FARM AND GARDEN NOTES. NOTES OF INTEREST ON AGRI- CULTURAL TOPICS. Protect the Barn Swallows--Stomes Under Apple Trees--Hard HoelngTo Rid the Poultry House of Lice, Eic. —— Protect the Bara Swallows, The barn swallows, which were for- merly very numerous about farm | buildings are great destroyers of in | sects. In some parts of England they | were depended upon by hop growers | to destroy hop files, They subsist wholly upon Insects which they catch | an the wing and are fond of all Kinds | of gnats, moths, beetles and many | other kinds. During recent years the swallow has been driven away from its home by the English sparrow, a fact to be regretted, Stones Under Apple Trees. i A great deal! of ripened fruit that might be saved is spoiled by bruising on left under from previous plowing. The ideal place for an apple to fall is on a thick grassy turf, making not only a soft place to | fall on, but a hiding place under the grass. If the ground under the tree is cultivated, after removing all the loose stapes, spread a layer of straw as far as the branches extend for the fruit to fail This had better be delayed unti! near time for the frait ripen, it will Keep the surface moist induce a growth of close the surface, which will Jured next Tree always very water than the top and are therefore rozZen, stones the irees 1. the to else and to routs in winter. be being frozen are They absorb more growth of more injured when f more water in them by rots porous, tis fhe ree, as there is to be expanded. The stake Is often only slighfly insert. od In the soll, but it Is sure to be heaved up by frost the following win- ter, and that will pull the fence out of shape If not driven down below the frost line. At the bottom a tone large enough to fill the space between post and stake should be laid for the lower rail to rest on, If it Is not Intended fo be plg or lamb proof there may be 4 space of a foot or more between the first and second rails, Four strong rails fastened by wires will make as strong a straight fence a8 80 muy boards against cattle or horses, The in is that the board fence requires a post in the middle cOxt rail fence Ix strong enough If wired to the post at each end. One advantage such a fence is that by unwiring the posts and taking out the rails a passage way may made between fields almost anywhere wide enough to br Sore Eyes in Ducks. I had been neglecting the care of my Peking one spring. 1 had neglected to supply them with a proper amount of sand and shell, but had fed too much concentrated food and they had been deprived of pure water at times It was but a short time until I noticed of them alling, Some seemed rheumatic, while others had matter protruding from the corners of their eyes, and in a day or so thore was a hard bail of whitish substance gath ered at the outer corners of the eyes of several, became bad eves entirely filled or adhered tightly together. After this they became in flamed and swollen, and had I not be Soe Rome at] their gun treatment at ones | think It might have resulted in gray film over the eye ball At first notice of trouble | began giv The Benefit of Experiment Farms. The agricultural experiment stations are doing a splendid work in the way of experimentation, but every farmer ought to experiment for himself. Not that he should go into expensive, ditt cult experiments, but into ordinary ex perimentation to test the value of dif . fruit and veg there ferent vari et ®les. Probably farmer’in a thousand, perhaps not one in ten thousand, who can say that he is t and profitable variety, or that h the eties of § is not one growing the bes most ¢ is using best means to keep up the fertility of his land; and ong an in the majority of cases no ceurate information for there is an indi viduality about the farm There are these advantages to come | give him a upon these points from conducting experiments: Obtain ing the most ad information re garding the value of different and new varieties, the t method of cultiva tion and of the way to maintain the fertility—not of his neighbor's land or of some experiment station land but of his own land. Experimentation is sure to result in the adoption of the most economical methods of farm management, [It in the produce of pure seed. ultimately quantities curate roe best reunites tion in such furnish “S OWn use, us the best of seed for the but a surplus to remunerative price. An acre on the road, superior variety planted to a super Or SOWHD to a ff oats or wheat, or lor variety of corn. will n process of growth, will