TH E 




yfHERN 



^VW*" 




Devoted to Agriculture^ Horticulture^ and the Household Arts. 



Agriculiure is the niii>in«; mother 


of the Arts. 'I 
[Xjjnophon. 


'illajro niid Pactum j;e 
ilie State. — Sully. 


are the two 

• 


breasts 


of 


J. B. 


WILLIAMS. 


Editor. 






AUGUST & WILLIAMS 


Prop' 


R8. 


Vol. 


XX. 


• RICHMOND, 


VA. 


, APRIL, 1860. 




No. 


4. 



From Josiah Parkes^ Essays on the Philosophy and 
Jlrl of Land- Drainage. 

[COSTINrED FROM MARCH NO. SOUTHERN PLANTER.] 

Section V. 

On the Quant iff/ of Rain Compared with 
the Quantify nj" Water Evaporated from 
or Jittered throuf/h Soil; with some Ob- 
servations on the Quantity of Rain- Wa- 
ter dischnnjed hy Draina. 

We arc indebted to Mr. Jolin Dickinson, 
of Al)bott's Hill, near Kini^'n Langley, 
Hert.s, (the eminent paper manufacturer,) 
ior a register, extending over a period of 
the la-t eight years, of the cjuantity of rain 
which has faHen in \m locality, and of the 
quantity which may be presumed to have 
passed through the soil. The first datum 
is determined by the common rain-gauge ; 
the second is derived from a gauge invented 
many years since for this special purpose, 
by the illustrious Daltun. And hereby we 
obtain, ver}' unexpectedly, as, regards both 
the facts and the extensive range of obser- 
vations, experimental illustrations of the 
desiderata numbered 5 and [in the pre- 
ceding section.] The construction of the 
rain-gauge needs no remark, and the Dalton 
gauge is equally simple. It consists of an 
open-top cylinder or rain-receiver sunk verti- 

1o * 



cally in the earth, level with its surface, hav- 
ing a talsc bottom perforated with holes like 
a cullender, which supports three feet depth 
of soil within the cylinder, through which, 
and through the cullender, the excess of the 
rain — or the portion not evaporated — fil- 
trates to the close bottom of the vessel ; and 
this communicates, by means of a small 
pipe, with a vertical tube, whose dia'meter 
bears some definite proportion to that of 
the receiver, and is sunk so much lower in 
the earth as to have its top nearly on a level 
with the bottom of the receiver. Thus, all 
the water which permeates the soil contain- 
ed wi'liin the rain-receiver flows into the 
tube, and is measured by a float, carrying a 
divided stem, and indicating, in parts of 
1-lOOth of an inch the quantity of rain 
which has entered it. The measuring tube 
has a cock at thq bottom for evacuating its 
contents from time to time and bringing the 
scale to zero." 

Mr. Dickinson's rain-receiver hns a diam- 
eter of twelve inches, and is thirty-six inches 
deep to the ful.«c bottom ; it was originally 
filled with the soil of the country, a sandy, 
gravelly loam, and ha.s constantly had gra8s 
growing on it. The contents of the receiv- 
er, therefore^ represent fairly the natural 
state of the soil; whilst the gauge indicates 
the quantity of water which a drain, at the 



194 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



depth of three feet, would have to convey 
away. The proportion which this quantity 
bears to the rain is obtained by comparison 
with the rain-gauge ; and their difference 
gives the quantity evaporated, assisted by 
the action of the succulent grasses. We 
may, however, for the present purpose, con- 
sider the whole of this last quantity under 
the term evaporation. 

It will be interesting and useful to agri- 
culturists to learn Mr. Dickinson's object, as 
a manufacturer, in ascertaining and regis- 
tering phenomena of this nature. Having 
several mills on the river Colne or its tribu- 
taries, it was a matter of importance to him 
to be able to calculate the power of the wa- 
ter on which he mij>ht depend for use at 
different periods of the year; and, having 
noticed that a considerable period elapsed 
after rain, owing to the extent and stratifi- 
cation of the country, before the springs 
were affected by it, he fixed a rain and Dal- 
ton gauge to assist his judgment in forming 
an estimate of the amount and duration of 
their flow according to the varying seasons, 
and the proportionable water-power on which 
he might count. These registers, combined 
with observation, have since enabled him to 
regulate his manufacturing operations, and 
to foresee what dep'endence he could place 
on the mill-streams, and to what extent he 
should require the aid of steam-power for 



fulfiling his contracts 



and 



This is a very remarkable and honoiable in- 
stance -of the application of meteorological 
"science to practice." 

Nor is this all — for the knowledge ac- 
quired by means of these instruments and 
the exposition of the results of rain and fil- 
tration proved by them, together with a just 
acquaintance with the area and nature of 
the soils in the district, supplying the 
streams (about 120 square miles) enabled 
Mr. Dickinson, * * * to demonstrate 
the impracticability of a scheme for fur- 
nishing the metropolis with water proposed 
to be drawn from the valley of the Colne, 
which must have inflicted irreparable injury 
on the mill-owners, at the same time that it 
would have proved, in all probability, an 
abortive speculation to the adveriturers. 
Such are the various and often unexpected 
fruits of exact knowledge. It was Mr. 
Dickinson's communication, of his experi- 
ments to the Institution of Civil Engineers 
last year, which introduced me to his ac- 
quaintance, and has enabled me to apply 



his acquired facts to the subject of agricul- 
tural drainage. 

The annexed table, No. I., contains the 
monthly and annual indications of the two 
gauges for the years 1836 to 1843 inclusive j 
those of the rain-gauge being, Mr. Dickin- 
son informs me, generally corroborated by 
another gauge kept by the Grand JunctioB- 
Canal Company, about eight miles distant. 

Table 11. gives the mean result of eight 
years observations for each month, and the 
whole period, in terms of the depth of rain 
which fell on the surface — of the amount 
which filtered through the Dalton gauge — 
and of that which was evaporated or again 
restored to the atmosphere in the shape of 
vapour — with two columns showing the pro- 
portion per cent, of filtration and evapora- 
tion. , 

Table III. presents to view the total 
amount of rain which fell during each year, 
with the per centage of filtration and evap- 
oration ; and 

Table IV. illustrates the quantity of rain, 
and the proportion of water disposed of by 
filtratioQ and evaporation during the six 
hotter and the six colder months of each 
year respectively. To these last tables I 
have added columns exhibiting the weight 
of rain in tons per acre, as that expression 
may convey to the farmer a clearer idea of 
its amount, than the more usual mode of 
stating it in inches of depth. By means of 
this tabular analysis we shall find the phe- 
nomena, as they may be applicable to agri- 
culture, early brought before us. 

The first important fact disclosed is, that, 
of the whole annual rain about 42^ per 
cent., or 11 3-lOth inches out of 26 6-lOth 
inches have filtered through the soil ; and 
that the annual evaporation force is only 
equal to the removal of about 572 per cent, 
of the total rain which falls on any given 
extent of earth three feet in depth. (Ta- 
ble II.) 

By a closer scrutiny we learn (table IV.) 
that only about 25^ per cent, of the rain 
which ialls from October to March inclu- 
sive, passes back to the atmosphere by evap- 
oration in the same period; whereas, from 
April to September inclusive, about 93 per 
cent, is evaporated. It appears then that 
there is even a balance on the side of rain 
over evaporation during the six hottest 
months; and we discover only two years, 
1840 and 1841, in which no filtration oc- 
curred within that period. Table II. shows 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



IM 



that in Aii<::ust the soil is in its driest state; 
but, even in that month, sonic filtration took 
place in three out of the eight seasons re- 
corded. It will be understood, that, though 
a near balance is shown to subsist between 
rain and evaporation during the six lu)ttc8t 
months, on an average of years, the hy- 
gromctric condition of a soil, /. r., its state 
of wetness or dryness at any particular time, 
is not indicated by the Dalton gauge. A 
soil may be in a state of drought or of hu- 
mid saturation, at different times during 
these months, and according to the season. 
It is, however, manifest, from these regis- 



ters, that if all the wafer derived from rain 
' during the si,\ colder months were allowed 
to accumulate in a soil, such land must be 
j)erpetually inf ; and coupling this fact with 
I the performance of drains, which I am now 
I enabled to exhibit, it appears that six monthp 
'are expended in maintaining, by the sole 
tinaided force of evaj)()ration, an uiidrained, 
retentive soil in a tolerably uniform moist 
condition, whilst deep covered drains re- 
lieve the same soils of excess ol humidity 
in a very few hours after every fall of rain 
I even in the wettest season. 







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196 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



TABLE II. 


MONTHS. 


Mean of each Month and of eight Years. 


Rain. 


Filtration. 


Evaporation. 


Filtration. 


Evaporation* 


Inches. 


Inches. 


Inches. 


Per Cent. 


Per Cent. 


January, - - 
February, - - 
March, - - - 
April, - - - 
May, -. - - 
June, - - - 
July, - - - 
August, - - - 
September, 
October, - - 
November, 
December, 


1.847 


1.307 


0.540 


70.7 


29.3 


1.971 


1.547 


0.424 


78.4 


21.6 


1.617 


1.077 


0.540 


66.6 


33.4 


1.456 


0.306 


1.150 


21.0 


79.0 


1.856 


0.108 


1.748 


5.8 


94.2 


2.213 


0.039 


2.174 


1.7 


98.3 


2.287 


0.042 


2.245 


1.8 


98.2 


2.427 


0.036 


2.391 


1.4 


98.6 


2.639 


0.369 


2.270 


13.9 


86.1 


2.823 


1.400 


1.423 


49.5 


50.5 


3:837 


3.258 


0.579 


84-9 


15.1 


1.641 


1.805 


0.164 


100.0 


00.0 


Total, - - - 


26.614 


] 1.294 


15.320 


42.4 


! 57.6 



TABLE III. 


Total of each Year. 


Years. 


Rain. 


Filtration. 


Evaporation. 


Rain per Acre. 


Inches. 


Per Cent. 


Per Cent. 


Tons. 


1836, 


31.0 


56.9 


43.1 


' 3139 


1837, 


21.10 


32.9 


67.1 


2137 


1838, 


23.13 


37.0 


63.0 


2342 


1839, 


31.28 


47.6 


52.4 


3168 


1840, 


21.44 


.38.2 


61.8 


2171 


1841, 


32.10 


44.2 


55.8 ■ 


• 3251 
2676 


1842, 


26.43 


44.4 


55.6 


1843, 


26.47 


36.0 


64.0 


2680 


Mean, 


26.61 


42.4 


56.7 


2695 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



19T 



T^LE IV. 


April to September inclusive. 


Years. 

• 




.2 
£ 


1 
I 


.2 


c 
o 

03 
> 


Rain per 

Acre 
Filtrated. 


Rain per 

Acre 
Evaporated. 


Inches. 


Inches. 


Inches. 


Per Cent. 


Per Cent. 


Tons. 


Tons. 


183G, 


12.20 


2.10 


10.10 


17.3 


82.7 


212 


1023 


1837, 


9.80 


0.10 


9 70 


1.0 


99.0 


10 


982 
1082 


1838, 


10.81 


0.12 


10.69 


1.2 


98.8 


12 


1839, 


17.41 


2.60- 


14.81 


15.0 


85.0 


263 


1500 


1840, 


9.68 


0.0 


9.68 


0.0 


100.0 


•• 


980 


1841, 


15.26 


0.0 


15.26 


" 0.0 


100.0 




1545 


1842, 
"'1843,' 


12.15 


1.30 


10.85 


10.7 


89.3 


131 


1099 


14.04 


0.99 


13.05 


7.1 


92.9 


100 


1322 


Mean. 


12.67 


0.90 


11.77 


7.1 


92.9 


91 


1292 


October to March inclusive. 


1836, 


18.80 


15.55 


3.25 


■82.7 


17.3 


1574 


330 


1837, 


11.30 


6.8.''> 


4.45 


60.6 


39.4 


693 


452 


1838, 


12.32 


8.45 


3.85 


68.8 


31.2 


855 


393 


1839, 


13.87 


12.31 


1.56 


88.2 


11.8 


1246 


159 


1840, 


11.76 


8.19 


3.57 


69.6 


30.4 • 


829 


362 


1841, 


16.84 


14.19 


2.65 


^ 84.2 


15.8 


1437 


269 


1842, 


14.28 


10.46 


3.82 


73.2 


26.8 


1059 


387 


1843, 


12.43 


7.11 


5.32 


57.2 


42.8 


720 


538 


Mean, 


13.95 


10.39 


3.56 


74.5 


25.5 


10.52 


1 360 



Note. — The quantitie.^ of rain in the columns headed Filtration, represent the required per- 
Ibrmance of drains in retentive soils. One-tenth of an inch of rain in depth amounts to 10.12§ 
tons per acre. 



198 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



Tabic IV. shows that the mean excess of 
rain-water to be disposed of during the six 
coldest months by some other process than 
evaporation, amounts to no less a weight 
than about 1,050 tons per acre. 

