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||he|l piMAND] j|o IT FINAL. [ E. E. Ewing, Proprietor; [Entered at the Post Office in Rising Sun, Md., as Second-Class Matter.] One Dollar per Annum in Advance. VOL. VII. RISING SUN, CECIL COUNTY, MD., FRIDAY, AUGUST 7, 1885. NO. 43. Fall Plowing. Profit Resulting From a Prop er Cultivation of the Soil. 4 v >. ■ ■ .. By HENRY STEWART. From The Frm and Fireside, March 1.1884. Plowing is the most Important work of the farm, because the successful growth and yield of the crops sown depend upon the manner in which the work is performed. Itjs a great help when one knows why a certain work or operation should be done, and for what purpose it is performed. A farmer is then able to choose the method or manner of doing the work so that it may serve the required pur pose in the best .manner. Now, we plow soil simply to make a proper bed for the seed, and the better we do this, the better the seed will gerrai nate; the better the plants will grow; the better they will be able to pass through the rigors of the winter, and the better will be the harvsst. Then, it is of great interest to know pre cisely what the seed requires for its complete germination; for the spread of its roots in the soil; for its strong est attachment to the soil, and for its most abundant nutriment. When the seed falls into good and well prepar ed soil—that is. one thoroughly broken up into fine particles—and is closely packed, it immediately ab sorbs moisture, swells and puts forth a root and then a spire. The root puts forth off-shoots in ' fevery direction; and these work their way among the fine particles of the soil, and imbibe moisture from them which supplies food to the young plant. The green spire appears above the surface and is supported by the roots. It must be evident that the growth of the spire or young plant depends upon the.growth and vigor : of the roots. The more roots ttie stronger they are, the more food they gather irom the soil and convey to the plant above the surface. But into the plant except through the roots, and nothing enters into Ihe roots except with ihe moisture which they imbibe or suck up from ihe soil. This is the great point upon which all we have to say here depends. young plant has put forth P|rcst roots and sent its spire above surface, a new set of roots are put forth, several inches down in the soil, and there they spread far and wide; the farther and wider as the IWSner and more compact and moister. (All this is shown in Figure 1) Then it is necessary, first, for the germination of the plqnt; second, for the safe and vigorous growth of the roots; and third, for the proper feed ing of the plant, that the soil should he nmde fine and compact. Now let us see how this necessary condition of the soil may be produced. The fanner plows his soil and lays over the furrows. If the plowiog is well done, the soil is cut into slices which are laid on edge at varying angles. (Usually they appear as shown in If the soil is stiff these slices re tain much the shape of a brick, if we could see them cut across as they arc laid over. If the soil is lighter it is more or less broken into frag ments, but still there are hollows and vacant places at the bottoms of the furrows, in the very best plowing, and in the general run of plowing these openings are in numerous places fr< in the surface to the bottom of the furrow. The farmer cannot sow his seed successfully upon land like that. He therefore harrows it. The harrow levels the surface; the teeth iiit a clod and the harrow jumps over it, or it is pulled to the surface The harrowing does not please the farmer, but he says to him self, 4 *l will fix that all right with the roller, by and by.” Then he sows his seed and harrows it in, or drillit; it is all the same. The harrow teeth disturb the soil and the seed falls down into the open spaces at the bot tom, and is covered withfthe soil that settles over it. Then the roller is drown over the field, and smooths and levels—the surface let us re member— but not the soil. For awhile the surface was made hard and smooth, the soil below is not affected in tiie least, or very little, and the openings and vacigrt spaces sti 11. re main. And thousands of seeds lie 1 ■ j in these spaces without any r fine sbM f in contact with them and are there fore entirely unable to sprout; pr if they do send out a rootlet, it wanders here and there for a little time and then dries up because it is exposed to the air and it perishes, and with it perishes the weak spire which may have appeared above the surface, all yellow and sickly looking, living only upon the substance of the grain; and when this is used up it also dies, because the roots are unable to get any food irom the dry clods and frag ments in which it lies loosely. (This is shown in Figure 3 ) I , * i a/ And this is the unsuspected and un known secret of the failure of thou sands of fields of fall-sown grain, the cause of which is attributed to the weather, to insects, to poverty of the soil, and to other unreal and imagin ary conditions, instead of to the im perfect preparation of the soil. Then how should the soil be prop erly prepared for the fall crops ? This is a yery important question. First, it