Revolutionary memory, who was Secretary of War under Mr. Madison. Though the author of several useful works on practical Agriculture and Gardening, Gen. Armstrong will perhaps be better known hereafter by his celebrated Newburgh Letters, addressed to the Army of the Revolution, when about to be disbanded by Gen. Washington. An interesting relic of the early days of our Republic was recently brought to light at Blithewood, by the removal of a partition wall. We annex an engrav It is a large copper button, supposed to have been worn by the officers of the army, and evinces their great attachment to Washington. The motto, "Long live the President," encircles the letters "G. W.," and the whole inscription is embraced teonisfe by a chain, in each link of which is the initial of town houses; and how often do we see gentle-letter of one of the glorious old Thirteen States of midst of a group of forest trees, it is no less ornamental than useful. An excellent macadamized road leads through the estate from the lodge to the mansion. Soon after entering the gate, we lose sight of all boundary walls and fences, and pass the gardener's house (fig. 25). This is in the Cottage Gothic style, and with its pointed and projecting gables, and miniature porch, covered with honeysuckles and Boussault roses, it has a very neat and pretty appearance. Approaching the house, the road winds among white pines, through which may be seen the graceful slopes of the grounds, and the noble masses of wood. The view which is disclosed, as you sweep round to the river front, assures you that nature has been lavish of her beauties here. Our readers will get a very good idea of the view presented at this point by looking at the frontispiece to Downing's Landscape Gardening and Rural Architecture. The dwelling house is 160 feet above the river. It is a low, but most commodious. structure, embosomed in trees, stuccoed and colored in imitation of freestone, with a deep verandah on three sides, and a boldly projecting and richly bracketted roof; and whatever may have been its original plan, it has been so enlarged and transformed by its present owner, as to present a most inviting aspect. The interior is very tastefully arranged; but on this we cannot enlarge, and confine ourselves to a description of the picture room an apartment on the river side of the house, 16 by 32 feet, of a high pitch, and receiving its strongest light through an ornamented The Farm.-This comprises 125 acres. The soil sash in the ceiling. In this choice, though limited collection, there are the Picnic Party in Epping For- varies from a sandy to a clayey loam. Parts of est, by C. R. Leslie; a Landscape, by John Both; the outer lots, where the subsoil was so adhesive the Billet Doux, by Terburg; the Lute Lesson, by as to retain the surface soil, have been subdrained Gaspar Netcher; a most lovely Madonna and Child, with the small stones gathered from the sursupposed to be by Luini; the Physician and Invalid, face. These lots can now be worked at the earliest by the elder Palamedes; the Benevolent Family, al opening of spring; and though forming a very su RAVINE WALK-FIG.. 26.d and peach, are grown in these houses as espaliers, and dwarf standards. 90 SCRAPS FROM MY NOTE BOOK.-No. 2. perior soil for grass; they yet yield very heavy foundation of the building over it, then lay up the crops of small grain. As an evidence of this, walls. The walls should be hollow, as they are although the season of '45 was very unfavorable to stronger than solid walls, and they save nearly oneoats, we here saw a lot which turned out 50 bushels third of the brick. The finishing plaster can then to the acre. Since acquiring possession of this place, be laid on inside without the expense of furrowing ten years since, Mr. D. has doubled the crops; and out and lathing, as hollow walls are always dry. though he has occasionally used alluvial mud (limed) The stucco is also more lasting and not likely to from the Sawkill, as a topdressing, and also plaster peel. The stucco can be painted a handsome fawn and ashes, and applied guano and poudrette to the color by dissolving burnt ochre in sweet milk. hoed crops, with satisfactory results; yet his main We saw here a most useful labor-saving machine, reliance for keeping up the fertility of his place, first introduced at Mr. William B. Astor's villa, for has been the barnyard. To this place all weeds, cleaning gravel walks. With this, a man, a boy, fallen leaves, butts of cornstalks, and offal of the and a horse, may do the work of twenty men, farm, are gathered, and through these the wash of We here annex an engraving of it. It is very simthe barnyard leaches. We think Mr. D. has gone ple in its construction, and costs about $10. through unnecessary trouble and expense in plowing in manure on the slopes and banks to get them into grass, instead of pasturing South-down sheep, which might easily be done in hurdles. growth of the sheep would in a single season defray the expense of the arrangement, and the sod would be left by them, topdressed and fertilized in the simplest and most efficient manner. We have often seen flocks of sheep pastured for this purpose on the lawns of the finest estates in England. The farm-buildings are judiciously placed near the centre of the land, and well constructed for sheltering the cattle and saving the manure. The boundary walls are well laid, and the expense and unsightliness of cross-fences have been greatly avoided by soiling most of the cattle. In stock Mr. D. has confined his attention to rearing a herd of milch cows, having with consi- MACHINE FOR CLEANING GRAVEL WALKS.