advertise itself, and finally, as the years go by, if the experiments are Kept up, will make the enterprising farmer a profitable business In Ontario thes iperative to rop that what Any other « show it is while have introduced co. imenting, It in i886, and the plan has been in- reasing ia magnitude ever since, To day there are 0.080 Ontario farms on which these co-operative experiments are going on. Every year the Ontario Agricultural and Experiment Union which is the name of the movement publishes the results of the year's ex. | periments, practical experi menters have choroughly tested from six to 210 varieties of nearly ever, crop that is grown, and the reports of the Union are of great interest to agricul ture. The experiments must have been of inestimable benefits to the farmers who conducted them. If it Is profitable in Ontario it would be profitable in the States. ~The Epitomist, exper was be. These Straight Rail Feaces. The old-fashioned rail fence, made to support itself, and occupying seven to eight feet of land between fields, has gone out of date being too wasteful, both of material and land, to be longer tolerated. But the rails re. main, amd by the use of a seven and one-half foot post set two feet deep In the ground with a stake beside it, one. half the rails will make a better fence than all of them would under the old | plan. Hy wiring the rails to boih post and stakes, they can be spread apart at any required distance, especially near the ground, In the old worm fence, the rails had only the width of their ends to keep them apart, as one rested on the other, accumulation of water, especially with soft woods, so that vspally the ends were rotted away while the middle part of the rail was as sound as ever, In making a rail fence the largest, heaviest ralls should be put at the bot. fom and comparatively lignt rails at the top. This with a worm fence, un- less the corners were locked with stakes, made it easy for horses or cows to push off the top rails until they pulled down the fence to where they can jump over it. With a staked straight rail fence this is impossible, as the wiring of the light tep rall should be made stronger than any- where else. A line of barbed wire at the top will also prove an advantage, as touching the nose to a sharp barb quickly anuses t animal to with draw. If the work of setting posts is done early in spring while the seil is moist, both the posts and stakes may as be driven down as deeply as needed. The mash wax made melst (not slop py) by mixing the ground oats with the tea produced by boiling common clover hay in a large tank. This tea 1 find to be a good substitute for the preparsd lover clover meal for those who have « hay. I gave them all they wanted of this as a drink, and at other had witer, what tea once a day they always them the tea first, my usual times fresh but I gave drink of I began at once feed of bles, such as cooked potatoes and tu nips, with plenty of mixed with food, onee a day, Several times 5 they would to amount vegeta sn tid ince 1 noticed ex, but they quick iy disappeared when 1 began feeding [I have described Herald. n have gymptoms of sore oy as Poultry Girains. harvesting When to Cut Small The exact time of «mall grains depends primarily upon the use to which the crop is to be put. With wheat where the straw lars i a secondary consideration or no « i onsideration at all, as is the case in the greater part of the United States, it should be ut when the grain will weigh the To condition cut when the grain i= in On small far § nse! for wheat growing sections of the most Secure this tim advanced dough state where one machine the on varied cording to circumstances, If the cron attasked by the He™an iy, falli onus quently Hittle « much of this injured grain as possible, The binder should be run low in this event, to gather up the fallen heads. Then too, If the crop ix attacked by rust the sooner the crop is in the shock, the bet ter. The longer it stands, the more injury the grain will sustain. If whent is allowed to get too ripe great loss results from shattering when the bundles are bandied. In of all these considerations no definite rule can be given the best time for harvesting wheat, mt each farmer must be governed by cirenmstances, With oats the condition of the straw must be considered as well as that of the grain, ns this makes valuable for age, provided the crop is cut at the proper time and well cured. If the westher is dry, ne is usually the case during oats harvest, ent when on the green order, bind