Evaporation is the only natural agent 
for diminishing the quantity of water ab- 
sorbed by retentive soils, but it is not at our 
command. When such soils are perfectly 
saturated, the superfluity must either stag- 
nate upon the surface or flow away from it ; 
and proof is here oft'ered, that the force of 
evaporation is scarcely equivalent to the 
duty required of it during one half of the 
year j also that it greatly falls short of the 
requisite power during the six colder months. 
This invention of subterranean drains sup- 
plies an eff"ective artificial method of com- 
pensating the deficiency of the evaporative 
force in our climate, and it is capable of 
placing the retentive soil in the same favor- 
able condition as respects meteorological 
agency and the "fruition of every agricultu- 
ral process, as soils naturally porous, and 
free from stagnant water. But, it must 
constantly be borne in mind, that, in order 
to assimilate this artificial process, to that 
of nature, drains should be deeply laid, as 
the floor of the drains forms the limit of 
their action, and determines the depth be- 
low the surface at which water must still re- 
main in a state of nearly constant excess 
and stagnancy. 

A study of the results registered in these 
Tables, puts us in possession of many other 
facts of import to the agriculturist, as enfor- 
cing the warning — which experience cannot 
have taught him — to adopt every appliance 
at his command for placing his soil in such 
condition as to derive the greatest benefit 
and the least evil from elemental influences; 
for, so variable are the seasons, that no ave- 
rage can properly display the changing 
amounts of meteorological quantities and 
forces. It seems from Table I., that the 
discharge of water by drains occurs, on the 
average, during seven months of the year. 
In 1840 and 1841, however, rain was in ex- 
cess over evaporation only during four 
months; though in the £rst year 21 4-10 
inches of rain fell, whilst in the second the 
earth received 32 1-10 inches, or 50 per 
cent more rain in the latter than in the for- 
mer year ; yet, the soil was equally dry in 
both years on the mean of the six hottest 
months, for the evaporative force was able 
to relieve the soil of all the rain that fell. 



though the quantities were so widely differ- 
ent, being 15 2-10 inches in 1841, and only 
9 6-10 inches in 1840. But, turning to the 
colder months of the same years, .we find 
the case reversed, for the proporj;ionate 
Evaporation in 1840 was double that in 
1841. It appears, too, that in^l 836, when ^ 
the quantity of rain was only about one 
inch less than the maximum in 1841, the 
force of evaporation was 13 per cent, less, 
and water filtered through the gauge in va- 
rious proportions during every month of 
that year, and the same in 1839^ Thus in 
preparing soil to receive the utmost benefit 
and the least evil from rain, however slight 
or excessive, it should be put into a state to 
refuse holding water in excess, but be capa- 
ble of absorbing humidity freely, and re- 
taining it deeply; whilst the drains should 
admit water with facility, and convey it 
away with dispatch. 

Observations on the qvantify of Rain-water 
discharged hy Drains. 

The quantities of rain and filtration de- 
noted by Mr. Dickinson's gauges arc daily 
registered, and this record has enabled rae 
to ascertain a remarkable coincidence be- 
tween the action of the Dalton gauge and 
that of Mr. Hammond's inch-pipe drains, 
as reported by mc to the Royal Agricultu- 
ral Society, in Journal, Vol. IV., p. 375. 
It appears, according to the rain gauge, 
that 48-lOOths of an inch of rain fell on 
the 7th and 8th of November last; and by 
the Dalton gauge, on the 9th, 46-lOOths, or 
nearly the whole of this quantity,^ had 
passed through it. It was on the 9th that 
I inspected the drainage of Mr. Hammond's 
farm, recording the fact that, after a rain of 
about 12 hours' duration on the 7th, I found 
the drains on the 9th in a nine-acre piece, 
3 feet deep, just dribbling, and those in a 
hop-ground adjoining, 4 feet deep, ex- 
hausted ; Mr. Hammond having observed, 
previously to my arrival, that the greatest 
stream at the outfall of each drain, amount- 
ed to about the half-bore of the inch-pipes. 
The times occupied in the discharge of the 
water by the gauge anji the drains may, 
therefore, be considered to be identical, and 
as comprising about 48 hours from the com- 
mencement of the rain. In drawing this 
parallel between the action of the gauge 
and these drains, I am presuming that the 
fall of rain at Penshurst was equal to that 
at King's Langley; and I think this may 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTEJl. 



199 



be assumed to be near enough to the truth, 
as I have learnt that a nearly similar downfall 
(5-lOthsol an inch) was recorded at I5ur- 
mijij^hahi northwards, and a rain of similar 
duration occurred at IJrii,'hton southwards. 
This experimental corroboration of the 
BuflBciencyof such small drains, will have 
its weight with practical men j but I am 
further able to demonstrate, by simple 
arithmetical computation, how very small is 
the «juantity of water recjuired to enter the 
crevice formed by tbc imperfect junction of 
two pipes. The rain-gauge informs us, that 
48-lOOths of an incK in depth of rain fell 
upon each square foot of surface in the ob- 
served time of 12 hours. The quantity is 
equivalent to 69 1-lOth cubic inches, or 2} 

f>ounds, which, divided by 12 hours, gives 
ittle more than 2-lOths of a pound per 
square foot of surface per hour for the 
weight of the rain. 

The drains were 24 feet asunder, and 
each pipe a foot in length, so that each 
lineal foot hud to receive the water falling 
on 24 s<(uarc feet of surface, ecjual to GO 
pounds, or 6 gallons; and as the time which 
this quantity occupied in descending through 
the soil and disappearing was about 48 
hours, it results, that 1 1 pounds, or one 
pint, per hour, entered the drain through 
the crevice existing between each pair of 
pipes. Ever}' one knows without having 
recourse to strict experime.it, how very 
small a hole will ](\t a pint of water pass 
through it in an hour, being one-third of 
an ounce per minute, or about twice the con- 
tents df a ladies thimble. 

The weight of rain, per acre, which fell 
during the 12 hours, amounted to 108.000 
pounds, or 48 6-10 .tons, which on the 
whole piece of nine acres, is equal to 437 
4-10 tons; and each drain discharged 10 
tons, equal to about 4-lOths of a ton per 
hour, on the mean of 48 hours ; but when 
the flow was at the greatest, I find that 
each drain must have discharged at the rate 
of five times this quantity per hour, which 
affords proof of the faculty of the pipes to 
receive nnd carry off a fall of rain equal to 
2i inches in 12 hours, instead of half an 
inch, a fall which is quie unknown in this 
climate. Half an inch of rain in 12 hours 
is a very heavy rain. I learn from Mr. 
Dickinson that his rain-j^auge has never in- 
dicated so great a fall as 1 \ inches in 24 
hours ; and from Pr. Ick, the Curator of 
the l^urminghtim Philosophical Institution, 
that only on five occasions has the rain 



there exceeded 1 inch in 24 hours, daring 

the same period of 8 years, the greatest 
(juantity having been 1 (5-lOths of an inch 
on December 4th, 1H41. We may, there- 
fore, consider the fact of the sufficiency of 
inch-bore pipes fur agricultural drainage to 
be fully demonstrated both by experience 
and experiment. 

I will now mention an experiment which 
every farmer is competent to make, and 
which can not fail to throw light on the ac- 
tion and effect of his drains, and on the rel- 
ative condition of different pieces of land 
as to porosity, or filtrating activity — I allude 
to the simple ascertainment by nicasure, of 
the quantity of water discharged from dif- 
ferent drains, after rain, in the same time. 
In reply to numerous inquiries on this sub- 
ject, I have only succeeded in obtaining suf- 
ficiently exact information from Mr. Ham- 
mond, whose intelligence had led him to 
make the experiment without any suggestion 
from me. He stiites : ''I found after the 
late rains, (Feb. 17th, 1844,) that a drain, 
4 feet deep, ran 8 pints of water in the 
same time that another, 3 feet deep, ran 5 
pints, although placed at equal distances." 
The circumstances under which this experi- 
ment was made, as well as its indications, 
deserve particular notice. The site was the 
hop ground before referred to, which had 
been underdrained 35 years since to the 
depth varying from 24 to 80 inches ; and 
though the drains were laid somewhat irreg- 
ularly and imperfectly, they had been main- 
tained in good action. Mr. Hammond, 
however, suspecting injury to be still done 
to the plants and the soil by hot t (mi water, 
which he knew to stagnate below the old 
drains, again underdrained the piece in 
1842 with inch pipes, in part, to 3 feet, and 
in part, to 4 feet in depth, the effect pro- 
ving very beneficial. The old drains were 
left undisturbed, but thenceforth ceased 
running, the whole of the water passing be- 
low them to the new drains, as was to be 
expected The distance between the new 
drains is 26 feet, their length 1;'<0 yards, 
the fall identical, the soil clay. Th«' exper- 
iment was made on two drains adjoining 
each other, i. p., on the last of the >eries of 
the 3 feet, and the first of the serits of the 
4 feet drains. The sum of the flow from 
these two drains, at the time of the trial, 
was 975 pounds per hour, or at the rate of 
10 i tons per acre in 24 hours— -the propor- 
tionate discharge, therefore, was 12 tons by 
the 4 feet, and 7i tons by the 3 feet drain. 



200 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



No springs affected the results. Hence, we 
have two phenomena very satisfactorily dis- 
closed : 1st, that the deepest drain received 
the most water; 2nd, that it discharged the 
.greatest quantity of water in a given time — 
the superficial area of supply, being the 
same to both drains. It would appear, 
then, either that the deeper drain had the 
power of drawing water from a horizontal 
distance greater by the ratio of 8 to 5 than 
the shallower drain ; or that the perpendic- 
ular descent of the water was more rapid 
into the 4 feet drain ; or that its increased 
discharge was owing to both ' these causes 
combined. The phenomenon of a deep 
drain drawing water out of soil, from a 
greater distance than a shallower one, is con- 
sistent with the laws of hydraulics, aud is 
corroborated by numberless observations on 
the action of wells, &c. ; but the cause of 
the deeper drain receiving more water in a 
given time is not so obvious. An opposite 
result, as to time, would rather be expected 
from the fact of water falling on the surface, 
having to permeate a greater mass of earth, 
both perpendicularly aud horizontally, in or- 
der to reach the deep drain. A natural ag- 
ricultural bed of porous soil resembles an 
artificial filter, and it is unquestionable that, 
the greater the depth of matter composing 
such filter, the slower is the passage of wa- 
ter through it. In stiff loams and clays, 
however, but more particularly as regards 
the latter earth, the resemblance ceases, as 
these soils can permit free ingress and 
egress of rain-water, only after the estab- 
lishment of that thorough net-work of 
cracks or fissures which is occasioned in 
them by the shrinkage of the mass from 
the joint action of drains and superficial 
evaporation. These fissures seem to stand 
in the stead of porosity in such soils, and 
serve to conduct water to drains rapidly, 
after it has trickled through the worked 
bed ; it is possible, too, that in deeply drained 
clays of certain texture, the fissures may be 
wider, or more numerous in consequence of 
the contraction of a greater bulk of earth, 
than when such soil is drained to a less 
depth. However this may be, it is ascer 
tained by several respectable and intelligent 
farmers in Kent, who have laid drains very 
deeply in clays and stiff soils, that the flow 
from the deepest drains invariably com- 
mences and ceases sooner than from shal- 
lower drains, after rain. On this interest- 
ing and unexplored subject I hope to be 
able to furnish multiplied observations after 



next winter, and trust also to receive the co- 
operation of the members of the "Society in 
making them in di'fferent soils, and with due 
regard to all those phenomena which may 
influence the results, or be detected by them. 
The consideration of the depth of drains 
has been too generally limited to the mere 
exigencies of culture and implements, com- 
bined with the natural desire to restrict ex- 
pense when the materials used were dear, 
and the cost of earth-work great. These 
adventitious circumstances have certainly 
tended to obscure from view the true princi- 
ples on which drainage should be founded, 
and on which the utmost benefits to be de- 
rived from it depend. The question of dis- 
tance between drains is important on the 
score of expense, and it will be wise to err 
on the right side, and keep within safe limits ; 
but insufficiency of depth can only be reme- 
died by a new outlay. So far as experience 
can illuminate the subject, we know that 
many agriculturists have, a second. time, 
drained their fields to a greater depth ; it 
may, however, be doubted whether any one 
has taken np deep drains, and placed them 
nearer the surface, or nearer together. The 
system of deep drainage has, doubtless, been 
encouraged by the cheapness, lightness and 
approved action of the pipe-tiles, combined 
with the more moderate cost of the earth- 
work incident to their small dimensions, and 
to the facility of laying tJhem. The aggre- 
gate cheapness of the work has set the 
mind ' of the ftirraer free to contemplate 
more exclusively and attentively the per- 
fection of the end in view ; and it is well 
worthy of remark, that experiment and ex- 
perience have rapidly induced the adoption 
of a system of parallel drains consederably 
deeper, and less frequent, than those com- 
monly advocated by professed drainers, or 
in general use. * I gave several instances of 
this practice in Kent, in the report of last 
year, already alluded to, and it is rapidly 
extending. Mr. Hammond stated {Journal^ 
\^ol. IV., p. 47), that he drained '^^tiff 
clays 2 feet deep, and 24 feet between the 
drains, at £3. 4. 3. per acre," and "porous 
soils 3 feet deep, 33 J feet asunder, at £2. 
5. 2. per acre." I now find him continuing 
his drainage at 4 feet deep, wherever he can 
obtain the outfall, from a conviction, founded 
on the experience of a cautious progressive 
practice as to the depth and distance, that 
depth consists with economy of outlay as 
well as with superior effect. He has. found 
4 feet drains to be efficient, at 50 feet asuu- 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



201 



der, in soils of varied texture — not uni- 
forni clays — and executes them at a cost of 
about £'2. 5. 0. per acre, being ISs. 4d. for 
871 pipes, and £1. G. C. for 53 rods of dig- 
ging. ComniuniiJations have been recently 
made to nie, by several respectable Kentish 
farmers, of the satisfactory performance of 
drains deeply laid in the Weald clays, at 
distances ranging from 30 to 40 feet, but I 
have not had the opportunity of personally 
inspecting the^e drainages.* 

The following little table shows the actual 
and the respective cost of the- above three 
cases of under-draining, calculated on the 
effects really produced, /. <'., on the masses 
of earth effectively relieved of their super- 
fluous water at an equal expense. I con- 
ceive this to be the true expression of the 
work done, as a mere statement of the cost 
of drainage per acre of surface conveys but 
an impcrf'ect, indeed, a very erroneous idea 
of the substantive and useful expcndiUire 
on any particular system. This will le ap- 
parent on rcfereuce to the two last columns 
of the table, which give the cost in cubic 
yards and square yards of soil drained for 
one penny at the above mentioned prices, 
depths and distances. 



