it is said, will support six horses per day with such effect, that the animals will be enabled to perform constant labour, without the allowance of either hay or oats. Farther, bullocks fatten more speedily on potatoes, than on cabbages or turnips, especially if a double portion of chopped hay or straw be mixed with the former. Cows also thrive well on these roots; so that with one bushel per day, together with a little hay, they will yield as large a quantity of sweet milk, or butter, as they usually produce, when fed on the finest grasses.
Potatoes are likewise serviceable in fattening sheep, and especially hogs; but, if the latter be designed for bacon or hams, it will be advisable to mix gradually four bushels of ground pease, with an equal quantity of the boiled roots; which portion will, it is affirmed, fatten an animal of twelve stone.—In a boiled state, they may also be given to poultry with similar effect.
Formerly, a kind of brandy was distilled from these roots; but the Legislature has wisely prohibited such practices.—Besides, a fine size may be prepared from potatoes, which will answer all the purposes of that in common use, particularly for whitening ceilings and walls. With this intention, any quantity of newly-made potatoe-starch should be boiled into a paste; a sufficient portion of which ought to be mixed with the whiting, after the latter has been diluted with water. The coat thus prepared is much clearer; retains its whiteness longer; and is less liable to crack or scale, than such as is mixed with animal glue.—There is another economical way of employing the water expressed from potatoes in the processes of making starch or size. This liquor is useful for washing linen, whether plain or coloured, silk handkerchiefs, stockings, &c. without the aid of any ley or soap: it is said to improve rather than to diminish the tint, while it restores their original brightness, and imparts a degree of stiffness to silk stuffs, which cannot be obtained by the common method of cleaning them. It deserves, however, to be remarked, that no discoloured or otherwise damaged roots must be used for this purpose.—Bakers in Germany, farther, convert the pulp of potatoes into yeast, by adding a small proportion (about the 8th or 10th part) of the latter, together with two drams of calcined and pulverized crab's-claws or oyster-shells, and a similar quantity of burnt hartshorn, to every pailful of the preparation. This compound is asserted to increase the bulk of the paste, and consequently of the bread; but double the measure of it is required to serve as a complete substitute for barm.—See also Cheese, vol. i. p. 501.
Farther, the stalks of these roots, when cut in small pieces, afford a grateful food to cattle: the haulm has also been converted into paper; but it is more generally, and, we conceive, more profitably, employed for stable-litter; or, when straw is scarce, instead of thatch for cottages.—Lastly, even the potatoe-apples may be usefully employed in domestic economy. In the New Swedish Journal of Husbandry for 1796, it is directed, that such apples should be collected while in a green and hard state; then well rinsed in cold water, and put for 48 hours into a strong filtrated brine. Next, they are to be
