THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 

Heboteti to Slgrfculture, horticulture, att& the gjousenotti girts. 



Agriculture is the nursing mother of the I Tillage and Pasturage are the two breasts 
Arts. — Xenoplion. of the State. — Sully. 



FRANK: G. RUFFIN, Editor. 



P. D. BERNARD, Proprietor, 



Vol. XIII. 



RICHMOND, JULY, 1853. 



No. 7. 



For the Southern Planter. 

LIMIT OF IMPROVEMENT FROM 
THE USE OF MARL. 

IN REPLY TO MR. NEWTON'S REVIEW, &C. 

Mr. Editor,— In the very able and interesting 
review, by the Hon. Willoughby Newton, of 
the Essay on Calcareous Manures, which ap- 
peared in the May number of the Planter, I 
notice an opinion stated which I think calcu- 
lated to do harm to the progress of improve- 
ment, at least in our low country. It is this: 
l; We believe there has been no instance in 
Virginia or elsewhere, nor do we think it pos- 
sible that there can ever be one, of the product 
of any naturally poor farm being brought up to 
an average on entire fields, from year to year, 
of more than ten bushels of wheat and twenty 
bushels of" merchantable corn to the acre, by 
calxing alone, however long continued, though 
the operation be aided by the use of all the 
putrescent manures that could be produced 
on the farm, and by plaster, clover and peas, and 
the best possible rotation." These views are 
altogether opposed to our belief and experience 
hereabouts, and coming as ihey do from a 
gentleman who is a most successful practical 
farmer, and whode*ervedly has great influence 
with the agricultural community, they require 
further examination. 

Mr. Newton admits the above assertion to 
be a strong one, but says that such a farm has 
certainly never come under his observation, 
and quotes the case of ihe Coggin's Point farm 
(the improvement of which as shown by the 
increased crops is treated in the Essay,) in 
support of his position. 

He thinks this farm supports his position, 
1st. Because a portion of it at least consists 
of originally rich land; 2d. The improvements 
were made to a considerable extent by eocene 
marl, wfiieh he thinks equal to a corribination 
of calx and guano; and, 3dly. Because the 
average of crops of wheat for the first fifteen 
years of marling was 8.22 bushels per acre, 
and during the last series of sixteen years was 
12.10 per acre. I will concisely notice these 
reasons in the order in which they occur. 

1st. This farm does contain a small amount 

of what wa<* originally good land ; but so little 

that it constitutes only one-half of one of our 

present six fields, or about one-twelfth of the 

Voi. XIII.-7. 



arable land, and does not in my opinion coun- 
terbalance the desperately washed and gullied 
slopes as found throughout the farm before 
marling. Even this small portion of originally 
rich land had been so exhausted that a gentle- 
man, who was an intimate friend and neghbor, 
when he heard that this farm had been left to 
my father, pronounced it a curse to any man. 
who might inherit it. 

2d. The eocene marl on the farm is found 
immediately on the river bank, and has been 
from its vicinity applied alone to the field 
containing the little originally good land. The 
great improvement on all the originally poo? 
acid soils has been effected entirely with mio- 
cene — and this improvement, without doubt, 
exceeds Mr. Newton's maximum effect cf 
marl. 

3d. The average crop of wheat per acre for 
the six years preceding marling was 6.75 
bushels per acre, and- that on the best portions 
only of the fields, at least one-half the arabje 
land being considered even at that time too poor 
for wheat culture, and accordingly omitted. 
I might add that all the putrescent manures, 
which an active and zealous farmer could 
make and apply, were necessary for even tht^ 
poor return. The average crop of wheat for 
the last twelve years, viz: from 1841 to 1852 in- 
clusive, was 13.60 per acre, and that on all the 
arable land, exceeding Mr. Newton's estimate 
of maximum product by 3.60 bushels per acre. 
(It is more than probable that were the com- 
parison confined to the portion of the farm 
cultivated in wheat before marling, the product 
would be found to be three or four times 6.75 
bushels per acre.) This series of years in- 
cludes three in which the crop was greatly 
curtailed by serious disasters — one year by a 
late frost in April, which cut down all the fal- 
low and the most forward parts of the corn- 
field wheat; another by a wet spell, in which 
it rained almost every day during the harvest 
operations, and some days all daylong, caus:'n;; 
the wheat to sprout as it stood in the field ; and 
a : third, when the -effects of Hessian fly ej- 
ceeded any thing I have ever witnessed before 
or since. Our crops are frequently subjected 
to these heavy losses, which when they occur, 
greatly reduce the average for a series of years, 
and thus apparently diminish the capability of 
the land. This capability, I conceive, m3y 
be exhihited by the crops of single years, 
when no unusual means have been used. I 



194 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



have had an average of twelve bushels of 
wheat after com, of twenty after clover, and 
of thirty-five bushels of corn on entire fields — 
originally poor acid lands brought about solely 
by the use of miocene marl and the partial 
manuring which the resources of the farm 
enabled us to do. 

But why, it may be asked, were not these 
crops, or the above average of 13.60 bushels 
of wheat per acre sooner attained'! I admit 
that the progress of improvement on this farm 
has been slow and in some cases unnecessarily 
expensive, and that we have not attained so 
large an average as we ought to have reached. 
By turning to chapter XXI of the last edition 
of the Essay, I think this question is there 
sufficiently answered to satisfy any one just 
beginning the system of marling that he can 
now do greatly better than has been done on 
the, Coggin's Point farm. The author states 
as causes of his slow rate of improvement, 
1st. The badly washed and galled state of the 
land when he received it, on many and exten- 
sive slopes, all the soil having been carried 
away; 2d. The fact that he had everything to 
learn about marling and "to prove by actual 
trial, without any light from either experience 
or the prior or cotemporary operations of other 
farmers, much of his labor was lost uselessly in 
wrong procedures, or was worse spent in exces- 
sive applications of marl, which subsequently 
proved to be injurious." As late as 1839, twenty 
years after the beginning of his marl labors, one 
of the best fields I now have for corn had been 
omitted under com culture for eight years or 
more, on account of too heavy a dressing of 
marl, and some limited parts of the farm have 
not entirely recovered to this day; 3d. "The 
fitness given to the before acid soil by marling, • 
to produce clover, was not found out until se- 
veral years after that best auxiliary to the first 
improvement ought to have been in full use;" 
4th. The want of sufficiency of labor for both 
manuring and marling; 5th. The culture of 
cotton for five successive years on all the best 
land, to its detriment; and lastly, The want 
of the personal attention of the owner, who 
for twelve years, from 1827 to 1839, did not 
reside on the farm. The importance of this 
last cause every practical farmer will at once 
appreciate. I will farther add as an additional 
reason the fact that this farm lies in the fork 
between the river and Powell's creek, and is 
intersected by numerous wooded ravines mak- 
ing up from both. The margins of every field 
are thus most seriously affected by shade, and 
the general average of crops reduced thereby. 
In later years, too, the crops, both of wheat and 
corn, have fallen below the actual capacity of 
the land, on account of the presence of two 
vegetable pests, which I admit after a hard 
struggle of more than a dozen yea^s, I have 
been unable to subdue. My fields are tho- 
roughly infested with wiregrass and partridge 
pea, the former a great impediment to the pro- 
per culture of corn, the latter very inimical to 
the successful growing of wheat. The part- 



ridge pea comes up in the fall about the time 
we are sowing wheat, and the only way that 
I know to diminish it, even for a single year, 
is to permit the pea first to vegetate and then 
destroy it in the process of getting in the wheat. 
This requires late sowing of the wheat, and 
can only be done at great risk to the crop. At 
this time, (the middle of May,) 1 can observe 
a marked superiority of the wheat sown in 
October over that sown in November, and yet 
1 am compelled by the partridge pea to sow 
my fallow wheat — the fallow, too, the main 
chance for a crop— in November, a time too 
late for the best yield. 

I have thus given the reasons, why I think 
the Coggin's Point farm, even with its slow 
rate of improvement, does not authorize so 
low an estimate of the maximum effect of 
calxing, with the usual aids of manure and 
green crops. I come now to the more agree- 
able duty of showing what has been actually 
done by a few of my neighbors. I shall limit 
myself to four or five cases, two of which are 
those of gentlemen I happened to meet just 
after reading Mr. Newton's review; the others 
are facts collected some two years ago for 
another purpose. 

1. On the stage road from Norfolk to Peters- 
burg and within about five miles of the latter, 
immediately on the ridge between James river 
and Black-water, is situated a farm of several 
hundred acres which a few years ago was re- 
marked for its extreme poverty. This land 
was originally acid poor land, growing pine 
and whortleberry. Mr. Birchett, its present 
owner, in reply to my queries, says 

" I purchased my farm in 1845. It was in a 
very dilapidated condition. There were only 
about 100 acres of open land. The plantation 
had been cultivated so badly that all the rest 
had been turned out and had grown up in 
small pines. In 1845 I cultivated 30 acres in 
corn and made 35 barrels. 1 then sowed ten 
bushels of wheat on the best part of the land 
and made 27 J bushels. The next year, 1846, 
I cultivated in corn likewise 30 acres, 17 of 
which I had marled. The 30 acres brought 
me 75 barrels of com, and I sowed the 17 
acres marled in wheat. The yield was 120 
bushels of wheat. I now have my farm in 
five shifts, with about 60 acres to the shift. 
The shift I had in corn last year (1852) was 
entirely marled over at the rate of 300 bushels 
to the acre. The 60 acres made 300 barrels 
or 1500 bushels of good corn. I sowed peas 
broadcast at the time of laying by the corn 
and put it in wheat the same fall. The wheat 
now promises well. The smallest estimate 
put on it by any of my neighbors is a yield of 
15 bushels per acre, although it has been some- 
what damaged by fly. The turn-out of my 
wheat crop for the last two years, 1852 and. 
1851, was 12 bushels per acre. My force be- 
ing too weak both for manuring and marling, 
not much manure was applied, so nearly the 
whole improvement has been from the use of 
marl." 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



195 



The marl used by Mr. Birchett was mio- 
cene — got with difficulty, lying below water, 
and hauled some distance. 

2. Dr. Dupuy, who resides on the originally 
poor highlands to the south-west of Peters- 
burg, writes: 

" I purchased my farm in 1837. It was poor 
in the extreme. The last portion of land to 
which marl was applied, and that to which 
your inquiries are directed, was marled in 
1842. At that time it was covered with po- 
verty grass and dew-berry vines. I do not 
think it would have produced more than one 
and a half or two barrels of corn to the acre, 
nor more than three bushels of wheat. Indeed 
no man in his senses would have put it in 
wheat. I used putrescent manure raised on 
the farm, moderately applied, owing to its 
scarcity. The field in question never had an 
application of guano on any portion of it till 
this year. I was compelled to cultivate, in 
not more than three, and often in only two 
shifts, owing to the want of arable land for 
my force, thereby depriving myself of the ad- 
vantages to be derived from clover. In 1851, 
I reaped my first and only fallow wheat from 
this field. The yield was within a fraction of 
twenty bushels to the acre. Two years before 
it had produced about sixteen bushels after a 
corn crop which it was supposed would have 
measured seven barrels. It is again in wheat 
after corn, with a light application of guano, 
and promises to make 15 or 16 bushels." 

I regret that Dr. Dupuy's occasional use of 
guano on the rest of his farm, prevents my 
citing the very great improvements from marl- 
ing which he had made, despite his hard crop- 
ping and slight use of clover. 

3. Col. R. M. Harrison, who has greatly 
improved his land, says, "My average crops, 
before marling, have been about fifteen bushels 
of corn and six of wheat on the best of the 
land, about one-third of the field being consi- 
dered too poor for wheat, and consequently 
left out. My actual crop of good corn in 1850 
was 2,000 bushels, or between twenty-two and 
twenty-three bushels per acre; and in 1851, 
2,300 bushels, being twenty-five bushels per 
acre. My crop of wheat in 1850 was about 
1200 bushels, being eleven and a fraction 
bushels per acre; in 1851, 1150 bushels, or 
thirteen bushels per acre — all the land being 
now put in wheat except two or three acres." 

4. Mr. H. W. Harrison states, "Before 
marling, my land brought fifteen bushels of 
corn and six of wheat per acre. In 1840, I 
made 300 bushels of wheat on my field of fifty 
acres — six bushels per acre. In 1851, my crop 
of wheat was rather over twelve and a half 
bushels per acre." 

5. Mr. E. A. Marks states, "Before marling, 
my land brought fourteen bushels of corn and 
five bushels of wheat per acre. In 1850, my 
crop of com was, 525 barrels, or over twenty- 
one bushels per acre; wheat, 1320, or twelve 
bushels per acre. In 1851, 535 barrels of corn, 
or twenty-two bushels per acre; wheat, 1393 

7g 



bushels, or 13.65 bushels per acre." Good 
merchantable corn is meant — the refuse corn 
of the above crops not taken into consideration. 
The last three gentlemen all own lands 
which are high ridge lands, and were originally 
poor acid lands. They deserve great credit 
for their improvements, which they have ef- 
fected in comparatively a short time, wilk 
miocene marl, aided partially by putrescent 
manure. I say partially, because, like nearly 
all the rest of us, their force was limited, and 
they did nothave enough labor to marl, manure 
and make their crops. Where all could not 
be done, they preferred neglecting what was 
deemed at the time the least important. But 
the foundation having now been laid, by calxing 
the soil, I hold the great improvement, on these 
and most other of our farms, is yet to be built 
up by the making and applying putrescent 
manures, by the use of plaster, by sowing peas 
and clover, by a proper system of grazing, and 
by adopting a more extended system of ro- 
tation. 

With the above facts before me, I think I 
am warranted in differing with Mr. Newton 
as to the maximum limit of improvement of 
poor lands to be effected by the use of calx 
and the ordinary resources for manuring. He 
would put that limit at twenty bushels of corn 
and ten bushels of wheat per acre. I would 
put it at thirty bushels of corn and eighteen 
bushels of wheat, to be reached in three courses 
of crops, of five years each, provided the im- 
provement be conducted by aid of all the lights 
we now have, and with judgment and skill. 
Not half the land that has been marled in lower 
Virginia has had half a chance. Our farmers, 
originally as poor as the soil they cultivated, 
were in debt, and with the first appearance of 
increased fertility of soil, they were in a mea- 
sure forced to take additional crops from it: 
But our people have now generally, by the 
aid of marl, worked out of debt; in fact, many- 
are rich, whose fathers were poor, and I look: 
forward to more rapid improvement in our 
lands. This, 1 verily believe, would, to a great 
extent, be effected merely by more leniency in 
its cultivation ; but would, of course, be greatly 
advanced by more extensive manuring, &c. 

I would not be understood as discarding the 
use of guano. On the contrary, I think Mr. 
N. has rendered an important service to the 
community in giving his practical directions 
for the improvement of poor lands. Such 
improvement is difficult enough to induce us 
to use all the means with which a kind Provi- 
dence has endowed us. I have always advo- 
cated light dressings of marl and lime, to be 
repeated as occasion required, and I have no 
doubt that guano is an important auxiliary in 
the good work. My own experience in its use 
is very limited, this being the first year that I 
have used it on wheat, (and certainly it does 
not now promise to pay expenses,) but I have 
heard doubts expressed by practical men here- 
abouts and those who have used it — 1st. Whe* 
it wjjl pay on lands which have reached 



195 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



twelve or fifteen bushels per acre; and 2d. 
Whether it ought to be used on lands contain- 
ing much vegetable matter, on clover fallows 
for wheat for example. If these views be 
correct, they would materially interfere with 
the progress of improvement promised by Mr. 
N. after the two first rounds of crops. 

While, therefore, I would use guano in the 
early stages of the improvement, I would in 
its progress rely more particularly on putres- 
cent manures of the farm, on clover, peas and 
plaster. I am somewhat surprised that Mr. N. 
in his practical directions omitted to recom- 
mend the use of plaster. After the land is 
limed and set in clover, so impressed am I 
with the importance of the use of plaster that 
had I to choose to-day between guano, at a 
cost of four dollars per acre, and plaster, at 
fifty cents per acre, I should undoubtedly take 
the latter. • 

In conclusion, permit me to say, Mr. Editor, 
that it is with no small degree of diffidence 
that I find myself differing with Mr. Newton 
on any point of practical farming. I read his 
review with the greatest pleasure, and I hope 
with profit. One of the benefits to the cause 
of agriculture, to which the Essay may here- 
after lay claim, will be the having elicited 
Mr. Newton's review. 

E. Ruffin, Jr. 



For the Southern Planter. 
NOTTOWAY AGRICULTURAL CLUB. 

Mr. President, — At a previous meeting of 
our Club, the following subject for discussion 
was selected: 

"What changes should we make in our 
present system of farming, and what system 
is advisable^for us to pursue — having in view 
present profits and the speedy and permanent 
improvement of our farms; and also having 
in view the peculiar adaptation of our climate 
and soil to the production of our present great 
staple, tobacco; and our expected low rate of 
transportation of that and other products to 
market!" 

The subject is too comprehensive to be 
i reated in all its bearings, with the minuteness 
it deserves, in a paper like the present, the ob- 
ject of which is only to make some suggestions 
ro facilitate the change from one system to 
another— a transition frequently readily as- 
sented to in theory, but often presenting obsta- 
cles in the practical operation sufficient to deter 
many from the attempt— from one you have 
unanimously condemned, to the one a large 
majority of the Club have approved. The 
question recited above would be covered by 
the following: What system of cultivation 
■would be best adapted to the improvement of 
our farms'? 2d. What crops would be most 
profitable on that system'? 