-FIG. 27. derable care and expense selected the best milkers among the native cows that he could purchase, Mr. Downing has kindly permitted us to make which, with one or two Ayrshires, he has crossed casts of the illustrations above, from the cuts exewith his imported bull, Prince Albert, a noble Dur-cuted for his "Landscape Gardening and Rural ham selected for him with much judgment, by his Architecture," a work which we cannot too highly brother, Mr. James Donaldson of this city, when and too often recommend to the public. in England in '41. Among the cows there is a most extraordinary animal, called Kaatskill, from her na- SCRAPS FROM MY NOTE BOOK-No. 2. tive mountains. She shows a dash of Holderness The Cherokee Rose Hedge.-South of Natchez, blood in her veins, though she is supposed to be a for miles, I rode between continuous lines of hedges native. We conversed with her former owner, of the "Cherokee, or nondescript rose," then, Mr. Hendricks of Red Hook, who assured us, that March 1st, in full bloom, of pure white fragrant this cow had, while in his possession, given 38 flowers, single, with bright yellow centres, and rich quarts of milk per day, on grass-feed alone; and bright green foliage, that gave the whole a most had made 18 1-2 lbs. butter in one week. On two lovely appearance; but the beauty of the scene was of the days the butter weighed 6 1-2 lbs., and had greatly marred by the fact that blossoms and foliage not a spell of unusually hot weather ensued. which could not disguise that the whole was in a most prevented her from feeding well, she would doubt-slovenly state of keeping; for the long straggling less have made 22 lbs. of butter in a single week. runners have grown up some ten feet high, and This cow received the first prize of the New York bend over upon each side, till the fence is often 25 State Ag. Society, at their annual show of 1844, or 30 feet wide, and owing to the hardness and as the best dairy cow exhibited. We could say much more of Blithewood; but should any of our readers chance to visit it, they will feel how inadequate words are to convey an idea of its varied scenes, some of which are worthy the pencil of Ruysdael or Claude. Stucco. We thought the Stucco used by Mr. D. in his buildings of a superior kind, and copied his recipe for making it. Take pure beach sand, and add as much Thomaston lime as it will take up, then sufficient hydraulic cement to make it set, say about one-fifth of the whole mixture of sand and lime. To prevent the cement attracting moisture, put a strip of sheet lead or zinc as wide as the sharpness of the briars, is as impenetrable as a stone wall for all kinds of stock, negroes included. Dr. Phillips and Mr. Affleck, who were my travelling companions, assured me that a good fence could be made in four years from the cuttings of this plant, and that by proper attention every year, it can be kept within reasonable bounds. I did not, however, see an instance where it was. I saw many places where the runners had climbed up some convenient tree at least thirty feet. To get a fence started is a very easy matter, as it is only to take those long runners and cut them up with a hatchet on a block, into slips about a foot long, and lay these in a furrow, with one end out, PEACH AND NECTARINE TREES ON PLUM STOCK, ETC. PEACH AND NECTARINE TREES ON 91 and tread the earth down tight; it will be a rare thing if they fail to grow. Though, whether from failure to grow, or from being killed by frost, or something else, I observed in all these hedges, the same unsightly gaps that mark nearly all the live fences in the United States. These frequent gaps in the hedge are filled up with one, two, three, or perhaps a dozen pannels of rail fence, and in the joining together of the live and dead fence, holes are very apt to be left, through which that animal which strange man permits to run at large, to the eternal torment of himself and neighbors, will be very likely to insinuate his porkship about" roast-so much less sap to support the development of wood, ing ear time." But why don't they fill up these gaps with new sets, if it is so easily done?"" Exactly the question that I will answer after the most approved Yankee fashion, by asking why we are not civilized, Christianized, rationalized enough to enact laws, or rather to repeal all laws, all over the Union, that compel one man to fence against every other man's cattle, some of which nothing but a Cherokee rose hedge would stop, and even that must be free from gates, bars, or gaps? And again, "if this hedge can be kept from spreading so as not to occupy four acres of land in every mile of length, and it makes such a beautiful as well as efficient fence, why is it not more extensively used? Exactly the other question that I will answer after the same approved fashion, by inquiring why you-" what me?"