one hundred varieties, and from their experience would give their preference to the Chinese. The Imphee and African mature a little earlier than the Chinese. They particularly recommend to cultivators that variety of seed that has been tested successfully in their neighborhood or latitude; that great care should be observed in the selection of seed, and plant none that has had any opportunity to hybridize with broom or other varietics of Plant the seed that ripens first.

corn.

good purpose. Cows, ewes, and other animals about to come in with young, must have especially tender care.

Implements of every description, harnesses, wagons, carts, &c., should be put in order without further delay, by repairing and painting, or oiling.

Clover-sowing, if intended to be done on the light snows of spring, may properly be attended to this month.

Seed-grain and garden seeds, of the best The Committee on Syrups and Sugars report kinds, should be secured. Hotbeds should be excellent samples of both articles produced made, and, unless the spring shall be late, all from both varieties, Chinese and Imphee vegetables, intended for early setting or plantBeautiful crystalized sugar and excellent syr-ing, such as lettuce, early potatoes, &c., &c., up, free from acidulous tastes, were before may be started in the latter part of this month. them. They remarked a great advancement

in the production of sugar since the first introduction of cane.

Statistical Queries respecting Sorghum, being submitted to the members of the Convention, upon several questions, resulted in the following averages for the year 1863:

Cost to grow per acre......

20

Scandinavia at the World's Fair.

Next come the nations of the North. Their

trophies and courts entire suggest, at a glance, that we have changed our latitude, and are among a strange people.

DENMARK

................ 13.00 Is the connecting link-her territory geographically between, and her people a mix

Cost to manufacture, per gal............
No. gallons produced per acre....

84

A Committee for calling a Convention at a ture of Teutons and Scandinavians. To us, future time was named by the Chair.

After soliciting the Legislature to publish the report in full, for general distribution, the Convention, on Friday noon, adjourned.

Hints for March.

REPORTER.

Look over the FARMER for the winter months, and be sure that nothing important is forgotten, and, more than that, take care that nothing is neglected.

this link is also interesting on another account: the Danes are our ancestors, in part, and no little of the force and fire of the Anglo-American is traceable to those dashing piratical heroes who, a thousand years ago, effected the conquest of Britain, and established an empire under the lead of the famous Canute.

A very little kingdom is Denmark-scarcely more than one-third as large as Wisconsin, its provinces, Zealand, Bornholm, Jutland, FunThe winter will be likely to hold on pretty en, and Langeland, Laaland and Falster, late, and, here and there, a farmer will find Schleswig-Holstein and Lauenburg, all told. himself deficient of feed for his stock. Econ- Formerly it also included under its rule Noromy, in such cases, will become imperative; way, but the fall of Napoleon, whose ally why not begin its practice now? Bring ev- Denmark had been, resulted in a curtailment erything available into requisition, and take of her territory by the cession of Norway to care that nothing be wasted. If hay is going Sweden. Iceland, the Faroe Islands, and three to run short, straw, with an occasional sprink- small islands in the West Indies, (St. John, ling of weak brine, and (for stall or rack-feed- St. Thomas, and St. Croix), constitute her ing) of bran, will be relished, and answer a present colonial possessions.

in their veins.

Small in area and population, both, is Den- province of Sweden, and now an independent mark, but, after all, she is something of a pow-government, though ruled by a sovereign in er among the nations. In the times past, common with Sweden, since the overthrow of Sweden, and even Russia, have taken rulers Bonaparte, presents features of great interest. from her royal family, and, henceforward, Lying in the same latitude with Siberia, England and Greece, and no knowing how Iceland and Greenland, and with nearly onemany more nations of the Old World are like-third of the whole country in the frozen zone, ly to be directed by rulers with Danish blood and consisting, moreover, for the most part, of a series of elevated plateaux and mountain ranges within the limits of perpetual snow, it has, nevertheless, a mean annual temperature corresponding with that of Wisconsin-a most remarkable proof of the influence of the Mexican Gulf stream, whose warm waters lave its western and even its northern shores, and thus temper the climate to this surprising degree.

Well, let us see what Denmark has brought

to the Great Exhibition.

Wheat, rye, oats, barley, and other agricultural products of good quality remind one of the fact of its being pre-eminently an agricultural country. The rye is particularly worthy of notice, as being the grain from

which most of the bread is made. The cereals are grown more in the Schleswig-Holstein, part of the kingdom than in the northern portion, or Denmark proper, where stock-raising and the dairy business occupy the farmers to a greater extent.

Mineral products are few in the country, their representatives in the Exhibition being | simply a handsome display of earthen, porcelaine and amber.

The remnant of the once great forests of Denmark are suggested by fine samples of furniture; the habits of the people by the beautiful drinking horns and pipes-Teutonic symbols.