H..E 


stance be- 
en the 
ins in feet. 


Massed* Soil 
Drained per 
acre, in cubic 
yards. 


ass of Soil 
ined for 
in cubic 

is. 


urface of 
Drained 
r Id. in 


•73 

cs 
9 


«<! 


■-'■id 


^ail 


a» .":: c; 
eg 


c* 


2 


124 


3226i 


4.1 


G.27 




3 


♦ 33i 


4840 


8.93 


8.93 




4 


50 


r,453 


12.00 


8.90 





I may liere observe, that Mr. Hammond, 
when draining tenacious qj^ys, chooses the 
month of February for the work, when lie 
lays his pipes, (just covering them with clay 
to prevent crumbs from getting in,) and 
leaves the trenches open thiough March, if 
it be drying weather, by which means he 
finds the cracking of the soil much acceler- 
ated, and the complete action of the drains 
advanced a full season. The process of 
cracking ^^lay, doubtless, be hastened both 
by a choice of the period of the year in 



• The cost above jijiven can only be taken as 
that of the particular ca>e. The cost of drain- 
at:c (See page fiO) is atfected by the tcxtur*' ol 
soils, their stoniness, ice; and rates of work arc 
beiiifr yiaid. varying from 3<l. to even Is. Od. pei- 
rod (^i yards), causing the cost of drainage per 
acre to vary from £2. to even £5. per acre, ac- 
cording to circumstances. 



which the drains are made, and by sucli a 
management of the surface as to expose it 
to the full force af atmospheric evaporation. 

Recurring to the foregoing tables, it must 
be noticed that the mean annual fall of rain, 
as therein registered, is below the average 
of Britain, whilst the force of evaporation 
is ])robably higher than the average ; and 
the monthly as well as annual amounts of 
filtration and evaporation may be expected, 
in dif!"eiH2nt latitudes, localities and .soils, to 
vary greatly from these records. Similar 
observations obtained on different soils, and 
in various parts of the* country, when com- 
bined with the indications of thermometers 
sunk in the earth, would put us in posses- 
sion of that condition of soil, which may 
not be improperly termed climate^ of which 
no certain knowledge can* be deduced from 
purely meteorological phenomena, but upon 
which the atmospheric climate of a district 
is known greatly to depend. 

Meteorologists have recorded, for many 
years, the amount of terrestrial evaj»oration, 
as denoted by a gauge invented by Mr. 
Ijuke Ploward, and have considered it as 
indicative of the quantity of moisture taken 
up by the atmosphere from the ear^;" but, 
this instrument only denotes the evaporation 
from a dish of water placed on the earth's 
surface, and therefore supplies no fact of 
direct use to the agriculturist, for cultivated 
soils are not under these circumstances, and 
the power of the sun's rays in heating soils 
is but indifferently represented by their ef- 
fect in transforming water into vapour. The 
difference between the indications of the 
Howard and Dalton gauges is most remark- 
able. Profes.sor Danicll states {British 
Almanac) the njcan annual rain in London 
to be 22.100 inches, and* the mean evapo- 
ration 23.081 inches, or 1.782 inches more 
than the rain ; and the results recorded by 
the IJurmingham Philosophical Institution 
for 1843 are,' rain 2G.71() inches, evapora- 
tion 31.081^ inches, or 5.200 inches more 
than the rain. Put we learn from the Dal- 
ton gauge that, in Hertfordshire, out of 
2G.G14 inches of rain on 15.32 inches 
were restored to the atmosphere — the re- 
mainder pa.sscd through the earth into the 
rivers; and this is the real fact on compar- 
ing the amount of rain with the amount 
evaporated from soil 3 feet deep. 

We must never forget that accurate and 
multiplied quantitative facts form the only 
substantial basis of science; and obscrva- 



202 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



tions of the rain and Dal ton gauges would 
be usefully varied by placing the latter at 
dififercnt depths, as at 1, 2, 3 and 4 feet, or 
more, below the surface, and filled with a 
diversity of soils, whence information may 
be expected to arise of great practical value 
to the agriculturist. 

[ To he concluded in our next numher, lolth 
the author^ s Lecture on Draining.'] 



For the Southern Planter. 

What has become of our Birds ? 

Mr. Editor : 

The aged and infirm, in general, should 
not wait to be advised by others to withdraw | 
from much intercourse with the public. The ' 
aged, however, ought to be best qualified to j 
answer the question, forming our caption. 
They have lived during the time that much 
of the diminution in the number of birds — 
so much complained of in our agricultural 
journals of late — has been occurring, and if 
they have been in the habit of noticing 
things around them, must* be able to teH 
something of the rapid decrease in the num- 
ber of birds, as also of the consequent in- 
crease i^ the number of ii; sects. 

A scarcity of birds is a misfortune to any 
country and, agriculturally, it is a calamity. 
This hardly needs illustration, for it is man- 
ifest to all who will recollect what destruc- 
tive depredations have been committed, even 
in the experience of our young farmers, on 
our sprouting and young corn, by clover- 
worms,* wire-worms, cut-worms and a vari- 
ety of other vermin of this description — on 
our wheat, by chinch-bugs, Hessian-fly, joint- 
worms, etc. These are the most common 
depredating insects; space is not allowed to 
specify all which I could enumerate. Let 
him who doubts whether birds eat insects to 
any useful extent, confine his turkeys, or his 
Guinea fowls — which are said to be better — 
for one season on a tobacco-lot, and he will 
have to account for the absence of horn- 
worms. But, I believe, the fact is admitted 
by all. 

The scarcity of our birds, or rather the 
decrease of our former supply, is ascribable 

* Most of these little rascals may be defeated 
in their evil purposes, by soaking the seed corn 
one nif^ht in warm water, stnearing with tar next' 
morning, and roiling in flour of sulphur and ! 
plaster of Paris. If the soaking be neglected,} 
the corn will not sprout in a dry spell of wea- j 
ther, being coated with tar. 



to several causes, some of which are hjti'dly 
removable ; but I would fain hope, they are 
all by a judicious and united public senti- 
ment and effort, capable of mitigation. In 
enumerating these causes/ 1 would set down 
as most efficient — 

I. Peculiarities in our climate, which 
have doubtless increased since the settlement 
of the country and clearing away the forests. 
These consist in very sudden and violent 
changes of weather, dependent mainly on 
the direction whence the wind blows, both 
in winter and summer, and affect different 
classes of birds as the season in which they 
prevail may be present. The varieties of 
our feathered tribes may be divided into 
several classes. There are such as may be 
called the indigenous or aboriginal birds, or 
those which remain with us all the year 
round. These are the turkey, pheasant, 
quail, or, as we call him, partridge; the 
crested or winter red-bird, the crested tit- 
mouse and some others. Of this class, the 
crow and the wild turkey may sustain life, 
when the ground is deeply covered with 
snow — and when food is obtainable, they re- 
gard not the cold — by picking the seed from 
the cones or burs of the pines, so abundant 
with us. The. pheasant at such times finds 
nourishment perhaps from pine-seed, and 
doubtless from berries which grow in the 
ranges which alone he will consent to abide 
in. I suspect the berries borne by what we 
call the green-barked swamp-dogwood, and 
by the" bamboo, are his favorites. But poor 
Boh White ! All the grass, clover and weed- 
seed on which he relies for his winter store 
of provision being covered a foot or two 
deep, must go ^pperless to bed and starve, 
unless he luckily find some rare friend. Such 
as a good man whom I once knew — my 
blessings on his memory ! — who kept an old 
negro man, skilful in the art, cooping and 
trapping partridges all the fall and winter. 
'J'he captives 'were imprisoned during the 
winter in a close room, well fed and—ex- 
cept a decimation taken by the wife, when 
she wanted birds for dinner — tmrned loose 
in the spring, to multiply and replenish the 
earth. Were this practice generally follow- 
ed, partridges would become numerous ; and 
I learned lately from " The Planter," that 
they have a taste, surely not to be admired, 
for eating chinch-bugs. However odd the 
taste, it is possessed in an equal or stronger 
degree, as I have learned from the best au- 
thority, by a beautiful favorite of some of 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



2M 



our u!nutcurojy3itlu)lo«ji8t8. I mean the com- 
mon Hhic 4B. Connuon thickens, I am 
told, will also eat tliem. Can you believe, 
sir, that any created thing will eat chinch- 
bu^'S y 1 had believed, untill lately, that 
they were a black little carsc upon us, with 
a mark on their foreheads or elsewhere on 
their persons, forbiddin«(all creation to touch 
theiu ; that nothing but natural death could 
hurt them ; and I even feared that instead 
of dying, they crept.out of their skins and 
went to work again. But when I learned 
that sotne birds would eat them, I cast aside 
despair, buckled on my old armor anc^de- 
termined to make one more blow, even 
though it might fall as feebly as the last 
cast of the lance of old king Priam. 

IT. Another class of birds come to us 
from the North, in the fall, seek food here 
during winter, and return northwardly to 
rear their families, as soon as sustenance for 
the purpose can be found in their native 
haunts. These consist chiefly of geese, 
ducks, skimming or Canada hawks, and very 
rarely, white owls, and would not require 
notice in an agricultural article, were it not 
for the amazing desUuction of partridges 
produced by the hawks. These piratical ma- 
rauders skim near the surface all day, and 
the prey must hide well wliich can elude 
their vigilant foraging. A law for the de- 
struction of these daring scoundrels would, 
I think, at least be more dignified than our 
c6unty crow-laws. I wonder our enthusias- 
tic sportsmen have never formed associa- 
tions for trapping and shooting all of them 
that come here. The first I saw of them 
was about the beginning of this century, I 
believe in 1807. By 1810 they became nu- 
merous. In January ISoO and also in 1857, 
very doep snows fell, followed by much hit- 
ter weather, nearly all our partridges per- 
ished. Since then I have seen but one 
Canada hawk. Cold winter weather can 
only affect these two classes of birds, as all 
others generally get out of its way. I be- 
lieve that most of them could withstand the 
cold, were they not deprived of food by the 
accompanying deep snows. Small /quadru- 
peds, such as hares, which do not hibernate, 
perish in the same way. I have kept in my 
garden and about my premi.ses, much berry- 
bearing shrubbery and vines, and I do not 
recollect a winter during which one or more 
mocking birds did not abide with me. Pid 
such birds know that the berries would af- 
ford them food for the winter ? There are 



strange mysteries in natural history. My 
father, nearly sixty years ago, was in the 
habit of spreading his straw, as he threshed 
out the wheat, on the next year's tobacco 
ground. An excellent practice, ^ncf none 
who have not tried it, can believe how much 
tobacco is improved by having land to grow 
on manured the season previous to its culti- 
vation. Invariably in twenty-four hours af- 
ter the straw was spread, countless multi- 
tudes of the spotted plover visited the 
ground ; so numerous were they, that I have 
on several occasions killed eight at one shoot, 
firing on the wing at the g.ing. The prac- 
tice was intermitted for several years, from 
scarcity of provender for stock. But as 
soon as it was resumed, the birds returned. 
Now the mystery to nie is, whence they 
came, whither they went, and how they 
knew that the straw was spread. I have 
never seen a spotted plover before, nor since, 
and know not in what region they could 
have been reared. Some two or three cur- 
lews usually came with them. These were 
so shy that I never knew one of them to be 
killed. 