—Oh, yes-you are the very man I mean I want to inquire if you love peaches, apples, grapes, and other fruit?« Why, certainly." Well, the hedge is not planted just for the same reason that you have never planted fruit trees and vines. In England and some other parts of Europe, where the atmosphere is surcharged with moisture, and the power of the sun's rays is so feeble that it causes but a moderate development of growth, and but an imperfect maturity of the wood on trees of great vigor, it has been found advantageous to curtail or diminish the expansion of the peach, nectarine, and apricot, by engrafting them on the plum, which is a tree of less sap and of much slower growth. The result of this practice is, that as the plum furnishes the growth is retarded, and the expansion of the tree greatly diminished. This practice has also been applied to the pear by engrafting on the quince, the hawthorn, and the mountain-ash; and to the apple by engrafting on the paradise dwarf stock, and on other species similar in character. The effect of this cause is precisely like unto limiting the development of an animal of gigantic race by an allowance of only that quantum of blood which nature allows to a dwarf or diminutive one; and the final result is as might be expected, not only the curtailment of dimensions, but the shortening of the natural period of existence. All the trees, therefore, to which this dwarfing process is applied produce their fruit the sooner, as they sooner attain an unnatural maturity. They are also much smaller and shorter lived than such as are propagated in the natural way, and engrafted on stocks of a similar and congenial character. WM. R. PRINCE. Prince's Lin. Gard, and Nurseries, Flushing, STUMP MACHINE.-This machine consists of a circular square or oblong cap, supported by three "And how far north will this rose flourish?" legs, and has a hole through its centre perpendicu I cannot say; but I believe that it would be danger- larly, sufficiently large to admit a screw of suitable ous to rely upon it north of latitude 33°. Major size. The length of the screw depends upon the Green, of Madison County, latitude 324°, told me distance the weight is to be raised, or the object to that he had 60 or 70 yards of Cherokee rose hedge which the machine is applied. The nut rests upon growing very thriftily around his yard, in the win- the top of the cap, where iron or steel washers ter of 1831-2, and nearly the whole of it froze to should be placed, to prevent too much friction. death. In the spring he cut it all off, and but here The nut is turned by a lever being attached to it, and there a sprout came up. His house stands on a the length of which will depend upon the purpose high piece of ground-the soil, reddish yellow clay to which the machine is applied. A horse will -timber, mostly black oak, rather scrubby. Whe-raise forty tons when attached to a lever twelve ther this has any influence, or whether this plant feet long, and lead himself around the machine by will answer for fences further north, I cannot say; a pole from the sweep near the nut, reaching just but I do say to those living further south, it is well forward of the horse, and the machine can be moved worth your attention, and you ought to try it from place to place by one or two men. The conforthwith. And as your paper, Mr. Editor, circu-venience of the improvement consists in the applilates so extensively at the South, if some of your cation of the lever and screw in the manner, and to southern correspondents would give you an article the purposes mentioned. every month upon this subject, it would not be too much of a good thing. It is also worth the trial whether the " Michigan Rose" will answer a good purpose at the North for hedging. Here, upon the prairies of the North West, where it is supposed there is no timber, fencing material is altogether too plenty and cheap to think of using hedges yet awhile. But as we contrive to burn up what rails we have once a year, we shall soon come to the necessity perhaps. SOLON ROBINSON. We regret to say that Mr. R. continues so ill that he will be obliged to give up his tour South this season, but we hope to see him there next winter. ANALYSIS OF MARL ON THE HUDSON.-We have often spoken of the immense beds of marl lying on the Hudson river above the Highlands. The following is an analysis of a specimen made by Mr. Jas. J. Mapes, for Frederick F. Betts, Esq., of Newburgh. Carbonate of lime,.. ...63.34 Woody fibre, moss, and decomposed veg. matter, 7.92 Sand and earthy matter highly colored with } iron and magnesia,. 16.66 5. 5.42 1.66 Parts 100. 92 EXPERIMENTS WITH CORN.