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THE T1FTON GAZETTE, TIFTON, (
ttffton (5a3ette ^ »
those who ate until at last nature could stand
Published Weekly
Entered at the Postoffice at Tifton, Georgia,
u mail matter of the second class.
|m. L. Herring Editor and Muager
Official Organ City of Tifton
and Tift County, Georgia.
PLANT RICE
TALKING TOO MUCH.
SATURDAY NIGHT
And They Did Afishing Go.
"Come on, John; le’s go fishing.”
The boy was just out from the noon, meal and
was spending part of the rest hour on the front
steps, helping his inseparable companion,
Towse, minister to a sore foot. The four men
were at the gate when he looked up—Joe and
Bill, Dsn and Uncle Jack. Each carried a pack
•n his back and from that of Joe—a middle aged
man, with red, flowjng beard—the handle.of
a frying pan protruded. A lump in tlje crocus
sack carried by Bill, also a man past the me
ridian, showed the necessary coffee pot was un
forgotten. The boy, anxious to go, for fishing
was a weakness, demurred about not being
ready;—then, that potato pntch needed half a
day’s work.
"Oh, come on; the potatoes can wait ahd
we’ve got all you need.” So, with scurrying for
hopks and lines, a hasty raid on the left-over
bread and meat- from dinner, he went.
It was a seven-mile walk, nearly all the way
through the trackless pine woods and wiregrasa
to where the veterans judged was good fishing
ground. They needed no trail, for the woods
were ka familiar as a well-thumbed book. The
July sun came down blisteringly, but they cared
little. In fact, the walk was only the beginning.
Two weeks of dry weather had stopped tlie
creek'from running, and the fish, their feed
ing grounds limited, were hungr/. The stream
m sight, the party scattered in search of bait. A
fallen pine, on which the bark had just begun
to slip, afforded a rich store of fat, white, flat-
heads; in the lowlands on the' edge of the
jrwamp there were many tiny mounds of cyl
indrical earth-balls, showing the habitats of
worms. A sprig of wiregrasa skillfully intro
duced into their holes, brought thefn crawling
•ut and soon bait was plentiful. The bushes
growing in the swamp furnished fishing poles
for the cutting, and soon lines were strung,
hooks and sinkers attached, bait stuck on and
■pat upon for luck, and the fun began.
Warmouth perch lurked out near the water’s
edge, around cypress stumps and cypress-kne
Closer to the edge there were always small red
eyed perch and stump-knockers, and deeper
fishing rarely failed to bring out a catfish-
a kind not to be despised.
With the first perch, the bait problem was
solved, for the main objective of- the fisherman
of that time and place was the red-finned pike.
This first for the sport, for the pike was vora
cious and lively; also for his desirability for
eating, one long backbone being all that was in
the way.
A strip of perch belly, white with red under
fins, was what the pike wanted; attached to a
book, with shortened line, the angler trolled
along the edge of the lakes, always wgtehing
for the shady spots. A quick dash; a swish
the line, a moment’s play and the prize lay on
the” bank.
Men and youth—really Dan was just past
boyhood, and fraternized with the boy in the
juvenile class—were busy, but silent. By one or
two, they scattered up and down the stream,
and soon the forked twigs cut from tough shrubs
bore their store of fish.
A hallo from Joe, who was ahead, far down
the creek, called the party at sundown to the
camping place for the night. A steep hill came
up in a bluff to the 'creek bank, at the bottom
a spring. A picnic fish-fry had been held that
day and the remains of a fire and many Mat
tered scraps told the tale of a good time gone.
But the picnicers had not spoiled the fishing.
.While. Jae .hvult. a fire .ol.pine sap.And Biunil
limbs up on the hillside and set the coffee pot
on to boll. Dan, Bill and Unde Jack and the boy
scaled and cleaned the fish down by the spring.
Soon, long, slender pike, glistening wljjjte, fheir
sides cut across with a knife to facilitate cook
ing and rolled in corn meal, were sent up to
Joe, and the others kept scaling until the cook
called that there was enough.
Then, around the pile of hot fish, laid out on
a big platter of pine-bark, with cold com bread
brought from home, the five gathered, as the
night shadows threw the background of pines
into somber reliqf. There were jokes and stories
of course, but eating was the main thing. With
piecerOf com pone handy, a fish was taken by
|bil; one hand held while the other,stripped
hot juicy meat from -the bone, and the wa
g-mouth was -waiting. Joe was a veteran
of %sny camp fishings, and had « faculty of
t of one side of his mouth whileLthe
s worked out at the other. Bill *^as
ly his class, but the others only got
enough lonfc after they were through. There
was only one tin cup and the five drank the
^ffee—oh beverage delicious—from this. The
ethers, by hardened practice, could drink the
Chick, black fluid scalding hot, but the boy
couldn’t. Result, he soon had a scalded mouth,
while his share of coffee was slim. Butf he didn’t
seed it As for sugar, it was not thought of.