III. Another set of our birds eonsi.sts of 
those which remain in the State through the 
year, but retire to the sea coast in very cold 
spells, such as blue birds, robins, killdccrs 
(perhaps), and a few others. Some of these 
arrive here so speedily after the wind shifts 
to a warmer point, that we cannot withhold 
from them credit for greater weather wis- 
dom than beloligs to many of our wiseacres 
who set up for seers in this line. As the 
weather can hardly hurt these shrewd little 
star-gazers, we must leave them to the ten- 
der mercies of other destroyers fully as re- 
lentless, to be noticed in the scfjuel. 

IV. The greatest variety of our birds 
is made up of those which spend the sum- 
mer with us, and depart on the approach of 
winter. It is from this class that I have ob- 
served the most striking diminution. So 
great, indeed, has this been, that I shall 
hardly gain credence, from any but the 
aged, in what I shall state. Yet who that 
can remember Richmond, in the close of the 
last, and connnencement of this century, 
how its atmosphere was blackened by the 
myraids of house-martins, and other varie- 
ties of swallows, which caroled and twit- 
tered and glided through the air, can have 
forgotten the countless winged-rollickcrs? 
I was told that the martins found their way, 
in vast numbers, into the roof of the capitol, 



204 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



in Vhicli were stored thousands of muskets 
and other arras of the State, an(jl that they 
became vexatiously pestiferous to the armo- 
rers, by defiling these articles. I sometimes 
go to^Righmond, in summer, and miss the 
birds much, but think the musquitos have 
greatly multiplied. When I was a boy the 
maxim prevailed, that martins would fill all 
the boxes you might set up for them. When 
I became a man I nearly verified this, for 
the martins not only filled all the boxes I 
provided for them, but took possession of 
the pigeon-house. I believe there were 
hard upon a thousand about my premises. 
This was very nearly " too much of a good 
thing" — too much noise of the same sort. 
But we began to have very cool spells in 
spring and summer, and these birds visibly 
diminished in number, and I think it was 
early in July, 1836, a wet, cold, spell oc- 
curred and lasted for many days, during 
which nearly every martin died — the young 
in the nests, and old ones were found dead on 
fences, and all over the farm. Whether the 
cold directly killed them, or caused their 
starvation by destroying the insects on which 
t&ey fed, or driving them into inaccessible 
hiding-places, is doubtful. For the last 
twenty years I have tried much to tempt 
the martins to abide with me again — but 
have failed greatly, as with all my efforts I 
have enticed but five or six to do so, whilst 
provision for many more has been made. 

The swallows, sixty years ago, were also 
very numerous. They took possession of 
every chimney-flue under which fires were 
not kept, and our good mothers and grand- 
dames would humanely suffer with cold 
rather than annoy the swallows by having 
fires kindled under them. I often bless the 
mother who taught me to put a nest of An- 
fledged young ones — which had fallen, from 
•its weight, in a damp spell — into a little 
basket, tied to a pole, and put it up the 
chimney in reach of its parents. How far 
birds ot the swallow tribe may employ them- 
selves in catching insects agriculturally in- 
jurious, I know not, but, as they live so 
much on the wing, I should think any man 
who hates musquitos would regret their ab- 
sence. Birds of this kind certainly resort 
much to sheets of water, streams, and boggy 
grounds, to perform their aeronautical evo- 
lutions. They usually construct their nests 
in places out of reach, both of the little 
urchins, black and white, who rob bird- 
nests, and also of the h^ks, and we would 



hope that one sportsman enough to hit one 
of them on the wing, would||hd better em- 
ployment. So that their wonderful diminu- 
tion may fairly be charged to cold weather, 
or a change in our climate. 

Cold weather can hardly kill snow-birds. - 
Yet there has probably been a much greater 
decadence in the number of these, within 
the memory of man, than of any, or per- 
haps of all others. About the y-ear 1796 
or 7, the writer thinks^ he waiS one of four 
boys, at a boarding-school, who caught, in 
little pit-fall traps, 180 odd snow-birds in 
ont day. The next day the good lady of 
the house regaled us with a pot-pie, which, 
to our boyish taste, produced impressions 
unequalled by any feasting since. I for- 
merly heard it said, that it was about the 
best sign of snow falling, when these pretty 
little fellows congregated thickly enough 
for one to kill six at a shoot. I rarely, in 
in these days, gee more than that number at 
one view, however scattered. These birds 
are said to build in ranges, on the Alle- 
ghany mountains, affording a supply of 
suitable food for their young. The settle- 
ment of these, in the^progress of civilization, 
and consequent dispersion of the birds, will 
account, mainly, for their diminution. Some 
drawback on their apparent numbers, by 
their scattering over wider areas of cleared 
lands, in their modern migrations, may be 
made, but not much, as they chiefly assem- 
ble about homesteads in snowy weather. * 

We have mentioned the weather, the 
Canada hawks — and we had too many land- 
pirates of this sort before they came — and 
the settlements among the Alleghanies, as 
causes of destruction to our birds. We 
come now to the knights of the bird-bag. 
In the first place, I must confess that I once 
belonged to the' fraternity. But while I at- 
tempt to. plead their cause, I must entreat 
any young brotl*er, who is in the habit of 
bagging from fifty to three times fifty at a 
shooting, to remember that they are now 
said to eat chinch-bugs. My common cus- 
tom was to take my gun and pointer, an 
hour or two before sunset, and I thought I 
did well if I brought in from ten to twenty 
birds. I was, however, not a good shot, or 
I might have done worse than that. I con- 
sider shooting as a fine exercise and amuse- 
ment, and — when not carried to excess — it 
invigorates both mind and body, affords 
dexterity in the use of fire-arms, and keeps 
down the number of squirrels, hares and 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



205 



other predatory vermin. As to cruelty,, it 
docs not compare with the daily butchering 
and wringing of necks among our brutes and 
poultry. I would recommend to young 
sportsmen, in their shooting contests, to let 
one comnion hawk count for a tenth, and a 
Canada hawk for a fifth of the whole num- 
ber of birds killed, or to agree upon some 
rule by which all bird-destroyers, except 
themselves, should be put out of the* way. 
They may rely upon it, that every such de- 
stroyer slain is a constantly working rival 
removed. In this way they may even 
prove to be friends to the birds — for all they 
destroy would amount to nothing like a 
moiety of those devoured by hawks, owls, 
foxes, minks, and other such vermin. As 
to a younger class of sportsmen, who, soon 
after getting out of leading strings, are fur- 



nished with accoutrements for the business, 
and roam the fields, shooting every pretty 
bird they see, and often themselves, I can- 
not be apologist for them, or their parents. 
One such little gentleman, some six or seven 
years ago, got to visiting my farm with his 
double-barreled gun, in mid-summer, when 
almost all the birds had nests. I had often 
boasted that I had counted twenty red-birds, 
^t one view, in my garden, enticed there, 
doubtless; by the berries. This young sports- 
man dropped them along the river-bank with 
a hand so unsparring fhat I have seen but 
one red-bird on the farm, that I recollect, 
since. The blue tanagers — also numerous 
and a very pretty kind of bird — fared as 
badly. I had thought that such gunners 
did but little harm. I now retract. 

There is a class of bird-killers — and not 
a small one — which we should not pass by 
unnoticed. Grown-up men, who, having 
suffered prejudice to take the place of close 
investigation, ignorantly and recklessly de- 
stroy most useful birds. The killdeer — 
most faithful guardian of our turnip-patches 
— charged with eating young turnips ; the 
different kinds of wood-peckers — guardians 
of our trees — are murdered ruthjessly for 
making holes in ears of corn, in pursuit of 
worms, and for feeding their young on cher- 
ries. The sweetly-singing thrush is killed 
for pulling up corn, which the farmer niight 



nothing. Artother swee* songster, the cat- 
birtl, is hated and killed for scolding when 
his persecutors go near his nest. 1 have, 
several times, dissected the gizzards of kill- 
deers — they have no crops or craws — to 
show their destroyers that they contain no 
vegetable substance, and nothing indeed 
but the little bug so famous for destroying 
young turnips and tobacco plants. These 
huixs can be ke[)t out of plant-beds by a 
perfect fence, three feet high, without a 
crack. A neat log fence, well-daubed with 
mud, will answer. I never could raise egg- 
plants until 1 elevated boxes, in which the 
seed were sown, beyond their reach. They 
can hop like fleas — crawl with difficulty — 
and if they ever fly, rarely do it, for, with 
close watching, [ have never seen them per- 
form the exploit. These little hopping 
beetles are a great nuisance in the land — 



and I fear are rapidly increasing. 'I he kill- 
deers seem to he their natural enemies, and 
formerly collected in vast numbers, and 
now in small ones — if even small ones con- 
venient, may happen to exist — to fulfil the 
purpose of their missiofl. I seldom, now-a- 
days, hear the cheery ring of the killdeer's 
voice. Let no man henceforth, kill one, ex- 
cept to convince himself and others that 
they eat no young turnips. The sacrifice 
of one producing such conviction may save 
hundreds of his brethren. The wood- 
pecker tribe, I look upon as very valuable. 
The lively, spotted little fellow, who strik- 
ingly verifies the adage about giving a dog 
a bad name, called sapsucker, has often been 
shot while picking grubs from the rind of 
some neglected apple-tree, which its owner 
should have saved by scrubbing the bark 
well with Ic}', because his unlucky name 
seemed to imply that he was sucking out its 
sap. His handsome compeer, the large, 
spotted woodpecker, much tinged with yel- 
low, — called lark-woodpecker, aftd by the 
boys, yucker — is the only bird I ever saw 
picking out and eating the worms from the 
roots of peach-trees. Spare him, ye far- 
mers, and teach your boys to spare him ! 
But where is the red-headed woodpecker — 
the guardian of the olden forests. His ce- 
cupation's nearly gone. Civilization has 



prevent by soaking, tarring and sulphuring! almost banished them all, as it did the snow- 
bis seed-corn. Ah, but the birds will still j birds, among the Alleghanies. We have 
pull it up, if they do not eat it. Now, cut down much the greater part of our forest- 
crows, etc., are industrious in gratifying 'lands. We have ceased girdling trees, in 
appetite, but, like men, they soon become! the half-rotten parts of which these birds 
weary, when they find their work is for [ could peck out holes for their nests. We 



206 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



even search out the old and . dead trees for 
fuel. Where are the poor birds now ? 
Like many of us, seeking homes — from dire 
necessity — far away. I have known a large 
community of them actually to arrest the 
progress of destruction, from the pine-borer, 
in a forest where one pine-tree had been 
felled convenient to a field of thickly gird- 
led trees in which they dwelt. They are 
nearly gone now. A solitary lingerer occa- 
sionally startles us with his merry squeal, 
but it excites rather sad assoc ations. This 
is no longer a home for them. What is 
called bat fowling, also causes great increase 
of insects. The number of bull-bats has 
very much declined in modern times. We 
thresh wheat so much earlier than formerly, 
that we can better dispense with the bats, 
as the summer-weavil, a favorite food with 
them, annoys us less. Leather- winged bats 
— ignored by ornithologists — should be 
prized by farmers. They live, I believe, 
entirely on insects, and in their destruction 
0^ them may substitute birds. But preju- 
dice will not spare even these poor, ugly 
little flutterers. They are accused of breed- 
ing chinches. Such bugs may get into 
sycamore-hollows, and their other domicils. 
But would any man destroy his poultry be- 
cause chinches infest his hen-house. This 
they often do. Bats live, by hundreds, under 
the barge-boards of my dwelling-house. I 
know no residence, within ten miles, where 
musquitos are scarcer — (and I may -say 
chinches, too, if none will call it bragging) 
— although there is a curved river-boundary, 
of more than two miles, within half- a mile 
of the house. Pardon this and several other 
digressions. The whole article is written, 
mainly, for the good of agriculi.ure, at which 
these digressions are aimed. 

The Great Creator can, by storms and 
tempests — or, according to His own good 
pleasure — ^terminate all, or any of His 
creatures. But He has so guarded animals 
preyed upon, against their marauders, by 
the law of action and reaction — in other 
words, of supply and demand — that the 
latter work against, weaken, or starve them- 
selves, when they approach too near an ex- 
tinction of the former. A community of 
cats, feeding only on one of rats, commit 
indirect suicide on themselves, when they 
carry on the destruction too rapidly, and 
must th<jmselves decrease to that point at 
which the rats and their offspring can sus- 
tain them. Well-fed cats — which are much 



the most valuable — might succeed in effect- 
ing their destruction. Nature shields the 
birds, generally, in this way, from utter ex- 
tinction. Even man would, probably, re- 
linquish their pursuit, when it ceased to pay 
in profit or amusement. 

The question has not been settled, and 
probably never will be, whether — on the 
whole — crows do most good or harm. I will 
not shirk it, though I confess ignorance 
and doubt. It seems as if it hardly need 
be settled, as in our region, in despite of 
some very keen crow-killers in my know- 
ledge, their numbers, though confessedly 
prodigiously reduced,, are far greater, in 
proportion to size, than those of any of our 
other birds. There are two or three ani- 
mals which, some say, never die a natural 
death. I think the crow has as fair a title 
to this distinction as either of them. He 
has no destroyer but man, and among men 
there are so few who possess the genuine 
crow-killing talent, that, I think, with all 
his cunning in eluding pursuit, and his 
great prolificness, the danger of his exter- 
mination is not very great. 