-STINGLESS BEES. EXPERIMENTS WITH CORN. acreable results, in bushels of 56 lbs.; the grain I PROMISED last summer to furnish you the re- was shelled in January. The loss in weight on the sults of some experiments in which I was then en- sample measures, from the last of October, when gaged with different manures on corn. The husked, to the first of January, when it was shelled, excessive drouth of the season undoubtedly affected was 22 1-2 per cent., on the gross weight, being in the results materially. Yet, as we have small accordance with the results of previous experireason to suppose the past to be the last dry sea- ments. I should state that experiment No. 1 son, they may be as valuable as though the eco- (covering 3-20 of an acre) included the outside row nomic result had been more favorable. It is not on the north side. any single result, but the average of many that Field No. 1, soil a free loam, in places gravelly; must be our guide. The experiments were all con- subsoil sand and gravel. In 1841, în corn; 5 cords ducted under my own eye, and with all possible half-rotted stable manure plowed under; seeded to care and exactness. The ground covered by the grass in spring of 1842 on winter grain. Topdifferent manures, varied from one-tenth to three- dressed with 25 bushels ashes per acre; again in fourths of an acre, and was of an uncommonly uni-'44, with 3 cords of compost. Average yield of form character. The different manures were ap-hay 1 ton per acre. April, 1845, sod inverted 8 to plied side by side, in strips through the whole 10 inches deep; rolled and harrowed. May 12th, length of the field. I have reduced the whole to planted with white flint corn, 4 by 3 feet apart. No. 1. 1 acre, no manure.. 25 50-56 bushels. 26 37-56 " Cost $1,25. Gain 43 lbs. " 353" hen-house from time Same field adjoining the above on south side, sod inverted, rolled, harrowed, and 8 cords of manure harrowed in, planted as before. "and 15 bush. unleached ashes. 15 66 hen manure. 20 แ Poudrette. 11. 1 LL "220 lbs. Guano (Peruvian). Your readers can draw their own inferences as to the economy of the different applications. The stable manure costs, spread in the field, $3,00 per cord. The concentrated manures are charged, likewise, at their cost in the field. L. Rahway, New Jersey, January, 12, 1846. STINGLESS BEES. I LATELY noticed among the exports of Campeachy, wax, the produce of wild stingless bees; this reminded me of a notice I had once seen of a hive of stingless bees sent to Dr. Mitchell. The following is the notice alluded to, being an extract of a letter published in the New York Evening Post in 1830, from Henry Perrine, Esq., U. S. Consul, dated San Juan, Baptista de Tabasco, Mexico, July 20th, 1830, to Samuel E. Mitchell. seemed intent on clearing their house. A hole in the side of the log, about three-quarters of an inch in diameter, answers the purpose of the entrance as a common hive. They are not so large as the common honey bee; but they have a neat aspect for an insect. As they are such harmless little creatures, it would please me very much to get a swarm of them. But I fear the number is so reduced, that it will require an apiary-man of more skill than I possess, to take the best care and make the most of them. I wish such a person would present himself, and take the colony under his protection. Something novel and curious at any rate-perhaps something useful might arise from it? An entomological description is desirable, but this must be postponed, on account of its nicety and difficulty, until a future day." "I send you by Capt. Powers, of the schooner If Mr. Mitchell made an entomological examinaWashington, a hive of stingless bees, which you tion of this interesting little insect, I never had the may dispose of as you think proper." Dr. Mitchell good fortune of seeing it published; indeed, since then says: "The bees have arrived in a lively con- the publication of the above, I have not seen the dition, and though they were received only yester-little Colony in any way noticed. Dr. Mitchell day (Sept. 1st), are now making their excursions to died in September, 1831, and I should think it and from their habitation with great vivacity. almost certain that he left an entomological descripTheir dwelling place is a hollow log, part of a tion of the insect. The probability is that this little natural excavated tree, in which these little crea-colony, by being so much reduced, or by the severity tures delight to live. The little swarm, after hav- of our climate, did not survive through the ensuing ing been released from its imprisonment, came winter. forth, and the members visited the flowers of the Will not some of our enterprising ship-owners contiguous garden. It was observed as a proof of in the Mexican trade, cause to be sent to this countheir economy, that after being immured during the try a few hives of these stingless bees, as there voyage, the notable insects came forth loaded with is much more attention paid and interest felt for bees the remains of their deceased associates, or with in the United States now, than was in 1830? I some excrementitious or foul matter. They thus have no doubt they can be placed under the care of |