The Home advocate. (Farmerville, La.) 1885-1???, 1885-09-18
4jlems ysor tarmlrs.

| COt!iS, ctC.
| Strawberry plants that have
fruiicd two seasons should be dug
over.
Never feed mouldy hay to Eors $
if it can be avoided, but if you
must, le. it first DO mOiStcncd.
We keep some kinds of stock
for other purposes than food. as
horses and mules for labor, sheep
for growing our walmest kind of
clothing material tut the leading
object in keeping cattle and swine
and we may say poultry, is to man
uflcturc food for us from those veg
etab'e products Which are, in the
main too co arse for human diytS-
ton and assimilation. 70 be sure,
we use the ld2s OF cattle for NAL,
Jag leather, and the feathers Of
some kinds ofpoultry to make soft
pillows and soft beds, but, after all
he main purpose for which wekeep
cattle and poultry is to increase our
food supplies.
DO our readers ever ask them
selves the que stiOn: Is there true
economy i'll keeping domestic an
imals to convert the products OF
the soil into flesh and fowl into
milk and eggs for food for man
kind! 1t is.nOt question very
easy of solution, and whether we
should answer il in the affirmative
or i'll the negative must deprnd'up-
on circumstances.
Were we living IN such Il country
as China, where population crowds
upon the means OF subsistence,
where human labor is cheap ami
it is necessary to make the soil
produce the last pOss ibie pound OF
human food to keep the wolf Of
famine from the door, We should
probably learn that more people
could DC SubSisteu from Il given
area of land by growing grains,
vegetables and fruits for direct con
sumption by man than by using
domestic animals to digest and pre-
pare those products for human food
We know that animals do not add
any nu trimcnt to the food which
they convert into flesh and fat and
milk and eggs, they only prepare
for our weaker digestive organs
such food as grass, straw, the
coaser parts OF grains ani sncb
vegetables as are not suited to the
human palate and tue human stom.
ach; with their stronger digestive
organs and more powerful saliva
and gastric juice they prepare for
us that which would not he availa
ble without their aid.
In this country where but
small proportion Of the arabic land,
capable Of producing useful plants,
is cultivated at all, and where but
a very small proportion of that
which is cultivated is made to pro-
duce anything like its full capacity,
we may find it economical to devote
q portion Of the soil TO growing
grass and the coarser grains and
vegetables for animals, while we
appropriate to our use their nour-
ishing, stimulating products and
flesh. We haye little doubt that
an acre of land devoted to wheat,
rye, corn. oats, barley, beans, po-
tatoes or garden vegetables, and |
thoroughly cultivated, would afford |
food that would subsist a given
number of men longer, if cooked
and eaten directly, than if fed cows
and their milk eaten, or fed swine,
and their flesh eaten, but we have
men to cultivate but a small part
Of our land iu that way, so we use
animals to Craze the grass growing
upon a portion, and grow coarse
foods upon other portions to feel
them, and thus utilize a larger
portion Of our productive soil than
we otherxise could.
Probably, as population becomes
dense and the necessity of pro-
tuclng moro food for their subsis-
tence becomes imperative, science
will devise methods of cooking the