Some people protect crows as very valu- 
able. The late John Randolph would not 
suffer one of them to be shot on his farm. 
Indeed, he fed them liberally when his 
young corn could be .injured by them. I 
tried this once, but they had not faith in 
me — the black rascals pulled up the corn 
close by the bait. Probably they prefer it 
soured or softened in the ground for their 
young. In that case, by soaking the feed 
in water a day or two, they might be accom- 
modated. I suspect that even then, from 
a proclivity to mischief natural to them, 
they would continue the depredation, in 
conformity with the boast of the black-bird 
to the crow, in the old nursery song : 

" Ever since old Adam was made, 
To pull up corn has been our trade.'' 

Some hate crows so much as to put food 
within their reach, impregnated with a so- 
lution of arsenic, and kill them by whole- 
sale. The gentleman mentioned above, 
declared to me, that he never could bring 
himself to administer poison to any of 
God's creatures — not even to -rats ; that he 
left arsenic to the doctors, and doubted 
whether many of them used it to advan- 
tage. 

There is an insolence and audacity about 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANT^llR. 



207 



tlie crow in the achiovcmont of liis tliieve- 
ries, seeming to defy retribution and chal- 
lenge as.<*iiult. Could the warmest apologist 
for crows — on finding thirty or forty of the 
best melons in his patch pecked to pieces, 
while the saucy rogues were chuckling 
noisily over the feat in the neiglibouring 
trees, beyond the reach of gunshot, how- 
ever — look at the black thieves, without 
wishtuj them all dead ? If, on the whole, 
they do more good than harm, it is with a 
very bad grace, and, like all the good done 
by scoundrels, with a bad motive. My rule 
has been, whilst I have by no means loved 
the crows, to let thetfi alone, except such as 
took to stealing the eggs and catching the 
young of my domestic fowls. I have sought 
the lives of these most sedulously, I would 
also contend for my melons, savagely, if 
need be. 

As for black-birds, they may readily be 
cleared out, if they be considered a nui- 
sance, by draining swamps and extirpating- 
willows. Even were they considered valu- 
able, we should not retain the swamps and 
willows, with all their accom})anying evils, 
for their sakes. Besides, I suspect that they 
eat but few insects except those peculiar 
to swamps, whilst at certain season^ they 
pillage voraciously on all the grain near. 

An intimation was made that remedies 
would be suggested, at least for the palia- 
tion of the foregoing evils. Here the wri- 
ter feels himself much in the condition of 
a physician, who has great confidence that 
he could prescribe sanative remedies, but 
has little hope that the patient will fol- 
low the prescription. In the present case, 
there are too many to be consulted — nine- 
tenths of whom will probably pronounce 
the whole business a humbug; and of the 
very few who may approve, hardly one will 
adopt and endeavour to carry out the sug- 
gestions. Such are the difficulties to be 
overcome. 

Public evils often call down public calami- 
ties, and the links which bind the various in- 
terests of civilized life, are so entangled and 
complicated that a lofty wisdom is required 
to prevent confusion and ruin. The feeble 
old man, who now addresses you, feels his 
utter impotence to wield the subject when 1 
applied to ourselves as a nation. He has 
no sanative remedies here. No — he begs' 
leave, humbly, to unite with a mighty host; 
of patriots in imploring those who are great 
and good to face the tempest, and agonize 



(0 uvi rt it. I have .already witnessed some 
stirring — grand dispJaya of patriotic elo- 
querice. Hut the good and great must not 
'only write and speak, but buckle on their 
'armour and fight ibr the cause of their 
I country. Perha})S the people will " rev- 
erence" them. Perhaps they njay be ena- 
bled to save their country ! 

'' But fools rush in where ant^els fear to tread." 

The peace of angels is what we need ; 
they are said to bring no railing accu.'^ations. 
Can part}* spirit heal us'/ No — this was the 
demon which hatched the mischicl". An- 
gelic peace must sweeten — jirofound wis- 
dom and vLi'tue give power to the medicine 
we take. God grant that no judgments 
from Heaven be necessary for our cure ! 

But to return to the birds. Often on 
viewing farms, in some of our richer coun- 
ties, 1 have asked, what provision is njade 
for the birds? Where so many good things 
abound any deficiency becomes the more 
striking. It is worse in poorer lands, but 
I choose the richer for examples, on account 
of the contrast. VVe see a handsome, 
sonietimcs, a splendid dwelling, neat and 
substantial out-houses, beautiful . shaders 
in the yard, very rare though in the 
fields, and no superabundance of wood- 
land. How long could a decimal of the 
feathered races \yhich once inhabited the 
same lands, be kept here now ? The in- 
digenous wild fruits are nearly all gone. 
Trees, shrubs, and vines, for food and for 
shelter, from storm and sunshine, are gone. 
It is true, there is an abundance of grain 
about its ripening time, soon to be shut np 
from the birds; an abundance of clover 
seed for such as feed on it, when it is 
not under snow. There are also insects 
enough for the pee-wees, wrens and spar- 
rows, which are not fastidious about se- 
lecting secluded spots for their nests. The 
blue-bird may, perchance, find a hole in 
an apple tree, if the little negroes are not 
permittt^d to rob him. Many other birds 
find it no home for them, and fly away. 
Others w(mld remain, and soon pay for 
coarse boxes, six inches square, to dwell 
in, if supplied with them. 

Some birds aflfect particular haunts or 
localities, as was said of the phea.sants. I 
have seen the scarlet tanagor — I know no 
common name for him — only in a range 
parallel to the Blue Ridge, and about thirty 



208 



THE 



SOUTHERN PLANTER, 



[April 



very 
v.'ith 
leirs. 



miles, south-east from it. This is a 
showy bird, brilliant scarlet in colour, 
glossy black wings, bill and lower 
The rain-crow used to be very numerous 
in the same range, both doubtless attract- 
ed by some food unknown to us, or by the 
charms ot seclusion, to these barren wilds. 

The' mocking bird will rarely abide 
where there are neither red hawthorns nor 
large wild rose bushes. The Baltimore 
oriole greatly prefers the Lombardy pop- 
lar to build in. 

If we desire birds, we must remember 
the condition of things when they were 
plentiful, or, as the politicians say, '' recur 
to first principles." Our forefathers, after 
they began to clear away the woods, made 
copses, or thickets, of shrubbery and vines, 
and crowded them as densely as possible 
not far from the dwelling. True, they were 
not made for the birds, but being composed 
.of plum bushes, cherry trees, winter-fox arid 
other grape vines, they formed a fine sub- 
stitute for the departing forest growth, by 
affording good shelter in cold and tempestu- 
ous spells, suitable privacy for their nests, 
and much food for their young. The pro- 
gress of refinement and luxury aided possi- 
bly by a hankering after rich ground for 
tobacco, swept all these away. They might 
cheaply be restored, and if tastily laid out, 
might be* quite ornamental. Such spots 
would certainly recall many of our wander 



whether its success Be desirable, I am not 
prepared to decide. There can be no doubt 
about the success of the latter, should its 
prosecution be directed by cautious and en- 
lightened enterprize. Grapes are rarely 
killed in middle Virginia, by frosts, as they^ 
do not bloom until about the middle of 
May. Their health and productiveness are 
greatly improved by using phosphate of 
lime as manure. 

By the foregoing appliances and other 
expedients to be suggested, I doubt not at 
all but that the number of our birds may 
be greatly increased. The adoption, by a 
large number, of the plan of imprison- 
ing and feeding partridges in very hard 
weather, would greatly protect one of the most 
valuable species of birds which abide here 
during winter. By a formation of the 
thickets and groves recommended, and a 
judicious adaptation of the growth to the 
soil, and of its fruits to the wants of the 
birds, a mighty enlargement might be add- 
ed to our summer birds 

The awful devastating snows which have 
swept away our hares and partridges, have 
only occurred three times in much over 
half a .century. One in January, 1799, 
which did not all melt away until the last 
of April. Two others, in 1856 and 1857, 
are remembered by young people. But 
the hawks, except the cute northern ones 
which go away when the birds get scarce, 



ing feathered friends. Birds should be are always here. And I wish to say a little 



treated like roaming husbands — make home 
pleasant to them. 

Other areas, bluffs, waste spots, and 
yawning gullies, too great to be filled at 
once at a compensative outlay, might be im- 
proved in appearance, and put to some use 
quite cheaply by planting them thus in 
trees, etc. ; and if well started, they would 
soon become rich. It may be objected that 
such places breed snakes. One or two 
pointers or terriers, trained to hunt these, 
will soon clear them. out. Family cemete- 
ries, instead of laying bare in the sun, 
might be tastefully surrounded by groves, 
and the music of the birds would sweeten, 
while it increased the sacred solemnity. 

Silk and wine culture would doubtless 
greatly favour the increase of our birds. 
The first, however, has, most probably, re- 
ceived its death blow twenty years ago, from 
the Morus Multicaulis mania — whether un- 
der the guidance of cautious and watchful 
experiment it might not succeed, and 



more about hawks, as they produce a sad 
draw-back on the number of our other 
birds. Allowing one hawk for every square 
mile, and I am sure that is much below the 
true mark, it is evident that they must de- 
stroy a prodigious number of birds in a 
year. I will leave the Canada hawks to 
their rivals — the sportsmen. Each of them 
should kill his hawk annually, as a tax for 
the privilege of hunting. They are easily 
shot from a blind, near which a bird or 
hare is hung up. Oar native hawks may, 
most of them, be trapped, the blue-winged 
in steel-traps, baited with a bi]^d, a squirrel, 
or even a stuffed squirrel-skin. The large 
red tailed hawk can be caught in a very 
strong tobacco-stick trap, baited with the 
lungs of a pig or lamb. 

I once knew an old gentleman, who had 
a thorough passion both for shooting and 
trapping all the hawks, owls, foxes, otters, 
minks, and other destructive vermin, ho 
could find — a perfect Daniel Boone in the 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



209 



midst of civilization. He had no particular 
objection to trappin«j a fox-hound occasion- 
ally, as he WHS convinced that hounds had 
been the chief instrument in destroying tlie 
game of the country. His labours con- 
vinced nic that his occupation was very use- 
ful, for it was manifest that his neighbour- 
hood abounded in birds far beyond any 
region near It is true lie may liavc in- 
dulged a prejudice somewhat bitter against 
the objects of his pursuit, especially the 
hounds, yet some such feeling almost 
amounting to hatred, is perhaps requisite in 
destroyers of all kinds. He was a worthy 
man, and is remembered with esteem by all 



For the Soul htm Planter. 

Advice to Young Farmers. 

Supposing that our young farmer friends 
have gone along \Hth us in our former ar- 
ticles, and heeded us whilst we discoursed 
of house-building, the management of self, 
the management of tobacco beds, the man- 
agement of the tobacco plant itself after 
being matured, &c., &c., we will now 
speak of other topics connected with the 
})rofitablo management of the farm. 

And here, lest the young Virginia far- 
mer j^hould be discouraged by the wonder- 
ful accounts he hears of the great produci 



who knew him. I have known several | per hand, made in the cotton and sugar 
men of less note who had the same turn of' growing portions of our country, over whal 
mind. They did a patriotic work ; whether we are able to do in this State, we deem 
they designed it or not, I cannot tell. it pertinent to remind him, that in the im- 

Our article is becoming entirely too long, 'provemcnt of his farm, the enlargement by 
We will deal in short order with the tq- natuml'mQxcwse of his stock in ^trade, the 
maining bird-killers. For their own sakes, multiplication of his negroes, his cattle, his 
the unfledged sportsmen should be stopped liorscs, &c., &c., he is adding, though 
altogether, unless their parents are able to slowly, much more certainly to his wealth 
employ those capable of training them to than those who are engaged exclusively in 
handle arms safely, and restraining them the plantinir business. 

from murdering harmless birds, through j The supe'rior planting lands of the South, 
sheer wantonness as unsportsmanlike and .^j^j^i^ produce these large yields to the 
cruel The smaller fry of nest-robbers, : ],j^„j,^,,d ^re not subject to complete ex- 
should be treated with mild expostulation— h^ustion, are confined to a comnaratively 



which, failing, the rod must be tried. 

This effort, hurried, miscellaneou.s, and 
unmethodical, is offered as the best testi- 
mony I can give of my kind feeling and 



small district of country. We would re- 
mind him that a very large majority of those 
cotton hands are deteriorating constantly, 
and that no successful plan has bet n resort- 



gratitude towards my agricultural editor,' j j^ of restoring them, that they arc cul 
who has afforded me so much pleasant read- ti^.j^ted at a most enormous expense, thai 
ing so cheaply, and my best wishes for you, the net per cent, upon the capital invested 



sir, personally, and oflicially, and for the 

cause in which you labour. 

C. 

