Wisconsin Farmer-Advertising Department. Comparative Statement of the business of the Company for the years 1859, 1860, 1861 and 1862. proof................................... Total amount accumulations........ ASSETS. of ................ incidental expenses... ****** advertising. postage, and all other compensation of officers printing, Am't of expenses paid, including all Am't of commissions paid to agents.... Am't of cash premiums thereon........ Am't of premium notes thereon........ Am't of outstanding risks thereon... Whole number of policies during the year ........................................... Losses reported and awaiting further, DIRECTORS FOR THE YEAR 1862. J. W. BOYD, Walworth Co. LU HRB SFORD, Grant C A A Anderson, Delafield, Waukesha Co......... LOSSES PAID IN 1861. 500 00 7.00 20 00 10 00 400 00 600 558 17 51 115 00 1,041 71 18 00 382 71 5 00 496 05 200 06 751 80 1.000 00 400 00 $5,903 23 $499 53 306 80 15.00 20 00 371 00 1.000 00 2.00 LD Lateer. Janesville, Rock co.......... dward Walsh, Centre, La Fayette co........ Nathan Kellogg, Madison, Dane co...... Henry A Chapman, Eas Randolph, Col co... Jared Bishop. Jamestown, Grant co.......... Allen Hoxie, Porter, Roek co.......... O C Burdic, Christiana, Dane co...... THE WISCONSIN FARMER. J. W. HOYT, VOL. XV. : MADISON, NOVEMBER 1, 1863. New Mexico. [The following letter from Hon. J. G. Knapp, U. S. Justice for New Mexico, touching the climate, agriculture, horticulture, &c., of that far off territory, will hardly fail to interest every class of our readers.—ED.] ED. FARMER.—Every kind of agriculture is here conducted on so different a scale from what it is in the States, that you can form no idea of the manner. You draw the water out of the land by drains and underdrains: we put water on the land to produce moisture, in order to induce vegetation. You are blessed with showers and rains from the heavens, and dews bedeck every plant, or fill the newly stirred earth with needed moisture; here, but one inch of rain has fallen in the valley since the beginning of the year. You talk of wells and cisterns, and make comparisons between hard water and soft; we drink and use the water of the Rio Grande, glad to take it as it runs, nearly as muddy as the Missonri. All water found in the ground is charged with salts, and one might as well use glauber salts as such water. For myself, I have constructed a cheap filter with a common barrel, and by that means get a good supply of clear water, nearly soft, by using the river water as a basis. Since the first of June the thermometer has every day reached 90° some time during the day, and not unfrequently it has reached 105° in the shade. Vegetation of certain kinds is enormous where there is a supply of water, and other things are forced to an almost premature ripeness. The castor oil bean, which EDITOR. No. 11. came up from seeds lying in the gronnd the last of April, is now eight feet high, and will grow two months more this summer, when it will live over the winter and be ready to grow again next summer. But the sun-flower ripened its seeds in July, and is dead. The old colony sweet corn made roasting ears in June, and was unfit for use the 20th of July. The early bush beans matured in July, and would raise a second crop; but the Limas, after making from ten to twenty feet of vine, and maturing what would be a full crop, are still growing and blooming as vigorously as if they had just began to bloom. Water melons are past their prime, and musk melons with me are going. from hard corn to ground. The cotton woods and willows have made more growth than I have ever seen before; but they are almost valueless for timber, and yet they are the entire timber of the valley. The musquit (mus-keet) is a mere bush, seldom found ten feet long or three inches through; but there is a large root just under the surface, which is dug out and makes excellent fuel or charcoal. This and the screw bean are varieties of the accasia (locust); and the musquit resembles the black locust found sometimes in Wisconsin, in the leaves and flowers, though the pod is not flat, but nearly round, and if picked when green it is filled with a sweet substance, which is often used by the natives, and is eaten with great avidity by horses and mules, both dry and green. The beans are eaten by all kinds of stock, even after they fall out, and are very fattening. Field corn is at all stages, plants a foot out of the The Mexican grants to the lands in this valley, required all the grantees to plant fruit trees and vines, and though the non-compliance with this condition forfeited the grant, it has, in almost every instance, been neglected, and fruit is almost unknown, even such as they might have. From El Paso, Mexico, come apricots in June, pears and moscatel grapes in July, peaches, pears and El Paso grapes (dark variety,) and sweet apples in August, peaches, pears and grapes in September, and in October peaches, pears and pomegranites are produced, and sometimes oranges find their way here from Chihuahua. All the grapes of the Rio Grande are raised in the same manner. The vine is planted and allowed to grow at random, only trimmed by cutting off the branches about two eyes from the main vine for a foot or eighteen inches from the ground, where the whole is cut off. This portion is covered in the winter by drawing the earth up around it with a hoe, and is expected to bear grapes the third year from the cutting. The vine grows with strong reeds, but short, seldom reaching