in small bundles, put up in shocks containing not more than tire crop this rule must be ar in siraw ng occurs and becomes more set as the grain matures, [It is cons advisable to girlier as 1 begin cutting a wi O ReCure as the view as 10 oughly dried out. When threshed. the grain may not weigh quite is heavily ax when allowed to stand a week long. er. but the straw will be very nutritions and almost ax valuable as timothy hay for cattle and horses. Some farm. ers prefer to cut their oats with a mow. er and treat it exactly as they do hay. In this case, after it is cut with a mower, it Is raked into windrows and taken directly to the barn or stack. It is not threshed, but the grain and straw are fed together, For young stock and dairy cattle, this Kind of feed, if well cured, is es. pecially desirable. Because of the shortness of the clover crop this sea in this manner. It is necessary when storing to put in some place where otherwise, there will be great loss, The rats not only destroy the grain of the oats, but cut up and mutilate many of the leaves, rendering the forage unpal- atable and unfit for feed. As a rule, most farmers prefer to cut their oats with a binder. For all kinds of small grain the mod. ern self binder does most excellent work. MH cuts everything from flax to the tallest rye. They are now so Simple that almost any one can operate them and they need but little extra attention. Keep well olled, never al. lowing the machine, particnlarly the canvas parts, to get wet. Cover it carefully each night and place in a shed as soon as the harvest is com. pleted. American Agriculturist, The number of children and youth in the United States is 21,082,472, # ~ USES FOR CORN PITH. IN THE WORLD. Defensive Belts of Cellulose--+Novel Utitiza- tion of a Waste Farm Product--~Corn- stalks Found to be Valuable for Many Other Purposes. tion bas been found, which, it is Heved, will make the American navy, in the world. Curiously enough, the material for this improvement comes, not from our seaboard products, but from the waste of Western farms, ts value lies in the fact that it will pre vent a fighting ability from being destroyed even after she has been pierced in a dozen places. Mr. Lewis Nixon, formerly a United States naval constructor and who is now engaged in building warships for the government at Elizabethport, N. J.osays of the pew invention: *The value of some light substance that will preserve the stability of light armored by displacing water that might enter after a projectile has been appreciated by naval constructors ever since we began to bulld steel arin ored vessels. “To meet this need the French orig inated the cellulose, which, vessel's vessels ol tise inflow. After adopted in our Columbia, the various trials it w 3 Thus, New York and 1 Olympia. there are protective decks of ample strength to keep out the <hells of any vessels they are liable while their stability is pr belts of cellulose along the edges. navy. ie to engage otectisd b feet 3 % ral SevYeras “No thoroughly satisfactory cellulose material for this purpose was discover ed, until stalks was utilized Corn pith however, the th of cor i nit $448 ur it ab from cot s manufac e, is a perfect obturator solutely prevents water “In by the opening made by inch shell it is thorough:y fireproof and in every way it meets the the situation, exclusively an American Thix an Immense advantage over other nations We have in t of Western flelds very best mate in the world for an When chemically treated requirements of Maize ia product gives us He waste matter our imparting this sot strength to one “For keeping belt of as efficient that when War Riips out water a cellulose three feed may be $s 1 about six-inch belt yen t as a steel, bility, deck with #0 we Onn om our sta # we have a god Prove bark of it the vit 100s to protect sis tons of cellulose, where we should require 1.16% tons of “In of bi lark HIRT weight is needed for arinor, vessels spend where machinery and an ell ulose armor belt cannot be earrisd ‘ lity Ie wed used to we stab battle amidships and a cellulose belt | In ac Nasy Department is preserve 1 ships thick armor is protective deck and the Hm f we yond ix oof this armor ordance with ti the iis plan ded for Lk ¥ iy Lv Kentucky as pros : cellulose protection in the Rearsarge, Alabama. Wisconsin, 111 1 : and other ndw «bh ti Lae 1% 5 this pur ner el absorbent Oils The Wns x of pith for suggested several Mark WW. Marsden its remarkable brought He attention of the use of corn pose by Prof observed TONS ’ ho