Oumhcrland, Frh. 20/7*, 1860. 
« » ■ » » 

Lime Water for Apple Trees. — A 
French journal relates of a landed propri- 
etor near Yvetot, that he had in his garden 
some old apple trees which produced no 
fruit. Two winters 



is not so much greater, after all, as the in- 
experienced arc led to think, — that we are 
led to doubt whether the sum of $5,000 
or $10,00 invested here, would not show 
as good a profit at the end of twenty years 
as the same sum invested there, to saj 
nothing of the superior comfort and satis- 
faction of living in this climate. To bring 
a<^o he took up gome j ''^^*^"' *^^'^ ^^^^^*'*^^^ investment here, how- 
lime, which he steeped^in water, and with! ^''^^' *^^ >'^""^ ^^""^^ ^'^^ ^'^''^ *« ^^ "^^ 



a brush washed the old trees all over. The 
result was the destruction of all the in- 
sects; the old bark fell off, and was replaced 
by new, and tlie trees bore an excellent 
crop. Most of them have now acquired 
such renewed vigour, that all appearance 
of a»e has disappeared. 

Remember the golden rule — do unto 
other as you would have them do unto you 
14 



the alert. As one step, he must attend to 
his 

MANURE HEAP, 

which is the farmer's bank ; not like other 
banks, though, its contents must be rotten. 
If the President of this bank will see to it, 
that its resources are always in a good con- 
dition, he may rest assured that it will yield 
to him a far more certain and profitable 



210 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[APRIIi' 



percent, than any other bankiniij institution, 
from the bank of discount and deposit to the 
farro bank, inclusive. Tke manure bank is 
the fanner's treasury. Thence he draws all 
his finances. Let all the inaterial, of little 
or much strength, therefore, out of which 
nutrition for plant can be extracted be 
gathered together and converted into ma- 
nure 

Our experience is, that whether applied 
to corn, wheat or tobacco, turnips, carrots 
or potatoes, it makes return exactly in pro- 
portion to the quantity and quality of the 
manure applied. A judicious manager may 
every year make mrfnure enough to dress 
thoroughly all the poorer portions of the 
fields he cultivates. Especially may he do 
80 with the partial aid of the foreign ma- 
nures so much in use now-a-days. We 
doubt, however, at the present high price, 
whether these can be extensively and at 
the same time profitably used on our Vir- 
ginia lands, as far as w^e are from the good I 
markets. Lime and plaster, where they act 
on our lands, may be used at all times' 
most profitably; nevertheless, these great; 
adjuvants to the growth of plants havej 
been found to produce no effect on some of i 
our Eastern Virginia lands, and consequent- i 
ly are to be used with caution. The Pied- 
mont lands of the State may be increased' 
to any amount of fertility by the judicious' 
use of clover and plaster alone — a proper 
rotation of crops being observed ; whilst, 
according to our experience, the soil be- 
tween these and tide-water are not effected ; 
by the application of either lime or plaster, j 
The lands of our State are so various in' 
their character, that no one of the foreign 
manures can be recommended as adapted 
to all. This remark, however, does not 
hold good in regard to our manures of do-| 
mestic manufacture. 1 

We will suppose, then, that our young 
friend has, last fall, after the housing of 
his crop turned all his industry and attcn-' 
tion to the accumulation of manure, that 
he has not depended on overseer or negroes 
in this most important operation, but given! 
it his pergonal attention. The crop having! 
been secured, he can't make it appear to| 
either of these parties, that there is any need : 
of further induntry or energy. Therefore' 
we press this point. Let the master be 
diligent in providing the material. Let 
him see that the stable yards, cow yards, 
the receptacles for manure about the dwel-, 



lings are all, every one of them, provided 
with plenty of crude matter, such as weeds, 
leaves, straw, as absorbents of that which 
may bo thrown or dropped on them, during 
the six months from November till April. 
Let him see to it, that the contents of both- 
horse and cow stables when cleaned out are 
thrown into shelters where rains nor 
weather have access to them. Let him see 
to it, that they are kept deeply littered 
with straw or leaves. And when the time 
comes for turning the stock on the fields, 
let him see that a pen well covered with 
crude matter of some kind, is made for 
thenj on some poor spot of the succeeding 
fallow, and removed every ten days or so, 
and he will find that with the diligence he 
should have exercised, he will have accom- 
plished so much towards going over all the 
thinner parts of the fields for cultivation, as 
to require but little of the more costly ma- 
nures. 

And here, being about to dismiss the 
subject, we would warn our young friends 
against the various preparations that are 
now sold for manure, unless they know 
the character of those making the prepara- 
tions. 

The season having arrived, viz : April 
and May, when the crop of corn is to be 
put into the ground, such manure as can 
be spared fi-om the tobacco crop — for, from 
our experience, none of it should have been 
used as top-dressing to wheat during the 
winter, inasmuch as it does not benefit to 
the extent that others suppose — should be 
spread on the thinner parts of the corn 
field, and lightly plowed in. Before this 
process, though, we suppose the corn land 
all to have been thoroughly plowed and 
broken with the subsoil plow to the depth 
of at least twelve or fourteen inches. The 
corn should then be dropped (I prefer 
sowing it, a grain in a place three to four 
inches apart) and covered with one deep 
stroke of the coulter on each side of the 
row. As soon as the plant is up, or even 
before, should begin the 

CULTIVATION OF THE CORN. 

This process is simply tlie breaking of 
the middle ot the row with five or six 
strokes of the coulter, so constructed as that 
it will go into the land and do the work 
thoroughly. Care should be taken not to 
break the roots of the young plants. Our 
plan, then, is, to disturb the land no more 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



211 



until the corn is large enough to have the 

dirt thrown to it, — which is done with a 
counii(ir) win^ j»low, one furrow bein«; run 
on each sitio ol the row covering, it' plowed 
as it shoul'i be, every particle ol" land be- 
tween tlie stalks of corn. Having gone 
over the lieUl with two i'urrows of this kind 
to the row, we return and give the row 
two more furrows, which operation will have 
left tv.o to three furrows more in the mid- 



hat, and in some cases in top, and a large, 
flat hill shouM be put round it in order to 
retain as much moi-^ture as possible, but 
deep and thorough cultivation will insure 
the retention of this moisture more than 
anything else. ]Jut before we proceed fur- 
ther, we would give our experience in 

FEEDING WITH CORN AND OTHER GRAINS. 

We give it as our decided opinion, from 



die of the row yet to be finished, which ill our own as well as the experience of others, 
the wheat harvest has come on, as it should that the grinding ot all grain fed to stock 
do, will have to stand until the wheat isjwjllsave imc-fourfh, in some cases more, 
saved, with no detriment, however, to the j All grain fed to horses, cows, beeves, and fat- 
corn, because its young roots will not have;tenin«' hojis, should be ground. Thou<'h 
progressed one inch beyond the two strokes^ thi> farmer have to travel ten miles to mill, 
of the plow on each side of the row that | the thing can be attended to with immense 



have already been given it. j saving. Fattening hogs may be ied on 

Immediately on the securing of the ^ corn cooked in large boilers ; but still the 
wheat harvest — that is, the cutting and put- 1 process of fattening is hastened by the 
ting into nicely capped dozens — the finish- ^ jrrinding and cooking. The want of atten- 
ing touch should be given to the corn byition to things of this sort, is where the Vir- 
filling out the remaining furrows; and du- ginia hu.sbandry fails. We make, but we 
ring this process the wheat, while the dew, do not economize. Suppose the farmer ro- 
is on it of a morning, may be put into,,|uiie 20U bbls. of corn for his annual sup- 
larger or five bushel shocks, and thus more | port, and our position is true — and wc know 
securely kept in case of long rainy .seasons, it is, — in the article of corn alone, he 
By this system of cultivation, we avoid dis- Lsaves 50 bbls., which is worth on an avcr- 
turbing the young roots of the corn plant, luge §?175 ; a sum sufficient to pay a hand to 
and prepare for them always in anticipation | do nothing else but prepare to feed and dis- 
a soft, fresh, and well pulverized body of ^ tribute to the stock. But the farmer who 
earth, in which they may seek their food. | has stock enough to employ a hand exclu- 
For this cheap and expeditious mode of jgively for the purpose of feeding, would, 
the cultivation, wc are indebted for our j under the ordinary plan, use 800 or ooO 
theory to the celebrated agricultural chem-| bbls. ol" corn ; this man's saving would be 
ist, Liebig, and for the practice to two or! §804. Do.sen't this pay for grinding? Let 
three of the most sensible old farmers of! our young brother attend to these thing.s, 
our ac«|uaintaiice, who possibly may never and he will at the end of twenty years (in- 
have heard of the great chemi.^t. 'dustry in other departments having been 

We rarely use the hoe at all in the cul-| observed) Ikivc no reason to look with a 
tivation of our corn, except to uncover .such 'longing eye towards South Alabama or 
of it as the plow may have accidentally Texas, or any other great cotton region. 

covered, and to chop the bushes which may' 

, 7 ' . ^ , i- .k <: 1 1 ' THE GRASSES, 

and do put up in many parts ot the iield. j * 

And just at this sea.son the young farmer Such as clover, orchard, timothy, «te., 
will remember that the crop of oats is com- should have been sowed on the oats at the 
ing fast to maturity; and he will remember, time of seeding them, and all the poorer por- 
also, that tobacco, which we told him in a tions of the field should have been covered 
former paper, he ought to have run over with straw, so thinly distributed as that the 
hastily — by moonlight if he had no day young plants may be shaded but not over- 
time for it. If he lias followed our advice laid. This covering, together with a bushel 
then, he will have plenty of time now to of plaster to the acre, will generally itsurc 
give the tobacco that thorough working a good stand, which should then be sacred 
with plow and hoe we there told him about, ground, so far as any quadruped is concern- 
because it is free from weeds and grass, and'cd, until the grass has matured the second 
the hoes will go over it as fast as the plows, year; the fields having been plastered the 
The tobacco will now be as large as a man's intervening seasons. 



212 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER, 



[April 



THE SEASON FOR SOWING WHEAT. 

The season for sowing this crop hav- 
ing conic, our young friends will, be- 
fore this, have fallowed all the land intend- 
ed for wheat, and as soon as the manure 
receptacles about the dwellings and farm- 
houses were emptied in the spring, (April 
and May,) will have seen that they were 
again filled well, with such matter as could 
be converted into manure, and will insure 
a sufficient supply for all the poor places in 
the fallow-field. This manure, together 
with the cow-pens that have been distribu- 
ted over the thinner portions of the land 
intended for wheat, should all be plowed in, 
and then the wheat sowed at the earliest 
possible time after the 25th September. 
We would advise the use of the drill by all 
means, wherever the land is tolerably level, 
more especially on the red lands where the 
wheat is apt to be thrown out by frost. 
This operation will require the greatest 
amount of care, however, as with all the 
precision that may be used, the drill is li- 
able to get out of order and to skip the land 
without dropping the seed. 

STOCK OF SHEEP, HOGS, &C. 

As it regards sheep, we would advise a 
good stock. Though they may cost more 
at first, they arc far more prolific and a 
dozen will soon stock an ordinary farm. 
They require 



notjutifyus in recommending particularly 
any of the various recent importations. So 
much depends upon the attention that i« 
bestowed on this s^ock, that wc can say^ 
safely, that any of good form, and size, 
and age may be bred from with propriety, 
provided that they be not suffered to 
" breed in and in" for too long a time. We 
dare say that the Surry, or the Berkshire^ 
or a cross of the two would be our choice. 
Our experience in thi.i department, as in 
that of the sheep, and indeed other stock, 
is, that M'ithout the attention of the mas- 
ter — without the (Iai7i/ attention— our friendft 
will find that they may make yearly impor- 
tations of the best breeds, and they will 
all resolve themselves into "Razor-backs" 
very speedily. If they want to see their 
sheep have lambs, their sows have pigs, 
their cows have calves, their acres produce. 
" two blades of grass where but one grew 
before ;" let theui not depend on their 
" good men Fridays," as an old friend of 
ours used to call those gentlemen agents or 
managers. 

In these sage advices which we have-' 
been so long doling out to our young 
friends, let them not suppose that we have 
talked unadvisedly about painting cow sta- 
bles, and horse stables, and negro quarters, 
&c., &c. If we were going to start in life 
again, instead of burdeninir ourself with 



great care, especially about | a large debt for land, the payment for 
Indeed, until the farm is which takes all one's surplus capital, we 

would take half the capital for investment 

undred 



fenced ofi" and well set in grass, this branch 
of husbandry should not be attempted It 
is absolutely needful that they have green 
food, to succeed well, and to insure this, at 
the tune they are raising their young, the 
ram should be kept from them until the 
latter part of November, so that, going as 
they do four months with young, they may 
'bring them the last of March or first of 
April, Frequent change of range is es- 
pcntial to their well-being, consequently 
their pasture should be changed monthly 
or oftener. The lambs should be altered as 
soon as they drop; this being attended to, 
they are always healthy and strong, and 
take on fat far more readily. We prefer a 
cross of the Bakewell and Cotswold, as com- 
bining a fineness ot wool, a delicatcness of 
flesh, and at the same time a juiciness 
which neither of those stocks have of them- 
selves, and this, without detracting from the 
fleece.- 

As it regards hogs, our experience will 



in land, if it didn't buy but one ni 
acres, and invest the other half in im- 
provements for that one hundred acres. 

