed from a credible source, that there is a ever, to be somewhat less nutritious, as it contains a larger proportion of water. The root of the arracacha resembles that of a gigantic parsnip, with numerous fangs, and in flavor is thought to be something between that of the parsnip and roasted chestnuts. Each root is said to weigh from four to six pounds, when grown on good land, and serves as an excellent article of food. But the question naturally arises, will it grow in the open air in any part of the United States?-a question that can only be answered by actual experiment. The tem

beautifully defining the limits of the phosphates of lime and magnesia contained in the corn, and indicating more than double the quantity than the Tuscarora variety contained when treated in the same way.

distillery in the vicinity of Lake Ontario, where this oil is extracted, at the rate of sixteen gallons from one hundred bushels of corn, leaving the remaining portion of the corn more valuable and in better condition for distillation, than before the oil is extracted.

Popping Corn.-On this oil, added Mr. B., depends the popping qualities of corn. For when the kernels are heated to a temperature sufficiently high to decompose the oil, a sudden explosion takes place, and every cell is ruptured by the ex