THE WISCONSIN FARMER.     11



wisest philosophers. Business men may have
larger yearly dividends in dollars and cents,
but their expenses, their cares, their risks,
their responsibilities are vastly greater; they
are liable to bankruptcy and failure from num-
bern of causes which they cannot prevent or
perceive, and these considerations, perhaps,
bring their real incomes nearly on a level with
the farmer's.
  Besides, the farmer's life contains much that
is pleasant and comfortable. He has a home
which he can call his own, to beautify and
adorn; he can embellish it with all that is
tasteful and agreeable to his fancy, and make
it a home rich with sweet memories and asso-
ciations, and attractive for its neatness, sim-
plicity and coziness,  He has a garden, in
which lie can gratify an honest pride, in pro-
ducing all that is beautiful and useful in the
foral and vegetable resources of the climate.
Hehasafarm, which liefeelsitaninwardsatis-
faction to cultivate, improve and beautify; and
thus there is joy in his labor, strength in his
fatigue, and thankfulness in his repose. lie
is acknowledged to be the most independent of
all men: working and communing with Nature
as he does, must make him the happiest of
mortals, or at least, lie should be, since whole-
some exercise strengthens and invigorates the
system, and makes him the healthiest of men.
  Having so many spare hours and moments,
he has an opportunity, by the aid of books,
newspapers and other means, certainly to make
himself one of the most intelligent of men.
                               1. T. DALE.

            Lime as a Fertilizer.
  I noticed in a late issue of the Rural a cotn-
munication from a subscriber, desiring inform-
ation on the subject of lime as a fertilizer. In
New Jersey and some of the eastern counties
of Pennsylvania, lime has been extensively
used as a fertilizer for the last twenty years.
Many farms in that region which would sell
for no more than twenty-five or thirty dollars
an acre, are now worth a hundred, and the im-
provement has been made almost wholly by the
use of lime. But renovating worn out lands
by the use of lime is a business which a man
should understand before engaging in it exten-
sively. It does not act like stable manure,
and produce a beneficial effect in whatever



manner applied. In fact, were it so used, it
would in many cuses prove a serious injury in-
stead of benefit to crops. Formerly the prac-
tice was to now it broadcast, at the rate of
fifty bushels of slacked lime to the acem, on
land prepared far wheat, and just before sow-
ing. But more recently the practice has been
to spread it as early in the season as possible,
on sod intended for corn the next year. By
the first method but little if any efiect would
be observed in the crop of grain, but the crop
of hay following would be more than doubled,
as well as the crops following. By the last
method a very morked effect would be observed
in the corn and following crops. Its effects
will always be most distinctly seen in grass.
In the extensive peach orchards of New Jersey
lime is almost the only manure used.



STOCK REGISTER.



              Chriuan Lads.
    What isow  a sermon on the short-comings
4 christians I' Yes, just that. But then we
use the term "Christian," in this place, in con-
tradistinction from barl*arian, and intend to
restrict the application of "loads" to the ma-
terial of one sort or another wherewith the
representative teamster is accustomed to bur-
den those poor. patient servants of the field
and road-the ox and the horse.
  While in l ondon it was scarcely possible to
pass the whole length of those great thorough-
fares of travel and traffic, Holborn, Cheapside,
and Picadilly, without one's human sympathies
being tortured by the misfortunes of wretch-
edly abused horses. The streets are paved
with blocks of stone, whioh, being coated with
a slimy dirt, are so slippery that for a horse to
stand at all, on anything like a steep grade, is
difficult, even when no load is behind him.-
What, then, under such circumstances, must
be the trials of such as are loaded down to the
last limit of their strength-slipping, catehing,
falling on their knees, and then springing vio-
lently to escape the merciless lash, then slip-
ping again and again, and finally sprawling
broadside upon the pavemnent, with strained or
broken limbs, and not unfrequently with har-
ful, fatal ruptures ?
  But scees like these are not confined to Lon-
don. We have seen them too often In most of