The Yankee farmer — but we forget, we 
must not mention that name to Southern 
ears polite, "odds pistols and pikes it raises 
ones passions!" but having named the ac- 
cursed name, we had as well say what we 
were going to say — viz : that the Yankee 
farmer invariably observes this rule in 
making an investment, and the consequence 
is, that he rarely, after four or five yeard, 
realizes less than from twenty to twenty-five 
per cent, on each investment. 

And now, if our young friends are not 
glad that we have finished what we had to 
say, we know that we ourselves are. 

L. M. 

Fehruary 21s<, 1860. 



Plow your ground deep— pulverize it well. 



18()0.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



218 



Powhatan Hole and Corner Club. * 

Mo<)t cheerfully do wc publish the followinii: 
iDtorc0iiii;{ report, in rnin])liance with the rcso- 
lutiun of the above club. We have often in- 
vited »nch couinuinii'iuiun.4 front the vnrions in- 
lelli(:ent attsociniions exi^tin^ in nutny of the 
«ouhtiei> of the Slate, but we are t>«irry to adtl, 
that our iioliritntions have been, for the most 
part, diitregardcd. The Nottoway club stands 
out a prominent exception. Their annual con- 
tributions have enriched our pages, and made 
the "Southern Phinter" the medium lor difTus'- 
ing the light of their eminently practical uml 
instructive essays^ throughout the country. The 
Powhatan club, too, is another exception. Their 
comnmnicntion of the invaluable ngricuiturul 
and geological survey of their coimty by Profes- 
«or Gilliam, through this paper, — if they had 
done nothing more, — would entitle them to a full 
acquittal from the general charge, and to the 
praiAe of having set an example worthy of the 
imitation of every county in the State. The 
Albemarle club.*, we know, are still active and 
elHiioni, but we have somewhat against them : 
they are appropriating the benefits produced 
by their asaociation and frequent intercourse 
too much to themselves. Why put their light 
under a bushel ? Why not let the practical ex- 
perience of one of the high-farming counties of! 
the State be merged in the common stock? 
What do any of you know that you did not 
learn from others? Much, no doubt — but do you 
not owe it to others from whom you have ile- 
rived instruction, to impart to them what you 
have learned from your own experience an<l ob- 
servation ? No man liveth unto himself — vrr- 
bum sal snpienli. What shall wo say of those 
counties in which there are no farmers' clubs? 
Brciliren! you are verily behind the time. Gird 
up the loins of your minds and immediately set 
you about to wipe out the reproach. What a 
powerful auxiliary such associations, in every 
county, would prove in effectuating the reforms, 
which it is the purpose of all classes of our citi- 
zens to introilucc — 

That is, to rely upon themselves as a commu- 
nity; to encourage our own mamifactures by 
buying nothing from the North which can be 
made at home ; to ship our productions in our 
own bottoms to foreign markets and import our 
own supplies; and in short, to leave nothing un- 
done which individual and associated action 
can accomplish to develop our resources of 
trade, of wealth anti of indefiendence Think 
of it. But to the report before us : 



Report to the Hole and Comer C/itb of 

Puichituu, on the mhjnt of the Tartar 
Shet'jt ami JSoryhnm. By C. V. Lfc. 

July Ist, 1859. 

At a fornior mcctinjr of the club I pre- 
sented for the iiispecti(jii of it.s tiieinhers 
" the American Farmer's New and I'liiver- 
sal Hand Book," lately printed in riiiladel- 
phia, and edited by J. W. O'Neill Among 
the many thin^ of ,i;reat interest and value 
in this valuable publication, I called the at- 
tention of the club particularly to what was 
said of the Tartar sheep and Chinc^^e su^ar 
cane. Many of the members of the club 
were so impres.«ed witli what was there said 
of the Tartar sheep, that tliey requested me 
to obtain, if I could, further intormation 
concern inji; them, and where and at what price 
they could be bought. In answer to my 
in(|uirics on this ^ubicct, I received a very 
obliging letter from Mr. O'Neill, editor of 
the " Hand Book," from which the follow- 
ing is an extract : 

*' Dr. Em:rson has had some six years' 
experience in raising the Tartar sheep, and 
not only fully endorses all I have said about 
theiu, (in the Hand Book,) but says that 
they endure the cold equally as well as the 
common breeds. As an instance of their 
prolific qualities, he refers to a ewe which 
brought forth three lambs, (two ewes and a 
buck,) in February of '54, all of which 
were raised to maturit}'. About the middle 
of November, of the same year, she brought 
t^o more lambs, and at the same time her 
two Fthrunn/ fambs each browjht a lamb — 
thui ma/cnuj the progrui/ in nine nionths no 
b'ss than srrrn. He says he has frequently 
seen four lambs at a birth, and never, ex- 
cept in the case of young ewes, as above 
mentioned, has he known of less than two. 
lie has cros.sed with other breeds, at differ- 
ent times, but witluout any satisfactory re- 
sults, as I judge — for though the fleece was 
improved, and the meat of eiiually fine fla- 
vour, yet the cross was not c<jually prolific 
with the original stock, and he has returned 
to the breeds of the full bloods. 

*' The fleece is light and adapted only to 
the manufacture of blankets, and other 
coarse woollen fabrics. Dr. K. oflTers to sup- 
ply you with a buck and two ewes of suffi- 
cient age to breed next spring, delivered in 
Philadelphia, for the sum of SoO, which is 
S1G.66 each — a very moderate price for 
fancy sheep. Some of his bucks have netted 
him $50 each. It would probably be as 



214 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



well for you to communicate with him di- 
rect. His address is, ' Dr. Governeur Em- 
ersen, 926 Walnut street, Philad'elphia.' 

" As you have planted the sorgho, and 
may probably wish to experiment on sugar, 
I will, in a few days, if I can obtain it, send 
you a printed copy of the details of experi- 
ment?? made by Joseph S. Lovering, of our 
city, (Philadelphia,) one of the most prac- 
tical and successful sugar refiners in the 
Union.'' 

I have since received from Mr. O'Neill 
the promised little pamphlet, which I will 
hand to the club with this report, deeming 
it however proper to copy and read here the 
result of the experiments it details, which 
is given (page 21) under the head of 

" SYNOPSIS." 

" 1st. That it is obvious that there is a 
culminating point in the development of 
the su2:ar in the cane, which is the best 
time for sugar-making. This point or sea- 
son I consider to be, when most, if not all 
the seeds are ripe, and after several frosts : 
say when the temperature falls to 25 or 30° 
Fahrenheit. 

"2d. That frost, or even hard freezing, 
does not injure the juice nor the sugar; but 
warm Indian-summer weather, after the frost 
of hard freezing, does injure them very ma- 
terially, and reduces both quantity and 
quality. 

'' 3d. That if the cane is cut and housed, 
or shocked in the field when in its most fa- 
vourable condition, it will probably keep un- 
changed for a long time. 

" 4th. That when the juice is obtained, 
the process should proceed continuously, and 
without delay. 

" 5th. That the clarification should be as 
perfect as possible by the time the density 
reaches 15° Baume, the syrup having the 
appearance of good brandy. 

" 6th. That, though eggs were used in 
these sniall experiments, on account of their 
convenience, bullock's blood, if to be had, 
is equally good ; and the milk of lime alone 
will answer the purpose^ in the latter case, 
however, more constant and prolonged skim- 
ming will be required to produce a perfect 
clarification, which is highly important. 

" 7th, That the concentration or boiling 
down, after clarification, should be as rapid 
;i8 possible, without scorching — shallow evap- 
orators being the best. 

" With these conditions secured, it is 



about as easy to m ke good sugar from the 
Chinese cane as to make a pot of good mush, 
and much easier than to make a kettle of 
apple-butter." 

I will only add to this synopsis the com- 
parison given on the page which begins it, 
between the yield of the sugar cane of Lou-" 
isiana and that of the sorgho cultivated in 
Pennsylvania: 

COMPARISON. 

Louisiana. 

Yield of juice per acre,. 2,236 gals. 

Yield of sugar per gallon of juice, 76 lbs. 

Yield of sugar per acre, 1,704 " 

Yield of molasses per acre, 102 gals. 

Pennsylvania. 

Yield of juice per acre. 1,847 gals. 

Yield of sugar per gallon of juice, 66 lbs. 

V , , r ' ^ Actual, 1,221 •• 

Yield of sugar per acre, {^ , ,' , Vi^^ :. 

^ ^ ' ^ Probable, 1,612 '^ 

v I 1 r 1 1 S Actual, 74 gals. 

Yield of molasses do., ^ p^^bable, 84" 

As every member of the club is as com- 
petent as I am to draw conclusions from 
experiments, I shall refrain from comment- 
ing upon them, and extract another para- 
graph from the letter of my friend, Mr. 
O'Neill. Immediately following those al- 
ready extracted is the following : 

'' Truly glad am I to learn that Virginia 
contains such a nucleus of progressive spirits 
as is comprised within your agricultural club. 
Associat'.on and combination are the great 
levers which move civilized society, and 
through them only can great results be ob- 
tained. Your efforts may now seem to meet 
with but little reward, yet, by perseverance 
year after year, in spite of every discour- 
agement, you must and will effect a radical 
change in your own vicinity, and by indi- 
rect means in- other quarters." 

It is, Mr. President, to produce the re- 
sult pi-edicted, I trust not erroneously, in 
the last extracted sentence from my friend's 
letter, that I have made this report in wri- 
ting, instead of verbally. I have thought 
that the introduction of the Tartar sheep 
and the sorgho into our husbandry might 
be beneficial to our vicinity and Common- 
wealth, and a large portion of our country, 
and that the publication of these views, 
made in our agricultural papers, by the re- 
commendation of this club, may call public 
attention to a due consideration of them, 
and that it might lead also to a due appre- 
ciation of the Farmer's Hand Book, whose 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



215 



su^'^estions and rccoiuniendations have led 
to this report. I have looked carefully 
through it, and find it to be such a work as 
every farmer ou^dit to have ; and I have 
called the attention, not only nienibers of 
this club to it, but other farmers, and all 
unite in confirming my opinion. In con- 
templating the vast importance and variety 
of the subjects treated of in this volume, 
every one of which should come within the 
purview, and most of them be embraced in 
the practice of the accom])lislied agricultur- 
ist, one is most forcibly impressed with 
the surpassing utility and true dignity of 
his calling. The effects of climates, the 
natur» of soils, the cultivation which will de- 
stroy and that which will improve them — the j 
products of the earth in grasses for his cat- 
tle, in herbs for his medicines and indul- 
gencies, in cereals for his necessities, in 
fruits and vegetiibles for his luxuries, in 
flowers for his elegancies, with the know- 
ledge of all of which, and how they should 
be treated, should he be familiar. Then 
come the fibrous plants for clothing and cord- 
age, with their seeds for oil, and others with 
juices to tinge our garments with the colors 
of beauty — then all the varieties of cattle 
for food or servitude — then all the leathered 
tribe, which increase our luxuries, and sus- 
tain our health, and adorn and make merry 
our bowers — then the insects, which help or 
which harm us — the name of the f-,rmer 
being the bee and the silk-worm, and that 
of the latter legion ; — then the mechanical 
knowledge requisite for the buildings and 
improvements of husbandry, and then the 
utilitarian discernment, the adorning fancy, 
the judgment, tbe humanity and taste ; with ' 
which, all these means of the farmer's live- 
lihood, sources of his wealth and materials 
of his happiness, should be maintained and 
increased and managed in the hest manner, 
require an exercise of intelligence and in- 
dustry and benevolence and taste demanded 
by no other profession. It is to impress 
upon the farmer, by the sight presented in 
one volume, of the large round of his duties, 
the importance and elevation of his calling, 
as well as to give him a complete and lucid 
manual of instruction in all of them that I 
hope it will please the club to commend to 
the public as heartily as I am sure they ap- 
prove it — the Farmer's Hand Book. 
» • • » » 

There is no condition so secure, as not to 



admit of chan 



gc. 



From the Xew Rnf^land Fanner. 

Coal .Ashes as a Fertilizer. 

Frikni) Brown: — Your paper is taken 
at our oflfice by A. H. Grosvenor, for the 
general instruction in agriculture garden- 
ing, &c., at our section of the Shaker Vil- 
lage at Harvard. Among the farmers' read- 
ing matter it contains, 1 have been pleased 
to observe, an occa.sional article upon the 
general uses of coal aslies as a fertilizer. 

In your last i.ssue, the editor of the Cortv- 
men ial Bulletin has presented to the public 
a good article on this subject, but in peru- 
sing it, I was led to suppose that many dis- 
posed to be skeptical on this subject would 
argue that the editors' test of anthracite 
coal was not a clear one, because he incorpo- 
rated with said ashes equal parts of horse 
manure and loam in one general heap, as an 
auxiliary to his pleasant half acre. 