The first has been so fully and ably discussed 



in our Club that I will not reiterate the argu- 
ments used on previous occasions, but consider 
it as settled, by a large majority of you, in fa- 
vor of the "five field system." That being 
agreed upon, the next important point is how 
to effect the change from the "three field" (the 
one in general use) to the "five." The impor- 
tant difference between them, as their names 
indicate, is the number of fields in cultivation, 
and consequently the relative size of the 
"fields" in the two systems. The difficulty at 
once presents itself to the farmer, "that if it 
requires one-third of his cultivated land to pro- 
duce a sufficient supply of corn for home con- 
sumption, (which is generally the case,) how 
would he be able to get on with the product of 
one-fifth, at least for a short time, untij be 
might expect some improvement in the land 
from the system he was adopting 1 ?" If he 
could bear the loss of a portion of the crop 
for a few years, or manufacture manure to 
make up the deficiency, the difficulty could be 
very easily gotten rid of; but, unfortunately, 
he frequently cannot submit to the first, and 
he requires all the manure he can collect for 
a tobacco crop, to meet his necessary expenses. 
The alternative is therefore presented to him 
of following the old system by which he can, 
for the present, at least, manage to pay ex- 
penses, or try a new one which necessarily 
brings debts accumulating for several years, 
and looks to future years for its profits; then 
probably to be delayed longer by unfavorable 
seasons and low prices. Thus many who 
would give their assent to the ultimate success 
of the theory, from present difficulties or ex- 
treme prudence are prevented from carrying 
it into practice. The plan I am about to sug- 
gest I think will lessen these difficulties, both 
by causing less risk of curtailing his crops- 
necessary for home consumption — and requir- 
ing a moderate and short loan to establish him 
safely, and in a short time, on the improving 
and more productive "five field system." 
The intermediate step by which I propose to 
accomplish this is the four field system, with 
some modifications— thus, "to begin with com 
the first year; the second year half of the corn 
field of the previous year to be seeded to 
wheat, and the other half to oats, with one 
hundred and fifty pounds of guano per acre; 
the last to be fallowed as soon as the oats are 
taken off— one hundred pounds again applied 
and seeded to wheat, together with half of the 
corn field of the present year. So that each 
year one-fourth will be in corn, one-fourth in 
wheat, one-eighth in oats and three-eighths in 
grass— one-fourth for two years and one-eighth 
for one year." I will now compare it with the 
other systems. It has one-fourth less in corn 
than the three field; but saves one-fourth of 
the labor, which if applied in collecting ma- 
terial for compost, &c, and better cultivation, 
will reduce the deficiency at least to one-eighth. 
A full compensation for which would be found 
in the oat crop, which (a good season) would 
be at least double. Usually oa the three field 



n 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



197 



system about three-fifths of the corn land is 
seeded in oats — on this, one-half; but the addi- 
tion of the guano would make the half, at least, 
double the three-fifths, (I have oats at this time 
with one hundred and fifty pounds guano, 
which I think will make five times the quantity 
the land would have made without,) and more 
than equivalent to the deficiency of one-eighth 
of corn. The quantity of land in wheat would 
be about the same the first year. The second 
year the surface in corn and oats would be the 
same, and the wheat would be double. The 
wheat on the oat fallow might, with great cer- 
tainty, be expected to pay for both applications 
of guano. 1 last spring applied one hundred 
and forty pounds of guano per acre for tobacco 
(by miscalculation,) and again one hundred 
pounds last fall, when it was seeded in wheat, 
which at this time looks as well as corn land, 
on which I applied two hundred pounds at 
time of seeding, and promises well to pay for 
the two hundred and fifty pounds of guano 
and more wheat than the land would have 
made before it was put in tobacco. The only 
outlay would be the loan of the cost of guano, 
which would be returned with probably a 
handsome profit, by the additional wheat, straw, 
grasses, &c, and a rapid improvement of soil. 
Although only one-eighth would rest two years, 
yet I consider the double application of guano 
fully equivalent to one year's rest. If there 
should be a difference between the two por- 
tions, they might be changed at each rotation. 
Grazing on this system would be limited to 
the portion rested two years, except the glean- 
ing of the wheat field by hogs. A great ad- 
vantage over the three field system is the op- 
portunity of seeding clover, herdsgrass. &c, 
lor hay and improvement. Compared with 
the four field system, as at present adopted, it 
has the advantage of one-eighth more land in 
cultivation, which doubles the crop of wheat; 
the other crops being about the same, and is 
fully equal to it for improvement. Compared 
with the five field system, it has one-fifth more 
in corn and one-fifth more in oats, but one-sixth 
less in wheat, and superior to it for rapid im- 
provement. To give a better comparative 
view, I have arranged them in tabular form — 
taking a farm of three hundred acres of cul- 
tivated land. 













a 






in 


w 












13 






40 


a 








O 
100 


O 
GO 




100 


C3 


3 field system, 


corn. 


4 « <i 


75 


374 


37* 


75 


75 


1 " " imp'd. 


75 


75 


37* 


37* 


75 




60 


90 


30 


60 


60 



The transition from this to the five field, after 
a few rotations, could be effected without in- 
convenience, as the improved condition of 
land would allow the requisite reduction of 
SVttxe, and yet give an excess in the product 
of corn, oats, &c, over the three field system. 



2d. This system would not interfere with 
the tobacco crop, except so far as the small 
quantity of fallowing would do. The tobacco 
lots might be kept up without necessarily de- 
ranging any part of the system, and the size 
of crops regulated, as it would probably be 
under any system, by the market value. The 
wheat crop would be very much increased 
and soon equal the tobacco in value, thus 
giving the farmer two staples of about the 
same value to protect him against the loss 
which either might suffer from season or price. 
Corn and oats, after a few rotations, would 
have to seek a market, thus giving the farmer 
four in place of one crop to meet the market 
fluctuations. The increased quantity of hay, 
straw, &c, rapidly ausment the manure heaps, 
and the farmer soon finds that he cannot only 
make enough for tobacco, but that his summer 
manure may be spared for wheat, and a portion 
of the winter to dress the thin spots in his corn 
field. 

Respectfully submitted, 

William S. Harris. 

May 20th, 1852. 

L_*. 

From the Michigan Farmer. 

MANURES. 

As most of our farmers probably have the 
manure of last year still lying in their barn- 
yards, a few words on the subject may not be 
inappropriate. That a man can make nothing 
out of nothing, is so plain a proposition, that 
it appears almost childish to state it; and we 
believe it to be equally true that a ver/large 
proportion of those who depend upon agricul- 
ture for their living, are continually making 
the vain endeavor to accomplish this exploit. 
The end of all farming is to produce from the 
earth grain, roots, or flesh, for the use of man- 
kind. Now, of all sublunary things, this 
earth is one of the most liberal, patient, and 
long suffering under ill treatment; but even it 
finds an end to its forbearance, and has a limit 
to its liberality. Or, to speak seriously, of 
what are plants and animals composed 1 Che- 
mistry teaches us that they all consist of a 
few gases, and a few more tangible elements, 
such as potash, soda, lime, sulphur, phospho- 
rus, chloride, &c; the former of which are 
partly derived from the air, but the latter en- 
tirely from the earth. Now, the stuff we call 
soil is nothing else than clay, sand, a little de- 
cayed vegetable matter, and the inorganic 
elements above meniioned. Clay, sand, and 
rotten wood, vihile they remain in that slate, serve 
no other purpose in vegetation than to hold the 
plant, give it a seat for its roots, and to some 
extent serve as a sponge to drink in gases and 
water. They do not enter into the elements 
of plants, except in a very minute degree. 
All the virtue which the soil possesses in 
making plants grow, resides in the elements, 



19S 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



or inorganic materials and gases; and just in 
proportion as they are abundant or deficient, 
the crop is large or small. Omit one or two 
of these elements and no grain whatever can 
be produced. Give them an abundant and full 
supply, and the grain can scarcely fail to be 
good. This is the whole secret of rich and 
poor land. The former is full of the raw ma- 
terial of plants, which the roots manufacture 
into grains; the latter has a very small quan- 
tity; and as a woollen manufacturer can only 
make a limited number of yards of cloth out 
of one bale of wool, so the seed sown can only 
return a very few seeds more. One of the 
ends of manure, therefore, is to fill the soil 
with these elements and gases. All animal 
manure has been grain or grass; in the animal 
they undergo a change which renders them 
richer — that is, alters their infinities, makes 
them better adapted to the use of the plant, 
and more readily taken up. This is all. But 
every good farmer knows that his manure is 
valuable, on the contrary, just in proportion 
to the food that the animals have consumed. 
Wheat straw contains a very limited quantity 
of these elemerfjs; linseed a very large quan- 
tity; and consequently, in England, where this 
subject is thoroughly and practically understood, 
the farmers go to vast expense every year to 
purchase cake, not to fatten their cattle, but to 
make rich manure. With them, one load of 
such dung is worth a dozen of our washed-out, 
sun-scorched, rotten straw. In the same way, 
elover ploughed in, plaster, ashes, &c. supply 
one or more elements in which the land is 
deficient. 

But a few years ago, the celebrated Pro- 
fessor Daubeny, of Oxford, discovered another 
principle upon which the value of manure de- 
pends. In the Botanical Garden under his 
care, were two beds— one which had remained 
tinmanured for many years, and was very 
poor; another which was constantly manured, 
and was very rich. He analyzed the soil of 
each, and to his surprise found scarcely a per- 
ceptible difference in their composition and 
chemical qualities. How could he account for 
this? Only in one way. Although the soils 
were actually alike, the elements were in dil^ 
ferent conditions. For instance, in the rich 
border there was no more sand or silica than in 
the other, but it was combined with the potash, 
which rendered it soluble in water and able to 
be taken up by the roots; while in the poor 
soil both elements were insoluble and hard, 
and the roots could not receive them, and thus 
with all the other requisite elements. Thence 
he deduced the principle, which further expe- 
riments have proved to be absolutely true that 
the difference between new and worn-out lands 
does not so much consist in the absolute defi- 
ciency of these elements, as in the want of them 
in, a soluble liquid stale. For instance, when we 
break up a piece of new land, all these elements 
are ready for use, and we get a large crop. 
Each crop, however, carries them away faster 
than nature can dissolve them, and at last the 



land is "worn out." Put the field then down 
to pasture for a few years. It receives nothing 
but what has sprung from it, therefore no in- 
crease; but the air, the rain, the carbonic acid 
gas and nitrogen have gradully dissolved a 
larger portion than the pasture grass could 
take up, and the next crop is again a good one. 
In this respect, then, manures have a different 
action. In the first mentioned case, they di- 
rectly supply elements ready dissolved for the 
roots to feed on. In this case, they act che- 
mically, by rapidly dissolving the elements 
naturally existing in the ground, and adapting 
them to the plants. In one year they may 
dissolve as much as nature would in ten. 
Such manuring is cooking the food. A raw po- 
tato is not only a very nauseous, but a very 
unwholesome food. It contains properties al- 
most poisonous to man. But cook it; the heat 
changes these properties, and it becomes a 
delicious and nourishing dish. In this way i 
mineral manures, such as lime, plaster, ashes 
and salt, chiefly work; but we are also au- 
thorized to believe that even barn-yard ma- 
nure has the same effect, but to a more limited 
extent. And this explains a fact which took 
the Connecticut farmers by surprise, when 
plaster was first introduced among them some 
years ago. Its natural effect was to increase 
the crop; and never having learned chemistry, 
those persons kept plastering heavily, and 
reaping great benefit, but putting on no other 
manure. They thought that plaster was itself 
a manure like dung. In a few years, therefore, 
to their dismay, they began to find their land 
more sterile than ever, and had to return to 
barn-yard manure. What had they done'? 
They had put their soil in the pot and cooked it. 
The plants eat heartily and grew fast and thick- 
on such good cheer; but they soon eat up all 
their food and then began to starve. Let our 
Michigan farmers beware of this. Clover brings 
up elements from the subsoil, and grows ra- 
pidly when stimulated with plaster, and in 
effect, throws the riches of the subsoil on the 
surface. But the subsoil is no more inexhaust- 
ible than the top earth— and if wheat follows 
wheat, with a mere clover and plaster crop 
between, the same result must inevitably, 
though not so rapidly, occur. Virginia is worn 
out, but only on the top— and many a north- 
ern farmer buys lands apparently worthless, 
puts in a subsoil plough, and reaps the benefit 
of a new soil, with any manure that the land 
may ever have received.* But if we wear 
out our subsoil, as a harassing course of wheat, 
plaster and clover inevitably must do; if we 
apply no other elements, as barn-yard manure, 
or potash, or lime, or phosphoric acid, renova- 
tion of the land is hopeless. At the time of 
the Revolution, the lands round Albany, New 
York, averaged forty bushels of wheat to the 

* The northern farmers in Virginia form the most 
inconsiderable part of the class in Virginia; and, by- 
no means the most useful in proportion to numbers. 
—Ed. So. Pl. 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



199 



acre. A farmer now thinks himself lucky if 
he gets seven; and miles ot land once as rich 
as earth ever presented, are now a wilderness 
of scrub birch and pine, and the Paradise of the 
land speculator. It is asad prospect; but what 
is to keep our light lands in the interior from the 
same fate 1 ? Professor Johnston says, "If we 
plough-in only the vegetable matter which the 
land itself produces, and carry off occasional 
crops of corn, the time will ultimately come 
when any soil thus treated will eease to yield 
remunerating crops. Though by skilful green 
manuring, waste land may be brought to a re- 
munerative state of fertility, it will finally re- 
lapse again into a state of nature, if no other 
methods are subsequently adopted for main- 
taining its productiveness. Indeed, we con- 
sider the reckless use of clover, plaster and 
wheat, however profitable at the moment, as 
the most entire spendthrift s)^stem. Virginia 
consumed the interest, and there stopped; we 
are consuming principal and interest together, 
and leaving nothing at all for our heirs. 

" Be wise in time — 'tis folly to delay !" 



TAMING THE HONEY BEE. 

We take the following article from the Ger- 
mantown Telegraph, which extracts it from 
some sheets of a work on bees now in course 
of publication by the Rev. L. L. Langstroth, 
of Greenfield, Massachusetts. If the rest of 
the book is as sensible as what we insert below, 
4 bee-keepers ought to have it. 

The Honey Bee Capable of being Tamed 
or Domesticated to a most Surprising De- 
gree.— If the bee had not such a necessary 
and yet formidable weapon, both of offence 
and defence, multitudes would be induced to 
enter upon its cultivation, who are now afraid 
to have anything to do with it. As the new 
system of management which I have devised, 
seems to add to this inherent difficulty, by 
taking the greatest possible liberties with so 
irascible an insect, I deem it important to show 
clearly, in the very outset, how bees may be 
managed, so that all necessary operations may 
be performed in an apiary, without incurring 
any serious risk of exciting their anger. 

Many persons have been unable to control 
their expressions of wonder and astonishment, 
on seeing me open hive after hive, in my ex- 
perimental apiary, in the vicinity of Philadel- 
• phia, removing the combs covered with bees, 
and shaking them off in front of the hives, ex- 
hibiting the queen, transferring the bees to 
another hive, and, in short, dealing with them 
as if ihey were as harmless as so many flies. 
I have sometimes been asked if the bees with 
which I was experimenting, had not been sub- 
jected to a long course of instruction to pre- 



pare them for public exhibition ; when in some 
cases the very hives which 1 was opening con- 
tained swarms which had been brought only 
the day before to my establishment. 

Before entering upon the natural history of 
the bee, I shall anticipate some principles in 
its management, in order to prepare my readers 
to receive, without the doubts which would 
otherwise be very natural, the statements in 
my book, and to convince them that almost 
any one favorably situated, may safely enjoy 
the pleasure and profit of a pursuit, which has 
been most appropriately styled "the poetry of 
rural economy;" and that, without being made 
too familiar with a sharp little weapon, which 
can most speedily and effectually convert ail 
the poetry into very sorry prose. 

The Creator intended the bee for the comfort 
of man, as truly as he did the horse or the cow. 
In the early ages of the world— indeed until 
very recently, honey was almost the only na- 
tural sweet; and the promise of "a land flow- 
ing with milk and honey," had then a signifi- 
cance, the full force of which it is difficult for 
us to realize. The honey bee was, therefore, 
created not merely with the ab ;, ity to store up 
its delicious nectar for its own use, but with 
certain properties which fitted it to be domesti- 
cated, and to labor for man, and without which, 
he would no more have been able to subject it 
to his control, than to make a useful beast of 
burden of a lion or a tiger. 

One of the peculiarities which constitutes 
the very foundation, not merely of my system 
of management, but of the ability of man to 
domesticate at all so irascible an insect, has 
never, to my knowledge, been clearly stated 
as a great and controlling principle. It may 
be thus expressed: 

A honey bee never volunteers an attack, 

OR ACTS ON THE OFFENSIVE, WHEN IT IS GORGED 
OR FILLED WITH HONEY. 

The man who first attempted to lodge a 
swarm of bees in an artificial hive, was doubt- 
less agreeably surprised at the ease with which 
he was able to accomplish it. For when the 
bees are intending to swarm, they fill their 
honey bags to their utmost capacity. This is 
wisely ordered, that they may have materials 
for commencing operations immediately in 
their new habitation; that they may not starve 
if several stormy days should follow their 
emigration; and that when they leave their 
hives, they may be in a suitable condition to 
be secured by man. 

They issue from their hives in the most 
peaceable mood that can well be imagined ; and 
unless they are abused, allow themselves to be' 
treated with the greatest familiarity. The 
hiving of bees by those who understand their 
nature, could almost always be conducted with- 
out the risk of any annoyance, if it were not 
the case that some improvident or unfortunate 
ones occasionally come forth without the 
soothing supply; and not being stored with 
honey, are filled with the gall of the bitterest 
hate against all mankind, and animal kind ia 



200 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



general, and any one who dares to meddle with 
them, in particular. Such radicals are always 
to be dreaded, for they must vent their spleen 
on sqmething, even though they lose their life 
in the act. 

Suppose the whole colony, on sallying forth, 
to possess such a ferocious spirit; no one would 
ever dare to hive them, unless clad in a coat 
ef mail, at least bee-proof, and not even then 
until all the windows of his house were closed, 
his domestic animals bestowed in some safe 
place, and sentinels posted at suitable stations, 
to warn all comers to look out for something 
almost as much to be dreaded as a fiery loco- 
motive in flail speed. In short, if the propen- 
sity to be exceedingly good-natured after a 
hearty meal had not been given to the bee, it 
could never have been domesticated, and our 
honey would still be procured from the clefts 
of rocks or the hollows of trees. 

A second peculiarity in the nature of the 
bee, and one of which I continually avail my- 
self with the greatest success, may be thus 
stated: i 

Bees cannot, under any circumstances, 
resist the temptation to pill themselves 
with liq.uid sweets. 

It would be quite as easy for an inveterate 
miser to look with indifference upon a golden 
shower of double eagles falling at his feet and 
soliciting his' appropriation. If then we can 
contrive a way to call their attention to a treat 
of running sweets, when we wish to perform 
any operation which might provoke them, we 
may be sure they will accept it, and under its 
genial influence, allow us without molestation 
to do what we please. 

We must always be particularly careful not 
to handle them roughly, for they will never al- 
low themselves to be pinched or hurt without 
thrusting out their sting to resent such an in- 
dignity. I always keep a small watering pot 
or sprinkler in my apiary, and when I wish to 
operate upon a hive as soon as the cover is 
taken off, and the bees exposed, I sprinkle them 
gently with water sweetended with sugar. 
They help themselves with the greatest eager- 
ness, and in a few moments are in a perfectly 
manageable state. The truth is, that bees 
managed on this plan are always glad to see 
visitors, and you cannot look in upon them too 
often, for they expect at every call to receive 
a sugared treat by way of a peace offering. 