more than six feet, and about two inches from joint to joint. A small branch, or, as the vine-dressers call it, "a thief" starts at every leaf. This, and the fact that the vine is allowed to produce as many vines as it may happen to have eyes, which are allowed to run over the ground in every direction, without any support or training, is undoubtedly the cause of the deformed condition of the vines, and their small yield of fruit. I have no doubt but that if these vines were properly cared for, trimmed and watered, three times the amount now produced might be obtained. There are three varieties of the grape, probably all of foreign origin. The moscatel is a white grape-color, a light green, almost water colored-sweet, sugary, with a slight flavor of musk, just enough to give them spice. The El Paso is a black grape, sweet, and without any musk or other flavor. When dried they resemble small (raisins. These are the great source of the wine, making a red wine of great body. The other is a grape about the size and color of the catawba, but as sweet as the black grape and much resembling them in flavor. This is also an excellent wine grape. El Paso wine, pure juice, sells at two dollars a gallon, by the barrel, in the early winter months, and some vineyards have been known to make as high as 300 gallons to the acre, of fermented wine. With these figures, and cuttings to be had for the asking, yet the Mexicans will not plant vineyards The apricot, when cared for, makes one of the prettiest shade trees in the country, and will give its fruit in four years from the pit. Both it and the peach grow very rapidly, not unfrequently making a length of limb of six feet in a summer, and adding two inches to their diameter. And notwithstanding these may be had for planting the stones in proper locations, and protecting them from the depredations of the goats for but two years, the Mexican has so little care for the future that he will not even put the pits of the peaches he has eaten into the earth, lest they might make him a tree, and he eat of the fruit thereof. The peaches and apricots are all poor, as care has been taken to improve them. The pears are all spontaneous productions, and may be pronounced unworthy of cultivation. This is certainly true of the apples. Hard, tough, sweet, and about as edible as the bark of the tree on which they grow, they are picked long before they are ripe, and never become ripened. no I have learned many facts about the agriculture and gardening of the country which I knew not before. I do not think the tap roots can be relied upon as a sure crop, though were the ground properly manured and prepared, I think they would be a success The Mexicans never raise them. Onions are the great crop. They are sown early and transplanted in May, in rows, at proper distances. I have 75 onions growing upon a bed four feet by eight, among which are several that now measure fourteen inches in circumference, and all are large, fine roots. To make such a crop requires irrigation once in four days during the heat of summer. Next to onions, perhaps before it, is to be placed by the Mexicans chile (red pepper.) This is eaten green and ripe, and at nearly every meal. I have seen a man eat a half pint of green, full grown peppers at one meal of bread and chile. But the country has its pests. In early Spring it swarms with black birds, which prey upon almost every herb which springs out of the ground. To these succeed bugs and worms. might be extended from the middle of August to the middle of November. But it wants men who have the will and know how to develope the soil. The mines would then take care of themselves. Secondly, it wants seeds and fruits. You boast of apples named by the thousands; plums, peaches, cherries and apricots in large catalogues; small fruits in almost countless varieties. Here there is not a blackberry nor The worst pest of the gardener a mulberry in all New Mexico, to my knowledge. There is a small red raspberry growing on the mountains. No strawberries, no currants, in fact, nothing which the inhabitants of Yankee land consider, not luxuries, but necessaries, of life, and every summer comforts. is the plant louse, and especially the one which infests the brassica (cabbage) tribe, and often destroys a whole plantation in a few days. Next to these is a chinche, an animal when full grown three-fourths of an inch long, and one-third as broad as long. These infest the vines. By them I lost all my choice winter squashes, and my cucumbers were badly injured. They committed their depredations in Jnne, and by withholding the seeds until after the ground has given a crop of early peas, the vines would escape their depredations, as I see is the case with late planted vines. The larvae of a red-spotted bug, a little larger than the half of the largest pea, does great damage to the bean crop by eating the leaves and thus destroying the plants. Early planting is the surest remedy against these. Wheat has no enemy but the black bird, which eats off the plants in the Spring, and if properly watered is a sure crop. It may be cut in May, in time to plant corn on the same ground, though it is seldom done. Corn meets with two difficulties. The first is in getting up after planting, and the second is the worm in the ear. The first may be remedied by care, and for the second I know of no remedy, as there are no birds to take the worms before they enter the ear. This country, abounding in mines as rich as California, wants people-Yankee