Fine furs and fur costumes from Finland, beautiful mats and robes of the skins of silver foxes, and most exquisite articles of female dress made of the down of the eider-duck, attract attention, and interest successive groups of curious visitcrs.

Hardware, surgical instruments, carving, silversmith's work, jewelry from antique designs, boot and shoe lasts, cooperage, musical instruments, a statue of the king, and paint ings represent the mechanic and the fine arts; while specimens of books and other educational appliances call to mind the high progress made by the industrious, intelligent Danes in literature and science.

NORWAY,

A large collection of cereal grains, including good wheat, grown as far north as the 70th parallel, tells the story of climate better than we can describe it.

Norway has a superficial area of about 121,800 square miles, or 2 times as great as that of Wisconsin, but is, nevertheless, said by her geographers to embrace not more than 1,060 square miles of tillable land in all its parts. Mountains or mountainous highlands, with sharp peaks shooting up sometimes to great heights, and lakes and morasses constitute the remainder. It must, therefore, require great energy, industry and frugality on the part of its people to secure and perpetuate that very considerable degree of prosperity to which they have attained. These traits are possessed by the Norwegians in an unusual degree, and it is because of them that a very large majority of the emigrants from that country to America take such high rank among the best of our citizens. Let them continue to emigrate. There are better opportunities for them in the Western World than they can ever hope to enjoy in the Old.

The specimens of grain have greatly interested me as well as a multitude of other foreigners from more southern climes who repeatedly ask the question, "How, in the

Once a part of the Danish empire, then a world, can they ripen so far north?" The

Here also are the skins of animals--prominent among them the beautiful steel-grey skins of the reindeer, with the high, branching antlers and head attached. Fur garments, too, and effigies of men and women of the far north, all muffled up in their furry costumes; portrails of royal dignitaries, and paintings by twenty. Oak and beech predominate, but

performed by horses. Skins of these representative classes of domestic animals are here. Flax and hemp, and their manufactures; silk and cotton fabrics of excellent quality; these and other articles in large number and variety show the degree of progress made in this important department of industry. Earthen ware, leather, furs, hair, feathers, and their manufactures are full of interest.

In the department of Operative Machinery we shall find several rotary and other engines, steam hammers, nail, and rolling machines,

&c.

The fine arts are likewise represented. Some of the oil paintings are highly creditable to Swedish genius.

All in all, Scandinavia has well filled her place in the World's Exhibition. When the nations gather again, these people of the Polar Zone will undoubtedly have made yet greater progress than in the last two decades.

The Modes of Sowing Wheat.

These are of three kinds-sowing broadcast, and harrowing it in, sowing the same way and plowing it in, and drilling it. I will not consider them separately, but refer to some of my farming experience and observation to set forth their relative merits. The first year of my farming I had twenty acres put in wheat, which was sown broadcast and harrowed in about the 1st of September. The last rain previously was on the 20th of August, and

covered deepest. It suffered much from the
drought, and much never came up at all. But
little of that harrowed in came up, and seem-
ed to yield to the drought where it did. When
the rain fell these portions retained their re-
in accordance with their fall growth.
lative positions, and the yield at harvest was

Again: some years after, when drills were becoming popular, there occurred one of those freezing-out winters that destroy our clover and wheat fields. A neighbor who had put in well a field of good soil, with wheat sown broadcast and harrowed in, had it completely frozen out. He remarked to me that he could well have afforded to have purchased a drill than sustain the failure from broadcast sowto put it in, and then to have burnt it, rather ing. I examined that spring, with much care, many drilled fields and many sown broadcast, in some of which the seed had been harrowed in and in others plowed in, and invariably found the drilled wheat firmly fixed in the soil, with no roots on the surface, except here and there where a wash had carried the top soil away. But in the other fields there were but few plants that had not many roots on the many but a portion of a single root. In puilsurface; most of them had no root in the soil; ing the drilled wheat it was firmly fixed, the crown close on the surface soil, whilst the other yielded, showing the crown above the soil, with a portion of the roots below it exposed. This was the case with the best of the plants.