I can superintend a large number of hives, 
performing every operation that is necessary 
for pleasure or profit, and yet not run the risk 
of being stung, which must frequently be in- 
curred in attempting to manage, in the simplest 
way, the common hives. Those who are timid 
may, at first, use a bee dress; though they will 
soon discard every thing of the kind, unless 
they are of the number of those to whom the 
bees have a special aversion. Such unfortu- 
nates are sure to be stung whenever they show 
themselves in the vicinity of a bee-hive, and 
they will do well to give the bees a very wide 
berth. 



Apiarians have, for many years, employed 
the smoke of tobacco for subduing their bees. 
It deprives them at once of all disposition to 
sting, but it ought never to be used for such a 
purpose. If the construction of the hives will 
not permit the bees to be'sprinkled with sugar 
water,' the smoke of burning paper and rags 
will answer every purpose, and the bees will 
not be likely to resent it; whereas, when they 
recover from the effect of the tobacco, they 
not unfrequently remember, and in no very 
gentle way, the operator who administered the 
nauseous dose. 

Let all your motions about your hives be 
gentle and slow. Accustom your bees to your 
presence; never crush or injure them in any 
operation; acquaint yourself fully with the 
principles of managementdetailed in this trea- 
tise, and you will find that you have but little 
more reason to dread the sting of a bee, than 
the horns of your favorite cow, or the heels of 
your faithful.horse. 



From the Albany Cultivator? 

(jTHE MINERAL MANURE THEORY. 

Analytical Laboratory, Yale College, ) 
New Haven, Connecticut, Oct. 24, '51. ) 

Messrs. Editors, — The subject which I have 
placed at the head of this letter, is not one 
which can be fully discussed in a single page 
of your journal; and yet it is one of so much 
importance that I desire to make a few expla- 
nations and statements, regarding the shape 
which it has now assumed among scientific 
men. When I mention the "mineral manure 
theory," I speak of that view of manures, 
which ascribes all, or nearly all, of their effi- 
cacy to their mineral constituents. 

The principal supporter, and indeed the ori- 
ginator of this theory, is Professor Liebig. 
This distinguished chemist, distinguished no 
less by his clear, lucid style, than by his high 
scientific reputation, was, for a time, devoted 
to "the ammonia theory," excluding those 
mineral manures to which he now attaches so 
much importance. A few years since, how- 
ever, he saw cause to change his ground, and 
has since held, that if we furnish mineral ma- 
nures in abundance, plants will, without doubt, 
always obtain their ammonia, or rather their 
nitrogen, from the atmosphere or the soil. 

In pursuance of this idea, he went so far as 
to compound, after careful study of ash analy- 
ses, specific mineral manures for wheat, rye, 
oats, turnips, &c, which were to take effect 
upon all soils in a proper physical condition. 
The failure of these specific manures, which 
were patented in England, was, as many of 
your readers, doubtless, are aware, very deci- 
sive. 1 had supposed the subject rather at 
rest, but find in the last edition Prof. Liebig's 
"Letters on Chemistry," published so late as the 
commencementofthepresentyear,he reiterates 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



201 



his former views on this subject in a most de- 
cisive manner, and prophecies that our future 
agriculture will defend them, however much 
we may distrust and disbelieve them now. I 
have also had occasion to observe quite re- 
cently, that some gentlemen of high standing 
among our own scientific men, follow Liebig 
in this as well as in other theories. For these 
reasons, I have thought it best to express my 
own opinions on this contested point, in order 
that our farmers may be aware, that all che- 
mists do not hold to views which militate al- 
most directly against the ordinary results of 
practice. 

My belief is, that when Professor Liebig 
advocated " the ammonia theory," he was 
nearer right than he is now, when he only ad- 
mits the necessity of mineral manure. Not 
that he was right then, but that better results 
would, in most cases, be obtained by the far- 
mer in the use of ammoniacal or nitrogeneous 
manures alone, than by the use of mineral 
manures alone. We find lands in all parts of! 
the country, where strictly mineral applica- ! 
lions, such as lime, plaster, marl, &c, fail to j 
produce any very marked effect, but if upon 
any of our fields we apply guano, or sulphate 
or carbonate of ammonia, the character of the 
vegetation is at once changed, its color alters, 
its luxuriance and vigor increases, and in a' 
great majority of cases the product is aug- 1 
mented. 

Every farmer who has observed such mat- 
ters intelligently, knows that the above state- 1 
menis are correct; indeed, they have been so 
far applied in practice, that the quantity of 
ammonia which any manure contains, is taken 
as the highest standard of its value. A guano 
for instance, with the usual per centage of am- 
monia, will bring twice as much as one which 
contains little ammonia, even though this de- 
ficiency is replaced by the most valuabls^pos- 
sible mineral constituents. 

I must not be understood to say, that mine- 
ral manures are not valuable; on the contrary, 
I have the highest opinion of them, and re- 
commend their application in almost all cases 
where my advice is asked; the mineral con- 
stituents of the plant are no less indispensable 
than its organic part, and if one or two of them 
are ab'sent from the soil, the plant will not 
flourish. There are many instances of these 
special deficiencies, which special mineral 
manures alone will alone supply, and there are 
certain mineral substances which have been 
found specially valuable; the most so of all 
these is phosphoric acid. Now, the phosp/iaks, 
that is, the compounds of this acid, are not 
more necessary to the plant than are the aVian 
lies, but the supply is far more apt to be scanty, 
and this — not its intrinsic importance to the 
plant— is the cause of its higher value to the 
farmer. 

The same principle applies when we say 

that nitrogeneous manures, of which ammonia 

is the most common form, are more valuable 

.than any others known to agriculture. They 



are volatile, easily decomposable, and very so- 
luble — for all of these reasons- they are ex- 
tremely apt to disappear most rapidly. These 
manures, then, are worth more to the farmer 
than any others, because the}' are most likely 
to be needed, and because their scarcity ren- 
ders it somewhat difficult to obtain a full sup- 
ply. I make these statements fearlessly, and 
confidently, although against so high an au- 
thority as Liebig. I should not presume to 
oppose him on mere theoretical grounds, but 
feel that I am here sustained by almost uniform 
practical results. 

It must be acknowledged that we have occa- 
sional instances reported, of plants growing 
upon soils nearly or quite destitute of vegeta- 
ble matter; but in most of these that have 
fallen under my observation, the fact of the 
entire absence of vegetable, and particularly of 
nitrogeneous matter, has not been sufficiently 
established. The information that they give 
is neither entirely definite, or well enough 
made out by continuous and careful experi- 
ments, to be set off against the immense array 
of facts brought forward in favor of the oppo- 
site view. Single experiments for a single 
year, must always be looked upon with distrust 
until amply verified, and it is by mainly trust- 
ing to such, so far as we are informed that the 
exclusive mineral theory has been built up. 
The laboratory alone is pretty sure to go 
wrong when it attempts to prescribe rules for 
practice; the chemist must go into the field 
and study actual experience, if he would serve 
the farmer effectually. 

It has been my intention to experiment some- 
what largely upon this particular subject, but 
in the last number of the Journal of the Royal 
Agricultural Society of England, is a paper 
by Messrs. Laws and Gilbert, that almost pre- 
cludes the necessity of doing anything more. 
These gentlemen have been experimenting on 
a large scale during the last ten years, and 
their results are clearly and admirably set 
forth. 

They took a field at the close of a four year's 
rotation, when the manures added at the com- 
mencement of the course were exhausted. 
On this ground they have cultivated wheat for 
ten years, under various conditions. One plot 
remained unmanured, and the produce of this 
served as a standard and starting point for 
comparison during the whole period. Thus, 
if its yield in 1845 was 17 bushels per acre, 
the improvement over this in an adjoining plot, 
otherwise the same, was set down to the ad- 
vantage of whatever manure had been em- 
ployed. Such a system of cropping, continued 
for so long a time, obviously affords results 
that are worthy of much confidence. 

The first year's comparative practice, was 
made with various approved mineral manures 
alone. It was found that even by the addition 
of large quantiiies of these, the increase of 
product over the unmanured plot was but tri- 
fling. In the next year the same character of 
mineral manures was employed, but with the 



202 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



addition in several cases of ammoniacal or 
nitrogeneous substances; in all of these the 
effect was quite marked, the yield increasing 
to 10, 12, and 14 bushels, above the unmanured 
plot. 

This, in short, was the character of all the 
results; sometimes ammoniacal manures alone 
were added, and then the increase was several 
times more than by mineral manures alone. 
One experiment was very striking. Four hun- 
dred weight per acre, of Liebig's special mine- 
ral manure for wheat, was applied to a plot, 
and produced an increase of but about two or 
three bushels ; upon this same plot, in the next 
year, a purely ammoniacal manure gave an 
increase of ten or twelve bushels. To make 
the experiment still more conclusive, no ma- 
nure was added to this plot for the next crop, 
and the yield then fell again almost to the ori- 
ginal standard. These trials seem to me per- 
fectly conclusive in this matter, so far as wheat 
is concerned; they prove that ammoniacal ma- 
nures increase its growth far more than mine- 
ral manures, whgre both are already present 
in moderate supply, and that the addition of 
any amount of the latter will do little good, 
unless the former be also present. 

These views are still further sustained, by a 
very able paper in one of the late French sci- 
entific journals. The experiments in this case 
were made upon oats, and were between forty 
and fifty in number. They commenced by 
growing them out in sand, first deprived of eve- 
rything soluble by acid, and then burned to 
drive off all vegetable matter. In this, as 
might have been expected, no perfect plants 
were produced. One mineral substance after 
another was added, until at last it was found 
that with a certain seven o[ them, the plant 
flourished better than with any others. It, 
however, was still far from luxuriant, or from 
yielding a fair amount of grain; it was not 
until some manures containing nitrogen had 
also been added, that entirely healthy, fertile, 
strong plants were obtained. These experi- 
ments appear to have been very carefully con- 
ducted, and furnish important confirmation to 
those of Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert. 

There are other questions involved in these 
experiments, which for want of space cannot 
be discussed here; the main point is, I think, 
fully established. The farmer may supply 
special deficiencies by special mineral ma- 
nures, and should aim to keep up the supply 
of mineral substances in the soil; but he can- 
not render it fertile, and continue it so, with 
ihem alone; he must also supply nitrogen in 
some form, and will find it in a great majoriiy 
of cases the most important and efficacious of 
all fertilizers. In despite of ilieorcticul views 
to the contrary, he will find that in practice, he 
can best afford to give a high price for those 
manures that are especially rich in ammonia, 
or some other compound of nitrogen. 
Yours truly, 

John P. Norton. 



For the Southern Planter. 

SUBSOILING. 

To the Farmers' Club oj Nottoway: 

I last year tried the effect of subsoiling upon 
tobacco and corn. I subsoiled a strip of land 
running through the centre of a lot of tobacco; 
the land on both sides ploughed and cultivated 
in the same way, except the subsoiling. There 
was no perceptible difference in the growth or 
production of tobacco. The land is now 
seeded in wheat; there is no difference per- 
ceivable in the wheat up to this time. I sub- 
soiled one bed on a piece of flat land in corn — 
no perceivable difference in growth or produc- 
tion; the subsoiled bed, and beds adjacent, on 
both sides ploughed and cultivated the same 
way and now in wheat, and up to this time I 
have seen no difference in the wheat. The 
land in both cases was ploughed with a two- 
horse plough, to about the depth of six inches, 
followed in ihe same track by a bull tongue 
plough, which penetrated some eight or ten 
inches below the furrow of the turning plough. 
William R. Bland. 



THE LOIS-WEEDON SYSTEM OF 
WHEAT CULTURE. 

The simple facts regarding Mr. Smith's 
wheat culture at Lois-Weedon are as follows: 
We confine ourselves to his four-acre field, for 
that presents the fairest test of the system. It 
was taken in hand during the autumn of )85Q, 
having just borne a crop of wheat. In 1847, it 
was in Swedish turnips, and received an or- 
dinary manuring of farmyard dung — this crop 
was carried off the land; in 1848 it bore an 
average crop of barley; in 1849 it was in clo- 
ver; and in 1850 it bore an average crop of 
wheat — an average crop of wheat on such soil 
is 24 to 28 bushels. The soil is not, strictly 
speaking, a wheat soil; it is of a free, some- 
what gravelly staple — of a dark color, pretty 
full of white gravel stones. On entering this 
field in October, 1850, it was immediately 
ploughed "an inch deeper than it had ever 
been ploughed before;" it was then cleaned 
and levelled, and the wheat was sown in triple 
rows one foot apart, with the blank intervals 
of three feet. These intervals were dug "two 
shallow spits" deep — In all not more than four- 
teen inches: and Mr. Smith, then, as he wrote 
in November, "without any misgiving awaited 
the result." The result was a crop of 164 
bushels of clean wheat (exclusive of tail,) 
from the four acres of land. Little more than 
one bushel of seed had been used over the four 
acres, in seeding the 29,000 yards of single 
row which they contained, and this does not 
seem so insufficient an allowance, when we 
remember that a bushel of wheat, generally, 
contains upwards of 600,000 seeds. But it 
was not on the mere thin seeding, the mere 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



203 



space thus given to each individual plant — 
nor was it exclusively on the greater scope 
thus given to atmospheric influences, that Mr. 
Smith built his confidence. We do not sup- 
pose that these, alone, would have produced 
the enormous crop that was reaped. The pe- 
culiar merit of the alternate seed bed and fal- 
low system adopted at Lois-Weedon, lies less 
in the management of the former than in the 
existence of the latter. And it is not upon the 
fallow given last year to the land under the 
plants of the growing crop, more than upon 
the fallow which is being given to the land 
this year alongside of the growing plants, that 
their productiveness will depend. The crop 
of 1850 was grown upon a well ploughed 
■wheat stubble, which was not a very desirable 
preparation for wheat, but it was grown every- 
where alongside of a well tilled and deeply 
pulverized fallow strip, through whose soil the 
hungry roots could luxuriously expatiate, and 
that, no doubt, was how it proved so produc- 
tive. The crops sown on the strips followed 
in 1851, yielded, last year, only 30 bushels " per 
acre," a result which is sufficiently explained 
by the character of the season. We prefer 
to retain the style which "Economist" objects 
to, of considering all these as acreable results. 
We are not to consider the system as crop and 
fallow, alternately, (as regards time) i. e. year 
about — so much as alternately, merely as re- 
gards space, i. e. as you walk from one side of 
the field to the other. The former style puts the 
crop to the credit of last year's fallowing, where- 
as, in truth, the crop is properly due to this year's 
fallowing. And so we consider, that whereas 
under previous management the land had 
yielded an average crop of 24 to 28 bushels 
per acre once in four years— under present 
management it has yielded after the rate of 40 
bushels and 30 bushels per acre during suc- 
cessive years. Certainly nothing can look 
finer than this four-acre piece at present does. 
The seed amounted to about a bushel for the 
four acres. The fallow strips of last spring 
and summer were in admirable order for its 
reception. It was sown in September, and the 
stubble strips alternating with it, have since 
been deeply dug. The rows of wheat are now 
of a healthy color and most vigorous growth, 
lying flat and bushy on the land, just as those 
most interested in the next crop could wish. 
For the rationale and the results of the Lois- 
Weedon system, we recommend our readers 
to study the 10th edition (incomparably the 
best of the series) of Mr. Smith's pamphlet, 
"A Word in Season." It is sufficient to add 
here, in justification of a previous article on 
the subject, that we do not propose that this 
new mode of agriculture, if it is to be so called, 
be recommended for universal adoption, lis 
results, hithetto, are useful, perhaps, chiefly 
as an illustration of the wonderful influence 
of thorough tillage upon fertility; but inde- 
pendently of the principle which they incul- 
cate, they m'vjhl, we think, and they will, we 
have little doubt, induce many to copy in full 



detail the methods by which the}' were at- 
tained. We strongly advise farmers to try the 
Lois-Weedon system on one of their wheat 
fields, if not on all. This can be done without 
any great interference with die price of labor; 
and if a field of suitable soil be selected, we 
have little doubt that more than one field will, 
in the course of a few years, be subjected to 
the same style of management. The mode in 
which Mr. Smith recommends a first adoption 
of his system, is detailed in the 10th edition of 
his pamphlet. — Agricultural Gazelle. 



For the Southern Planter. 

REPORT ON THE USE OF LIME IN 
NOTTOWAY COUNTY. 

. Mr. President,— As a member of a special 
committee appointed in the early part of the 
last year to test the value of lime on growing 
crops, I beg leave to report: That, in the early 
part of March, I spread over an acre of land, 
litter composed of pine and oak leaves, 
enough to cover the entire surface. On the 
5th day of this month, thirty bushels of agri- 
cultural lime was scattered uniformly over 
this litter, and the whole of it turned under 
with a double horse plough. 

This was pla'nted in corn at the usual time, 
and cultivated in the usual way, from which 
I realized a crop considerably increased by 
the application — but, to ascertain with greater 
certainty its value in an uncombined state, I 
made an application of lime at about the same 
rate, to a piece of land adjoining of the same 
quality, and without the admixture of litter. 
This, was also planted in corn, and yielded a 
crop very little inferior to the first experiment. 

It was not measured, so as to ascertain the 
improvement with exactness, but was suffi- 
ciently obvious to leave no doubt on the minds 
of general observers. I asked one of my ne- 
groes, during the growth of the crbp, if he 
could discover any benefit by the use of lime; 
"yes!" he said, "I think it a great deal better 
than artificial guano,"— a high compliment to 
lime, in comparison with the other miserable 
humbug. 

The land on which these experiments were 
tried, was old-field of the third or fourth year, 
ofalightnature,and with thestumps just crum- 
bling to decay. 

On the 6th day of this month, 1 made an ap- 
plication of lime at about the same rate to a 
strip of wheat, where the land was almost en- 
tirely of sand, and no grass had been seeded, 
the wheat was guanoed; I thought it continued 
greener than the surrounding wheat, but mark- 
ed no particular increase in product. 

The land on which this experiment was 
tried, was treated to a dressing of about three 
hundred pounds of guano, the acre, and seeded 
in turnips, both ruta baga, in the drill, and 
common white turnips, broadcast. The crop 



204 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



•was an abundant one, thereby establishing 
the important fact, that there is no incompati- 
bility between spring dressing of lime, and fall 
dressing of guano — agents, which, when si- 
multaneously appligdj are found to be so mu- 
tually destructive, rniiy be thus rendered, not 
only harmless, but mutually subservient to 
each other's efficiency. 

On the 26th day of March, I applied ten 
bushels of lime to one-half an acre of wheat 
set in clover this spring, with an abundant 
crop of sheep sorrel on the land. As this is 
an active plant, I desired to see whether the 
alkali would not so neutralize the soil as to 
destroy it. It has not, yet, done so. 

The wheat and clover grew finely, and 
yielded a good crop. If there was a larger 
yield than in the parts of the field undressed 
by lime, (which I have thought there was,) it 
was not sufficiently apparent to state it as an 
undoubted fact. 

Respectfully submitted, by 

J. M. Hurt. 

January 13tt, 1853. 



For the Southern Planter. 

ATKINS' AUTOMATON, OR SELF- 
RAKING REAPER. 

Reaping machines are attracting great at- 
tention, both in the United States and in Eu- 
rope. Recently, there have been many altera- 
tions and improvements in this very important 
machine. Among these, is one made last year 
by Mr. Jearum Atkins, of Chicago, Illinois, 
which consists in attaching a rake to his reaper, 
which is, in some respects, like Hussey's. 
This rake is worked by a very curious, but 
simple piece of mechanism, displaying great 
ingenuity in the inventor. The same forward 
motion of the machine which works the blade 
that cuts the wheat, also sets the rake in mo- 
tion, and as fast as the grain is deposited on 
the platform, the rake sweeps over it, presses 
the wheat against a sheet iron palm, holds it 
firm, turns one-fourth of a circle around, when 
the rake opens and deposits the grain on the 
ground in rear of the machine, and in suitable 
bundles for binding. The rake then reaches 
around for another bundle, and so on, dropping 
the bundles at equal distances along its track. 
This is, doubtless, a very pretty operation, but 
it strikes us, (though we acknowledge we are 
not capable of judging, never having seen the 
machine) that there is more importance at- 
tached to this improvement than it merits. It 
must enhance the price of the reaper, make 
it more complicated, and, consequently, render 
it more liable to get out of order; whilst the 
only advantage which we can see, is saving 
the labor of one hand, viz: the rakeman who 
rides along on Hussey's machine, and per- 
forms the raking in a satisfactory manner. 

The most perfect, and the most useful ma- 



chinery is, generally, the most simple; and 
simplicity of construction is absolutely indis- 
pensable in every implement that is to be 
used by ignorant laborers. 

This machine of Mr. Atkins', which Mr. J. 
S. Wright of the Prairie Farmer has patented, 
includes in its patent, a simple and decided 
improvement, by which, the knife or blade is 
prevented from, clogging. Judging from the 
very little that we know about reapers, we are 
disposed to think this one of the best machines 
of which we have heard. 

June 3, 1853. 



For the Southern Planter. 
COTSWOLD SHEEP. 

Mr. Editor, — I will simply state for the 
benefit of my brother farmers of the South, 
especially those of them who have been im- 
posed upon by Northern impostors and hum- 
buggers, that at my sheep shearing, the 30th day 
of May last, I sheared from a yearling Cots- 
wold buck, not fourteen months old, purchased 
by Col. John L. Cralle and myself of Col. 
Josiah W. Ware, of Clark county, Virginia, 
the enormous quantity of seventeen and one- 
fourth pounds of wool, (17-|- lbs.) measuring 
from eight to fourteen inches in length; the 
quality of which you can judge of by the 
sample sent, which is neither the longest nor 
the shortest, but just about a medium staple. 
And the buck weighed after being first clean 
sheared (and he has no horns) two hundred 
and nine and three-fourths pounds live weight, 
(209f lbs.) which I think is pretty good weight, 
considering he is not yet fourteen months old. 
I make this statement that Virginians and 
Southerners may know that they can be sup- 
plied in Virginia with what I, in my humble 
judgment, consider the very best stock of 
sheep for our purposes in America. And I 
know of no one who can supply them so well 
and on better terms than Col. J. W. Ware, of 
Berryville, Clark county, Virginia. 

You can do as you like with this, burn it or 
publish it. 

Most truly yours, &c, 

R. H. Allen. 

Oral Oak, Virginia, June 3, 1853. 



HOW TO GET RID OP MOSQUITOES. — The Oil 

or essence of pennyroyal, (the oil is the best) 
sprinkled around the room, and over the bed- 
clothes, before retiring to bed, has been found 
to answer admirably in correcting these rowdy 
insects of their calithumpian and bill-sluicing 
propensities It is a volatile article, and there- 
fore can do no injury to the clothes, while the 
aromatic flavor is by no means disagreeable. — 
Southern Cultivator. 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



205 



For the Southern Planter. 

LOUDOUN COUNTY AGRICULTURAL 
SOCIETY. 

Mr. Editor, — Having been requested by the 
President of the Loudoun County Agricultu- 
ral Society, to forward to the Editor of the 
Southern Planter, an account of the present 
condition and prospects of our Society, I take 
pleasure in complying with the request. This 
Society had its origin in the desire of a num- 
ber of public spirited individuals of this county, 
who believed that benefit might arise by an 
association of this kind, and who did not wish 
an impression to go forth, that they were less 
concerned for their own agricultural advance- 
ment than were the citizens of other counties. 
It was organized during the early part of last 
year, and a list of premiums were offered, and 
a fair held at Leesburg, last fall. The exhi- 
bition and attendance were creditable; and 



from the interest manifested at present, hopes 
are eniertained of an enlarged exhibition and 
fair this fall. 

From the Treasurer's report it appears that 
the amount received from members was $334, 
and that there was collected at the fair, $252 
25; and there was paid out for premiums, $136; 
and for incidental expenses, $176 33; and 
leaving a balance in his hands of $273 92. 

At the meeting of the Society this spring, the 
following officers were re-elected: 

Robert L. Wright, Wheatland, President. 

John A. Carter, Union, ) y 

John George, Jr., Lovettsville, \ «_■■>/. 

C. T. Hempstone, Leesburg, ) results. 

Yardley Taylor, Purcelville, Correspond- 
ing Secretary. 

William Fulton, Leesburg, Recording Sec- 
retary. 

John B. Wildman, Leesburg, Treasurer. 
Yardley Taylor, Cor. Sec. 

Loudoun, Gth mo. 23d, 1853. 



MORRILL'S IMPROVED DITCHING MACHINE. 




This engraving is a perspective view of 
a ditching machine, patented by Jonathan 
W. Morrill of Hampton Falls, New Hamp- 
shire, May 10th, 1853. 

A A are the wheels; B is the axle of the 
same, across which the beam lever, C, is 
secured. The cutters for ditching are 
placed and secured in this lever. D D D 
are the cuttere for cutting the sides and 
front edge of the sod3. These cutters are 



united together and are braced and sup- 
ported by the stirrup brace, E, which has 
a vertical bar, F, secured to the front edge, 
and passes up through the slot, G, in the 
lever, C. This bar, F, has a slot, H, cut 
in its upper end with a pin, I, passing 
through it to make it fast to the lever. As 
the cutters are raised and lowered, the slot 
in the bar, F, admits of the lever, C, being 
depressed and raised. J is a spade, cutter, 



206 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



or scooper; it has a bent handle, K, L, 
which turns on a fulcrum pin, a, which 
passes through the bar, F. The part, L, 
is eecured to a link, M, which passes up 
through a mortise, tV, in the beam, and it 
is loosely secured in the same by a pin, c, 
\vhich it allows to move back and forth, as 
the cutters, D D D, and spade, J, are de- 
pressed or elevated. O P are thin plates 
of metal for guiding the sod as it is raised 
up, and for throwing it out at the side of 
the ditch. The plate, P, is only to incline 
the sod to one side. 

Two men take their position at the han- 
dle of the lever, facing the wheels. They 
press down the lever, which causes the 
spade to fly out, at the same time cutting 
the sod on three sides; then, raising the 
lever (without changing their hold,) forces 
the spade in, cutting the sod off at the 
bottom. The machine being now at the 
surface, swings forward seven inches, when 
the same operation is repeated, one sod 
pressing out the other, throwing them upon 
the side of the ditch. Or the lever can be 
extended across the axle, a man working 
at each end. 

The machines can be made to cut ditches 
one, two, or three feet deep, and seven 
inches wide, or fourteen or twenty-one 
inches wide, by going over the ground 
twice or thrice, or wider by repeating the 
operation. It is comparatively easy work 
for two men. It is fitted to the large 
wheels of a single horse wagon. 




Tt may be used to good advantage with- 
out the wheels and lever, by having at- 
tached to it a piece of wood two ffeet long, 
with handles, as represented in the small 
cut. It cuts a ditch smooth on the sides 
and bottom. 

Applications for machines or rights may 
be made to the patentee as above. 



For the Southern Planter. 
SHUCK MATTRESSES, &c. 

Mr. Editor — I wish to become a subscriber 
to your paper, lo commence with the January 
number of this year, and will thank you to 
send it to me at Smithville Post Office, Pow- 
hatan. Please direct it with my lull name, 
as I have a near neighbor with the same ini- 
tials, which might cause some mistake. I will 
endeavor to send my dollar in a few weeks. 
Yours, respectfully, 

Josiah Smith. 

Powhatan county, March l8iA, 1853. 

P. S. — Since writing the above, I have 
thought it might be well to give you my plan 
for preparing shucks for making mattresses — 
I have very little doubt but some of your read- 
ers may have seen them prepared in the same 
way, still, there may be some, like myself, who 
have had to resort to the tedious operation of 
hackling with the flax hackle, for the want of 
something better. Being very fond of a shuck 
mattress, and not having patience with the 
hackle, I was induced to try some shorter plan. 
I have the shucks pulled or cut off from the 
nub, and when I have as many as I need for 
present use, I pass them through my wheat 
machine twice, and have them well prepared 
at once, though not as fine as the hackle would 
make them, but sufficiently fine to make a first 
rate bed. If you think this worth a place in 
your valuable paper, you can publish it, if not, 
consign it to the flames. J. S. 



COST AND PROFITS OF GUANO. 

A correspondent of the "Edinburgh 
Quarterly Journal of Agriculture," in allu- 
sion to the fact, that the fixed price of gua- 
no has settled to $45 per ton, states that it 
is a curious coincidence that the returns of 
the crops manured with it amount to just 
about the cost of its application. For ex- 
ample, three. hundred weight per acre, the 
usual quantity, amounts to thirty shillings, 
(sterling,) which has been found on an 
average to increase the whole crop six 
bushels. This, at forty shillings per quar- 
ter, is just thirty shillings, the exact ex- 
pense of application. 

The amount consumed in that country, 
in consequence of no profit being made by 
its use as a manure, he thinks is very mo- 
derate, when compared with the extent of 
farming territory, and will continue to be 
so until the price of guano is lessened. 
By reducing the duty on this article to one 
pound per ton, the price would immediately 
become so low that farmers would find its 
use eminently profitable, and the trade 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



207 



would increase so rapidly that the Peru- 
vian revenuewould be actually augmented. 
"The British creditors of the Peruvian na- 
tion have not allowed them to make that 
reduction;" the chief difficulty in the way 
of which, appears, at present, to be want 
of sufficient proof of the extent of the de- 
posits — some distinguished persons having 
declared that they could not hold out twenty 
years, at the present rate of consumption; 
while others assert that there are no less 
than thirty millions tons in the beds al- 
ready explored, to say nothing of others. 
It must be a very superficial examination 
that would lead wise men so far apart as 
this in their estimates, unless interest has 
led to gross misrepresentation, as there is 
some difference in twenty years and seve- 
ral centuries. Cannot some of our pow- 
erful governments afford to send a compe- 
tent person to examine these beds accu- 
rately, and to furnish a true estimate of the 
number of cubic yards? 



From the Northern Parmer. 

THE BIBLE A TEXT BOOK FOR SHEEP 
1 HUSBANDRY. 

A gentleman who has had much experience 
in sheep raising in Virginia, writes thus: 

" In the year 1840, while reflecting upon mat- 
ters of stock and sheep breeding, it occurred 
to me, that the Bible contained information of 
a practical character upon this, as it does upon 
most other subjects; and I turned over its sa- 
cred leaves to see what the great successful 
shepherd, Jacob, had left on record with regard 
to this department. I soon found that he had 
designated the number of males and females 
which constitute a flock for breeding to advan- 
tage, in his present to his brother Esau, to 
whom he gave "two hundred ewes and twenty 
rams." — Genesis, 32d ch. 14th v. 

,: The proportion being one ram to ten ewes, 
I suppose this relative quantity was designed 
to keep up the equality of the sexes; and af- 
ter a careful examination of my own flock of 
about forty ewes with two rams, and finding it 
to hold nearly true, I commenced with the ad- 
joining farms of greater extent. Without in- 
forming any one of my motive, I requested all 
the overseers to give me at shearing time, the 
number of ewes and rams in their flocks, and 
the number of ewe lambs and ram lambs of 
the season. You may judge of my surprise, 
when in every case out of seven farms with 
large flocks, the facts confirmed the theory. 
In all cases where the proportion of one ram 
to ten ewes existed, the sexes of the lambs 
were about equal — in some cases, where there 
was a great disproportion from this rule, either 



way, there was a corresponding disproportion 
of the sexes of the young. One man had a 
ram for every four ewes, and nearly all of his 
lambs were rams — anotherhad one ram to fifty 
ewes; the result was nearly all were ewe 
lambs. 

"For several years I continued my inqui- 
ries, and the Jacobian rule was satisfactorily 
vindicated in nearly every instance." 



From the Boston Cultivator. 

TUMID JAW IN CATTLE. 

Messrs. Editors, — T have reason to be- 
lieve that every attempt to cure the tumid 
jaw in cattle, after — as your correspondent 
Frank expresses it — (see Cultivator for 
April 16th) it has become a "sit fast," will 
be found abortive, at least, I have never yet 
known a cure effected by the most skilful 
treatment; it ie satisfactory, however, to 
know, that unless the animal thus afflicted 
has an extraneous value, its intrinsic worth 
might be secured by feeding for the 
butcher, commencing at the time when the 
evil is first discovered, between which and 
the period when the creature begins to lose 
condition, the season will prove lomr 
enough for common purposes. I very well 
remember that a remarkably fine short- 
horn cow, selected in England, and brought 
to this country in company with the Bates' 
bull, "Yorkshireman," by Joseph Cope, 
of Westchester county, Pa., was thus dis- 
eased, but her extraneous value forbade 
the sacrifice of her life by the butcher; yet, 
with all the care of the owner, and skill of 
the medical professor, I have no idea that 
her life was long spared. At this time, 
too, there were several other cases' of the 
same nature in the neighborhood, one, es- 
pecially, at Allerton Farm, the owner of 
which being desirbus to know if the disease 
had ever been cured, made inquiry to that 
effect through the Farmers' Cabinet, and 
was answered in an article that appeared 
in the next number, written by a medical 
practitioner of the highest standing, and 
from which I beg to make a few extracts, 
and remain your subscriber, 

John Marks. 

The Tumid Jaw in cattle, is essentially 
the same disease which surgeons call osteo- 
sarcoma or bony cancer, in the human sub- 
ject. It is a disease of the bony system, 
and is common to man and the lower ani- 
mals. Although the jaw bone, and espe- 
cially the inferior one, is the most frequent 
seat of this terrible malady, yet it may in- 



238 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



vade any part of the bony fabric. No sa- 
tisfactory cause has yet been assigned for 
osteosarcoma. Sometimes it may follow 
contusions or other injuries of the bones; 
or when seated in the jaw, it may appear 
10 proceed from the irritation caused by a 
decayed tooth; but there is reason to sup- 
pose that in those cases there must have 
been a constitutional predisposition to the 
disease. This supposition is rendered 
more probable, since it has sometimes at- 
tacked successive members of the same 
family; at other times, it has appeared al- 
most simultaneously in distant parts of the 
body, and when the affected member has 
been removed, the disease has been repro- 
duced elsewhere. 

The seat and commencement of this 
malignant disease, is obviously in the 
spongy cellular substance, formed in the 
interior of most bones. As the disease is 
developed, the bone swells, and its healthy 
structure becomes entirely changed. The 
following graphic description of the ap- 
pearances of the tumor, is drawn by Dr. 
Gibson, (Surgery, vol. i. p. 40S.) "The 
bone will be formed smooth on the surface, 
and either uniform and regular, or else dis- 
posed in lobulated masses of different forms 
and sizes. Sometimes these are extreme- 
ly regular, of a rounded form, and resem- 
ble very much a cluster of grapes. At 
other times, several large masses are 
pined together, and present the appear- 
ance of an artichoke or a protuberant po- 
tato. When the bony texture of these tu- 
mors is cut, forcibly separated, or crushed, 
a number of irregular cells are brought 
into view, containing either a thick, cheesy, 
lardaceous, medullary matter, or gelati- 
nous, or semi-transparent fluid, which 
oozes. out of its own accord, or can be re- 
moved by mechanical means, or by mace- 
ration — leaving the sides of the cavities 
lined by a very fine and delicate membrane. 
The morbid tissue of bone will then be 
found to consist of innumerable spicula, 
disposed in endless variety of ramifica- 
tions, and shooting out in fantastic forms, 
resembling some species of coral, or as- 
suming the shape of some vegetable pro- 
ductions." 

The same writer continues, "I have in my 
possession a very fine specimen of ostea- 
sarcoma of several pounds weight, taken 
from the upper jaw of an ox. In this spe- 
cimen, the cells which I have described, 
and the arrangement of the bony spicula, 
are uncommonly well displayed, owing to 
the magnitude of the tumor, and the ori- 



ginal texture of the bone upon which it is 
reared;" 

In the more advanced stage of tumid 
jaw, more or less suppuration takes place; 
the tumor bursts in one or in many places, 
and pours forth an ichorous and corrosive 
discharge, which soon excoriates and con- 
taminates the adjacent soft parts. From 
this time the disease puts on more and 
more the appearance of malignant cancer, 
until the poor animal falls a lingering prey 
to suffering and exhaustion, or is kindly 
released from further torment by the hu- 
mane interference of its owner. 

It may readily be perceived, that a dis- 
ease such as I have described, will prove 
intractable and difficult to cure. In its in- 
cipient stage of tumid jaw, while the tu- 
mor is small, it ought to be rigorously at- 
tacked by oft-repeated blistering — or by 
opening a constant drain from the immedi- 
ate neighborhood by means of a rowel, or 
the application of strong caustic. If these 
means fail to avert its progress, an opera- 
tion for its entire removal should not be too 
long delayed. With this view, the whole 
of the diseased mass must be laid bare, 
and by the bold-and dexterous use of small 
saws, gouges and chisels, every vestige of 
unhealthy bone must be cut away. As we 
are by no means certain that success will 
attend even this dernier resort, I would by 
no~means recommend it in ordinary cases. 
Where there is no extraordinary value at- 
tached to the animal, perhaps it would be 
more prudent to put it off, before the dis- 
ease shall have progressed so far as to in- 
terfere with the process of feeding. Nei- 
ther is it likely that any lasting advantage 
would accrue from the operation, after the 
tumor has become a corroding cancerous 
sore. 

Medicus. 



CURE FOR ROSE BUGS. 

A subscriber wishes to know if any one can 
suggest a method of preventing the yearly in- 
cursions of the rose bug, and having heard 
considerable complaint among our neighbors 
of having their cucumbers, grapes and other 
fruit destroyed by these insects, I will suggest 
a remedy. Plant in the centre of your garden 
damask rose bushes, and they will never light 
on any thing else. We have a large garden 
with almost every kind of fruit, vines, shrub- 
bery, and flowers, with several kinds of roses, 
and in the centre we have four bunches of da- 
mask rose bushes, and I never saw in the 
whole garden a rose bug on any thing but the 
damask rose. Whea th'ey are in blossom 1 go 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



209 



iDio the garden once a day with a pan of hoi 
■water, and get about a pint at one time; this 
I practice for a few days, and then they will 
disappear. — Boston Cultivator. 




THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



RICHMOND, JULY, 1853. 

TERMS. 

One Dollar and Twenty-five Cents per 
annum, which may be discharged by the pay- 
ment of One Dollar only, if paid in office or 
sent free of postage within six months from 
the date of subscription. Six copies for Five 
Dollars; thirteen copies for Ten Dollars, 
to be paid invariably in advance. 
,f3= Subscriptions may begin with any No. 

I^*No paper will be discontinued, until all 
arrearages are paid, except at the option of 
the Publisher. 

U- Office on Twelfth, between Main and 
Cary Streets. 



All communications for the columns of this 
paper, and all letters of inquiry, to insure 
prompt attention, must be addressed to Frank: 
G. Ruffin, Shadwell, Albemarle County, Va. 

All business letters connected with the 
Planter must be addressed to P. D. Bernard, 
Richmond, Virginia. 



ANSWER TO CORRESPONDENTS. 

"A Subscriber" wishes to know if the Me- 
diterranean wheat is affected by joint worm, 
and what are the remedies for it generally. 
We shall touch the latter question in August, 
and can only reply now to the first, that the 
early wheats are somewhat less affected than 
the later varieties. But even this very slight 
exemption is modified by season and other 
circumstances, and is liable to exceptions for 
which no cause can be assigned. 



POSTAGE ON THE PLANTER, 

When paid quarterly or yearly in advance. 

To any part of the United States 1| cents 
per quarter, or 6 cents per annum. 



WANTED IMMEDIATELY, AND BADLY 
WANTED, 

At the office of the Southern Planter, four 
thousand dollars due by a portion of the sub- 
scribers, who are now receiving the paper. 

This money is wanted to enlarge the paper, 
to improve it, to pay debts already contracted 
in its publication, and to live on. It cannot be 
a burden to any one to pay the small price 
asked for the Planter, and we have no doubt 
of the inclination of our friends to pay us. 
But it is so small a matter that they put it off 
from time to time, to our loss, and, in view of 
what might be done with the money, to the 
loss of the agricultural community. 

We hope our friends will attend to this at 
once. 



STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 

We are happy to state that our work goes 
on very well. 

Genl. Richardson, the Society's agent is in- 
dustriously employed,, as will be seen by his let- 
ter below, in getting members to it, and engaging 
contributions to its fair. We feel well assured 
that if any man can succeed, he will. Tb re- 
markable conscientiousness and zeal in what- 
ever he undertakes, he adds a devotion to agri- 
culture, sufficient of itself, to carry him over 
impediments much more serious than any, we 
hope, he is likely to encounter in his travels. 
For we will not permit ourselves to believe that 
Virginia will be backward or slow in the for- 
mation of an Agricultural Society. Like our 
patriotic friend of the Dispatch, from whose 
columns we copy the letter, (and only regret 
that we have not room for the hopeful editorial 
which introduces it,') we think that there is 
material among us for a first rate society, not 
only in respect of ability of members, but, also, 
of articles for a good exhibition. All our far- 
mers want is public spirit to induce them to 
show both themselves and their commodities, 
and if Genl. Richardson cannot infuse that 
into them we know no one who can. 



210 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



The following letter is a mere outline sketch 
of what Genl. R. has seen, which he has pro- 
mised to fill up for the Planter when he gets 
time, and to continue as his travels extend. 
We confidently expect from him a series of 
articles on the agricultural resources of Vir- 
ginia, as interesting and instructive as any 
which has yet appeared in our pages: 

Richmond, June 15th, 1853. 

Dear Sir, — 1 have been so constantly on 
the wing of late, that it has not been prac- 
ticable to keep you "posted up" in the pro- 
ceedings of the State Agricultural Society. 
It may be truly said that this Society has 
now tor the first time, an organized and 
vigorous existence. "The union of the" 
farmers "for the sake of" the farmers, be- 
ing of vital importance, the Society has 
taken measures for canvassing the State 
as thoroughly as practicable with that 
view, and also for uniting with it the mer- 
cantile and industrial classes as incidentally 
interested in the cause. It has made the 
terms of membership low enough to ena- 
ble all to become members, and has re- 
ceived a prompt and liberal subscription 
from the merchants and mechanics so far 
as they have yet been applied to. 

The Executive Committee has deter- 
mined upon holding the first great cattle 
show and fair, in the city of Richmond, 
early in November, immediately succeed- 
ing that at Baltimore, and we have ascer- 
tained that there is within convenient ac- 
cess to this place, as much fine stock 
owned in Virginia, as can be produced 
any where — and which if sent forward as 
is promised, will do 'credit to the State. 
But the Society is anxious also to have the 
contributions of our worthy mechanics 
from every section of the State, and there- 
by to show, as we think can be shown, that 
Virginia is unnecessarily and culpably tri- 
butary to other States, for what her own 
artisans can supply as cheap and as good 
as any in the world. 

We not only do not appear to know what 
we can do — but we do not know what is 
actually doing in the State. Our cities are 
instinct with enterprise — have each of them 
their great lines of railroad in progress — 
population rapidly increasing, commerce 
and the mechanic arts 1h riving — life, en- 
ergy and activity pervading every thing. 
You are familiar with the state of things 
in Richmond, and therefore I need not Btop 
to speak of it — but in Petersburg — in Nor- 
folk and in Alexandria the evidences of 



enterprise, induslry and prosperity meet 
one at every step. In Norfolk, I saw among 
other things, some of the handsomest spe- 
cimens of coach making in the extensive 
establishment of Mr. Thomas A.Mayer — 
and upon jocularly remarking to him that 
an amphibious population had not, I sup- 
posed, much occasion for riding carriages, 
was surprised to learn, that in addition to 
the local demand, he had several depots 
for the sale of carriages, one of them in 
Richmond. I saw there also, as in other 
cities, beautiful specimens of saddlery and 
other branches of the mechanic arts. 

Petersburg — the gallant Cockade city — ■ 
always in the van, appears to be in a rapid 
and healthful state of improvement. She 
has made a strong impression upon the 
subscription list of the Society, and need 
not — will not, I am sure, fall below any of 
her sister cities in the exhibition. 

I had not until last week, been in Alex- 
andria for more than twenty years — of 
course not since she got back to our old 
Mother — and so great has been the im- 
provement there, that I should never have 
known the place. The old church was the 
only object recognized, and even that bears 
the impress of an improvement which 
seems to be universal. Passing through 
one of the streets, I saw just ready to be 
run on board a vessel at the wharf near 
by, the largest locomotive engine I had 
ever seen, just completed at the extensive 
establishment of Smith & Perkins, in Alex- 
andria, for the Hudson River Railroad. 
It w'eighs, I was told, 60,000 lbs.— cost $10,- 
500, and is constructed for burning coal in- 
stead of wood. A friend introduced me to 
the public spirited and intelligent proprie- 
tors of this gigantic establishment, which 
far surpasses my power of description. I 
therefore send you as better than any 
thing I could give, a slip cut from the Alex- 
andria Gazette. It is worthy a place in 
every paper in this and the States South, 
and I hope you will find room for it. Ex- 
tensive, additionsare in progress by Messrs. 
Smith & Perkins — and another large fac- 
tory of the same character will ere long 
be in operation, under the direction of Mr. 
Jamieson, a native of that city. In addi- 
tion to this, a large steam mill is building 
on one of the wharves — which will, when 
completed, be equal to seven or eight hun- 
dred barrels of flour per day. I also saw 
the extensive cabinet factory of Messrs. 
James Green & Son, which employs from 
one hundred and forty to one hundred and 
fifty bands, and turns out as beautiful fur- 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



211 



niture as the hand of man can produce. 
Indeed, Alexandria seems destined to be a 
great city, and by means of her Railroads 
and fine harbor, cannot fail, I should think, 
to command a large trade which heretofore 
has gone out of the State. 

As regards the state of agricultural im- 
provement, it seems to have awakened to 
a new life. So far as I have yet had op- 
portunities of observing, especially on the 
South side of James river, it is great and 
growing — moving steadily onward to a 
point of excellence never before reached, 
or even dreamed of. I have seen this 
spring, in the course of my excursions, 
some of the best cultivation I ever met 
with any where, and I much regret that 
want of time put it, out of my power to 
collect agricultural statistics, which in 
some places, especially in the country 
above Norfolk, must be seen to be believed. 
The farmers there operate upon a quick 
and kindly soil, easily cultivated, with 
the markets of Baltimore, Philadelphia 
and New York, by means of the lines of 
first class steamers — now at their very 
doors. The amount returned to Norfolk 
for spring and early summer crops — as 

feas, strawberries, tomatoes, cucumbers, 
rish potatoes, &c, must be immense. A 
view of the truck farms, as they are called, 
in this (to us) terra incognita, would 
amaze the planters and farmers of our 
great tobacco and grain growing regions. 
Farms of twenty-five, fifty and one hun- 
dred acres returning thousands to the pro- 
prietors, within the first six months of the 
year, and producing besides, the requisite 
supply of corn and forage as succession 
crops — and this, in what has been gene- 
rally regarded as the very poorest section 
of the State!! 

On the farm of Lieut. Wier, of the Navy, 
I saw fifteen acres in strawberries; one 
hundred and ten persons employed in pick- 
ing them, and was told that two hundred 
pickers was the requisite number while the 
crop was in full bearing. On other farms, 
I saw acres and acres in tomatoes, cucum- 
bers, potatoes, &c, all for the Northern 
markets, and a gentleman of the highest 
character told me of one farmer, upon re- 
claimed land, in the vicinity of the Dismal 
Swamp, who planted 1200 bushels of Irish 
potatoes. Occasionally, some good crops 
of wheat and clover were seen, and several 
very fine graea lots. Indeed, it eems evi- 
dent, that under-draining and liming would 
infallibly produce good crops of grass on 
these lands generally. 



Very fine farming lands are to be found 
in this region, adapted to the growth of 
corn, wheat, oats and grass, as the opera- 
tions of intelligent and improving proprie- 
tors will very soon show. I was more than 
gratified by visits to the farms of Captain 
James Cornick, Mr. Richard Walke and 
Mr. John Petty, in the county of Princess 
Anne, from five to seven miles distant from 
Norfolk, and saw at Capt. Cornick's varie- 
ties of corn and oats, (crops of last year,)' 
superior, I think, to any I ever saw before. 
These oats, I learned, may be seeded in 
the fall, and stand the winter as well as 
wheat or rye. This farm — four hundred 
acres — under cultivation, is in the highest 
state of improvement, with admirably ar- 
ranged farm buildings, good stock — "a 
place for every thing, arid every thing in 
its place." 

Mr. Walke's farm of 1000 acres, lately 
purchased, lies beautifully, has quite a 
paradise of a homestead, and cannot fail 
to yield a handsome return upon the im- 
provements he is making. 

Mr. Petty's is a large estate, 1700 acres, 
a considerable portion virgin forest, rich 
enough to produce as much corn per 
acre as any land in the State. The crop 
last year, on some of it, reached fifteen 
barrels. His attention having been chiefly 
devoted to other pursuits, he is but at the 
commencement of a system of improved 
farming — with his industry, intelligence 
and zeal, he cannot fail of success. He, 
too, has a most beautiful residence in 
Kempsville, where, as at other places 
named, the old style Virginia hospitality is 
dispensed in perfection. I am indebted to 
these gentlemen for two of the most plea- 
sant days of my life. 

Want of time deprived me of visits to 
Mr. Herbert, Mr. Garrison, and other gen- 
tlemen in that region, whose kind invita- 
tions it was not in my power to accept at 
the time. I hope to avail myself of them 
hereafter, in company with a strong de- 
tachment of the Executive Committee. 

Passing through almost every portion of 
Virginia, from the mountains to the sea- 
board, especially upon tide water, it is a 
subject of absolute wonder that there 
should be so much unoccupied land, capa- 
ble, as may every where be seen from the 
small portion in cultivation, of yielding 
profitable returns to the industrious culti- 
vator. Cheap, too — cheaper, probably, 
than any of equal value to be found else- 
where. No portion of the United States 
presents such advantages to the farmer of 



212 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



limited resources. Can no means be de- 
vised for calling the attention of the thou- 
sands who are seeking locations, to the vast 
and varied extent that Virginia can pre- 
sent to them"? Where for $5 to $10 per 
acre, (doubtless, in many instances, for 
much less,) land may be purchased 'which 
now has wood or timber enough to pay for 
it, and which when brought into cultivation, 
with the aid of a few dollars worth of gua- 
no, can be made to pay for itself from the 
first year's crops. Of the number of Vir- 
ginians who have abandoned their native 
State to seek fortune in the South and 
West, how lew have prospered by the 
change ! Probably there is not one of them, 
who, if he could now be reinstated in his 
patrimony, with present facilities for im- 
provement, would not be substantially 
richer, and, in point of social comfort, im- 
measurably "better off." 

But I have spun out this hasty sketch too 
far — it may serve, however, for you to pick 
out the information you want. Would that 
I could render any substantial aid to your 
zeal for the Society. An extensive tour is 
before me, and I have little time to write. 
Yet, full of hope for the great cause, any 
information I may collect shall be at your 
command. The Society wants, and must 
have, the influence of numbers, as well as 
of mind and skill — it wants, not 1500, but 
fifteen or 20,000 farmers in its ranks, be- 
sides the merchants and mechanics; and, 
therefore, it calls upon the cultivators of the 
soil every where in Virginia to be just to 
themselves, in giving each and every one 
his personal aid and influence. Let us 
hope that the call will not be unheeded. 
I write in much haste. 

Very respectfully, yours, &c, 

Wm. H. Richardson. 

To Hogh R. Pleasants, Esq.. 



mixed with some of his daily food for the 
space of ten days or a fortnight. We read in 
another place that an ounce is the common 
dose for a full grown animal. 

Will some of our readers who have tried it 
state the proper mode of using crude antimony 
and what is its value 1 ? 

If we have a Tennessee subscriber who will 
do it, we shall be much obliged to him. 



CRUDE ANTIMONY FOR HOGS. 

Mr. A. H. Davies, of Columbia, Chicot 
county, Arkansas, in a letter to a gentleman, 
who has forwarded it to us, asks how to use 
crude antimony in fattening hogs. 

We can only say that we have no experi- 
ence in its use, either as a medicine or a pro- 
moter of fat. And we find it only generally 
stated that it is used for this latter purpose. 
As a medicine, we read that it may be given 
to each hog according to its size, from half an 
ounce to two ounces, properly pulverized and 



RESOLUTION OP THE BRUNSWICK 
AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 

At a regular meeting of the Brunswick 
Agricultural Society, held on the lGth of 
March, 1853, the following resolution was 
unanimously adopted: 

Resolved, That the Corresponding Secretary 
be instructed to inform the Editorof the South- 
ern Planter, and the Executive Committee of 
the State Agricultural Society that the action 
of its delegates, in the late meeting at Rich- 
mond, was cordially and enthusiastically ap- 
proved by this Society; and request that this 
resolution bepublished in the Southern Planter. 



FALKIRK TRYST. 

Instead of bringing their cattle and sheep 
on in separate lots and selling them all along 
the road, as is^the case in the grazing districts 
of the Valley, the drovers*of Great Britain con- 
centrate their stock in immense hordes, at par- 
ticular places, whence they are distributed over 
the whole kingdom. One of the greatest of' 
these places is Falkirk, which is the main 
market for the cattle, sheep and horses raised 
in the north or more mountainous part of 
Scotland. 

The following account of the 'business done 
there will be read with interest by cattle men: 

The earliest trace obtainable of this leading 
market is in 1701. In 1772 the number of 
cattle exposed there for sale amounted to 
24,000. 

" By the year 1812, the number of cattle ex- 
posed for sale had increased so much that Dr. 
Graham, the agiiculturist, informs us that at 
the August trvst, about 6,000 head of black 
cattle were exhibited; at the September tryst, 
fully 15,000 cattle, and the same number of 
sheep; and at the October tryst, the number 
averaged from 30,000 to 40,000 cattle, and 
25,000 sheep. 'It appears,' says this writer, 
'that there are annually exhibited at the trysts 
above 50,000 black cattle, together with about 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



213 



40,000 sheep. Taking the former at the mo- 
derate average rate of £8, and the latter at 
that of 15s. each, the value of the whole will 
amount to £430,000. An intelligent friend, 
who lives near the spot, calculated that 50,000 
black cattle are exposed to sale at the last two 
trysts alone; and he estimates, on good grounds, 
that the total value of the cattle bought and 
sold at these trysts must amount to half a mil- 
lion sterling.' Within the last forty years, the 
business has immensely increased, and at a 
single tryst there is now a larger number of 
sheep and cattle than at all the three in Dr. 
Graham's day. At last October (1852) tryst, 
which was one of the largest that have ever 
taken place, there were probably not fewer 
than 80,000 cattle and 120,000 sheep, not in- 
cluding between 20,000 and 30,000 sheep sold 
before the market. The tryst of the previous 
October was about the same size, and there 
were as many cattle, at any rate, though per- 
haps not so many sheep. For some years pre- 
vious to the two last, a falling off had been no- 
ticed, but this was no doubt owing to a dulness 
of trade, which seems now, fortunately, to 
have passed away. Good times have once 
more returned to the sheep farmer and the 
cattle grazier, and with them the trysts have 
revived to all the activity which they mani- 
fested some eight or ten years ago. The only 
permanent loss has been in fat cattle, which 
are now sent to London direct by steam con- 
veyance, for the feeding districts on the east 
coast, instead of being brought to the trysts. 
But it is chiefly as a market for young grazing 
beasts and sheep that Falkirk Tryst is cele- 
brated, and in these kinds of stock an increase 
rather than a falling off may be anticipated, 
as the capabilities or the islands become more 
developed. Meanwhile, let us endeavor to 
estimate the amount of business at present 
transacted. The following may be taken as 
a near approximation to the numbers and 
prices of cattle, sheep and horses for the last 
two years. In the absence of any exact ac- 
count, the following estimate of the numbers 
has been formed, with the assistance of the 
most competent judges, while the prices have 
b?en calculated from correct averages of the 
different markets: 

AUGUST. 

30,000 cattle at £5 a-head, £150,000 
1,000 horses at £15 " 15,000 



£105,000 



SEPTEMEER. 

50,000 cattle at £5 a-head, 250,000 

100,000 sheep at £1 " 100,000 

2,000 horses at £15 " 30,000 

380,000 

OCTOBER, 

80 W0 cattle at £5 a-head, 400,000 

120.000 sheep at £1 " 120,000 

2,000 horses at £15 " 30^000 

550,000 

For the year, £1,095,000 

Of this large sum, probably the greater part 



is paid by English dealers, who individually 
make by far the largest purchases of any 
dealers frequenting the trysts; for while Scotch 
farmers who wish to stock their lands in most 
cases attend and buy for themselves, it is the 
usual custom of English farmers to intrust 
their orders to agents. The business that thus 
passes through the hands of a single individual 
is sometimes very extensive, and we have 
heard of sums paid away in the course of a 
forenoon by a single commission agent which 
would make no paltry figure beside the great 
business transactions of Glasgow and Liver- 
pool. Turning from the buyers to the sellers, 
we find the state of matters equally creditable 
to the enterprise of the Scotch farmers and 
salesmen, whose transactions are not so very 
far behind those of the Australian sheep own- 
ers as most people imagine-. At the tryst in 
September, 1852, one dealer sold upwards of 
10,000 sheep. In October, he brought forward 
nearly 15,000, but sold them all before the tryst 
commenced, owing to the great demand; and 
another dealer sold about 10,000 sheep at the 
same tryst. In fact, nearly one-half of the 
entire sales of sheep are made by some ten or 
twelve individuals. The most extensive sheep 
owners in Scotland at present are Mr. James 
Scott, of Hawick, and Mr. John Kennedy, of 
Kirkland, better known by the title of one of 
his Highland farms, Fasfern, on the Lochiel 
estate. Mr. Kennedy is said to possess from 
40,000 to 50,000 sheep, a patriarchal number, 
which only two or three of the Australian 
magnates can surpass. Adjoining Fasfern is 
the iacm of Locharkaig, which is rented by a 
gentleman who is tenant of upwards of a thou- 
sand acres of arable land in the county of 
Roxburgh, and has several othersouth country 
farms in his hands. Locharkaig contains, we 
believe, somewhere about 100,000 acres; it was 
stocked with 22,000 sheep, and, like his neigh- 
bor Mr. Kennedy, the tenant can ride twenty- 
five miles on his own farm. But the patriarch 
of Scotch sheep farmers and cattle graziers 
is Mr. John Cameron, of Corrychoillie, who 
can boast of having brought a greater quantity 
of stock to Falkirk Tryst than any man living; 
and no wonder, for, besides the extent of his 
flocks and herds, he has attended the market 
for nearly half a century. His transactions 
are not now so great as they were, but at one 
time Mr. Cameron used to institute a compa- 
rison, not very far out of the way as regards 
the numbers in either case, between the Duke 
of Wellington marshalling his army at Wa- 
terloo, and his own achievements in leading 
his sheep and cattle to Falkirk Tryst. Mr. 
John Patterson, of Skinnet, whose death we 
observe recorded in the newspapers within the 
last few weeks, was another leading sheep 
farmer, and one whose prosperity was entirely 
owing to his own industry and perseverance. 
He commenced the world without a shilling, 
and before he retired from business he had 
nearly sixty miles of sheep-walks in the county 
of Sutherland alone. 



214 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



In a recent work on the wonders of the 
southern hemisphere, we read of a Mr. Jeely, 
who, besides an estate of 50,000 acres, has 
'hundreds of thousands of acres of pasture 
rented from the crown, 25,000 sheep, 3,000 
cattle, and some 300 horses.' This is a very 
tolerable establishment, certainly; but about 
a dozen years ago, Corrychoillie — by which 
name Mr. Cameron is well known throughout 
the country — sent more sheep and cattle to Fal- 
kirk, in the course of a single season, than Mr. 
Jeely possesses altogether. Of course, these 
great sheep farmers cannot be present to super- 
intend all their own farming operations, like the 
agriculturists of the Lowlands, but the sheep 
walks do not require the ever-watchful over- 
sight which is essential on an arable farm. A 
steady shepherd can do all that a master can 
do, and the care of the flocks may be much 
more safely intrusted to him than the manage- 
ment of any other business to a deputy. It is 
this which makes it possible and profitable for 
one individual to hold farms in different parts 
of the country; and the practice is accordingly 
very general, and is necessarily followed by 
all the leading farmers, many of whom reside 
in the Lowlands, and do not visit their farms 
oftener than once or twice a year. — Hogg's 
Instructor. 



For the Southern Planter. 

IS SHADE A SUBSTITUTE FOR BARN- 
YARD MANURES? 

Mr. Editor, — In the April number of the 
Southern Planter the question "Is barn-yard 
manure indispensflble to the preservation of 
the fertility of cultivated lands?" is answered 
with much confidence in the negative; and 
with equal confidence the writer farther asserts 
that "even impoverished lands may be made 
exceedingly fertile without the application of 
manure of any kind whatsoever." The remedy 
prescribed, as universally applicable and in- 
fallibly certain, both in its conservative and 
restorative results, savors much of the charac- 
ter of the many nostrums of the day. These 
promise to cure all diseases, and, save fatal 
casualties and old age, to bar all the avenues 
of death. The wonderful panacea "shade" 
is made to promise even more; not only to 
exclude death altogether, but by its wonder- 
working power, to generate a vitality more 
vigorous and recuperative than that infused 
by the Creator. Now, sir, I apprehend there 
is a natural or inherent constitution of things 
that will forever modify the action of all agents 
brought to bear upon them. Two things, dif- 
ferently constituted, may be equally susceptible 
of improvement; and yet, with equal improve- 
ment, the original difference remains. Gra- 
nite and marble may be subjected to equal 
operation of the artist, and both be greatly 
changed in outward aspect; yet they remain 



granite and marble. Lands, in their original 
constitution, poor and sterile, may be artifi- 
cially supplied with abundant aliment for 
plants; and lands, originally fertile, may re- 
ceive, artificially, an equal increment of fer- 
tility—and yet the primordial distance, in the 
scale of fertility, will remain undiminished. 
They have approximated seemingly only ; sub- 
ject ihem to equal culture, and the results will 
soon show the extent of improvement. The 
one feeding liberally, soon exhausts its limited, 
borrowed stock, and future plants become 
sickly and dwarfish, from want of food. The 
other, with equal borrowed capital, backed by 
ample hereditary stores, produces abundantly, 
and at the same time, retains a surplus at in- 
terest, to supply the current waste; and so, 
with occasional rest, may hold on without 
exhaustion. 

I apprehend the writer is mistaken in the 
declaration that "The observation and expe- 
rience of practical farmers establish, beyond 
Ihe possibility of a doubt, the important fact, 
that if the surface of the earth be closely 
covered with any substance whatever, it be- 
comes exceedingly fertile, no matter how poor' 
originally, nor what the deficiency in its mine- 
ral constituents." It will not be denied that 
covering land will, to some extent, enrich it, 
and it may be conceded that if the covering 
be continued long enough, the land will be 
fertilized to the full extent of its capacity to 
attract and appropriate fertilizing principles; 
but it may not be conceded that this fertiliza- 
tion will advance to a state of "exceeding fer- 
tility," no matter how poor originally, nor what 
the deficiency in its mineral constituents. 

If mere shade be the wonder/ul agent, why 
is not the surface covered with stones as much 
enriched as that covered by straw or hay? 
Why is the surface shaded by the walnut tree 
always richer than that shaded by the oak?' 
And why are not fields shaded with hen nest 
grass or broomsedge as speedily restored as 
those covered with clover? 

That lands, originally rich, by a judicious 
system of rest and shade, with clover, &c, 
may be kept in good tilth for remunerating 
crops, is readily admitted; but it is quite ano- 
ther thing to restore these lands, when ex- 
hausted of their fertility by excessive culture, 
to their virgin richness, and greatly more dif- 
ficult to render lands originally poor "exceed- 
ingly fertile." I should like to be certified of 
an example, where a poor Spanish or chestnut 
oak ridge of land, with a soil scarcely an inch 
deep, and that resting upon a subsoil of tena- 
cious clay, has been made "exceedingly fc?-tilc" 
by mere shade. I would as soon expect to see 
an individual of a depraved, scrofulous and 
consumptive habit raised to a state of health, 
exceedingly robust and elastic, by any of the 
thousand cure-alls of the.day, as that lands, 
originally poor, shall be rendered "exceed- 
ingly fertile," and kept in a condition to pro- 
duce remunerating crops by mere shade. 

Conceding that shade is the remedy, the 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



215 



question comes up wilh what material and 
how shall we shade"? For lands adapted to 
the growth of clover, peas, &c, and in suffi- 
cient tilth, the remedy is plain; but for lands 
too poor to produce a covering, what shall be 
the remedy 1 ? A part, I suppose, may be covered 
with straw, another with leaves and brush — 
stones, when at hand, plank, logs, &c, may 
also come' in for a benefit. What time is re- 
quired to aecpmplish a state of exceeding fer- 
tility is an item of important consideration, as 
the time consumed in the accomplishment 
may outweigh the benefit or render it unavail- 
able. If the writer, upon farther consideration, 
shall see no good reason to withdraw his con- 
fidence from the remedy he has prescribed, it 
will become a desideratum of no small mag- 
nitude that a prescription shall be furnished, 
by which, such as are unskilled in its use, by 
adapting its administration to the varying cir- 
cumstances of constitution and disease, may 
secure to themselves the beneficial results of 
exceeding fertility. It may be that the writer 
has drawn his conclusions from observations 
made exclusively among the rich limestone 
lands of the Valley, and concludes that all 
others possess equal recuperative properties. 
This, however, would be scarcely less unwise 
than to conclude that because an individual 
of sound, robust and elastic constitution, pros- 
trated only by excessive labor, had been re- 
stored to wonted health and vigor by mere 
rest and ordinary food ; therefore the emaciated 
hectic of depraved constitution may be restored 
to a state of exceedingly vigorous health by 
similar means. 

Doubtless the writer's purpose in writing 
was to contribute what he could to the general 
stock of agricultural knowledge— actuated 
and controlled by similar motives in making 
the above animadversions, I trust he will take 
in good part the liberty taken. 

It may not be inappropriate just here to ad- 
vert to the fact that opinions, whether derived 
from observation or experiment, are often 
published to the world with a lamentable want 
of discrimination and specification as to the 
attendant circumstances. This has been a 
fruitful source of disappointment to many who 
read agricultural papers, and attempt to apply 
practically the eonclusiods they form. Ano- 
ther and perhaps not less evil, is the tendency 
to foster in the minds of ihose opposed to what 
they call book farming, all their pre-conceived 
prejudice. In this way, the march of agricul- 
tural improvement has been greatly retarded. 
The speculative genius too often conceives 
and frames a theory, plausible and specious it 
may be— then makes facts and experiments 
bend, so as to furnish props to sustain the 
bantling; while the more practical man, dis- 
carding all means of learning except actual 
experience, confirmed and fixed in his oppo- 
sition to all new notions and plans, adheres the 
more obstinately to the old beaten track. 

B. 

Charlotte county, 20lk June, 1853. 



For the Southern Planter. 
TRIAL OF REAPING MACHINES. 

Mr. Editor, — Presuming that the public gen- 
erally and the farmers of Virginia especially, 
would be pleased to hear the result of the trial 
of reaping machines at Curie's Neck on the 
2lst and 22d of June, the undersigned, Chair- 
man of the Committee appointed by the Ex- 
ecutive Committee of the Virginia State Agri- 
cultural Society to award a premium of fifty 
dollars to the "best and most effective ma- 
chine," feels authorized to announce that re- 
sult to the public in advance of a more full 
and minute report to be made to the State So- 
ciety at its meeting in November next. The 
following gentlemen, composing a majority of 
the committee of award, viz. Messrs. Richard 
Irby, Robert M. Taylor, Edward O. Watkins, 
John P. Royal and the undersigned, met at 
Curie's Neck, the estate of Mr. Wm. Allen, 
on the 21st ult. and found in the field, ready for 
the trial, three machines, viz. M'Cormick's, 
Hussey's and BurralPs. The committee ap- 
pointed to make all the necessary preliminary 
arrangements for the contest having executed 
their office the machines commenced their 
operations about noon on the 21st ult. The 
weather was excessively hot and dry, the 
wheat shattering ripe, (the Maryland Blue 
Stem variety, very tall, and averaging, I sup- 
pose, some twenty-five bushels per acre,) the 
land mostly level, but a sufficient portion of it 
undulating to test the machines on that kind 
of land. 

Without extending this communication — 
which I desire shall be brief— I will only add 
that the committee of award, after following 
the machines closely through the day of the 
2lst and again on the 22d with a sincere and 
anxious desire to award the premium to the 
"best and most effective machine," upon com- 
paring opinions were utterly unable to agree, 
each member of the committee expressing his 
great difficulty in deciding between machines 
all of which had operated so beautifully and 
effectively for two entire days. 

Upon taking the vote of the committee it 
was found. that Messrs. Watkins and Taylor 
gave the preference to the machine of Mr. 
Hussey, Mr. Irby to Mr. M'Cormick's, and «■ 
Messrs. Royal and Garnett to Mr. Burrall's. 
Under these circumstances the committee, of 
course, could award no premium, and they 
will report the above facts to the State Society 
in November next. 

John R. Garnett. 

July 2, 1853. 



Core for Founder. — Thisbeing theon- 
ly piece I shall give you for the Cultivator 
this year, I will bring forward from the 1st 
volume of your journal a valuable recipe 



216 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



for founder — more correctly speaking, a 
water founder: Bleed the horse from the 
neck as long as he can stand up; then 
make him swallow one pint of salt; anoint 



well around the edges of his hoofs with 
spirits of turpentine; keep him from drink- 
ing too much water, and he will be well, I 
think, in a few hours. — Farmer <$• Planter. 



For the Southern Planter. 




a 



S3 

o 
w 

o 

it" 



Mr. Editor, — In the March number of the 
Planter I notice an article from the pen of Jo- 
siah Wm. Ware in relation to French Merino 
and Cotswold sheep, in which I was much in- 
terested, although I must differ with him in 
the comparative merits of the two breeds un- 
der consideration. 

The first point I shall notice is in reference 



to their breeding. He is of the opinion that 
they will not, or are not allowed to breed be- 
fore they are three or four years old. 

"You say the owners of the French Merino 
keep the ewes until three years old, the buck 
four, before they are permitted to copulate, 
and say it approvingly, most probable, that is 
desirable, if not necessary , to that breed of sheep." 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 



217 



Now, as I have had some little experience 
in breeding French Merinos, I would inform 
your correspondent that it is not necessary to 
wait three or four years before they will breed, 
but on the contrary, they are inclined to breed 
before they are one year old; nor is this all — 
many of them have twins, and will, if well 
kept, breed twice a year". These are "stub- 
born facts," but I would not be understood to 
think it advisable to either let them breed so 
often or so young. But am of the opinion 
that ewes should come well nigh to maturity* 
before they are allowed to breed. Young bucks 
should be used moderately. With proper at- 
tention "a ewe of the improved Cotswold 
breed in three years, at the lowest calculation, 
with a single lamb each year, will have given 
in that time, in muttODS alone and independent 
of three additional fleeces, $24, and it might 
be (twins each year) $48." 

Now, sir, the French Merino will give at 
least as many lambs, which, at the lowest cal- 
culation, will sell at §100 each— $300— and if 
twins, $'600, besides a fleece of at least 25 per 
cent, more value than the "improved Cots- 
wold." " How will the French Merino ever 
catch up with this start - ?" A wonderful start 
this, to be sur#. "The French Merino can 
only sell his mutton once in three or four 
years." 

Here, again, Mr. Ware is clear off of the 
track. Why, sir, I have seen many a lamb in 
Mr. Cugnot's or Leroux's sheepfold at six 
months old that would weigh from 80 to 100 
lbs. and so very fat would tickle the palate 
even of the most fastidious epicure. It is no 
uncommon thing in France for sheep at 18 
months old to weigh 200 lbs. At present the 
French sheep cannot be sold for mutton on 
account of the high price of them, but when 
the time comes that the market is supplied ibr 
breeding purposes (which, by the way, will not 
be very soon,) I see no reason why they will 
not be sought for as a mutton sheep. I do not 
know but the Cotswold will grow larger than 
the French, but they cannot be more docile or 
fatten more readily. One of our French ewes 
that did not breed last season got so fat by 
grass that she was said to be worth $20 for the 
New York butcher. 

I do not wish to overrate the French sheep, 
but for wool and mutton combined I consider 
them a valuable animal, but for wool alone I 
believe there are other breeds of the Merino 
that will be quite as profitable to the wool- 
grower. 

* It i9 a well established fact lhat in order to de- 
velop the highest degree of perfection in breeding 
domestic animals the sire and dam should be al- 
lowed to arrive to maturity before breeding. It is 
rny belief that if the breeders of the Cotswold 
sheep pursue the course which your correspondent 
has adopted, they will deteriorate in size, and they 
■will be under th« necessity of resorting to new im- 
portations in order to keep up their present good 
•ies. 



I send you a cut of our French buck " Match- 
less," with a short description of him, and 
leave the French sheep for the present. 

"Matchless" was selected by myself from 
the flock of Mr. Cugnot in April, 1851. He 
is now four years old and weighs 280 lbs. His 
wool is thick, fine and good length. His stock 
is of the highest order, and he is considered 
by all who see him to be one of the best of 
his kind. I have lately sent a buck lamb, 
sired by him, to Dr. Win. L. Wight of Dover 
Mills, which is a fair specimen of his stock. 
Geo. Campbell. 

West Westminster, Vt., April 22, 1853. 



For the Southern Planter. 

AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 

Mr. Editor,— We could charge ourself with 
no task more agreeable to our feelingsj^or 
render, as we would fain hope, a more accept- 
able service to your readers, than that of in- 
troducing to their notice the "Premium Essay 
on Agricultural Education, submitted to the 
Executive Committee of the Southern Central 
Agricultural Association, by Edmund Ruffin 
of Virginia." This Essay, on a comparison 
with four others, each exhibiting "considerable 
merit in regard to this important subject," was 
in the opinion of the Committee of Award 
considered " as decidedly entitled to the premium." 
Indeed, so "valuable a document" did they es- 
teem it, that they accompanied the report of 
their award with a request, involving a de- 
parture from the course usually adopted by 
the Executive Committee in regard to other 
prize essays, namely, that it might "be pub- 
lished at once and spread out before the agri- 
cultural community, without waiting for the 
publication of the Society's transactions." — 
The premium awarded to the author is in the 
form of a beautiful silver pitcher elaborately 
ornamented, appropriately emblematized and 
tastefully inscribed with the following testi- 
monial : "Awarded by the Southern Central Agri- 
cultural Society at their Glk annual exhibition in 
October, 1852, to Edmund Ruffin, Esq. of Virgi- 
nia, for Hie best Essay on Agricultural Education." 
The typographical execution of the pam- 
phlet containing this essay is lamentably de- 
fective, both in artistic skill and in the failure 
to detect numerous errors which greatly mar 
the sense, or entirely pervert the meaning of 
the writer. We may venture to hope, in dis- 
missing this part of the subject, that when this 
essay (with the necessary corrections) shall 
again appear, in the transactions, above re- 
ferred to, justice will be done to the good taste 
of the Society and ample amends made to its 
distinguished author for the mortifying garb 
in which he has been made to appear before 
the public. We pass on to the examination of 
the contents of this valuable essay* 
The name of Edmund Ruffin, standing, by 



218 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 



common consent, "primus inter pares" on the 
list of distinguished worthies, who have sig- 
nalized their patriotism by the devotion of 
themselves to the work of aggrandizing their 
country, would secure for it a passport to public 
favor. But it needs not the prestige of a name. 
Its claim to public consideration may safely 
be left to rest upon the basis of its own merits. 
It is written in the happiest style of its author. 
Clear and precise to a degree which admits 
of neither doubt- nor obscurity, its arguments 
carry with them the force of demonstration, 
and its conclusions are attested with the sig- 
nature of truth. 

The design of the essay is to show (he pa- 
ramount necessity of knowledge to the attain- 
ment of any degree of success in agriculture, 
and to suggest a plan for supplying the exist- 
ing destitution of the means of instruction in 
agriculture and its cognate sciences. 

This general principle, — the necessity of 
knowledge, — is applicable alike to the opera- 
tions conducted under the guidance of the 
most scientific principles and most enlightened 
skill, or to the ruder processes of the most ig- 
norant and unskilful, who rejecting, as fatally 
pernicious, the dogmas of "book-farming," 
aspire to no higher attainment than a know- 
ledge of the routine of practice "received by 
tradition from their fathers," whose code of 
agriculture maugre their contempt for "books" 
was embodied in the almanac, and who, by 
erroneous induction, ascribed the success of 
every process and operation to the causation 
of the moon! Their proceedings in agricul- 
ture were, therefore, commenced or forborne 
agreeably lO the moon's phases— its changes — 
its increase, or decline, and they regulated the 
"times and seasons" for all the necessary ope- 
rations occurring in the husbandry of the do- 
mestic animals, according to the moon's appa- 
rent motions and position within the twelve 
signs of the Zodiac rudely configured on the 
pictorial frontispiece of the almanac aforesaid. 
But to return. Knowledge — the indispensa- 
ble motive power to the whole machinery of 
agriculture in all its complicated parts and 
multifarious relations, is discussed by our au- 
thor under three grand divisions. 
1st. In its relations to agriculture as an art; 
2d. In its relations as a science, and 
3d. In reference to the administrative ability 
(natural or acquired) necessary in proper com- 
bination with the skill and science referred to 
under the two preceding heads, to secure the 
most perfect success in agricultural improve- 
ment and practice. 

The views of the author on these several 
particulars are clearly and concisely expressed 
in the following extracts: 

"Regarding agriculture merely as an art, it 
" is no small matter, that the cultivator shall 
" know how to order and conduct the nume- 
" rous mechanical processes, all of which are 
" essential to success, of ploughing, hoeing, 
" draining, reaping, preparing crops for mar- 
" ket, &c; and to keep in good working order 



" all the implements, machines and appliances 
" for all farming processes. There are not 
" many employments which require more of 
" this merely mechanical capacity and skill. 
" Yet this one is but the lowest grade of the 
" three great departments of agricultural know- 
" ledge required; and which one, however gen- 
" erally and greatly deficient on nearly all 
" cultivated lands, is more usually operative 
" than either of the other and still more im- 
" portant requisites for agricultural success. 
" The highest skill and perfection in the prac- 
" tical operations referred to, which belong to 
".the art of agriculture, would be of little use, 
" if the cultivator is not also directed by the 
" science, which would direct why, when, how, 
" and under what circumstances, each and eve- 
" ry mechanical labor or process shall be either 
"performed, modified or wholly omitted. It 
" is not necessary, indeed, that every indivi- 
" dual farmer shall be a scientific agricultu- 
" rist— and it may be that many may do well 
" in practice with scarcely any acquaintance 
" with the science of agriculture. But, never- 
" theless, it is essential, not only for the greatest 
" success, but for even a moderate degree, that 
" all practice in cultivation shall be directed, 
" as in fact it always is directed or influenced 
" more or less, by the theories and reasoning 
" which constitute the science of agriculture. 
" An ignorant individual cultivator may not 
" reason at all. But he is not, therefore, the 
" less directed in his practice by the glimmer- 
" ings of light derived from the experience of 
" better informed farmers, who themselves de- 
" rived their knowledge from some source of 
" scientific instruction and reasoning. The 
" sound scientific knowledge of one individual, 
" in some cases, might serve to diffuse light to 
" thousands of merely practical cultivators, 
" and to influence and direct successfully the 
" general practice throughout an extensive re- 
" gion. Still this aid and direction would not 
" be the less furnished by science, even though 
" most of those who were benefited by the aid, 
" were totally ignorant that its source was in 
" scientific reasoning and research. All the 
'' success of merely practical cultivators is 
" due to their availing themselves of such 
" lights of scientific instruction as are readily 
" accessible and available. And all of those 
" who deem themselves the most perfectly in- 
" dependent of the aid of scientific agricul- 
" ture — who indeed scorn and denounce it un- 
" der the contemptuous epithet of 'book-farm- 
" ing' — are, in fact, directed in their almost 
" every labor and process by doctrines which 
" were derived indirectly from scientific agri-j 
" culturists. But the great drawback from the 
" benefits so derived is, that the sources of in- 
" formation are so imperfect, or so remote, and 
" the channels through which the instruction 
" flows are so circuitous and so clogged with 
" errors, that the lessons so received are greatly 
" damaged in their truth and value. 

"Further: A planter may be so fortunate as 
" to be able to avail himself (through his sub- 






THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



219 



" ordinate agents) of every proper appliance 
'■ of art and skill — he may also be well versed 
" in the science of agriculture — and yet his 
" results may be unsuccessful, and his labors 
" and capital be unprofitable, for want of still 
" another requisite. This is administrative 
" ability — or wha't, in common parlance, is 
" understood as a man's having 'a turn for 
" business,' and habits of business. It is to 
" little purpose that both the art and science 
" of agriculture may direct and accompany 
" all the operations of a proprietor, if he does 
" not also know how to govern and direct his 
,: subordinate agents and laborers, to manage 
" his teams and all their equipments, to eco- 
" nomize his provisions, and to guard against 
" the manifold evils of waste of means in 
" every department. It is this all-important 
" capacity fbrgood general management, (more 
" usually a natural than an acquired faculty) 
" which enables many cultivators to thrive, 
" though greatly deficient in the other requi- 
" sites of knowledge and skill. And it is the 
" want of this business capacity, or of its pro- 
" per exercise, which has produced to so many 
" other cultivators loss or failure, even though 
" exercising more than ordinary knowledge of 
" the art or the science of agriculture or of 
" both in proper combination. 

"There are but few, if indeed any persons, 
" who have attained an eminent station in all 
" three of these departments of knowledge, 
" which are required to make a perfect agri- 
" calturist. But there are many farmers or 
" planters who, however falling short of these 
" highest claims to distinction, have acquired 
" more knowledge, and exercised more talent, 
" in conducting their humble business, than 
" have served, and will again serve, in many 
" cases, for the whole intellectual capital of 
" renowned commanders of armies, and rulers 
" of nations! 

" Wliea so much study and research is re- 
" quired for attainments in the science — so 
" much skill and judgment for the art— and so 
" much ability and varied talentforthe business 
" in general — it scarcely needs proof, that no 
" other pursuit more needs instruction for its 
"young votaries than does agriculture. Yet 
" it is almost the only business or profession 
" which is without any regular and ordinary 
" instruction, and in which every learner is 
" without a teacher." 

In ourforegoing remarks, and with the above 
extended extracts, whi'ch could not be abridged 
without injustice to the author, in our humble 
effort to afford what at best must prove but a 
very imperfect representation of his views, in 
respect to the importance of agricultural know- 
ledge and the enormous destitution of the 
means for obtaining it, we have left ourselves 
within the space allotted for this review but 
little room for the introduction of but a mere 
outline or skeleton of the plan, proposed in 
detail by our author, to meet this great public 
necessity. Referring the reader to the essay 



itself, which we hope to see published and ex- 
tensively circulated through individual enter- 
prise, we can only glance at some of the more 
important features of the plan, leaving details 
entirely out of view. 

1st. Then, in an agricultural State, agricul- 
tural education should be provided for at the 
cost of the treasury, because directly or indi- 
rectly, agriculture pays all the taxes — and also 
because through the enhancement of agricul- 
tural profit, by reason-of the increase of agri- 
cultural knowledge, a large return would be 
made to the treasury in the great increase of 
taxable values, and also a great amount of 
additional means be acquired for the promo- 
tion of the general objects of education. 

2d. That the proposed institution, in its en* 
dowment at the public expense, should be fur- 
nished with ample means to provide for the 
necessary buildings and appurtenances for 
thorough instruction in scientific and practical 
agriculture, for the payment of the salaries of 
the professors and for the instruction on elee- 
mosynary principles of a select number of 
young men of good character, promising ta- 
lents, and of suitable age, and also for the 
education of a larger number whose instruc- 
tion should be conducted at private expense. 

3d. That such an amount of manual labor 
should be performed by each student without 
regard to the profit thereof, as should be found 
necessary for his instruction in experimental 
and practical agriculture, and yet so limited 
as not to interfere with or disturb the course 
of his scientific studies, but rather promote 
them by its healthful effects and its salutary 
influence in promoting a vigorous physical 
development. 

4th. That a farm should be provided, "cul- 
tivated regularly and continuously, and upon 
a proper system of rotation and general ma- 
nagement." 

5th. "The discipline of the whole establish- 
ment to be strict to the degree of military pre- 
cision" — the pupils required to dispense as 
much as possible with domestic servants, and 
to conform in dress and every thing else to 
strict economy. 

With this brief and very imperfect outline 
of the proposed Agricultural Institute we must 
conclude, not, however, without expressing 
the hope, as the plan is of Virginian origin, 
though first recommended for the adoption of 
a sister Commonwealth, that Virginia will be 
the first to adopt and reduce it to practical 
operation. 

, Ch. H. Williams. 



To Keep Horseradish.— If you want to 
keep horseradish, grate a quantity while the 
root is in perfection, put it in bottles; fill the 
bottles with strong vinegar, and keep it corked 
tightly. You may thus have a supply at all 
seasons. — Exchange piper. 



220 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



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PAYMENTS TO THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 

From 1st to 15lk June, 1853. 

T. J. Michie to April 1854 $1 00 

Dr. William Gvvathmey to Jan. 185-1 
Thomas J. Shepherd to April 1854 
Col. J, M'Clanahan to April 1854 
Madison Pitzer to January 1854 
John W. Mead to January 1852 
"N. duesenberry to January 1854 
Samuel Turner to January 1855 

C. H. Harrison to April 1855 
E. Valentine to January 1854 
Judge P. V. Daniel to January 1854 
William B. Murray to April 1854 
William R. Mosely to April 1854 

D. M. Wood to April 1854 
R. N. Trice to January 1854 
Cain J. Gaines to January 1854 
Col. B. Davenport to January 1854 
George Isler to April 1853 
John Willis to July 1853 
Dr. D. C. Winfree to May 1854 
Ronald Mills to January 1854 
W. M. Bowie to January 1854 
Andrew J. Carper to January 1854 
R. T. Pleasants to April 1854 
Thomas Wiley to January 1854 t, 
James S. Yarbrough to April 1854 
H. B. Hunter to July 1854 
G. A. Hancock to July 1853 
J. T. Hammer to January 1854 1 00 
David N. Patterson to April 1854 1 00 
S. D. Boyd to September 1853 1 00 
Maj. R. Thrift to September 1854 1 00 
William O. Ohambliss to April 1854 1 00 
J. A. Womack to January 1854 1 00 
William Payne, Sr., to January 1854 1 00 
Granville C. Owen to July 1853 1 00 
Lewis Bailey to January 1854 1 00 
Thomas H. Boswell to April 1854 1 00 
S. C. Shelton to January 1854 1 00 
John White to January 1854 1 00 
Robert Gibbony to January 1S54 1 00 
Dr. N. K. Foster to April 1854 1 00 
Powhatan B. Sledge to January 1854 1 00 
William M. Shepherd to Sept. 1853 1 00 
H. P. Pope to September 1854 1 00 
Richard Payne to July 1854 2 00 
Orris Moore to January 1853 1 00 
C. C. Burton to April 1854 1 00 
Samuel Tunstall to January 1854 1 00 
James S. Walker to January 1854 1 00 
William K. Fry to July 1854 2 00 
A. W. Cousins to January 1854 1 00 
Col. Wm. A. Sheffield to January 1854 1 00 
George W. Waller to January 1854 2 00 
Thomas W. Mathews to April 1854 1 00 
John A. M'Craw to January 1854 1 00 
Wm. Appleberry Jr., to January 1854 1 00 
T. J. Taylor to January 1854 1 00 
Dr. George Field to January 1854 1 00 
A. S. Jones to January 1854 1 00 
John H. M'Kinney to January 1854 1 00 
W. S. Major to January 1854 1 00 
John A. Montague to January 1854 1 00 



Elbert F. Redd to May 1854 * 
B. J. Jordan to June 1853 
Capt. W. E. Britton to January 1S54 
John Jones to January 1854 
R. H. Abbott to January 1854 
William Woodson to January 1854 
Estate of M. Clements (in full) 
Dr. H. L. Jeffries to January 1854 
George L. Bullock to July 1854 
John H. Montague to October 1854 
John G. Pole to January 1854 
William C. Terry to April 1854 



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AN ESSAY ON CALCAREOUS MANURES, 

BY EDMUND RUFFIN, a practical Far- 
mer of Virginia from 1812; founder and 
sole editor of the Farmers' Register; Member 
and Secretary of the former State Board of 
Agriculture; formerly Agricultural Surveyor 
of the State of South Carolina, and President 
of the Virginia State Agricultural Society; 
fifth edition, amended and enlarged. 

Published by J. W. Randolph, 121, Main 
street, Richmond, Virginia, and for sale by 
him and all other Booksellers; fine edition, 
8vo., printed on good paper, and strongly bound , 
library style $2: cheap edition, l2mo. $1 25 — 
copies sent by mail, posupaid, to those who 
remit the price. 

A large proportion of this publication con- 
sists of new matter not embraced in the pre- 
ceding edition. The new additions or amend- 
ments serve to present all the new and impor- 
tant lights on the general subject of the work, 
derived from the author's later observation of 
facts, personal experience and reasoning found- 
ed on these premises. By such new additions 
the present edition is increased more than one- 
third in size, notwithstanding the exclusion of 
much of the least important matter of the pre- 
ceding edition, and of all portions before in- 
cluded, that were not deemed essential to the 
argument and necessary to the utility of the 
work. 

"This work is from a Virginia gentleman, 
whose contributions to agricultural science 
have already given an extensive popularity. 
Mr. Ruffin is a practical farmer, of great in- 
telligence, and is eminently competent to im- 
part information on the subject, which has 
for so many years engaged his attention." — 
Methodist Quarterly Revicio. 

The Southern Planter, in speaking about the 
cultivation of Irish potatoes and liming, says: 

"But for the details of that business, we 
would refer our correspondent to a book, which 
if he has notnow, we beg for his own credit that 
he will get as soon as he goes to Richmond. We 
mean the final edition of the Essay on Calca- 
reous Manures." 

"The farmers of Virginia have just reason 
to thank bctfh the author and publisher for this 
enlarged and improved edition of a most valu- 
able book." — Hon. Willovghby Newton. 

je— tf 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



221 



TO THE FARMERS AX D AGRICUL- 
TURAL, COMMUNITY OF VA. 

THE subscriber is desirous to make known 
to the above, an article of manufacture of 
Chemical notoriety, namely, SUPER-PHOS- 
PHATE OF LIME, allowed to be one of the 
most efficacious Manures ever yet adopted in 
this or any other country, for its well known 
properties of regenerating and fertilizing the 
barren and worn-out soil. Its first introduction 
was into England, some ten years since, when 
from its then pronounced magic effect, a pa- 
tent right was granted to its inventor, the cele- 
brated Professor Law, of London, who stands 
now unrivalled as one of the first Chemists of 
the day. Having had the honor of graduating 
under him, and together with some years of 
practical experience in the manufacturing of 
this article with him, gives a sufficient confi- 
dence to state that the A No. 1 of my present 
manufacture cannot be equalled in this vast 
continent, being the sole inventor and intro- 
ducer of it into this country. Should there be 
a doubt as to its truthfulness, my Diploma, re- 
ceived from the New York American Institute, 
will fully attest of the correctness of my state- 
ment, together with a host of the highest tes- 
timonials from the Farming and Agricultural 
consumers of my Manure for the last twelve 
months while there. 

I can al=o state with pleasure having re- 
ceived many kind letters from mere stratigers 
to me, requesting of me to refer any one who 
may feel skeptical of the powerful influence 
it has over the most barren or useless land that 
can be found — in a great many instances, par- 
ties were dubious of buying more than some 
50 or 103 pounds to make trial; the same par- 
ties nowjaurchase in Tons, and feel proud in 
making it known to their surrounding farming 
neighbors, who seemed quite astounded at the 
crops produced by the application of this mi- 
raculous process, which enters into the com- 
position of all plants, and the importance of 
invaluable constituent to the agriculturalist 
will be easily understood, when the reader is 
informed that no plant will grow upon a soil 
denuded of it. Phosphates of lime is being 
continually removed and abstracted from the 
soil, and taken up by the plants in solution for 
their nourishment, and unless such an equiva- 
lent be returned, diminution of fertility must 
naturally be the issue. I apprehend the effi- 
cacy of ground or crashed bones on the soil is 
well known to the American farmer. 