people in the valleys, with Yankee tools to make the soil, rich and inexhaustible as the Nile, produce what it can. Cotton grows well, and ripens a full crop. Rice would grow as well, and especially the upland variety. Sorghum ripens its seed in August, and the grinding season I can think of nothing which a humanitarian could do which would conduce so much to the comfort and well-being of New Mexico, as the introduction of American apples, (no fear of tender varieties,) plums, cherries, peaches and pears in varieties, with all the small fruits, blackberries, raspberries, currants, high bush cranberries and strawberries, all of which I believe would flourish finely, as they can be supplied with any amount of water. The locusts, maples, and white willow would be valuable as timber trees, and no time should be lost in their introduction; so the walnut, hickory or pecan, and the butternut, would thrive luxuriently if introduced. None of these are here. Roses and flowering shrubs are strangers, and only the first is ever seen. The Mexican has seldom planted a vine, and a tree, never. There is a fig tree in Mesilla, of two summers' growth, which is twelve feet high, and four inches in diameter two feet from the ground, yet nobody plants the fig, even for its fruit. I have already written to my friends of the Rock Terrace Nursery to prepare me something of all their varieties, which I propose receiving by mail to experiment with. MESILLA, Aug. 14, 1863. J. G. KNAPP. The cultivation of fruits is characteristic of a civilized people alone. November's Duties. As the seasons stop not in their course, but ever unresting, yet never hastening, move on in their unending circle, so must the husbandman know no end to his provident care and faithful endeavor. There are times when he may have relief from the severity of his labors, when by means of relaxation, travel and study he may reenforce himself for the labors that lie in his way, in order to their better performance; but his labor must not be postponed when the time comes for it to be He must strike at the right time, or suffer for his procrastination. Nature will done. not wait. And now, that "Summer, sighing, has fled the plain. And smiles to think it's all for him," while the plow of preparation stops not in the furrow, there are a thousand little things, as well as other larger labors, that must not be neglected. Many of those suggested in October should be understood as reiterated here. leges, honors and responsibilities of a sovereign people. The right of suffrage in the control of the affairs of a great nation is a sublime and sacred trust, and carries with it an obligation entitled to its exercise may reasonably hope equally sacred-an obligation which no man to escape. We do not say that you should support the nominations of this party or that. We have nothing to do, as a journalist, with political parties or party strifes. But as an indepedent friend of our common country, it is our prerogative to urge upon every one of our readers who is a constitutional elector, the faithful discharge of this sacred obligation at all times, and especially in these times of our national peril. Vote as your own best judgment and conscience shall dictate, but vote. That man is unworthy the name of a patriot who, when occasion comes, will not cheerfully sacrifice something of his own convenience and material interests for the good of his country. The British Colonies at the Great Exhibition. NO. III.-CONCLUSION. In a word, as to all practical duties on the From Van Dieman's Land we but step across farm, November is, in this climate, simply a the narrow strait which separates it from the prolongation of October-a special favor to the New Holland of the old atlases, and we stand husbandman, in order to the more thorough on the soil of that vast island, which, from completion of his work of gathering and stor-being a prison place for the condemned felons ing his crops, laying down and covering of England, has, within the past few years, with straw and earth the vines and plants that become a centre of most extraordinary interest. so enrich and beautify his home, in providing ample food and shelter for all his dependent animals, in gathering up all the odds and ends of everything, and in thus preparing himself to sit by the family hearth during the long evenings of winter with perfect immunity from reproaches of neglect and with larger facilities than heretofore for intellectual advancement and social happiness. And then there is one other duty falling this year within November. It does not refer itself directly to either the farm or the garden, or to any other branch of farm work, though it does have an important indirect relation to them all. We refer to your duties as citizens, as men clothed with the high privi Almost as large as the whole continent of Europe, Australia is at the same time endowed, to a remarkable extent, with many of the elements of material greatness. Of gold and wool it has already exported so much as to be entitled to rank first in the production of these great staples of commerce. This entire island, destined in the progress of its civilization to be a galaxy of flourishing states, as yet has been divided into but six colonies, to wit: Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland-which three constitute the eastern portion of the island-and South, North and Western Australia, which together make up the rest of what is now known under the comprehensive name of Australia. |