Such'eating! Such sweet, delicious-mouthfuls!
Upland rice la one of the most easily pro
duced and least expensive food crops that the
farmer in this section can grow. A few years ago
nearly every farmer in Wiregrass Georgia pro
duced enough rice to supply family needs, Then
allowed ourselves to drift into the habit
of buying everything we eat, and the humble
rice was despised.
Rice will grow almost anywhere in this sec
tion, under almost any circumstances. It is es
pecially adapted to wet lands unsuitable for
many other crops, but will grow equally well
on upland*. It will grow between rows of other
crops or will easily produce 25 bushels to the
acre when planted by itself on average land.
At present prices it is worjh^something over $2
a bushel.
But • little attention is required after it
once thoroughly cleared of grass and light c
tivation will mature the crop. If our people
will plant more rice mills will be set up at con
venient paces and we will shut off another out
flowing stream of dollars from South Georgia
annually. It can be planted any time up to the
first of July and will mature a crop.
Plant a patch of rice.
THE WEEVIL IN LOWNDES
no more.
Supper over, the older ones smoked, while
the younger ventured down to the creek for a
few catfish. But all wfere tired, and soon in
slumber. The wiregrass was the only bed, the
towering pines the only shelter; each selected
his sleeping place t« suit himself—there was lit.
tie choice.
Dan had brought along a slicker—a rubber
rain coat that all day had been joked about
an unnecessary burden. This he spread upon
the ground nt the foot of a big pine and invited
the boy to share it with him. On the other side
of the pine, also with his head to the tree, his
feet stretched out like wheel-spokes. Joe slum
bered, his snore soon attesting that by him the
•orld was forgotten. On either side of the
tree, between the deepen}, the fishing poles
leaned.
Evidently Joe had eaten not wisely but too
ell, or else he dreamed again the day’s sport,
for about midnight the boy was awakened by a
call:
"Great Scott, boys, here’s a whopper.’
At the same timt^ there was a crash of raking
bark, and a sounding slam as the heavy pole
h?t the ground alongside Dan, just grazing his
j. Joe dreamed he hooked a jack, and seiz
ing the pole just beyond his head, had brought
it over with u powerful swing.
There was a scramble as the boy and Dan
hurried out of the danger zone. Joe made an-/
other swipe before he was awakened by the
others, who had a laugh after the scare was
over. There was little more sleep, for the nigh s
were short and day near.
Next morning there was breakfast of fish,
corn-bread and coffee, and the fishirtg began
again, this time for a supply for the home-folk'.
Luck hejd throughout the morning and n
hour or so after noon the party started on *1
long walk home. lx»ng. for they had fished two
or three miles down the creek from the starting
place and the sport was now behind instead of
ahead. They had no dinner, and as the others
said nothing, the boy didn't, although he was
very hungry. Just as they were leaving the
swamp, what should he run 'up on but a soft
shell turtle, a luxury, but a heavy'tote.
That long, seemingly never-ending, hot walk.
The miles drug like leagues, the sun was merci
less. and the empty stomach appeared to stick
to the backbone; feet once light, were, leaden,
and the turtle seemingly weighed a/ton. The
boy has never relished turtle soup since. Half
way home, feeling in a back pocket, he found a
piece of-, sweaty corn-bread, two days old and
forgotten. But never did-cake taste sweeter.
At last, home, sweet, welcome, home, was
in sight through the pines. ForaIth}ugh t.JM Be[wecn tbe row8 of cotton pla „, „ rov ,
lnd w.s glad to go. thst «as nothing to the „at-! go f>r ^ ba8 been thc con ,
isfaction with which he sank down on the front npt interfere in the least with the cotton crop
step on the returti. [ an d jf t he boll’ weevil gets the cotton the corn
Bill and Joe are long since gone to ‘.he happy j crop wil] be ga f e
Assistant State Agent G. V. C.unningham and
County Agent L. S. Watson were in Lowndes
county Thursday, where they attended a meet
ing of representatives of the state and national
Departments of Agriculture to Inquire into
the existence of boll weevils in that section.