hb w the matter to and at their suggestion devised an apparatus qualities the Cramps for separating the pith from the stalk In ING the naval asthorities were duced to make duct, A 250-pound projectile was through a steel coffer dam packed with cellulose three feet thick, The shell made a hole an foot in diameter through the structure. The water was imme diately turned on and continued for an hour. At fhe end of that time not a drop had come through, and the pack ing at the hole in the rear of the plate was not even dampened cellulose, tested at the same time, failed to up to these require ments and since then the nee of corn pith has been adopted in all of our naval construction. The cellulose is packed In the coffer dam space between the outer and in ner walls of the ship. A belt of it three feet thick backs up the armor belt, ex- tending six feet above and six feet be. low the water tine, entirely around the vessel, Fifty tons of it Is required to equip a vessel of the [Hlineis class, and this is compmted to equal 500 tons of steel in adding to the defensive strength of the ship. It takes about fifteen tons of the raw material to pro vide one ton of celinlose. To supply this important feature in the construe. n a test of the new pro fired The cocoa COI therefore, requires 750 tons of stalks, or the product of more than 200 acres of corn land. In the same way that the corn pith aflont, even after holes have been punched in their sides, it may be used passenger ships, In trying to find a product that would answer the needs of the navy, Mr, Marsden unwittingly stumbled up- on.a product that is useful in a great. er variety of ways then any other growth of onr fields. Since the mann facture of cellulose for the use of the navy, two years ago, it has been ap plied to a dozen other practical uses, which nitimately will utilize the whole product of our cornfields, It is esti mated that a bundred and fifty mil llons tons of cornstalks go to waste every year now. When this amount is all utilized, it will add three-quarters of a billion dollars to the yearly re. sources of American farmers, and will increase the annosl business of the country, by considerably more than a billion, The abworbent qualities which make a packing for warships also makes it i i for the manufacture of smokeless pow. der. All guch powders are made by guncottost and nitro-gly- cerine In a solvent and then mixing Corn pith makes a cheap and has recently been formed, with a capi tal of $10,000,000, to manufacture this form of powder, The company’s Works located in New Jersey, and are under operation on government contracts, It is not alone to warlike uses that the bumble corpstalk is to be devoted, The absorbent pith makes the best sort of a bath brush, It has also been used as a packing for steam pipes, The fibrous portion of the stalk is man- ufactured into paper and paper boxes, and the residue, the leaves and the out. a prepared food for horses and cattle, that has been adoptell for the cavalry and artillery of the United States All this reads like the clalms of a patent medicine cure-all, but they have all been tried and proved by prac. tical experience, These uses ana others which will probably the maize plant from t to the farmer proud lmportance us a sour ene, hie discovered raise of a ie position nuisance to one of ¢ of rev Three factories now in operation are employed in products mentioned above turning out the various TLe larg Ky hie Rockford, 1H, and Ches. another cture of the est of them Owensboro is at others are at Penn, factory navy product is to! 1 Va. Hort 1 Since the whole proce Later In the season ff or the manana Wr Ope ne i nenr New. News, ufacture is a by which it is carried Hew one, on laud The which it presented baffled the inventor but he has at srt perio wpecially devised problems f time lel in iw Rone NOC whic it pos sible Gnished prodo eful ts on a lar . Tree asf Tg manuiaeiur pur 1st be well ripened ng ie mss ¥ p= of canvas pith « ied off wptacle prepar for it. "ale go om curtains, Aes down on CANVAS un t lis fiiy 34 ei chopped up stalks and leaves 0 sling they ith x ftir ey sich fire used ——————— An Indian's Awfal Self-Fanishment, iH. PP. Mston, 1 tent at White ag the [te nite States Iodian Rocks, Utah among Indians on his reseryv: has 4 tion 5n who for done accidental man twenty years awful peusuace to for killing spite of what he thinks sufficiently alone ¥s vicst ie wer. but has passed of hi in h, ered =" ho. throug ig fit {ransgres that has yet wis win The was entirely ace and