may be replied, it should be thoroughly well plowed, so that every portion of the ground is turned over i evenly, regularly and completely. Then it should be thoroughly well pulverized and settled and made compact. And this cannot be done with any of the common tdbth har- rows. Only one implement of this kind (but one which also levels the surface, breaks the clods, settles |)ie soil and makes it compact at one operation) can properly serve the pur pose. This is the “Acme” Pulverizing Harrow, Clod Crusher and Leveler, and which does the work for which ■it is designed in the most thorough and effective manner. Its leveling bar, furnished with cutters, crushes the clods, levels the surface and cuts up the soil. The hind bar, famish ed with scrapers and curved steel knives, works completely into the soil as deep as the plow has broken it, and these cut the furrow-slices and pulverize them, and turn the fine soil over as so many plows, the cutting plates being curved in the manner of the mold-board of a plow for this very purpose. The effect is to make a compact bed of mellow, fine soil down to the subsoil, in which the seed finds Ihe most appropriate bed for its germination and the spread ing of its roots. Moreover, as a plant, like au animal, can digest its food the better as it is brought into a finer condition, so that the soil thus prepared offers to the roots an .infi nitely greater feeding surface, and so encourages the formation of a mass of fine feeding roots, which supply the plants abundantly with the food they require. But it is not every farmer who uses the plow to put in his fall crops. A corn stubble which has been well cultivated does uot require plowing if it can broken up and mellowed leveled ready for the seed. And this, which is done sometimes imperfectly by the common iiarrow, may be per fectly done by the ‘, A.cme” Pulveriz- Clod Crushes rind Lev eler which combines the plow’—or rather a series of gang plows, with the most effective iiarrow in one im plement. The writer has thus pre pared a corn stubble for fall rye with better results as to yield of crop than an adjoining field that was plowed; for the soil being cupmact. was not affected by the frost and not a plant was thrown out or heaved by the winter. And just here attention might be directed to this point. Winterkilling is universally disas trous to fall crops; But if a farmer will observe the cauSe and effects of this lie will find it will be due to the lifting and bursting of the sail by the freezing of the water in it. And this occurs where the ground is loose and puffy and gives opportunity for the water to collect in small quantities here and there. It is a very common experience that the headlands of a field, or the angles of fields which have been plowed around, always yield better grain and suffer less in jury than the other portions. This is because of the treading of the ground which makes the soil com pact. And it is indispensible that the soil all over the field should bo brought into this condition. And it is very certain that the plow and the - harrow and the roller will not do i., ' or that these have not done it and cl.. ] not effect it. But it is quite certain. t if many years practice and experience ' of thousands of farmers, and the t scientific principles of mechanics, i which are abundautly corroborated by these experiences, are to be relied upon, tha this comi act yet mellcw and fine pulverulent condition is pro duced upon all kinds of soils by the “Acme” Pulverizing Harrow, Clod Crusher and Leveler. One word might be added in re gard to the profit resulting from a proper preparation of the soil. And as one example'will go farther than a grea. many precepts, the case of a farmer in Shawnee County, Kansas may be mentioned/ He took espec ial pains to make the s< il compact and fine over his wheat sown October. 1882. At the harvest in July, 1883. he threshed out fifty-six bushels and thirty pounds per acre of wheat, weighing sixty-one pounds per bush el, And no doubt the majority of farms in the United Slates are fertile enough to produce as much as this, if the crops were nt damaged through the poor mechanical prepara tions of the ground, against which manure or natural fertility cannot prevail. The average yield of wheat is fifteen bushels to the acre. No doubt with perfectly prepared soi,l this j’ield would be double. What then is the actual value to the farmer of an implement that is perfectly adapted to this requisite preparation of the soil, such as the ‘‘Acme” Pul verizing Harrow, Clod Crusher and Leveler has proved itself to be beyond all question or doubt ? > , A TERRIBLE STORM. The cenlral pat of this county was swept by a cyclone on Monday last, which did an immense amount of damage. A genuine cyclone of the western stripe, such as the ocople of Kansas, Nebraska and oilier dwel lers on the plains west of the Misouri river are too familiar with, hut which the deni zens of this part of the country seldom wit ness. • The rain commenced in the morning and was a succession of thunder gusts Sometime between twelve and one o’clock a genuine cyclone showed itself in Elk Neck. The track of the cyclone was about a hundred yards wide. It traveled in zig zag course, its