I will presume to point out the advantage 
Super-phosphate of Lime has over bones. 
Bones are insoluble in water, and have first to 
be decomposed before they can be incorporated 
with the soil — such decomposition taking a 
bng time. From authenticated writers and 
scrupulous experimenters, it has been acknow- 
ledged that twenty bushels of Super-phosphate 
of Lime, will have the desired effect of 100 
bushels of unprepared bones. The reason of 
such fact is on account of its being in a state 



of solution shortly after having been applied 
to the soil, and taken up by the plants, which 
derive their strength and growth from the soil 
in no other form. 

The subscriber offers his manufactured Su- 
per-phosphate of Lime as a chemically pure 
and genuine article; a perfect Super-phosphate, 
with the addition of guano and other fixed 
salts, &c, only known to himself— containing 
ammonia and other constituents necessary to 
furnish to the soil that which it has been 
robbed of by previous growth. It is quite as 
effective as Guano, but much more durable as 
a manure, and less volatile than any other. 

To be obtained in bags or barrels, of 

C. B. De BURG, 
Agricultural Chemist, Williamsburg, L. I. 
Where purchasers. may rely upon obtaining a 
warranted, pure and genuine article, styled A 
No. 1. 

To prevent deception being practised hence- 
forward, all packages will be branded with 
the manufacturer's name. 

C. B. De BURG. 

Affixed are the names of gentlemen of ac- 
knowledged celebrity and standing as Analyti- 
cal Chemists, who have passed their judgment 
upon it. 

JAMES R. CHILTON, Esa., M. D., 

THOMAS ANTISELL, Esa., M. D., 

WILLIAM W. ELLETT, Esa., M. D., 

ISAIAH DECK, Esa., M. D., 

JOHN H. CURRIE, Esa., M. D. 

P. S. — My representative, Mr. J. P. O'Neil, 
shall do himself the pleasure of visiting Vir- 
ginia on a tour of business, when he shall be 
most happy to receive orders and impart such 
information as may be required of him rela- 
tive to this matter — he shall also bring on with 
him a supply of Pamphlets, with full particu- 
lars, which will be found most essentially use- 
ful to the agricultural community. 

PRICE— ffi45 for 2,000 lbs. from the manu- 
factory. 

Williamsburg, L. I. . 

S. M'GRUDER & SONS, 

July— 3m Agents, Richmond, Va. 

EAGL.E FOUNDERY. 

THE subscriber having removed to the 
large Foundery, just erected by him and 
fitted out with machinery of the latest and most 
approved style, is, in addition to the manufac- 
ture of Tobacco Flattening Mills, prepared to 
receive orders for Stationary Steam Engines, 
Saw and Grist Mills, Agricultural Machines, 
Tobacco Presses of every description, and all 
kinds of Iron and Brass Castings. He pledges 
himself to execute faithfully, and with dis- 
patch, all work entrusted to him, and respect- 
fully solicits a call from his friends and the 
public generally. 

The highest cash prices paid for old cast 
iron, brass and copper. 

PHILIP RAHM, 
je— ly Cary, between Pearl and 15th sts. 



222 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



ATKINS' SELF-RAKING REAPER. 

THIS machine is now offered to the public 
and warranted to be a good self-raking 
reaper. It is also believed to be a good mower, 
but not yet having been sufficiently tested in 
grass, (though it soon will be) it is not war- 
ranted to be equal to a machine made mainly 
or wholly to mow. 

The raking apparatus is of novel and very 
simple construction, and not liable to derange- 
ment, and every farmer who has seen it in the 
harvest field, says it performs the raking better 
than a man can possibly do it. 

Price of machines at Chicago, $175, of 
which, $75 must be paid on giving the order, 
$50 upon successful trial, and $50 in note pay- 
able 1st December. 

The machines are thoroughly built and 
warranted. 

§£§=■ Descriptive circulars, with cuts, sent to 
post-paid applications. 

J. S. WRIGHT, 
" Prairie Farmer" Warehouse, Chicago, June, 
1852. July— 3t 



ANALYSIS OF SOILS, &c. 

THE undersigned is prepared to execute 
the analyses of Soils, Guano, Marls, Plas- 
ter, &c. &c. at the Laboratory of the Virginia 
Military Institute. Packages may be for- 
warded through Webb, Bacon & Co. Rich- 
mond, or Echols & Pryor, Lynchburg. 

Persons desiring further information will 
please address 

WILLIAM GILHAM, 
Prof. Chem. and Agriculture, V. M.I. 
Feb. 1, 1852. Lexington, Va. 



CHOICE POULTRY. 

THE subscriber offers for sale the following 
varieties of pure blooded FovjIs, viz: Cochin 
China or Canton Fowls; Black, White, 
Buff and Brown Shanghais; Chittagongs 
or Gray Shanghais. 

'The above are the largest and best variety 
of fowls bred in, this country, and are from 
stock originally imported by the subscriber. 
Gentlemen, Poultry-keepers and others, desir- 
ous of procuring choice Poultry may depend 
upon the above stock being purely bred and 
warranted true to their name. Address 
CHARLES SAMPSON, 
West Roxbury, Mass. 
The different varieties of these beautiful 
fowls may be seen at my residence on First 
Street, between Main and Cary Streets. 

W. A. BUTTERS, 139 Main Street. 
Richmond, Nov. 1, 1852— ly 



BOOKS, PIANOS, MUSIC, &c. 

NA SH & WOODHOUSE, Wholesale and 
Retail Dealers in Books, Piano Fortes, 
Stationery, Mdsic, &c. 139, Main St. Rich- 
mond, Virginia. 

Constantly on hand, a full supply of stand- 
ard Agricultural Works. oc— tf 



FOR SALE. — A fine farm near Marysville, 
Buckingham county, Virginia; well tim- 
bered, has good drinking water, fine grass, and 
is a desirable location for health and comfort. 
Farms in Talbot county, Eastern Shore of 
Maryland, on the salt water, in healthy sec- 
tions. Also, in Baltimore county, within 12 
miles of the city. 

Cotswold Rams, Ewes, Ram and Ewe 
Lambs from the best flocks in the United 
States. Also, Southdown Ram Lambs from 
fine flocks. 

Shanghai Fowls from different importations, 
and as grown by Professor James M'Clintock, 
for which, I am the only Maryland agent. 

Moor's Patent Premium Wheat Drills, on 
more accommodating terms, with the improve- 
ments. 

Letters of inquiry and orders, post paid, will 
receive prompt attention. 

MARTIN GOLDSBOROUGH, 
Agent, HarrisonvlUc, Baltimore' Co., Maryland. 

July— tf 



THE SUBSCRIBER has for sale yearling 
and two year old BUCKS, of the New 
Oxfordshire or Cotswold breed, which he will 
sell any time when called for, and has no hesi- 
tation in saying this breed of sheep are superior 
to all others, for large carcass, heavy fleece, 
early maturity, constitution, and defies all 
other breeds for profit. This flock has been 
bred from the best ever imported, the sire hav- 
ing clipped eighteen pounds of well washed 
wool; and a' small amount of wethers, 
slaughtered in Philadelphia, in February, 
weighed as follows: 

Live weight, 374, 309, 307, 285, 271, 254 lbs. 
Dead " 269| 213, 203, 201, 181, 160J " 

No. 1 being the heaviest sheep ever slaugh- 
tered in the United States. 

I^T Persons are invited to call and see for 
themselves, or communicate by mail to 

WILLIAM REYBOLD, 

July — 3t Delaware city, Delaioare. 

FOR SALE.— A thoroughbred Bull of the 
Ayrshire and Durham breed, in fine health 
and vigor — color, rich red, with slight white 
spots in the flank, characteristic of the Ayr- 
shire breed. Said Bull is immediately de- 
scended on both sides from Imported Stock. 
For testimonials of stock, &c. enquire of the 
Editor. oc— tf 



THE DAILY EXPRESS, published at 
Petersburg, Va. is the cheapest daily pa- 
per published south of James river, Virginia. 
It is devoted almost entirely to news matters 
of every description, and eschewing politics, 
maybe emphatically styled a "Newspaper." 
Three hundred and twelve copies, which em- 
braces the whole year(Sundaysonly excepted,) 
will be furnished at the unprecedented low 
price of four dollars per annum. Address 
AND. F. CRUTCHFIELD & Co. 
ap— tf Petersburg, Va. 






THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 



223 



PLANTATION BOOK. 

JW. RANDOLPH, Richmond, Virginia, 
• has just published the Plantation and 
Farm Instruction, Regulation, Record, Inven- 
tory and Account Book, for the use of ma- 
nagers of estates, and for the better ordering 
and management of plantation and farm busi- 
ness, in every particular, by a Southern Planter. 
Order is Heaven's first law — Pope. Price $2, 
or six for S'10; a larger edition for the use of 
cotton plantations, price $2 50. 

Contents. — Actual number of pounds to a 
Bushel of Wheat, Articles received for use of 
Plantation, Brick-Kiln, Births of Negroes, 
Balance Sheet, Cows, Cultivation, Contents of 
a Corn Crib, Clothing to Negroes, Diameter 
of a Horse Mill, Deaths of Negroes, Directions 
how to use this Book, Expenses and Sales for 
the Year, Form of a Contract with Manager, 
Force of a Draught Horse, Horses, Hogs, 
Instructions to Managers, Implements, Jour- 
nal or Daily Record, Medicines, Manure Ta- 
bles, Mechanical Power, Effect of the Labor 
of an Active Man, Inventoryof Negroes, Oxen, 
Washington's Letters to his Steward, Planta- 
tion Management, Police, Ploughing Rules, 
Planting Distances, Physicians' Visits, Quan- 
tity and Value of Produce Made, Quantity of 
Work of a Man and Two Horses, Rules for the 
Government and Discipline of the Negroes, 
Rotation Tables for Cultivation of Crops, 
Rural Economy, Sheep, Steam Engines, Stock 
and Implements, Tools, &c. used by the Ne- 
groes, Weight of Materials, Weights and 
Measures, Wind Mills, Water Wheels, When 
a Horse Draws to Advantage, &c. &c. 

There are extra sheets for monthly and 
yearly reports, for the use of those who do not 
live on their farms. The Book will be sent 
by mail free of postage to any one who will 
remit the price in money or postage stamps. 

This Book is by one of the best and most 
systematic farmers in Virginia; and experi- 
enced farmers have expressed the opinion, that 
those who use it, will save hundreds of dollars. 

"Every fanner who will get one of these 
Books, and regulate all his mover/tents by its 
suggestions, cannot fail to realize great bene- 
fits from it. We cannot too highly commend 
it to the consideration of agriculturists." — 
Richmond Whig. 

"It will prove a most valuable assistant to 
the planter, manager or overseer, and a work 
that will facilitate them greatly in the trans- 
action of business." — Richmond Dispatch. 

"The Book we should suppose to be indis- 
pensable to any one having the management 
of a large estate." — Richmond Republican. 

" We hope many farmers will buy the work, 
and make an effort to keep things straight."— 
Southern Planter. 

" It is fnll of useful information and is well 
calculated to induce a methodical system, in- 
dustry and energy especially vital to a suc- 
cessful and profitable cultivation of mother 
earth." — Richmond EnqvArer. june — tf 



TO AGRICULTURISTS. 

MORRIS & BROTHER have received the 
following valuable Books, pertaining to 
Agriculture: 

Elements of Scientific Agriculture, or the 
connexion between Science and the Art oi 
Practical Farming. This was the prize essay 
of the New York State Agricultural Society; 
by J. P. Norton, M. A. 

Elements of Agricultural Chemistry and 
Geology; by Jas. F. W. Johnston. 

American Agriculturist, for the Farmer, 
Planter, Stock Breeder, and Horticulturist; 
by A. B. Allen; numerous plates. The 8th 
and 9th volumes of this most valuable work are 
received, also complete sets. Every farmer 
should have this work. 

American Farm Book, on Soils, Manures, 
Drainings, Irrigation, Grasses, Grain, Roots, 
Fruit, Cotton, Tobacco, Sugarcane, Rice, and 
every staple product of the United States. — 
This is a perfect fanner's library, with upwards 
of 100 engravings; by R. L. Allen. 

Farmer's Manual, with the most recent dis- 
coveries in Agricultural Chemistry; by F, 
Faulkner. 

A Muck Manual for Farmers; by S. L. 
Dana. 

Farmer's Land Measurer, with a set of use- 
ful Agricultural Tables; by Jas. Pedder. 

American Husbandry. — Series of Essays on 
Agriculture, with additions; by Gaylord" and 
Tucker. 

Farmer's Encyclopaedia; by Cuthbert W. 
Johnson. 

Productive Farming, with the most recent 
discoveries of Liebig, Johnston, Davy, and 
others. 

European Agriculture, from personal obser- 
vation; by Henry Coleman. This is a very 
popular work. 

Johnson's Chemistry and Geoldgy,with their 
application. 

Johnson's Dictionary of Gardening; by Da- 
vid Landreth. 

London's Gardening, for Ladies; by A. J. 
Downing. 

Squarey's Agricultural Chemistry, Bonssin- 
gault, Rural Economy, Buist's Kitchen Gar- 
dener, Landscape Gardening,, and Rural Ar- 
chitecture; by A. J. Downing. 

Fessenden's American Gardener. 

American Fruit Book, with full iustructions- 
by S. W. Cole. 

Downing on Fruit Trees. 

Theory of Horticulture; by Lindley. 

Florist's Manual; by H. Bourne; 80 colored 
engravings. 

Bridgman's Kitchen Gardener. 

In addition to which, Morris & Brother have 
all of the late Works on Agriculture, Horti- 
culture, and Raising Stock, of any celebrity. 

Richmond, March 12, 1851.— lv 



224 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 



CONTENTS OF NUMBER VII. 

PAGE 

Limit of Improvement from Use of Marl. . 193 

Nottoway Agricultural Club 196 

Manures 197 

Taming the Honey Bee 199 

The Mineral Manure Theory 200 

Subsoiling . . - 202 

The Lois-Weedon System of Wheat Cul- 
ture 202 

Report on the Use of Lime in Nottoway. .203 
Atkins' Automaton, or Self-Raking Reaper. 204 

Cotswold Sheep 204 

How to Get Rid of Mosquitos 204 

Loudoun County Agricultural Society 205 

Morrill's Improved Ditching Machine. . .205 

Shuck Mattresses, &c 206 

Cost and Profits of Guano 206 

The Bible a Text-Book for Sheep Hus- 
bandry 207 

Tumid jaw in Cattle 207 

Cure for Rose Bugs -... 208 

To Correspondents 209 

State Agricultural Society 209 

Postage on the Planter 209 

Four Thousand Dollars Wanted 209 

Crude Antimony for Hogs 212 

Resolution of the Brunswick Agricultural 

Society 212 

Falkirk Tryst 212 

Is Shade a Substitute for Barn-Yard Ma- 
nure 1 214 

Trial of Reaping Machines 215 

Cure for Founder 215 

French Merino Sheep— with a Portrait of 
Mr. Geo. Campbell's buck "Matchless". 216 

Agricultural Education ' 217 

To Keep Horseradish 219 

Payments to the Southern Planter 220 



THRESHING MACHINES, REAP- 
ERS, &c— The Subscriber continues to 
manufacture Stationary and Portable Thresh- 
ing Machines, with or without horse-powers, 
mads in the most substantial manner. He | 
would call especial attention to his new porta- 
ble horse-power, made to suit four, six and 
eight horses. 

The Eight Horse Machine can be moved 
with a common farm wagon without changing 
the common body, and can be loaded or un- 
loaded by three hands. 

I am manufacturing the following valuable 
machines: Bamborough Wheat Fans, Behel's 
Patent Wheat Fan, and common Fans of dif- 
ferent sizes— Straw Cutters, Corn Shelters, 
&c; and have for sale the usual variety of 
Agricultural Machines. 

Hussey and M'Corrnick Reapers and Mow- 
ers, both highly approved and extensively 
used. Information furnished in respect to 
either on application by letter or otherwise. 
H. M. SMITH, 

je— 2t Corner Main and \%Lh Sis. 



SCHOOL FOR SMALL BOYS. 

HAVING employed a competent teacher 
to educate my children, 1 wish to get five 
or six boys, not more than twelve years old, as 
boarders. The whole number of pupils will 
not be allowed to exceed twelve or fourteen. 
The teacher is a good classical and mathema- 
tical scholar and a gentleman in whose capa- 
city, fidelity and high character I have entire 
confidence. The school will commence the 
first of October and terminate the middle of 
August, with a short recess at Christmas. . 
Terms— £130 per annum for every thing. 

FRANK: G. RUFFIN, 
July, 1853. Shadwell, Albemarle. 



RIDGWAY SCHOOL.— -The next ses- 
sion of my school will begin on the 15th 
of August, 1853, and end on the last Friday 
of June, 1854. There will be a vacation of 
three weeks at Christmas. The expenses of 
a whole session, including all charges for tui- 
tion, board, lodging, washing, fuel, lights, &c, 
are $200. If a pupil is engaged for less than a 
whole session, I charge for the time he at- 
tends, at the rate of $22 a month. 

My whole time and attention are devoted to 
the school. I have two assistant teachers, Mr. 
W. N. Bronaugh and Mr. T. A. Minor, of 
whose qualifications I have the amplest assu- 
rance. Greek, Latin, French, German, Ita- 
lian, Mathematics, the rudiments of Chemis- 
try and Natural Philosophy, and all the 
branches of English are taught in the school. 
My Post Office is Charlottesville, Va. 

je— 2t FRANKLIN MINOR. 

ANALYTICAL LABORATORY 

FOR THE ANALYSIS OF SOILS, &c— 
The undersigned announces, that through 
the liberality of the Planters of the adjacent 
counties, there has been established, in connec- 
tion with the Department of Chemistry in Ran- 
dolph Macon College, an Analytical Labora- 
tory, for the analysis of soils, marls, plaster, 
guano, minerals, &c, and for instruction in 
Analytical Chemistry. The Laboratory will 
be furnished with the' most approved appara- 
ratus and choice re-agents, with every desira- 
ble facility. He has associated with him Mr. 
William A. Shepard, who was recently assist- 
ant to Professor Norton, in the Yale Analyti- 
cal Laboratory, and who comes with ample 
testimonials of skill and capacity. Young men 
can ^pursue any studies in the College they 
may wish, while they are receiving instruction 
in the Laboratory. Copious written explana- 
tions will always accompany the reports of 
analysis. The charges for analysis and in- 
struction will be moderate — trie design being 
to make the Laboratory accessible to the peo- 
ple at large. Packages left with Messrs. 
Wills & Lea or Smith & Dunn, Petersburg, 
Virginia, will be forwarded, free of charge, to 
those who send them. For further information, 
address CHAS. B. STUART, • 

Professor of Experimental Sciences, Randolph 
Macon College, Va, oc— tf