held the Indian blame less, and did not punish him, His « was his acocuser, and kill the tr ug dental, ihe of however iminal, burst of Le imposed a harsh sentence up He made a solemn rest of his life he clothing or enter a tepee of other dweding For more than twenty years the red Ie sleeps in open air with a of an old blanket about three feet square hung over him sticks. He is en. tirely nude. Mr. Myton sayz that the Indian lies on the ground through winter, even when the thermometer goes as low ax 40 degrees below zero New York Journal. it held him up as a cor When first grief was his on Limself, : Yow w ould house, that for the nol wear flan jriece ou some the Kissing in Ancient Greece, Greece of the olden times had a law the public street It happened that woman or girl on should suffer death. with the daughter of Plsistratus, the tells us that even tyrants may wife of Pisistratus remanded the death penalty for the offending youth, the tyrant replied: “If we remove those that love ns, what shall we do with those that hate us?” Publius Maevius of Rome, on the other hand, bad a liberated slave torn to pieces by wild horses because he had kissed the Roman statesman's daughter. The censor Cato promul- gated a law prohibiting married peo- ple from kissing each other in the presence of their danghter. When Saastroke Is Desirable. The shadow of debt is rather gloomy but some of us would run great risk of sunstroke If we ever got out of it Puck. There are only 100,000 Britishers in India-—one to every 3,000 of the popu: PRIMITIVELY No Hesitation Here Those Presents Back. “Taint everybody that's got such right feelings ax Bally Potter and her ma; I will say that for the Potters, even If our family aren't going to be connected, after all.” Mrs. Hoberts was speaking to her next-door neigh- bor, Miss Elizabeth Sprawle, “They're honest as the day, [ know that,” sald Miss Sprawlie, “and I only hope your Ned will find another girl as good as Sally.” “There's not a mite of hard feeling betwixt Ned and Sally,” answered Mrs. Roberts; “they're friends still, only they =ade a get ting engaged, know their own minds, and Mrs ter and 1 both take blame that didn’t counsel them to walt, Bat isn't what 1 tell You remember that sprigged muslin dress pattern that Ned gave Sally when the engagement came out?’ Miss Sprawle podded assent “Well,” continued Mrs, Roberts, “it being so hot last summer, Sally had it made up and wore it, know, but not "twould have year if Abont good niistake Pot- we that was you going to ax you probably but what ven excellent wear this they'd been married, Well Sally and Ned Mrs, Potter can nothing wonld do but ! the ma 0 enongl so i ns Boom break off as ie OY I should te! “1 i : ida wiaat to Linted moneys not for il only the year! “1 told Sally that folks that would i $f inter rent many ing 6 per but = "twas oon Ch a case and sald only whe wa right. Now, what do 3 “Ned afraid!” sal Roberts Le wa ef Irprised, of that? ne find another such, I'm and Mrs Youth's iss Sprawle with her Nog I nderstood the Conversation, ing he go 0 th He never to remind him of his duts and up the cows needs a aud er neglect During parently any furthe: conYersatlior this sound jects heard, barking i bh the ty hol herd Ale gate, stood lerneys, roused fron en hots over-geal a and dris thirsting greater praise of canine exp ons’ “What do you nu shouted, knowing that the roundly rebuked. “You r back to What do yon mean ean?” TE an ag i ascal! Take those tows the stantly. pasture in by brin ing them up at this tine of the day?” The Hight died of Roger's ing eyes: tall and ears drooped tification. Dazed and ished as the cows could be, 1 dane in mor as much aston hie round. went solemnly down lane and back to pasture, the Roger hix feet to the ding«long, cling-clang of the leader's bell.—New York Sun. the the CI0Ous ming 0 New Orileans’s Water Ballast, “The report that Orleans is dangerously said an old captain government short service, have grown of the fact water ballast a trifle light. remedy is simply letting in more wa- ter, and the incident iz chiefly valua- ble as showing the immense superi- ority of American-built ships. Water ballast on a modern war vessel is a good joke. Ballasting a corrective measure intended to overcome too much buoyancy. constructed it oughtn’t to over buoyant and oughtn’t to need ballast of any kind, The presence of such a thing is conclusive evidence that the designer made a mistake in his ealew lations, Every inch of an armed cruiser should be occupied by some thing useful. and