nder glass, as they sometimes are in winter, in abandoned
green-houses. In the first place, see fowls have a dry and airy roosting
place, but where they will be out of a draft or cold currents. Feed once
daily in the morning, the following compounded rations. Raw onions one
part, pork-cracklins one part, and bread or boiled potatoes one part,
chopped tolerably fine, but do not wet the mixture before feeding. If
you can substitute a few bits of garlic for twice the measure of onions,
it will be all the better for the health of the fowls, but they might
taint the taste of the eggs. If fowls are fed this mixture once daily,
it don't matter much what the other food is, whether corn or small
grain, though for laying mill-screenings or shrunken wheat is best.

ASA GRAY, ROCKFORD, ILL.--I have seen it stated the daily rations of the
cowboys of the Southwest, in certain sections and during some months,
was confined to raw beef, rock salt, and red peppers. How is it?

ANSWER.--We don't know. Will someone familiar with cowboys and their
manner of living report. However, all things considered, the ration is
not a bad one, for the reason that raw beef digests in half the time of
beef well cooked, and the large, sweet pepper of the Southwest deprived
of its seeds is not near as hot in the mouth as it is commonly
represented.

R. ROOT, CLARKSVILLE, IOWA. 1. Does the basket willow have to be
cultivated like a field crop? 2. Is there more than one kind, and if so
which is best? 3. What kind of soil is best adapted to its cultivation?

ANSWER.--1. In some respects, yes; the land having to be given over to
them exclusively. In France the cuttings are planted from twelve to
fifteen inches apart in order to obtain long and slender shoots. 2.
There are half a dozen cultivated in Europe, the best two being the
Salix rubra or red Osier, and the Salix vitellina or yellow Osier. But a
hardier variety, Salix viminalis, is commonly preferred in this country
where the cultivation, though often undertaken, has never been very
successful, from the fact that American labor can not compete with the
labor of women and children in Europe. 3. In cool climates having a
moist atmosphere the Osier willow is successfully grown where ordinary
crops thrive, but in warmer and drier sections low and moist land must
be chosen. Indeed the whole tribe of willows love cool, moist
situations, and the richer the soil the stronger and quicker the growth.
We should b