general direction being some what wes of north. AtWilna, where the rew Baltimore and Ohio Railroad crosses the valley of the Little Elk creek, the storm seems to haveheen of unusual violence. Wil nabe’ongsto Dari. Harvey, formerly of Bal timore: The old Wilna mansion, now oc. cupied by his son Daniel, is a substantia! stone structure, surrounded by what was un til the hour of the storm a beautiful grove of old forest trees, not one of which is now standing. At the foot of the eminence on which the mansion house stood was the grist mill. Arthur Harvey and the miller heard the storm coming, and took refuge in the lower story of the null just in time to escape being blown into eternity, Ur when the force of the storm abated a few minutes afterwards all the upper stories oftiie mill, which were of frames, were found to have disappeaaed, as had also the barn, a frame structure, which stood no* very far from the mill. Some of the build logon the farm of Dr. Justus Dunot, close by Wilna were unroofed. A traiu of six pr seevn cars on the new Baltimore rnd Ohio Railroad, near Wilna, was blown along the track for. abont three- Jityadred. withstanding the brakes wye screwed Hown -s hard as possible. The hands on the cars jumped off and grasped the rails on the track to keep from being blown away. At Marley, just above Wilna, the Ledger paper mill of G. W. Childs was unroofed ■ and the smokestack blown down. Three i men working in the ipJll were injured by i the falling debris. The baraon the Spenje f property, northeast of Marley, was blown ( down. The cyclone passed near Andora, on the road leading from this place to Fair Hill, and completely demolished the orch ard of Daniel Arbuckle" The roads for as much ns half a mile in some places were lit erally covered over with fallen trees. The growing corn is terribly injured, and in some eases the oats which were in the shock have been entirely blown away and destroyed. The storm was the most terrific ever exper. ■enced in this part of the country.. It was accompanied by a roaring or humming sound, which added much to the terror of those who heard it. and lasted for two or three minutes. The damage to George W. Child’s Marley paper mills by tl>e cyclone is estimated at from $2,01)0 to $3,1)00. The loss of Daniel Harvey, wlu.se barn was demolished and grist mill partly destroyed, is between $6,- 000 and SB,OOO ’ * The roads are badly washed in many places, and the high wind which accompan ied the rain has prostrated many fields of corn. Tlte barn of Peter Gillespie, in Band box Hollow, about five miles from Port Deposit, was blown from its foundation and partly destroyed. HAKFOKD COUNTY-STORM —ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS DAMAGE. The most destructive flood ever known ip Harford county occured on Monday morn* iug. Nearly every bridge and mill-dam OB Deer creek, Winter's run and Little creek were swept away, hund.-eds of acres of corn were damaged, fences were destroyed and roads made impassible. The most serious loss was the destruction of Han.way’s wool en factory on Winter’s run, six miles from Belair. Samuel Harman’s blacksmith shop and its , contents were swept oil’. Deer creek rose V above the highest water mark, the flood carrying away nearly every bridge from the Harford county line to the Susquehanna liver. The stable at Preston’s mill was curried ofTalld tlie mill and dam injured. Ev’ery bridgo of Little creek is gone and the lands along the stream were flooded. The injmy to the roads by the rain of Sunday night was chiefly confined to the upper part of the county, but on Monday afternoon a thunder-storm of almost unpre cedented severity passed over the centre of the county, tearing the roads to pieces. The damage to public and private property will amount to at leat SIOO,OOO. De&r Town Lots. Every little town is afflicted and re tarded in.its prosperity and growth by the speculative value which theavarice of its real estate holding citilens place upon the lots. A writer in .the Whig last week commenting on this evtl, suggests that those speculative v&lues be made the basis of taxation. If John Smith's Jot on the corner sells forasl,- / 000, as toon as the money is paid over the assessor taxes it for the full amount. Why should the ass . ssor the day have valued the lot at S2OO, when Smith* all the time had been rating its cask value at $1000? The law says, asseef property at its actual cash value. If the selling or cash price is fixed by the owner, and is accepted Ly the assessor, there should be no room for complaint. This rule, if adopted would lessen the tax burthens of productive industry, aud increase the revenues from proper, ty that inddsiry is steadily improving with no compensation from, or expense to, the owners. Why do Doctors Prescribe Liquors? Because they do not know what else to do or because sometimes a little liq uor serves to kiudlo the exhausted fires fdigertion. But this liquor prescription is a bad business for the patients, for it makes drunkards out of a large majority of them. Brown’s Iron Bitters does not kindle a te&pbrary fire. It nourish es, enriches, strengthens, purifies. It dVives out debility and dyspepsia, and sets* the invigorated system atjjwjk, oa a basis of health-