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-*0o S oo *ooooooeo 0 Ms//./t. CAHE OF SHEEP. The Critical Time for Sheep the Early Spring? Months. If there is one time more critical than another for sheep, that time is the last of winter and through the early spring months, before getting out to pasture. While in winter quarters, one of the most essential things in success ful management is a clean, light, airy and dry place for the sheep to he down in, with room proportionate to the number. No animal kept on the farm if we except poultryis so suscep tible to the effects of foul air caused by poor ventilation, or no ventilation at all, the foulness arising from the ac cumulations of tilth, waste straw and hay heating and decomposing in the housing departments. Variety of food is an all-important thing to be considered in the manage ment of sheep durtng the winter. This is necessary to the health of the ani mals, as well as to the best bodily de velopment, the growth of wool, and the well-being of the progeny. The breed ing ewes, in order to produce strong, vigorous lambs, must be kept in a healthy condition dining the days of pregnancy The sheep, more than the horse and cow, is subject to constipa tion when kept on dry feed. This con dition should be guarded against by careful attention! to feeding. Consti pation is the bane of all pregnant ani mals, and a cause of the death of more young lambs than any other one dis ease. The remedy lies in a variety of foodssucculent foods, as supplied in roots or ensilage. Foods abounding in protein elements should take the place of highly carbonaceous foods for sheep at the barn. This is found in clover hay and the mixed grasses, rather than in timothy fed wholly or largely. Com ensilagesiloed with the ears about matureabounds in carbonace ous material, but its succulence when feeding it connection with clover hay, a concentrated ration of cotton seed meal, oat-and-pea meal, linseed neal or bran, of all the above prop erly balanced, forms about a's good feed for breeding ewes as can be found. Corn meal is too heating and fattening. On the other hand, oats and bran car ries no danger when fed to the flock from grass to grass again. If to the mixture linseed meal is added to make one-fourth of the whole, and fed at the rate of one pound daily of the mix ture for 100 pounls weight o sheep, the flock will keep in line condition L. F. Abbott in Orange Judd Farmer A. Mechanical Root Cutter Wheie stock is kept in any consider able quantity and roots are fed them a. steam power root cuttei is almost a necessity. Where but a small herd or few animals are kept a home-made cut ter may be made to rill the bill In the cut illustrated, Fig. 1 shows a cutter complete. The iiguie a bote Fig 1 is a basket to catch the roots as they fall I from the knife at g. The frame or box, a, of heavy lines, is made of l*/4 by 4 in stutf, or a. shoe box can be made to serve as a hopper by cutting out about seven inches from the front end and then placing a board, e, diagonally as shown The heavy platform, k, is sup ported with legs and and are cross pieces for increased support. An old hand saw blade will sen for a slicing knife. It should be 5 or inches wide and 10 inches long it less than 6 inch es the back of the slide can be made level with the upper side of the knife, by a thin piece ot board. In Fig. 2 the knife is fastened to the slide g. The boa id should be about 15 inches long i and wide enough to correspond with the width of .the box. Befoie fasten- JL !ng the knife 5TI place a hole is cut through slide 4 inches wide, the edge being even with the edge of the knife. JThe knife is raised from the -slide by a piece of lath JA inch thick and fastened by screws. In !Fig. 1 the slide is worked by the lever c, being fast ened as in Figs. 1 and 2. Two pieces of 1 by VA inch stuff 6 inches long are bolted 16osely to the lever and slide. 'An old shovel handle 4 feet long makes a good lever and is fastened to the cutter leg at f, which is a board the same width as the hopper and extend ing down to the slide against which the knife comes at each stroke. The slide is inserted from the front before the stubbing board is put in position. The board should be made adjustable to be removed to sharpen the knife. R. Logan, Blanch County, Mich, in Farm and Home. Baked Bones. A correspondent of the Rural New Yorker, who seems to be very confi dent and positive in his statements, says: "I got eggs all through the cold weather, and here in Montgomery county, Pa., in seven winters have never failed to fill my egg basket. I will let the readers of the Rural New Yorker into the secret of my success. The main part of it is baked bones. The bones are placed in the oven and when sufficiently baked, are taken out and crushed with a hammer or com mon bone mill. I feed them every day one-half ounce to each .fowl. I regard the baked bone superior to the raw, and a better egg food. "Hen houses should face the south with enough windows to give plenty of light and warmth, no ventilators, have matched board floors, with a layer of coarse straw changed every week. Con stant work in cold weather, brought ibout by scattering wheat In the straw, K3 Is another secret of my winter yield of eggs. This and the baked bones are the mainsprings of my "good luck." Hoinc-Made Batchers' AVindlass: Conveniences for butchering should be in every community. A plan of one in common use in the East is given be low. First, prepare a strong timber, a, 6 or S inches in diameter and nearly as long as width of the barn. Bore a three-quarter inch hole at each end and drive in each enfr an iron, b, let ting it extend about 2 inches. Then take two pieces of old iron, (I use wagon tire), and bend in the form of V, fastening each end to the beam above. The iron or roll, b, will fit in the point of the bent iron, c. With a two-inch augur bore two holes at right angles through the roll, about a foot from the end men take eight pieces of 2 by 4 material, four of them made to fit the augur holes. The other four should be. or inches shorter and een nailed in betwe TJaen take some iflSS'f Butchers' Windlass strips of %-mch stuff, 4 inches wide, d, and nail to the ends of the eight pieces of 2 by 4. Nail strips on the edge of the 2 by 4 to keep a rope in plact-. If a large wheel can be secured and attached to the beam, a, it will be unnecessary to make one. A half-inch rope v\ ill hang any beef. Wind it sev eral times arqund the wheel. Fasten two ropes, one is shown at f, to the roll about feet apart, long enough to reach the floor. Construct a 3 inch roll 15 inches long, g, about 3 feet from the floor, wun a crank attached to wind the small rope on. Attach the rope taut and the windlass is complete. I can dress and hang a 1,000-pound beef alone and can take dovvn a quar ter or side and leave the rest hanging. It is a simple, strong and cheap wind lass.E. N. Fisher. Hampden County, Mass in Farm and Home. Rules for Breedings Like begets like, only departing un der strange and extraordinary influ ences. Nature's laws are unerring, and, when scientifically directed, success is alwajs attainable. The male should invariably be line bred. His pedigree, form, constitution and disposition are his chief require ments, and should be as ne ir- perfection a"* possible. Inbreeding is desirable where positive qualities aie well established, and are transmitted with a certainty and strength that can not be reached by any kind of miscellaneous breeding. The male should not be confined in dark and foul stables, but should have light and exercise and be fed with strict reference to strength and vigor. The female requires light, air, and exercise, with a proper amount of food containing the proportionate elements of growth for the foetus. The female should not be allowed to associate or have in sight inferior ani mals while in sexual heat or in early stage of pregnancy, but should famili arize with the best of her kind. Kind treatment and regular attend ance are strictly essential to success. Ex. Live Stock of South America. South America has 03,418,000 cattle, 11S.229,200 sheep and 5,000,000 goats. Of these the Pampas of Argentine has 23.000,000 cattle, Brazil 18,000,000, Chile 6,000,000, Uruguay 8,000,000, Venezuela 5,000,000. Argentine has S0,000,000 sheep, Uruguay 23,000,000, Bolivia 7,000,000, Venezuela 4,000,000 and Chile 4,000,000. Venezuela and Argentine each have 2,000,000 goats and llamas. With such immense numbers of cat tle and sheep rapidly increasing, and some of them being improved by the importation of pure bred bulls and bucks from England, they will give us stronger competition in the Eu ropean markets unless we grade up with more pure bred sires and raise & better class of stock. They can raise them cheaper and sell them cheaper on their boundless ranches than we can on our high priced lands, but we should be better able to raise high-class stock than any ranch country. Stock Notes. Cotton seed oil is said to be fatal to cattle ticks. The Cornell station says that heavy milking ewes, two yeais old, are best for early lamb-raising. If vour pullets ha^e been properly ~ared for they should be laying nicely now. Do not keep the hens until they be come too old. The pullets and jear ihi* hens pay the best. If your hens are lousy they will not lay. A hen cannot fight lice and nil the egg basket at the same time. Th Russian war office thinks it has discos ered that gray horses have more strength and endurance than brown ones. Experiments with feeding wheat have shown that when wheat and corn are the same price per bushel, it pays better to feed the wheat and sell the corn. One year old is soon enough for sows to breed to attain the best re sults. At this age they will pass the farrowing oideal better, be better mothers, and the pigs will be larger and glow more rapidly. If you intend to breed any sort of stock the coming season, try and get it better than you ever had before. Better not breed at all if you can't im prove upon what you have been doiu* in the past. A 1 *AT.i '-^fi^B^^^b^^ STRANGE VISIONS. HALLUCINATIONS HARD TO EX PLAIN BY EXPERIMENTERS. Crystal (the Gazing a FadPsychical Re, search Society Trying to Find Out Why People See Queer Things ia tiobletn and Globes. iRYSTAL visions are the latest fad of the Society of Psychical Research. That as sociation of pro gressive savants has devoted much of its attention re cently to the ability of certain persons to produce hallu cinations by gazing .nto^glass globes or goblets of water. It has obtained data of startling results and is preparing to astonish the world with a mass of learned literature which it is collecting, says New York World. Professor H. J. Hyslop, of Columbia College, is the most active member of society in New York. Though he is a scientist of the most severely practical type, he is convinced that the illusions of crystal-gazers are well worthy of study, as having possible .bearing upon undiscovered scientific truths. With clear, unbiased mind, he feathers all the statistics he can find and turns them over to his fellow seekers after knowledge. During the past few years he has studied carefully several cases that have come under his personal observation and has furnished to the society much interesting in formation concerning the strange phenomenon. It should be premised that the society its not an organization with a hobby. |As its name implies, its object is to search for all stories, histories, auto biographies and traditions that may possibly have anything to do with psychical phenomena. It' is absolutely unprejudiced and makes no attempt to shape facts. All it tries to do is to collect them If the trend of the evi dence it gathers leads to a belief in the supernatural, it is satisfied to ac cept spiritualism or any other doctrine that may be established by the facts if the mass of testimony leans toward materialism and a denial of the exist ence of everything spiritual, equally good. It is simply a jury of scientists and other thinkers prepared to try the case of the Seen vs. the Unseen upon its merits. Professor Hyslop was quite willing to talk of crystal-gazing when a Jour nal reporter saw him in the crowded library of his residence, No. 519 West pne Hundred and Forty-ninth street. {After having prefaced his remarks with a, reiteration of his disinterested posi tion upon the question, he went on to say: "Crystal isions are among the most curious of unexplained phenomena. Strictly speaking, they have little scien tific value, so far as I know. They are simply hallucinations produced by gazing at a crystal globe or a glsas of water, and seem to have little if any thing to do with the will of the in dividual. Often the illusions are mere mosaics of previous incidents in the ex perience of the gazer sometimes they are visions of things which the gazer has never actually seen, but which like most so-called 'strange* dreams, may easily be imagined by anybody of active fancy. i "Still, I have witnessed many start ling coincidences in connection with those same hallucinations. It happens pot infrequently that the gazer sees in |the crystal or water scenes which have actually happened, or possibly, are ac cually happening at the time. Then it is that the phenomenon seems to en croach upon the realm of the super natural, and is called by most un thinking persons 'second sight.' As a matter of fact, nothing has been ad duced to show that the ^incidences may be explained as an instance of clairvoyance. In fact, I *n tempted to throw the clairvoyant out of the reckon ing altogether, as almost unworthy of :onsideration in the question. "Telepathy, in my opinion, mav prove to be prt of the cause of the phenomenon, what I mean by that qualffieflt statement is that if other facts yet to be established happen to prove conclusively that there Is such a thing as telepathy, or thought-transference, I shall be nearly willing to accept it as an explanation of the faculty of crystal-gazing. There may be many other ways in which the existence of the telepathic communication may be demonstrated. As I say, crystal-gazing is not sufficient in itself to do so, but we may ascertain in the future that thought-transference is responsible for the visions seen in the crystal. "Remember, the scene in the crystal is not a complete hallucination. In the first place, the image is seldom, if ever, the actual size of the supposed scene. If a gazer has a vision of a man, the figure seen in the crystal or water is always much smaller than the man himself. So the vision is not a perfect il lusion. In fact, the gazer is never de ceived by the vision, but always real izes, even while seeing it, that it is only a hallucination. "Again, the vision can generally be traced to the observation unconscious at the time of the object or objects Seen in the mirror. It is surprising how many things we see without re alizing that we are looking at them, and still more astonishing how we re member sights that have never attract ed our conscious attention. You may be walking along the street and see a woman with a red shawl. It is almost certain that the garment, being un usual under the prevailing fashions, would attract your attention immedi ately You might not notice, however, that the woman wore a black bonnet, if there were nothing unusual about it, but weeks afterward the unconscious observation of the bonnet might crop up in your memory. Possibly you could not recollect when you had seen a woman in a black bonnet or, at any rate, that particular black bonnet nevertheless, the image of the black bonnet might be almost indelibly im pressed upon your mind and cause you to do not a little guessing. "The most remarkable case of crystal visions that has ever come within my personal observation is that of the wifu of a Brooklyn clergyman, a most es timable lady, who would be greatly pained to see her name in print. There fore jou must pardon me for keeping her identity secret. I can assure you, howe-v^r, that I have utmost faith in the sincerity of her statements, and, in fact, know her to be incapable of de ceiving either herself or me as to the manifestations of the phenomenon. For the purposes of this interview I shall call her, with your permission, Mrs. D. "For many years this lady has had crystal visions frequently. She can produce hallucinations by gazing into either the globe or the goblet. Most of her visions are merely mosaics, as in other instances, but some of them have been, if nothing more, curious co incidences "One day, looking into the globe, she saw a woman, evidently ill, lying in bed. Alongside the woman was a little childhow old, she could not de termine. She conceived the idea that the woman was her sister-in-law, who was in the West, but she could not recognize the face. A few minutes later she saw a vision of the graveyard in her native town, and noted with in terest that the gate and walls were just as she had last seen them in early youth. The interior of the cemetery, however, was strange to her. She could not find a single one of the doz ens of monuments and headstones with which she had been familiar, and that fact led her to believe, for she is inter ested more or less in psychical research and understands something of her own phenomenonthat the vision was a mosaic. Bear in mind, the memory re tains thousands of unimportant scenes and bits of scenes, which it jumbles to gether just as you shake up the pieces of colored glass in a kaleidoscope, pro ducing an endless variety of combina- tions.''"'' "Mrs. t). knew, however that her brother was down with typhoid fe*e at the family home and that he wag not expected to live. She momentarily ex pected a telegram summoning her to his bedside, and all her baggage was packed, in preparation for a hasty start. The visions, following so closely the parents, worried her sadly,1 and* s&e was just about io leave for her home, When she got a letter or telegram say ing that the crisis of the disease had been passed and that her brother would recover. ^v* "Three months later she went West and, with great difficulty, drew from her father and mother, both of whom were bitterly opposed to psychical re search, facts that completed the coin cidence. They told her that her broth er, during the worst hours of his ill ness, clung to the delusion that his wife had presented him with another child and that he saw it constantly ly ing on the bed beside its mother. Then, too, at the time when he was most dangerously ill, his relatives were so sure he would die that his other sister, a young girl, was already discussing with her father the advisability of pur chasing a plot in the new cemetery, as the old 'graveyard was in such a hopelessly dilapidated condition. "Now, those facts may be taken as explanations of the two visions seen in the crystal by Mrs. D. The hallucina tion in regard to the mother and child may have been transferred to her by her brother, although he was delirious, and the conjunction of ideas in her sister's mind in regard to the old and new graveyards may have caused Mrs. D. to see the vision of the cemetery with the familiar gate and wall, but not the strange tombstones. Telepathy may have been the process by which those ideas were transferred from the minds of her brother and sister to that of Mrs. D. and thrown by her into the crystal visions. "For the gazer appears to have the power of projecting ideas into the crys tal, though involuntarily, and thus forming the visions. A thought occu pying the mind of the gazer may be made external by a process opposite to that of ordinary sight. When you see anything in the oidmary way it is be cause rays of light travel from that ob ject to the retina of the eye. Similarly, an image formed in the brain may travel outward along the optic nerve and the outer eye, and be projected into the globe or goblet. This is not specu lation, but a fact well within the knowledge of any oculist. Armenians Shrewd and Tricky. F. Marion Crawford, the novelist, who has met many Armenians in the East, says of them- "I doubt whether they are the innocent, confiding, inoffensive Christians that the American people be lieve them to be. My experience with them i,s that they are the sharpest, shrewdest and trickiest of all the East ern people. They say in Turkey that it takes ten Jews to equal one Armenian, and five Armenians to equal one Persian in sharp business dealings. They have many able men among them, and I doubt not that their leaders have to a certain extent fermented this trouble, hoping that the governments of Europe would interfere, and that Armenia would be entirely freed from Turkish rule. I would rather trade with a Turk or a Jew in any part of the East than with a Christian. I have the highest respect 'for Christianity, but the Christ ians of the East are not like us. The business-men among them are to a large extent a set of sharpers, so much so that the words Oriental Christian in the minds of the Eastern travelers is al most synonymous with that of a thief." His I-ast Blissful Thousjht. The old organ blower of Pinkelbury lay dying. The curate was visiting him. "Would you mind, sir, asking our organist to play the 'Dead March' over me?" asked the sick man. "Certainly I will, Jones," said the curate. "Thankee, sir. None o' that 'ere tweedle-dum Beethoven, you know, sir. Only Handel's." "I am sure he will do it," responded the curate. The old man lay placidly for awhile, then exclaimed with fervor: "How thankful I be that I 3han't have to blow for him when he plays the loud part at the end." The Working: Class, i fiwi Over three-fourths of the membership of the churches of the United States are composed of the.working classes.Rev. A TERRIBLJB AUDIENCE. -Tlcfeet-of-Iieave Men See tlie Ticlcet* of-Iie&ve Man Performed. "Having had a long rest from act. ing," a well known actor relates, "I re^ turned to Melbourne to play a shoit' engagement with my former partner ai the Haymarket and then sailed to Var uiemen's Land, now called Tasmania This lovely" island had formerly been a convict station, where life-sentenced prisoners from England had been sent, There was at the time I speak of, and is now, a most refined society in Tas mania, though among the lower class there was a strong flavor of the con vict element. I acted the 'Ticket-of Leave-Man' for the first time in Ho. bart Town, and there was much ex citement in the city when the play was announced. "At least 100 ticket-of-leave men. were in the pit on the night of the ]o- duction. Before the curtain ros J. looked through it at this terrible au^ dience. The faces in the pi? were a study. Men with low foreheads and small, peering, ferret-looking eyes, some with flat noses and square, cruel jaws and sinister expressionsleering, low and cunningall wearing a sullen, dogged look, as though they would tear the benches from the pit and rob the theater of its scenery if one of their kind was held up to public scorn upon the stage. "The first act of the plaj progressed with but little excitement. These men seemed to enjoy the humorous and pa thetic side of the stoiy with great rel ish, but when I came upon the stage in the second act, revealing the emaciated teatures of a returned convict, witht sunken eyes and a close-shaved head, there was a painful stillness in the house. The whole pit seemed to lean, forward and strain their eager eyes upon the scene, and there were little murmurs of recognition and shaking* of head, as though they fully recog nized the local illusions they so well remembered deep-drawn sighs for the sufterings that the hero had gone tnrough, and smothered laughs at soma of the old well remembered inconve niences of prison life but their sympa thies were caught by the nobleness of the hero's character and his innocence of crime, as though each one of these Mllains recognized how persecuted he had been. "AS the play progressed their enthu siasm increased. Whenever the heio was hounded by a detective or ill treated by the old Hebrew they would howl with indignation at the actors, and when he came out unscathed at the end of the play, a monument of persecuted innocence, they cheered io the very echo. "This performance rendered me exr tremely popular with the old 'lags* of Hobart Town, and I was often ac costed in the street by these worthies and told some touching tale of their eaily persecutions. In tact, they quite looked on me as an old 'pal.' "These courtesies were very flatter ing, but the inconvenience that I was caused by being poked in the ribs and winked at now and then, as much as to say, 'All right, old boy, we know you've been there,' rendered my -voritisin among those tellowrs irksome."Boston Post rathe*-,fa Tailor Gonns. The tailor gown, in all its simplicity an I beauty, is one of the favorite spiing costumes, and deservedly so^ tor there is nothing prettier or simple* than J. well made tailor gown. Skirtb are to be narrower this spring but will be cut in very much the same way, fitting smoothly over the hip*^ the lullntss all in a small space in the back. The bell skirt, somewhat fulle* linn it was two or three years ago, i to be worn, and it is one of the mosV becoming of all skirts. Dark blue is ta^ be .i favorite color, and a great many-* cost'imes have already been made up^ wit'i plain skirt and smart little jacket tiMun ed with black braid. The effect is somewhat of a military jacket, and the bi aid is put on in front and around ih coat sometimes frogs are used in pi of the braid. These jackets are always tight-fitting. sTau and gray cloths are also made? up in the^e gowTns. and there is a cer tain shade of warm chestnut-browjL* se'"4e which is also fashionable. The Eton jackets will be worn witlr th- spiing costumes, and an unusually pre.tj style has the skirt very much gort/l. and opening at the side of the fiovr breadth like the bicycle suits An Eton jacket fitting tight at the bacfc has revers turned back from the waist to the shoulder, and lined with blue s-itai With this is to be worn a silk bloa5e of blue and white checked silkr Odd colors are combined in these cose- tui.li1, blues are lined and faced witf given and heliotrope browns also have hehoi rope or yellow or red, and al thoig.) there are only glimpses to be sen, thoje glimpses give a touch o! color which makes the gown chic, oi. otherwise. Shepherd's plaids and checks of all kinds are made up into skirts to b worn with fancy waists and black jack ets, and there are some entire costume* of +he plaid. One of dark green and white fine check has linings, facing* and bands about the skirt of darl* green satin.Harper's Bazar. Old Ribbons Ribbons are to be extremely fash ionable again, and already theyayarerwa being put to new purposes in He Got It. of trimming for evening and other smart dresses, while at the same time mil liners are once more resorting to them. It is principally owing to the sudden reaction in favor of a simpler style of hat for ordinary wear that ribbons are to the fore again at the milliner's. Foi the sailor-shaped silk hat and the smooth felt Amazon hat turned up at ihe side, ribbon trimmings are requir ed to compose the decoration, with the addition of quail or cock's plumes, or sometimes a large bunch of flowers. The ribbon is banded round the crown, and arranged in simple bows on one side.Boston Times. "Ma'am," said Mosely Wraggs, who stood at the kitchen door, dripping: yt with rain, "I'm not askin' ye fur any thing to eat this time, but _- "Well, what do you want?"' sharply iv^ demanded the woman of the house. "Would you mind givin' an old wet ter an umbreller?"Chicago Tribune. -S| Vt-jk-S f$ The Way to Do It.\ 'l-fll ""Mrs. TriwetMiss Elder is trying lo%||lf make a new woman of herself., 1^^^ Mrs. DicerIs she? r'^Mk^ip&m Mrs. TriwetYes she has 'already.?^|| knocked fifteen years off her age. *^^S