Watson brought back with him a bottle
filled with live vigorous weevils and a cotton
square into which a weevil had already bored
and deposited an egg. He says the weevils were
found in every cotton field visitied.
Mr. Cunningham brought cotton squares con
taining weevils and »ays there are thousands
of them there, with no prospects of the early
demise we were told a few weeks ago would
overtake the weevil who came before ftie time
set for him.
To show how silly and harmful are so-called
devices for knocking weevils off cotton, Mr.
Cunningham said they-experimented by kick
ing^ shaking and knocking the stalks, but not
a weevil fell to the ground. The weevil* were
either already in the cotton where they could
not be knocked out or they clung tenaciously
to the plant and refused to be shaken off. They
even held on tight when the captors tried to
pull them off. ThihJiarmful part about the so-
called weevil-catchers is that they mislead far
mer* into trying to fight the weevil where he
has all the advantage.
The Gazette reads with surprise the statement
attributed to State Entomologist Worsham that
farmers who plow up their cotton are making a
mistake, and that the boll weevil scare has
been exaggerated. If that is all the State Ento
mologist knows about the real situation, he
ought to keep silent until the crisis has passed.
Mr. Worsham says the board has been keep-
„.g a close check on the movements of the boll
weevil by use of cages at the sea island experi-
:ental station at Valdosta, arid Assistant Ento
mologist J. G. Smith reports from that place
that the weevils began emerging on Feb. 21. in
rery small numbers and that in three of the
cages there has been no emergence since that
date. Nowhere, says ,Mr. Worsham, has the
weevil been moving in any quantity, and out
in the fields at Valdosta station only about
twenty weevils have been taken so far this
season.
Experiments made at tho-station show the
average life of the we^vtf^after emergence to
have been 19 days where fed on cotton plants
and only 11 days where fed on okra. Where
water alone has been used the weevil lived only
4 1-2 or 5 days. The longest life under any con
dition has been 45 days, and in every showing
the emergence of the weevil has this year been
very slow.
Mr. Worsham is also quoted as saying that
in many cases the pea-pod weevil has been
mistaken for the boll weevil. This is true. Ear
lier in the season, many specimens were
brought to Tifton from near by farms which
proved to pea pod weevils. But those bTiUght
LOYALTY.
What a great word, and what a
world at action U condensed in It
Loyalty to country i»»hs thought
mostly conveyed now-a-daya.
Well, we can be loyal to our coun
try In ways other than mouldering"
gun and going on a hunt tor Ger-
Thi* ia to call attention to the
unloyalty ahown by too many of our
men who are sitting around town J
from early morning untu night dls-
euaaing the newe of the day to no-
body's good, and eking ont a bare J
existence for self and family (if be 1
has one) and feela satisfied if the
home folks are not,, begging
bread.
I believe, from observation
II not find ■ man in
districts sitting whittling
and arguing and talki
as often to be seen
thst I am here pictg
when a m
fingers .
make haste a
cook them £
T tWO.
BETWEEN THE COTTON ROWS
fishing grounds, we hope: Dan, Uncle Jack and
the boy will soon answer the call But in heaven
surely somewhere the joy must dwell to equal
the camp fish of forty years agone. But if to
these four it is given to meet and know, iecol-
lection and retrospection will be enough.
Plant a patch of r
cost of living.
» on the seat of the high
DID YOU KNOW
From “Italy at War and the Allies in the West.”
published by Scribners.
That the Italian front is longer than the
French. British and Belgian fronts combined?
That some of the Italian positions can only
be reached in baskets slung from wires?
That Italian railway trains have been shelled
by submarines?
That some of the most famous churches in
Venice hnve been destroyed by Austrinn air
planes. which have raided that city mure thrm'
-a hundred tiroes ?
That in six days the Italians mobilized' and
equipped and transported trt the front an army
of half a million men. \
bum i
And after the weevil gets the cotton, peas or
some crop of that kind can be put where you
can plow it up.
