ing. The first sweat is thus disposed of, and there is but little danger of injury from rain, when put up green, as it packs closely.

3. The averaged quantity of seed I think should be 12 quarts to the acre. The richer the soil, the more seed when grown for hay. If sown thin on such land, it grows too rank and coarse. I have not tried it on poor land, or even light land, but am told it does well on such soils. I should prefer a good corn stubble, potato, or other well tilled land.

The millet shelled from a crop cut for hay, is not fit for seed-a portion of your field should be fully ripened for this purpose. I can furnish all the seed you want. I introduced this crop here. I am greatly pleased with it. If cut for hay, the mowing machine does it finely -for seed, use the cradle.

I have been feeding my entire stock on this kind of hay for the last fortnight, and all seem satisfied, even the calves. L. M. BARTLETT.

Top Onions.

MESSES. EDITORS-I have several letters from your state within a few days inquiring about top onions. And to save work and letter postage to write to all, permit me to do it at once through your paper.

1. The top onion seed has the shape of an onion. Its bigness is from that of a kernel of corn to a dove's egg. The same onion may be set out for seed year after year. But if you wish to raise a large good onion to use or sell, plant the seed.

2. Sow the seed as early as you can work the ground They will have ample time to grow, planted in July; but like leeks they grow best in April. No matter how much snow falls on them or if the ground should freeze, it only seems, afterwards, to hasten their growth.

3. Plow your ground, put on the top, well rotted manure, sow on ashes, harrow or rake thoroughly, row it out about 8 inches apart, place your seed from two to four inches apart on the row, cover the seed a little out of sight, so that perhaps the first shower will bring many of the seeds a little in sight, tramp on the bed as much as you please while you are making and sowing, especially on the row after the seeds are sown.

4. After planting the seed, sow on common salt, which you can find in old fish barrels in the stores. When your onions are well up and growing it is well often to take ashes and plaster, and while it rains, or a little after a shower, throw it up into the air and let it fall in fine dust. A little will do.

8. The three great advantages over other varieties are these. The top onions are earlier, so that you can supply the market before other people have them grown. Another is, that you can hoe 14 times as many in a day as you can of those from the black seed. At the first hoeing you have no weeds; besides the blade [one] or spear is large and you can see the row. And the other reason is, that you will never be troubled with maggots. S. MORGAN. Bristol, Vt.

Why Plaster is not Always Beneficial.

I understand plaster to be a sulphate of lime, i. e. the base is lime united chemically with sulphuric acid. My theory is that when plaster does no good, the soil has already its quantum of something analagous to sulphuric acid. For instance, on the sand lands about Dunning Street, in this (Saratoga) county, formerly plaster was the making of the farmers. It would then make every thing grow, and they have been wondering for a year or two back, why plaster did not make clover grow as it used to. Their fields are covered with sorrel, the plaster has furnished the soil with an excess of acid, and sorrel grows better than any thing else. Now the remedy I believe to be lime, which will unite with and neutralize this excess of acid, and afford the same fertilizing power as plaster formerly did, at much less expense. The farmers have only to procure common stone lime from the nearest kilns, or air slaked will do. On light soils, let the lime be slaked before applying, but on cold clayey soils, it may be beneficial to apply in the stone, and let it heat up the soil. It will loosen a heavy and lighten a sandy soil, and where it does not already naturally abound, is a necessary addition, especially if you want to raise wheat. It will stimulate all the crude organic elements to action; but it is important to remember that when you have put this stimulant into light soils, containing but little nutriment for plants, you must not expect its good effects to continue unless you feed your soil with manure, or muck, or leaves, or something else; no more than you would expect a hungry man to keep on working without food. But draw on your chip dung, muck, leaves or other stuff, and your lime will continue to keep it at work to the best advantage, for years. Putting on the lime gives the appetite and

6. Gather them as soon as the top is fairly wilted. If you do not they will start to grow again and burst. Some tell us this kind of onions are tough and strong. But it should be known that the reason of that is, that they are left in the ground after they are ripe. Gardeners who have known them for 20 years write for seed and tell me they prefer this variety because they are sweet, tender and juicy.

7. When ripe gather and keep them, both onions and seed, in a dry place. Never leave them on the damp cellar bottom. If you have planted them in season and as I direct, you may raise from 600 to 1000 bushels per acre. I often have them over a foot round.

cannot work on with nothing long. Your hungry man will soon be worked out, without food; but don't give him the appetite and good digestion, and work him hard and then refuse to feed him. If any body has a better theory let us have it. H. VAN OSTRAND. Rock City Mills, N. Y.

PERUVIAN GUANO, vs. SUPERPHOSPHATE OF LIME FOR OATS.-The Southern Planter gives the results of some experiments with oats. 200 lbs superphosphate gave 704 lbs. of oats. 200 lbs. of Peruvian guano produced 1556 lbs. At 35 lbs. per bushel this would be, with superphosphate 20 bushels: with guano 44 bushels per acre. We are sorry the yield, without any manure, is not given.

Poultry House.

И

An Honest Word about Chittagongs. MESSRS. EDITORS--In answer to the queries of J. W., allow me to give my experience in the matter May, 1853, saw me the proud possessor of two coops of Grey Chittagongs, just arrived from the land of wooden nutmegs, from celebrated dealers whose names are not unknown to the columns of the Cultivator. One coop, I was assured, were sent at a rate below the market price, and was politely requested to make up the balance by way of a "puff" in some agricultural paper. My pleasure was enhanced, on waking the next morning, to hear the two cocks crow a race, making a noise somewhere between the braying of a jackass and the bellowing of a mad bull, and rivaling the cackling of the geese that foretold the downfall of Rome. The hens will lay about thirteen eggs to a litter, and then they are bound to set, right or wrong. The weights

Fig. 1, is the exterior, fig. 2 the ground plan; a is the feeding room, b, b, b, the nests, c the passage to the roosting-place, which is up in the loft above, f the feed box, the top of which is hung with hinges, and holes cut in the top, which enables the fowls to feed at leisure and not to waste their feed; the box or trough can be filled up, which will last them several days; e,

the passage by which the eggs can be removed from the nests without disturbing the fowls; each nest is to have a small sliding door into the passage-way, by which means you can readily get at the nests. A house of this description 8 feet wide, by 12 feet long and 8 feet high, will accommodate from 50 to 60 fowls.

The best situation for a house of this kind, says the Journal, would be in a bank fronting south, and by this means you can have fresh eggs all through the winter, for if fowls are well sheltered from the cold and storms, and well fed, they will continue laying all the winter; the floor of the feeding room should be kept covered with sand, pounded oyster shells, and lime; you may also have a yard in front, with a high picket fence around it, by which means you can shut up your fowls at pleasure.

Best Fowls-Large Eggs.

MESSRS. EDITORS-I have raised within the past few years, almost all the large varieties of fowls; but I have found none that suit me as well as the cross with the Jersey Blue and Shanghai. I think they are unsurpassed by any, either for laying, setting, brooding, or table use. Some of my last spring pullets weigh from 7 to 9 lbs. If any readers of the Country Gentleman have tried the above cross, I should be glad to hear from them.

Hold on Madagascar, and let Ohio speak-I have two specimen Shanghai and Jersey Blue eggs. The measurements of the one, 8 by 6 inches-of the other, 8 by 6 inches. H. S. Greenfield, O.

four to ten weeks old, the chicks are mostly destitute of down or feathers, looking as if prepared for the pot, and a cold rain makes sad havoc among them. The first six months they run to legs and bones, are very impossible to dress them fit for market. In fact, their poor and blue, with so tender a skin that it is next to long, bony legs, gaunt, blue bodies, and torn hides, make a sorry show. They are voracious eaters, one requiring as much as two common fowls, and being essentially a lazy animal, and opposed to the locomotive tendencies of the age, are good for nothing to hunt their own fodder. But when winter

66 -holds the sun
A prisoner in the yet undawning east,
Short'ning his journey between morn and
And hurrying him, impatient of his stay,
Down to the rosy west"-

noon,

Then, on account of their thin covering of feathers, and long, fleshy toes, will they suffer and their owner lose most severely. Toes freeze and come off leaving a leg and stump of a foot which resembles Powhattan's war club as seen in Barnum's museum. Being a tropical bird, perhaps they are not fully acclimated, or do not find their proper food here; be that as it may, it has been observed that they thrive here best during the prevalence of a certain kind of bug not mentioned by naturalists. VERMONTER.