the space taken up by the water tanks is dead waste, The New Orleans, as you will remember, was built by the Armstorngs for the Brazilian service, and while she is a fine craft, she is distinctly inferior technically to those constructed in this country. None of the American-made ships carries a pint of water-ballast.” «New Orleans Times Democrat, the cruiser New now in “seems to eR ont Wns is be A Rare Disease, The condition of the unfortunate man who is being gradually ossified into a state of absolute helplessness in New York City is one which quite nat. urally arouses public interest in the melancholy afid inevitable outcome, Although the diseass in question, which is scientifically known as rheumatoid arthritis, ix not very rare, ts extreme manifestation, as in. the present in. stance, 8 somewhat unusual. It is characterized by a calcareous deposit at first around the joiats, then after. wand into the surrounding tendons and muscles, and finally throughout the entire fleshy portions of the body. ms NS { quence of the original trouble, Thos | the patient is unable to feed himself, on account of the rigidity of his upper i limbs, is confined to his bed by his In- | ability to walk, and not infrequently | his reputation is affected by the grad unl and progressive solidification of his chest walls, It is easy to under. | stand that the disease is occasioned | by a profound constitutional error of { nutrition, and is virtually incurable, — i New York Herald. SPORT FOR THE MULE. He Kept 8 Whole Hegiment Awake Down in Cubs, i The following is told G. A. Thompson, Company B, | First Hlinois legi » interesting story by nent “Speaking of mules,” “did » desire a body? said the dough- thie On Bone mule sees a he ground he i making run for { them than a policeman can help going to sleep. When | First in Cuba we made a night march from front, We landed at adguarters 11230 p. m. ground. fixed for rere any hrough the giclee of boy, OU ever notice insane mule Lins Well, sir, when lot of people asleep on {Can no ti step ia . more help i was with the Riboney for the | Bhafter's lhe at and camped on the “We sleep had ju when ope * bered tha hind a one for some our line orbs Eilat all the bigger ivusaiuite Wil COn- * in the the the the + put of bet i using 43 26 Crigin of a Coin’'s Name, things a paper cerning I a sap for But it Ii. that Coli. the was the It generally was was to Las bot suines ntention twenty-shilling rather, the if gold 37 that iis time in by ruin, Sd... and he Crown proclaimed t should hs urrent A Very Sanitary House, has lou Pe joi ed soni houses, and now in Yokohama wid carth- we hear Japan in quake j of Kesey 1 in abode which pos tion of being in Cham is supposed to an eminent Ger man bacteriologist, who hopes by its aid to aroid all the ills to which hu. man flesh is heir so far as they are due to zymoti The house is built of glass bricks, =0 that there is no peed for windows, and the doors { when closed are perfectly air tight. { Ventilation ix brought about by air i being foreed into the building through wool filters, and in case this treatment does not rob it of all its bacteria, the air farther driven {against glyeerineconated pilates of glass, Or the | strange domicile is opened admit | vigitors armies of air-borne microbes {| must come in too: but the sunlight | which plays around the rooms will soon kill off these. he unique distinct proof, A Journal microls writer bers’ save it have been erected by Canses, cotton is course when door of this to Does All His Own Werk Vinathaven, Me., has a hotel propri- | etor who does all his carpenter work, paints his house, drives his hack to the ferry, or will take passengers to North { Haven, nine miles distant. He does all | his cooking and chamberwork, and | one morning recently got up in the morning and got breakfast for his two boarders and family of five, and then did Is weekly clothes washing, hav. nz it on the line to dry before many of the people in the town were up. At 8 o'clock he went downtown and bought articles for dinner, and while these were cooking the landlord smus. ed himself by scrubbing the floor of the hotel office.~New York Press. Ny Comparison, Friend—And so the members of the committee at the Academy sent this picture back! What fools, Artist--Aye, what fools! Friend-—-It would have given their own pictures such a chance, you know. Pick-Me-Up. Portland, Ore, claims to have the fastest stern-wheel steamboat in the world. The Hassalo, recently .
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers