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ROCKY MIOUNTAIN HUSBANDMAN PER ANNUM. A Journal Devoted to Agriculture, Live-stock, Home Reading, and General News. 10 CO . VOL. 1. DIAMOND CITY, M. T., DECEMBER 16, 1875. NO. 4. . . .. . m nnn m n mu mie mmmnm m en PUBLISHED WEEKrL BY R. N. SUTHERLIN, EDITOR AND PrOPI$IETOR. The Rocar MorUNrAIN HUURANDAMAN is d .,irned 'o be, as the ntme indli :'i , a h:i bhand m in in cvery senseof the term, embracing ra it.l c,lu.mns every departme.lt of A :r::jl , , Si:rk-:...i: S, ilorti culture, Social and Domestic Eonomy. ADVERTISING RATES. Sweek 3 4 0 2 15 28 mJmo n th s 10 1 16 1 2 4 1 0 3 6 4 2 1 8 0 1 20 4 months 18 25 36 45 Si 6; 120 200 1 year 30 41 (;)3 75 0o 10,1 180 250 Transient ad\eri=eme:nts payable in advance. Regular advertisements payable quarterly. Twenty-live per cent. added for special advertise ments. AGrRICULTURAL. IN A NEW country such as this, where the popalation is sparce and very much scattered, and by reason of this, see but little of each other, people are apt to weary of their lot, they are apt to become discontented and beget a thirst for some other clime or some other business. Particularly is this true of a large portion of our farmers. The major ity of them have been here since an early day and were successful miners, and when misfortune comes in the shape of a failure of crops, they are liable to long for old times, and wish that fate would lead their wander ing steps to a new and better filtd 'of action. Companionship is essential to man's lappi ness, and few who are isolated will be con tent save in the rapid accumulation of wetlth. They never pause to think of the condition of the farming population of another coun try; never stop to count the blessings they enjoy, but if their position in life is not what it once was, become disappointed, and if they do not break up farming and rush around over the country, are always grum bling about depression in business, and blame their calling that such is the case. Such farmers raise their children to hate a farmers' lite; are continually telling them that they want to nmake something better of them; that they desire them to choose a profession and lead the life of gentlemen. This is all very nice in theory, and the child 'drinks in the hope of a career of ease and lileasure. Little do they know of the reall ties of such a life; of the great number of failures in proportion to the number that enter such fields. It would be far better for the child if instead of filling their heads with these foolish aspirations, they would teach them what is actually true, that their's is the most independent occupation known ;among men; that it affords ample scope for a life-time of study and improvement. To lead the life of a farmer does not necessarily mean to grow up in ignorance ; in fact, there is no profession where intelligence chn be bre'ight to better account than in the culti vation and preservation of the soil. The old ways of our fathers are fast being left be hind; new and better modes are being adopted, and we predict that a few years hence the farmers, instead of being derided amid sneered at as the most ignorant class in the land, will be acknowledged as the most intelligent. T'he importance of agricultural education is being agitated, and meets with favor on all sides; the vast power of the farmer is beginning to be realized: instead of the dupe, led captive at the will of an intelli gent master, they are raising themselves to the lead, and their former masters fear and tremble. The great army that have sub sisted at their expense are fast being made to realize their utter uselessness to society. Then, if our farmers would have their children be independent and occupy a posi tion in the front ranks of men, let them ed ucate them and learn them to love their occu pation. It is not long to be considered a drudgery; even at present, in summing the matter up, we find their lot is no worse than that of other callings. There are few walks in life where men not born to wealth would bear as cheerful a summing up as the following view of the farmers' situation, given by J. M. Smith, before a Farmers' State Convention recently : "In all that goes to make up the ordinary comforts of every day life, we are the most wealthy people upon the earth. This may seem a strange statement to some present, and I do not mean to say that we have more gold and silver than any other people; but, gentlemen, did it ever occur to you that the west and northwest is the only territory of any size in the world where the masses of the people can afford to have wheat bread, butter and meat as the main articles of their daily food? And yet such is the fact. No nation, either ancient or modern, has ever before been able to provide the above named articles in sufficient quantity and at prices to place them within the reach of the labor ing classes as articles of daily food. Our stock of all kinds isirncomparably in advance of that of any previous century. In short, the last quarter of a century has almost completely revolutionized the science of agriculture. We have just entered upon the last quar ter of the nineteenth century, and if I re tain my life and health until its close, I shall expect to see vast improvements made, not only in the cultivation of wheat but in the fertility of the soil and in the quantity and quality of nearly all of our crops. I shall see the noble specimens of different breeds of stock, now held by comparatively few, scattered far and wide throughout all our State. I shall see the great mass of our farmers much better educated than most of us are to-day. I shall see homes made more comfortable and pleasant than they are to day. Farmers' sons will not be so anxious to desert the farm for a clerkship or law office, as heretofore. The books, the papers, the music and the comforts of a farmer's home will be much more pleasant to them than the home of strangers. Fewer of them, after having borne their parents to their silent homes, will return to the old home stead and sadly say: "This old place is all run down and worn out, and will not sup port us in comfort, and we must leave it for other business and other homes." But they will rather say, "Father has made this a pleasant home and he kept the farm improv ing for years, and has so taught us that we can still go on with improvements and maks it still more pleasant, as well as more profit able, than he was able to do; and so we will stay and make the old homestead our abid ing place and our home. There will be fewer pale-faced, care-worn wives and mothers on the farm, toiling from early morning till late bed-time, until their daughters, warned by their mother's cease less toil and labor, declare that they shall never marry a farmer. I shall see the pro fession of the farmer elevated fat above what it has ever been in the past or is now, not only financially, but socially, morally and intellectually. Tye aged man, as he retires from the battle of life, may look back upon the years, not with sadness or regret, but thinking that he has done something for the elevation and comfort of his race. The young than may look forward to the profes sion full well assured that he is in the pos session of a business which, if intelligently and industriously pursued, will lead him, not only to a competence in his old age, but to the front rank of influence, as well as of distinction, among his fellow men. FROZEN POTATOEs.-Expeliments in Ger many on frozen potatoes proves that the freezing in no wise alters the chemical com position of the tubers. The change is sim ply physical, and, even if frozen hard, they are still fit for distillation, or they may be pressed to get rid of the water, and then ground into a very good meal adapted for feeding cattle. MANY residents of Union Hill, N. J., since the abolition of the Bible from the public schools, have withdrawn their children. AERATION OF THE 80IL. The old-fashioned but still prevalent idea that "humus" or vegetable matter was need ed in the soil to furnish food for plants it now exploded. After a century of journey ing around a circle, we seem to have come back to the old idea of Jethro Tull, but with much clearer and more definite knowledge than this old writer possessed. He believed and taught that by sufficient culture the soil could 'be made to bear crops continually without manure; that "tillage is manure" in fact. After much working in the dark, much experimenting, much theorizing, and much scientific investigation, we find that we can produce crops indefinitely by means of mineral manures alone, and without so much as returning one straw or one ounce of vegetable matter to the soil. Thousands of tons of chemical fertilizers are now used yearly in which there is nothing but mineral matter, and profitable crops are raised year after year' by the aid of superphosphate ol lime, nitrate of soda, and guano alone. Then we have found-to explain the seeming anomaly-that plants can only appropriate mineral fopd; that vegetable or animal ma nures are pseless until they have been re duced by decomposition to their ultimate mineral el ments. And herein lies a lesson that is of bresent and most useful applica tion. Decomlosition of organic matter can only go on in the presence and by the direct agency of he oxygen of the atmosphere. Until orga ic matter is decomposed it is not a fertilizer., If we apply never so much raw manure or egetable matter to the soil, and bury it out4of reach of the air, we may sow in vain, forwe shall fail to reap the expected crop. It i by cultivation of. the soil only that we caa admit the air, which is neces sary to red ce the manure we apply to such a state of 4nal decomposition as shall fit it for the growth and subsistence of plants. These facts explain much that we have d,.Aver d by simply ruwning our heads against it. The benefit of applying manure and keeping it near the surface is one of the things we have learned. Others are that the more mellow and open we keep the soil, the more we aerate it and permit it to breathe, the more productive it is made; that the more we leave the soil exposed to the Win ter's frost, the more mellow and open and fertile it beomes ; that the more we expose manure to the atmosphere by repeated turn ings, the wore available it becomes for plant food; that vhen we plow under clover and other gree crops in the fall, and leave them to remain a frozen condition during the winter, th are not half so effective as when we plow t em