Russia may come out of the present situa
tion all right, but we can’t help feeling squeam
ish. That report about officers having a great
deal of trouble preventing Russian soldiers
from fraternizing with German soldiers doesn’t
read like there was much probability of Rus
sia fighting Germany. It is to be noted is mor?
than a coincidence that the revolution in Rus
sia and information as to the allies straits came
ju?t as we were getting our feet wet. Evident
ly. Uncle. Sam didn’t get into the scrap anv t
soon.
vils and were so pronounced by Assistant State the father
Agent Cunningham and County Agent Watson.
together with many others whose acquaintance' i, ac k to 1
with the boll weevil makes them authority. Tlie "' ork toT he ha * * ®
, , ... clean crop. _
pea pod weevil has deceived no one in position j Why I know of a family; 1
t„ juto and the part it haa played in t.- f JgBSS&ftif,
ports of the boll weevil s presence is negligible. and r!canc ,i out the grass from the
In direct contradiction to Mr. Worsham's field and this mother who led in the
.1 , n field fight was a grandmother. "i
statement is the report of the State and County , Now this j, heroism thi« gread-
Agpnts who visited Thomas. Brooks and mother a heroine, U>at exceeds In
' wndes last week. There they tound weevil* ^'g“^mn'd”^ th**" eount^£
plentv, in the cotton, and the numbers rtip- citing the women to vote and eon-
y inrmaamr. Every field visited by then.
Lowndes was infested. Although Mr. Worsham the Red Cross Society. We need tof-
.aya that only twenty weevils have been tound-gg
the fields of the Valdosta station, a man the difficulty of having home sap-
brought from one field in Lowndes Thursday pli ^ d ndr .-.
last more than twenty specimens tafcan from « our southern sorghum will go forth-
ttnlks er to give the desired relief than aay
lewstaiKS. - 'one thing that the farmer can do.
The statement that weevils will not live more, Why we ,i t do wn and read with
than five days without food is a mistake. In tbe wonder what alfalfa will do out ia
Gazette office last winter specimens were kept u>al W e “pirie^e”^ot theory) a’San
for more than two weeks without food, and can raise as much horse reed and hog
men whom we consider reliable showed us spec, j^^hum E£ yoo'SS'rf'aKffi
imens which they said had not been fed for a or anything else. And this can ha
month, and which showed no lack of either life S”5^gtaiS?n°aa?tf
grow alfalfa.
Planted the first of April yon can
begin to cut it to feed with the .first
delude farmers by false hopes into attempt- 0 f j u ) y a nd continue to feed with It
ing lo raise a larger acreage of cotton than will “W ff 05t - first that yon cm
. . , , *, .... -pi. cut will succor out and make ttoMt*
be possible under boll weevil conditions. There growth nearly as good as the first,
will be no lack of cotton this year; too much will depend on the amount of fsitfl-
..... „ . , itv of the soil,
in this immediate section. Every acre plowed up sorghum will make from .11 to IT
and planted in grain puts the farmer that far tons to the acre,
from danger of the boll weevil, and adds that ai ° r ?
much to the success of the great scheme of n G. Tom West.
food production which is a part of the plan for Rh.um.ti.m,
national protection. I If you are troubled with chronic
Not lotiK since we h.vd a statement ffSnt Mr. jLShS-LtoiJSSl'Sll.'Th.’JSS
Willett, of Augusta, that weevils coming out from pain which it affords alone
The statement that a firm’at Rome wanting
one million sweet potato plants is hrfving diffi
culty in finding them is^not surprising. Many
millions of plants are grown in the section
around Tifton and the growers here Cannot
supply their orders. -Severat hravc been buying
from Termers who have surplus plants, hut
even with this they will probably be compoll-
, led to return much good hard money, becaup-*
That theJiYonch have bulif a r,2-centimeier th( * havc n 0t Mhe plants to send,
gun which fires a shell weighing 1 1-2 tons ’
now would not live twenty days. Four weeks
have gone by, and the weevils are not only alive
but growing and multiplying.
The situation is bad enough without being
complicated and much hard work of earnest
men undone by such statements as attributed to
Mr. Worsham. His position is all the more sur
prising in view of his efforts for milny years to
warn t'ae people of Georgia gainst the coming
of the weevil and to prepare for it. If the ox
riment station at Valdosta is misleading the
people, it should be closed and the money spent
thereon used for the dissemination of real in
formation.
able everywhere.
the
i«t. Obtain-
C TO MACH Ailments
Tijc Nation’s Curr-
PLENTY OF COTTON LEFT
That the French have in commission 7.000
airplanes?
That tear producing shells are more effective
and .more generally used than asphyxiating
gas?
That in places the Austrian and Italian
trenches are only six feet apart?
fhat on the western front men have been
drowned in the mud?
That infantry charges are now led by offi
cers in airplanes?
That the British have organized a salvage
corps to save everything on the battlefield;
that even the rags are collected and sold?
That the traffic on the roads behind the Brit.
i»h front is denser than the traffic on Fifth
avenue and that it is controlled by traffic po
licemen?