To such facts I will be told (for I have often been) that one of the best crops of wheat raised by the farmer answering me was from broadcast sowing. I grant this; but under what circumstances was it done? When the soil was at its best, when no drought occurred in the fall, and no freezing out in the winter. Why recollect the one successful crop and forget the many unsuccessful?

the next was on the 20th of October. The soil Let us now examine into the causes of this was good, tolerably well broken up, and har- great difference between the drilled and broadrowed. The seed commenced to sprout, some cast-sown fields. In making my examination came up, when the drought checked the fur- I dug up some of the drilled plants, and some ther growth. I examined its condition every of the best sown broadcast. The secondary day, and soon found insects preying on the roots of the drilled plants were double in sprouted grain. The worst of these was the number compared with those of the broadcast small, red ant, which eats out the softened sowing, much longer, with a much greater germ, attracted apparently by the sugar form- number of fibrous branches, and with an ined from the starch. When the rain fell, in clination deeper in the soil. These are the October, the grains uninjured came up, but facts, and the philosophy of them will be seen there was not one in twenty of what had been from what I have said on the germination of sown. The twenty acres yielded 109 bushels. the seed and the growth of the plant. Wheat In the same fall, and about the same time, put in with a drill is sown at a depth of about a farmer of this county broke up a small field; three inches. The seeds are placed regularly; and with the first drill that came here he the space for the growth of each plant is equal. drilled in a portion, sowed another broadcast If a drought comes on, as it so often does in and plowed it in, and the other portion he our falls, the grain is so far down that it is harrowed in. The drilled wheat came up slow-not much affected. Plants have two sources ly, and grew slowly but steadily. Not many grains failed to come up. That plowed in came up in irregular patches, and in some places apparently in rows, where it had been

from which they derive the moisture necessary to their growth in time of drought-that which descends through the atmosphere in the fall of dew, and that which rises up through

the subsoil.

But there is a kind of investment for a portion of every man's funds, believed to be better than any or all of these. It was recommended by Franklin, that most excellent embodiment of practical economy, when he said, "Empty your purse into your head, and no one will ever be able to get it away from you."

Rain is the common source of ty-five to fifty. Shall he invest in land? It both these supplies. When drought parches is not likely to take wings, to be sure, but its the surface soil, the dews are of little or no consequence to the roots of plants; its pur- taxes are heavy and its income slow. There pose is, in its daily evaporation and nightly are government bonds. They are doubtless condensation, to envelop the blades or leaves all right, and the interest sure. and stems with a moist atmosphere The sources of their evaporation are supplied in droughts by the evaporations of the subsoil moisture through the leaves of plants and trees and from the surface of the ground. Their subsoil moisture is drawn to the surface by capillary attraction, and the heated and dry condition of the surface, air and soil. As it ascends, the roots of plants lay hold of it and carry it to the stem, branches and leaves. An observation of twenty years, and constant We believe that for real practical economy examination during the years of our great droughts of 1854 and 1856, convince me that this is the best investment. Daniel Webster this is the precise office of dews and subsoil being asked if there was room in the legal moisture. A law of the growth of the root is that it always turns to the source of its nu- profession for any more, replied, "Yes, plenty triment. Now the grain of drilled wheat be- of room higher up." The upper grades are ing deposited as deeply as its germination will never full. These are the most remunerative. allow, its roots, both the primary or tap root, and the secondary, are beneath the influence He that can reach them finds the richest reof the surface droughts, and, receiving their wards. In our land they are within the reach moisture from the subsoil, they turn toward it. Hence the fact of the roots of drilled of every one. Twenty years ago a machinist's wheat having a downward inclination. The apprentice carried all his earthly possessions wheat covered in by the harrow lies so near in a very small box into Worcester, Mass. He the surface that a drought soon dries the soil around it, stopping the growth at all stages. did not appear remarkably promising, and The roots get their moisture from the dews at his companions were not slow to remind him night, meeting the evaporated subsoil moisture at the surface of the ground, and the roots, But be patiently put gains into his finding their chief supply at that point, in-head. Slowly his mates came to regard him cline to the surface. Hence they are checked as their equal. Before they had fairly settled in their autumnal growth, and are soon laid bare by the freezing of winter.-L. Bollman, that idea he had bought out the whole concern, of Ind., in U. S. Ag. Rep. was one of the largest manufacturers in the city, and they were his employees. He made good investments.

From the Christian Advocate and Journal.
How to Invest.

Every one having funds in his possession naturally feels anxious to put them to the best account. But how to do it is a difficulty. Stocks are very high. Share in cotton mills are nearly a hundred per cent. above par, and the mills not running a spindle. If cotton should continue to be difficult to get, these shares would only represent so much brick, mortar, and water power, that no one desires to use. Railroads and telegraphs are doing a splendid business. They thrive by war and its measureless transportation. Hence their shares are high. But no one cares to pay one hundred and twenty-five to one hundred and fifty for that which a year hence may be twen

of it.

Forty years ago a lad toiled for his daily bread in the forests of the West. There were scarcely ten books within as many miles. Yet he put investments into his head. He had no genius, but he had in its place many disadvantages. He had no wealth. He was not prepossessing; he was extremely uncouth. But he put his gains into his head, and to-day he holds the highest place of any man upon the earth.

[Other illustrations are given by the author of the article, but we have no need to put them in print. No sane man is so blind as not to have discovered by his own observation that intelligence is always a potent helperthat knowledge is power.-ED.]