Treatment of Roup.

Roup is the most obstinate disease we have to contend with. It in most cases attacks fowls from October to April. The first symptoms are a difficulty in breathing; then a weeping at the eyes, together with a swelling of the head; a discharge of foetid matter from the nostrils ensues, and the fowl pines away and dies, unless taken in hand on the first appearance of the disease. Many are of the opinion that it is very contageous. Those affected with it, should be removed to a warm, dry, ventilated room, and treated as follows: Squeeze each nostril out by pressure with the thumb down towards the beak, which will remove all the discharge; then sponge the head with assafoetida dissolved in vinegar, and squeeze a drop or two in each nostril, and finish by tarring or well greasing their heads from above the nostrils back to the top of the head, and keep them tarred until relieved. One or two applications will generally suffice. Finally, it is best to kill the fowl if it does not recover immediately. JONATHAN RAMSEY. Middletown, Conn.

Alderney Milk.

MESSRS. EDITORS-The communication of Mr. PRENTICE, in your paper of 1st inst., has led me today to weigh the product of 163 lbs. 14 oz. Alderney milk, and the result is 13 lbs. 14 oz. butter, or 1 lb. of butter for 11 lbs. milk. This is a fraction more than from the Ayrshires. The manager of my dairy had not seen Mr. PRENTICE'S communication, nor did he know my object until the result was ascertained.

During the cold weather, in addition to hay, my cows are fed daily with from 1 to 3 quarts of bran each, in warm water. I do not think this adds to the weight of the milk, but it probably does to the quantity, and it certainly tends to keep them in good health.

The result both with the Alderneys and the Ayrshires, is more favorable than I had supposed. I have always, when inquired of, replied that about 7 quarts of milk or 14 lbs. in weight, would produce a pound of butter.

I send a specimen of the butter made to day for your inspection. JOHN T. NORTON. Farmington, Conn., March 19, 1855.

Mr. NORTON will please accept our thanks for the above, as also for the box of beautiful and delicious butter which accompanied it. It will be seen that the product is a trifle more than in the case of the Ayrshires heretofore reported by Mr. PRENTICE; and both statements fully substantiate all that has been said in relation to the richness of milk from these breeds of

COWS.

Food for Ewes and Lambs.

I would inquire of you through the CULTIVATOR, what I shall feed to sheep to make them give milk. I have lost a number of lambs this month. My sheep did not give any milk, and they would not rear the lambs. I have fed them oats and corn through the winter, until they began to lamb, and then I fed them potatoes. Now can you tell what is the best feed to make them give the most milk? If you can you will oblige WM. E. WHEELER. Warren, N. Y., March 26. When sheep have been well wintered as yours appear to have been, we have rarely found any trouble from a deficiency of milk. The severe weather of the past month has probably had much to do with your difficulties. When a ewe has yeaned, she should be immediately separated from the rest of the flock for a few days, and she will then seldom or never disown her lambs. When ewes have couples, they will frequently disown one of the lambs, but by placing them in a pen by themselves and holding the ewe while the discarded lamb sucks, for a day or two, she will take to it. Good hay, shorts, cabbage, mangel wurzel or ruta bagas, as you may chance to have them, are the best food for ewes. Unless lambs are raised for the butcher, it is best not to have them come till there is a good bit of grass for the ewes. We have never found any roots or grain that would make as much milk as good grass. Rye is frequently grown in England as a green food for ewes and lambs in the spring: but we do not approve of the practice. It is on the wane in Great Britain, on account of its exhausting effect on the soil.

Cabbage, in our experience, is better than ruta bagas, mangels or beets, for ewes and lambs. In fact we know of nothing, except grass, that will produce so much milk, or at least that enables the ewes to support their lambs so well. Will our correspondents give us their experience in regard to the inquiry of Mr. Wheel

er.

Diseases of Cattle.

MESSES. EDITORS-I suppose that information respecting disease in domestic animals, extending to the cause, prevention and cure, is not inappropriate to the design of your paper. I have a cow whose stale has for some time past exhibited more or less of a bloody appearance, the disease seeming to increase in severity, and will I apprehend, if not removed, eventually cause her death. She is evidently declining in flesh, and her milk has nearly dried up. I have never had or seen a case like it. Can you or some of your correspondents direct to some simple and sure remedy?

