Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 September 1891 — HOME AND THE FARM. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

HOME AND THE FARM.

A DEPARTMENT MADE UP FOR OUR RURAL FRIENDS. The? Neglected the Swamp,—How Farra- . era Could Uhtto Iter Mutual Benefit—Furo Water ot the Bight Temperature for Stuck—A Convenient Arrangement for the Tired Beuaewtfe. Low Lands.

ONE of the greatest mistakes made by the early settlers In our hilly v country was In clearing the high lands and neglect- | ing the swamps. I . Y r ' The result has ' * been disastrous iu < many ways. On many of the rocky /)t summits where wm lf/ there was soil and vegetable matter enough to support a forest, the fire has followed the JpiP ax and the vegetable matter has been consumed

and thA sand either blown or washed away, and were it not tor a few of the remains of the large stumps no one would suppose that the spot was ever anything else than a naked ledge. On other hills where there were no rocks the sand is drifting like the snow, and on some farms there are many acres of this shifting sand that a warranty deed will not hold and that is being conveyed without any legal process. On hills where the soil is between these extremes, the process of exhaustion is more gradual, but just as sure. And now that the high lands are exhausted and denuded some farmers are prevented from clearing up their low lands by the fact that they are all they can depend on for woodlots. But the time is coming when the deep, black deposits of vegetable matter which we call muck-bogs, as well the intermediate strips between them and the dry lands, will be cleared and improved, and other conditions of the farm will be made to conform to the change. These border lands betweon the high lands and the swamps are in many cases of the least value, because they are harder to subdue. The growth upon them is largely spruce, fir, and cypress and the soil is white or rimy sand, with a few inches of black soil abovo it, and as soon as the trees are cut off swamp moss will cover the ground and seeds will blow In and start a new forest.

An Everlasting Fence. The best and cheapest fence on my farm I built seventeen years ago, and It is still good. The posts are cedar, set eight feet apart with the end of the timber which naturally stood up placed dpwn. This is the way to make the fence: .Let the posts go in the ground thirty inches and project four and onefourth to five feet above ground. A top rail of two by four scantling is to be mortised into the corners of the posts and nailed fast. White oak pins are turned uniformly one inch in diameter and inserted in holes bored in every other post. They must be previously well seasoned and soaked In boiled oil. The holes musj, be bored in the posts at the exact point where the wire is to pass it. To get the holes exactly right with the least trouble, it is the best plan to first bore a board for a pattern. Now lay a wire along the line of posts, coil one end of it around a pin and drive the pin in until Its head imbeds the wire in the post. Then drive a staple over the end of the wire. Now, with one man to handle and drive the pins and another to stretch the wire by means of a crowbar or wire-stretcher each time a pin is driven, fifty rods of fence may be hung in one day. I use five wires under the scantling. Each time after a pin is driven the wire is slackened to allow It to be twisted about another pin. These pins are only placed on every second post, the wires being stapled to the Intervening posts. The cost is as follows: Two cedar posts at 15 cents, 30 cents; five plain wires, Nc. 12, 15 cents; five oak plus, 5 cents; scantling, 13 cents; labor, 37 cents. Total, sl. The wire rarely or never breaks, as Its contraction and expansion are taken care of by these pins.—[George W. Humphrey, Onondaga County, Now York.

Simple Bag-Holder. Take three light poles, cut to the same length, each to be about 6 feet Bore a a hole through each pole 2X or 3 inches

from the end, large enough to receive a oneeighth or onequarter inch thick carriage bolt Be sure that the bolt is long enough to pass well through the three poles, leaving plenty o f room on the threaded end to receive the burr.

Having fastened the poles together by means of the bolt, insert into each pole a serewhook in such a position, and at •uch a height, as to hold the bag well open and allow the bottom to rest upon the floor or ground, as shown in illustration.—[Practical Farmer.

Co-Opera(ion ot Farmer*. There seems to be quite a tendency among farmers, of late years, to form closer unions for mutual benefit. First, farmers’ clubs were organized; then came the Granges;thenFarmcrs’ Alliance, etc., all calculated to increase the power and influence of the farming class by union and combination. The principle of co-operation might be greatly extended among farmers with good results. Wince so many kinds of farm implements and machinerv have come tc be substituted for manual labor small farmers labor under a disadvantage- unless able to invest quite a large capital in labor-saving machinery. If able to make the investment the limited use to which each machlne.can be applied on a small farm of 40, 50or 80 acres hardly saves enough labor to pay interest and wear of machines. Now, If a dozen farmess owning together 600, 800 or 1,000 acres of land could unite and ’purchase all necessary farm machinery it would greatly reduce the cost to each individual, while serving their purposes nearly as well as if everyone owned all the machines. Of course, they would need to eliminate something of human selfishness, and allow the one who most needed the use of the machines to have the first use.

If only a broad, liberal, manly, Christian spirit were always cherished small farmers could, In many ways, co-operate to mutual advantage.