That the French have organized a corps of
scene painters to paint scenery to deceive the
German airmen?
That in a heavy bombardment the springs in
a field gun wear out in two clays?
That soldiers whose faces have been blown
away have been given new faces by American
surgeons?
‘That there is a Russian army fighting in
France?
That an American woman ia giving phono-
graph.cpncerts in the Belgian firsHine trenches'
That in one day the French fired ?l,600f>00
worth of shells at Arras; that in one week the
Germans fired two hundred and forty train
' , oads of shells af Verdun; that in one weekrthe
British fired five million shells on the Somme?
GEORGIA LIVE STOCK
From the ‘Atlanta Constitution.
Of the live stock shipments from southvy- st
Georgia to butchers and packer® abroad—nota
bly more than l’OO carloads from Turner for the
season—The Tifton Gazette says:
“Remarkable to say. quite a lot of the live
stock shipped this season went to St. Louis and
Chicago. There it jvill be butchered and dressed
and a portion- of it nt least shipped back to
Georgia, the consumer paying the freight both
ways. The completion of the Tifton packing
house should remove any necessity for live stock
of this section going away from home to find
a market-’’
The Tifton packing plnnt. now nearing com
pletion. is an enterprise in which the . farmers
of the entire county hnve'taken an active inter
est since the progressive business men of Tifton
placed-the faith of their money in it by the most
liberal stock investment, and there is no doubt
that big business-will await its opening day. for
the farmers of that section are enlarging their
live stock operations and "the outlook for a big
cattle and hog crop for 1917 is very flattering.
As this outlook brightens and broadens, the
business of packing plants at home will grow
in proportion. As the Tifton Gazette well says
there should be no necessity for liv« stock to go
away from home, with packing plants nt thc
farmers' doom; and these plants will be going
at full capacity if the live stock industry makes
•rood its promise of a big cattle and hog chop
this year.
'Aw.y—Hundr,
This is one year in which no planter should
Ive the slightest fear of. the ovir-jiroductiou. >UyrV%:re4er*at- «isN
of food. There is absolutely no basis for the i,^, any ot h,. r . it sweeps the Bttt
belief that everybody else has abandoned cot- nn(J p„i S „ n i>us Catarrhal ArcretioB*
ton for the exclusive cultivation of food crops; flom t h c system. Soothes and allaj ^
nd those who quietly turn to an all cotton crop jnfiomation in the Intestinal Tract'
thinking to take a selfish advantage are tin- _ t h e C uu»e of serious and fatal ail-
ttingly planning their own disaster. The Tif- SU(: h as G.-ill Stones, A PP «n-
ton Gazette quotes a man who has just re- ^iritis, 'cute Indigestion,Cancer and
turned from "an adjoining county." According Ulcere of tho Stomach nr.d Inte*.
to him. "it’s cotton everywhere." What county tincs _ Veii^ j a undcc. Constipation^
this and what is the matter with its. far- (jngtritU, Auto Intoxication,^
mers?—Savannah Morning Nows.. * jetc. In every locality there are grete-
As. according to recent reports, they have lf u l people who owe their com|
wed up several thousand acres of cotton recovery to Mayr's Wonderful I
r there, and as they arc next door neigh- 1 edy. Thousands say it ha. saved
,, _* them from the knife. The most thor-
bors. we had rather not call names The county ^ , y „„ m . deiiner ^
referred- to was not Dooly, but the following no a j bhol or habit , foni
from the Vienna News shows that there ore drugs.’ FREE booklet or
others: ,*■ '.ailments. Addrvss Geo.
It’is very discouraging this inform''*’"" ■ Mfg. Chemist, Chicago. I
.„ coming from people nvho -have made tours obtain- a bottle of Mayr's
of the county, and are therefore in a position Remedy from Brooks Phanar
to know, that no diminution has been made in »"r reliable druggist, who i
Dooly’s cotton acreage this year. After all the
effort that has been made to save the farmers U
from making an egregious mistake it aeem^
incredulous that such should be the case. It is
a deplorable state of affairs and when harvest
time, comes, if not before many are going to see
the tragic consequence of this unwise action.
GHIGH
A. Savannahian is said to have discovered the
largest diamond in the ^rorld in a South Afri-
"an mine. Wonder if this is a mj>re by that pro
gressive city to get into the ftext big movie de
tective screen?
OLD 3Y All. QRlJS.
'■'•iim. Eifi tlV!IE R 3§jj