I would further inquire, do you know of any really good book that treats of the diseases of stock-plain, simple and cheap, and at the same time clear, comprehensive and efficient? Every owner of stock needs such a book, if the thing exists, and you will be entitled to our thanks if you will inform us what it is, and where, and at what price it is to be had. E. S. F. Gilsum, N. H.

DADD'S "American Cattle Doctor," comes nearest the requirements of our correspondent of any book we are acquainted with-price $1.

How to Raise Calves.

MESSRS. EDITORS--March is a month in which many cows drop their calves, and March calves are the very ones to raise, provided they are good ones, "for a good cow may have a bad calf," but a good cow will be more likely to have a good calf, than an ordinary cow. My practice is, to let the calf have what milk it will take for the three first days of its existence; then allow it to suck one-half of the milk until it is three weeks old; by this time you can decide upon appearances whether it has such points as you desire in an animal of that age; but if the calf is doomed for the shambles, give it all the milk for two or three weeks more, and it will find a ready market; but if to be raised, continue to allow it one-half of the milk until it is eight weeks old, during which time it can be learnt to eat a half pint of meal a day, with a little fine hay; then it will do to confine the calf to one teat, with an increase of meal; and at the expiration of three months, it will do to deny it milk, provided you supply it with a suitable quantity of meal and good hay, or grass, three times a day, and what water it desires. Do not turn the poor calf out to shirk for itself, in a poor pasture, but give it a good stable, that can be made dark during hot days, to prevent the flies from tormenting the creature, and save it from the rays of a vertical sun, which it will avoid if possible. The last of September, if you have good aftermath, turn your calves on to it, and with plenty of pumpkins through October and November, with a regular supply of hay and roots the following winter, you may rationally expect to show as good a yearling, when March comes round again, as your neighbors. S. D. WALBRIDGE. North Bennington, Vi.

National Sheep Show.

At a public meeting recently held at the village of Bath, Steuben Co., N. Y., a "Wool Growers' Association of Western New-York" was formed and a constitution and by laws adopted. The Society have resolved to hold a "National Sheep Show" at the village of Bath on the 29th, 30th and 31st of May 1855. The following is a list of the premiums offered.

FIRST CLASS.-Sweepstakes Pen, best 10 fine wool Ewes, $75. Best fine wool Buck over two years old, $50; 2d do, $40; 3d do. $30; 4th do, $20; 5th do, $10.

Awarding Committee-Wm. Wheeler, Wheeler, Steuben Co.; Hector Hitchcock, Conesus, Livingston Co; J. L. Monier, Naples, Ontario Co.

SECOND CLASS.-Best five Ewes with Lambs, fine wool, $30; 2d do, $20; 3d do, $10. Best five Ewes two years old. $20; 2d do, $15; 3d do, $10.

Com-Alex. Arnold. Avoca, Steuben Co.: Wm. D. Dickirson, Victor, Ontario Co.; Chilson, Pavilion, Wyoming County.

THIRD CLASS-Best five Ewe, one year old, fine wool $20; 2d do, $15; 3d do, $10.

Com.-Solomon Hitchcock, Conesus; Calvin Ward, RichGalentine, Rush, Monroe. mond, Ontario ;— FOURTH CLASS.-Best Buck two years old, fine wool, $30: Best Buck one year old, fine wool,

2d do. $20; 3d do, $10.

$20; 2d do, $15; 3d do, $10. Com-Loomis Bunce, Milo, Yates; C. D. Champlin, Urbana, Steuben; Nathan Squires, Penn Yan, Yates.

No Sheep will be allowed to compete for more than one premium except in the Fifth Class.

FIFTH CLASS-Best single Ewe, fine wool, $10. Best 3 Ewes, fine wool. $15.

Com-Daniel Gray, Wheeler; Wm. A. Cook, Lima, Liv. ingston; G. H. Wheeler, Wheeler.

This Class may be drawn from any of the foregoing pens.

Any person may become a member of the Association by the payment of $1. The following are the principal officers for this year:-President-WM. BAKER, Urbana; Cor Sec'y -WM B. MCKAY, Bath: Rec. Sec'y-ROBERT B. WILKES, Bath; Treasurer-Hon. REUBEN ROBIE, Bath. There are also thirteen Vice Presidents and several Corresponding Secretaries.