under in the spring, when the air, he ed by the sun's warmth, quickly reduces th m to decomposition; that when we drain te soil and free it from stagnant water and )ermit the air to enter in, we double the capability of the soil to produce crops Al these and much more we have learned b. experience, and when the chem ist discovers in his laboratory that plants feed only bn mineral food, we have at once the solutioh of the problem we have blunder edinto ou.selves. It is comfortable to know that we hove been on the right track, and that we have not to change our plans for something new. We have now a good opportunity to apply this knowledge to practice. The stubbles which now lie untouched, beaten and hard upon the surfaceB, should be plowed at once, and exposed to the sun. and air as much as possible before the winter sets in. Whatever vegetable matter in the shape of muck, ditch mud, road scrapings, weeds, or stable manure we can gather, should be heaped and composted together, that it may pot freeze up in the winter, and that it may be rotted and fit for use in the spring. Dres 'ngs of mineral manures that may be intesnd ed for fall sown crops should not be applied until spring,"as, needing no time for decour position, and being very soluble, they can not be made available now, but can be,, to the ful extent. when growth is active in the spring. The thoughtful farmer can find a very general application of the facts here intended to be elucidated in his practice at at this season, and in the interval which will occur before his work is stopped by frost and snow he will lose no opportunity of assist ing the operations of nature by his own in telligent labor.--New York Times. FARMER'S WANT AND NEED.-We doubt not the farmers want much, and need much more. They want their burdens lightened, both as to direct and indirect taxes, They need better reward for their labor and for their products. They want no monopolies fostered by the State and National Govern ments. They need no increase of officers or salaries. They want fewer offices and lower salaries in many of the fat offices. They need less and want better legislation. They need men in office whose aim is not money making; but serve for the good of the peo ple, They want men who will not seek of fice so, constantly, but who will wait till asked to take office by those to be served. They need more systematic, industriouts, energetic labor, and want no more idle heart, heads and hands in any department of bus iness. They need less extravagance lngov ernment and among individuals, and want more good common-sense economy, and the people educated to the industries and neces sities of the times. They need a govern ment to do the greatest good for the greatest number of her people, and they want the people to feel proud of that government.- Rural Sun. ANOTHER STEAM PLOW.-A Mr. Benson, of the Monumental Iron Works, Baltimore, has invented a steam plow and is on his way with it to a farm that he owns in Buena Vista County, Iowa. Mr. Benson does not, use ordinary plows, but has substituted a revolving horizontal shaft, armed with a series of sharp blades, that dig up the ground and thoroughly pulverizeit. To complete the Work a rake with,steel teeth moves close behind thispe werfd luther.ar editely above it is another horizontal .lt,' armed with steel spikes or springs, that pass be tween the teeth of the rake at every revolu tion. This is the whole of the plowing apa ratus. The rest of the machine does noth ing except furnish the motive power. It consists of a neat little engine, mounted on traction wheels, and the necessary gearing for moving the wheels and keeping the two shafts already mentioned in motion. The plow is ten feet wide, and will pulverise a ~strip of ground of equal width as it moves forward. It can be run at the rate of two nuiles an hour, but a tarmer would probably prefer the rate upon which Mr. Benson has based his calculations, namely, one mile per hour. At this rate it will plow from ten to fifteen acres per day. The ground will need no harrowing or stirring after the minchmne has passed gver it. A FERTILE SOIL.-Even now, the soil of Palestine, after the waste and exhaustion of four thousand years, is of surpriang fertil ity. Dr. Robinson, in his tour, found the l ill country of Gallilee yielding crops which tidil cate a productiveness equal to all that Jose' phus has said of it. The industrial settle ment lately and sucoessftlly begun near the pools of Solomon, ~uth of Bethlehem, rb port that they rai~ two crops in a year. Their grapes alm t rival the clusters of Esh col, a single $ne having one hundred bunches of g$pes, each three feet long, and each grape .iree and a half inches in circum ference. 'f$ey havte Indian corn eleven feet hig water melons twenty, thirty, forty poun4 ::weight, and bean-pods thirteen lnchriong, and six on astem. Theirquince trees yield four hundred quinces each, whieh Rre larger than'the largest apples of 1New .England, and a single citron tree yields five hundred and ten pounds of fruit. A pEw years ago the site of the town of Greeley, Col., was an uninhabited waste. Now, within the limits of a single school district of that town, there Is taxable prep erty valued at over half a million dollars.