Such skeptical friends would be apt to 
contend that the horse manure did all the 
work, while the ashes, like the white, soft- 
handed gentleman farmer that simply rides 
through his plantation, received the honor, 
and made all the noise. But as we too 
think different, please allow us to state our 
reasons for endorsing his opinion. 

We consume at our large dwelling-house 
a number of tons of coal each winter, and 
having added portions of it to our com- 
posts, with little ealcution or observation, we 
determined to test it singly this past season, 
and closely observe its effects. On an old 
mowing field too much run down, we top- 
dressed a square piece of ground fairly with 
clear coal ashes early in spring. While the 
crop was growing, at all stages the differ- 
ence was perceptible. When ready for the 
scythe, it was more in quantity; and as to 
reality, it produced about equal parts of 
herds grass and red clover. If the clover 
was not introduced by the agency of the 
ashes, we know not how it was introduced, 
for four years none was seen there before, or 
in any other part of the field, and this wa» 
the only clover seen in said field the past 
season. Both grass and clover were more 
vigorous, green and lively within the top- 
dressed square, and just as vi.sible all around 
was the exhausted crop, which said as audi- 
bly as grass could say, in its declining state, 
that it had received no such assistance 
from this individual fertilizer. 

On a hill-side not at all renowned for it» 
wealthy properties in soil, we planted the 



21G 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



Davis Seedlings and Jenny Lind potatoes in 
clear coal ashes, half a shovel full in a hill. 
Below, on equally as good ground, we plant- 
ed the same kinds of potatoes in compost 
manure, and the coal ashes single handed, 
turned out the largest, best, fairest and most 
numerous quantity of potatoes. In reality, 
they were the best we raised on the farm. 
Almost side by side, in compost manure, 
our potatoes were somewhat infected with 
rot ; in the ashes they were all healthy and 
Bound almost to a potato. 

In kindling fires, it is true, we use shav- 
ings and a little light wood, but the quan- 
tity I consider almost too insignificant to 
take into the account. 

These experiments convince us that as a 
fertilizer, anthracite coal ashes possess the 
life and energy to produce the above efiects 
on common crops. Hence, whatever theo- 
retical lecturers or writers may present to 
undervalue the better qualities of the arti- 
cle, while it continues to improve quantities 
and qualities of grass, and give us sounder 
and larger crops of potatoes, we conclude to 
give it an honorable standing among the 
general agents which have long held undis- 
puted station in the farmers* compost. 

Wm. Leonard. 

South Groton, Oct., 1859. 



Chemical Properties of Tobacco. 

During the process of curing, tobacco 
undergoes important chemical changes. 
Its peculiar properties are owing to the 
presence of several remarkable compounds, 
of which one called "nicotine," and another 
called "nicotianine," are most important. — 
Nicotine is an alkaline substance, and has the 
form of an oily liquid when separated from 
Other compounds. In its concentrated forip, 
it is a most deadly poison ) but when taken 
in the dilute condition in which it reaches 
the stomach in chewing, or lungs in smoking 
"the weed," its effects are greatly modified. 
The quantity of nicotine varies in the dif- 
ferent qualities of tobacco cultivated in the 
game region, and still more does it vary in 
that cultivated in different countries. The 
Havana has about 2 per cent of nicotine — 
hence its mildness. Virginia (best manu- 
factured) tobacco has 5 or 6 por cent, while 
the stronger varieties have about 7 per cent. 
The French tobacco has from 3 to 8 per 
cent of nicotine, according to the region in 
which it grows. Nicotianine is a more vola- 



tile substance than nicotine, and is more 
odoriferous. The pleasant odor of good 
tobacco is due to this compound chiefly. 

The nicotine and nicotianine do not exist in 
the green leaf, but are formed during the 
curing of the tobacco, from substances 
already in the plant in variable quantities. 
If the leaves are dried very rapidly, these 
compounds are not fully formed; and if the 
heat is raised too high in firing, they may 
both disappear to some extent, by being 
either volatilized or decomposed. They 
both contain nitrogen, and, like all other 
compounds containing that element, are 
readily decomposed. Hence the firing 
should be conmienced at a low temperature 
which should be gradually increased, and 
may be advantageously suspended at night. 
The temperature should never rise above 
120°. 

Tobacco-barns should be closely planked, 
or in some way made close, having windows 
for ventilation, which may be opened or 
closed at pleasure. Smaller, and hence 
safer fires, will be sufficient in such houses. 
Curing } ellow tobacco with cliarcoal at a 
high temperature, kept up day and night, 
is recommended. 

"It is best to five all grades of shij^ping 
tobacco, and cure it a dark nutmeg color. 
^ ^ ^ From 24 to 36 hours after cut- 
ting, if the tobacco is ripe — if not, from 36 
to 48 hours, according to the weather — 
seems to be about the right time to com- 
mence firing. Begin with small fires, and 
bring the tobacco to a proper state, and then 
increase the fires." 



Rope Making. 

The name "rope" is generally applied to 
the larger descriptions of corda_i:e, such as 
exceed an inch in circumference, though 
the principles of formation are much the 
same for cordage of every size, and the 
smaller sizes are known by various names. 
Those large ropes which are said to be 
cable-laid are formed by the combination of 
smaller ropes twisted round their common 
axis, just as the shroud-laid ropes are com- 
posed of strands twisted round their com- 
mon axis. As cable-laid ropes are harder 
and more compact than others, this mode of 
formation has been adopted for ropes to be 
exposed to the action of water, even though 
their thickness may not be very great. 
Ropes formed by plaiting instead of twist- 



I860.] 



TH£ SOUTHERN PLANTJSR. 



217 



ing arc niado use of for some purposes in 
wliich pliability is especially needed, they 
beinj^ more supple and less liable to cnt-an- 
gltinicnt tlian those of the ordinary make; 
8ueh i-opes are jrenerally prel'erred where 
the rope has to pass over pulleys of snuill 
diameter. Flat ropes, which are valuable 
for sjiecial purposes, are either formed of 
two or more small ropes placed side by bide, 
and united by sewini::, lapping, or interlacing 
with thread or smaller ropes, or of a num- 
ber of strands of shroud-laid rope similarly 
united. In either case it is necessary that 
the component ropes or strands be alternate- 
ly of a right hand and left hand twist that 
the rope may remain in a quiescent stjite. 

Many experiments have bc«'n made to 
test the loss of strength by the ordinary 
twist given to ropes. Dumahel prepared 
the following stitement to show the compar- 
ative strength of ropes formed of the .same 
hemp, and the same weight per fathom, but 
twisted respectively to two-thirds, three- 
fouths, and four-fifths of the length of their 
component yarns. In rope of two thirds 
twist, the weight boine in two experiments 
was 4,01)8 and 4,250 pounds; three-fourths 
twist, 4,850 and 6,753 pounds ; four-fifths 
twist 6,205 and 7,o07 pounds. The result 
of these experiments led Dumaiiel to try 
the practicability of making ropes without 
any twist, the 3-arns being wrapped round 
to keep them together; these had great 
strengfh, but very little durability. In 
shroud or hawser-laid ropes the usual reduc- 
^ tion of length by twisting is one-third; but 
cable-laid ropes further shortened, so that 
20 I fathoms of yarn are required to make 
120 of cable. A hawser-laid rope 6 inches 
in circumfcrenee by 120 fathoms long, 
weighs about 10 cwts. ; a cable-laid rd^c 12 
inches in circumference and 120 fathoms 
long, weighs 80 cwts.; a hawser-laid rope 6 
inches in circumference will bear a weight 
of 140 cwts. The tarring of ropes some- 
what impairs their strength, but renders 
them more durable. 



Effects of Heat upon Meat. 

Prof Johnston, in his (Miemistry of Com- 
mon Life, says that a well cooked piece of 
meat should be full of its own juice, or nat- 
ural gravy. In roasting, therefore it should 
be exposed to a (juick fire, that the external 
surface njay be made to contract at once 
and the albunu'n to coagulate, before the 
juice has had time to escape from within. 
The same observations apply to boiling; 
when a piece of beef or mutton is plurjged 
into boil.ing water, the outer part contracts, 
the albumen which is near the surface coag- 
ulates, and the internal juice is prevented 
either from being diluted or weakened by 
the admi.ssion of water among it. When 
cut up, therefore, the uieat yields umch 
gravy, and is rich in flavor, llence a beef- 
steak or mutton chop is done (juickly, and 
over a quick fire, that the natural juices 
may be retained. On the other hand, if 
the meat be done over a slow fire, its pores 
remain opdn, the juice continues to flow 
from within as it has dried from the surface, 
and the flesh pines and becomes dry, hard 
and unsavory. Or if it be put in cold and 
tepid water, which is afterwards brought to 
a boil, much of the albumen is extracted 
before it coagulates, the natural juices, for 
the most part flow out, and the meat served 
is nearly tasteless. Hence to prepare good 
boiled meat it should at once be put into wa- 
ter already brought to boil. But to make 
beef tea, mutt^m broth, and other beef 
soups, the flesh should be ))ut in cold water, 
and this afterward very slowly warmed, and 
finally boiled. The advantage derived Irom 
simmering — a term not unhequent in cook- 
ery books — depends very much upon the 
eflecta of slow boiling, as above explained. 



Sweet Potato Pie. — Boil the potatoes 
very soft, then peel and mash them. To 
every quarter of a pound put one quart of 
milk, three tablespoonsfull of butter, four 
beaten eggs, together with sugar and nut- 
meg to the taste. It is improved by a glass 
of wine. 

Good stables save good hay and grain. 



Self-Government. — Parents I to which 
danger had you rather expose your son — to 
the danger of an ungoverncd hor^c or his 
ungoverned icif? Depend upon it that 
"self" needs government, before your son is 
safe to enter upon the career of life more 
than his horse needs "breaking" before he 
can venture to trust him for a safe journey. 
As you love your boy then, see to it that he 
is governed and well governed wIkmi young; 
then will he go far and high in the career of 
usefulness and happiness of life. Teach 
him to govern himself frat, and then he 
will be able to govern every thing that need 
be brought to his service. 



218 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



From the Southern Fnrnier and Planter. 

A Practical Paper upon Gardening, Ditch- 
ing and Improving Land. 

To which icas aicardpd the iirtmnmi of 
Twentjj DoIlai'K, hy the State Agricultu- 
ral Societij of South Carolina, at its An- 
nual Meeting, in Novemher, 1859. 



BY D. WYATT AIKEN. 



INTRODUCTION. 

In agriculture, theory and practice arc by 
no means correlative terms. Theory depicts 
the planter's life one of ease, and portrays 
his arduous labors a task of leisure, while 
it flatters the sluggard, equipped with a lit- 
tle scientific knowledge, that planting, of all 
other pursuits, should be his. In theory 
''Paul may plant and Apollos may water," 
and the increase follows ex necessitate. 

Theoretically, stimulating manures have 
only to be heaped upon all lands indiscrimi- 
nately, and fat harvests will be reaped; or 
gullies are prevented by tapping the sub- 
soil; or the level has only to be applied, and 
hill-side ditches are located. Theoretically, 
grain must be sown in level furrows, or seed 
must be planted upon horizontal beds, to' 
prevent the escape of the virgin soil. In 
fact, theory in agriculture attaches plausi- 
bility to the most visionary schemes. 

How different is the result of actual 
practice ! Practically, agriculture climbs 
high in the scale of sciences; it developes 
thought, matures judgment, and requires, 
for execution, untiring energy, perseverance 
and industry. The skillful planter stops not 
to theorize about the result effected by cer- 
tain means applied ; plow in hand, he grap- 
ples with the soil, sows his seed, vigilantly 
watches the progess of his growing crop, 
and after assiduous cultivation, at harvest 
time anticipates a yield commensurate with 
his unabated zeal. It is he who understands 
best the caption of this essay, and knows 
that the improvement of land consists in 
increasing its productive capacity. Nor 
does any one know better than himself that 
this end is attained in three ways : 

1st, by ditching, i. e. hill-side ditching, 
draining and bottom ditching. 

2nd, by cultivation, i. e. horizontal and 
grade culture. 

3rd, by rotation of crops and manuring. 

The first step, then, towards improving 
any plot of exhausted undulating land, is 



the' location of a series of ditches, so ar- 
ranged as to empty, with least detriment to 
the land, all the surplus rain-water into the 
creek or branch bottoms below, or into -the 
adjacent forests, or in some direction out of 
the field. To do this effectually the land 
must be studied. Its elevations and de-- 
pressions must be studied ; they must first 
be seen by the eye, and then made more 
perceptible by applying the level. The most 
practised eye should never venture to locate 
a ditch without the assistance of the level, 
in hilly lands, and the more moderately un- 
dulating the land, the more difficult the 
task, and the more judgment required to ac- 
complish it successfully. It often happens 
that the particular inclinations of a large 
field are westward, while the general decli- 
nation of the land is eastward, and vice 
versa, so that the level, when giving suf- 
ficient fall to the ditch, seems to the eye to 
be laying off a perfectly level line. 

The nature of the land being understood, 
the next question is, where shall be the 
mouth or the source of the ditch. If the 
mouth be determined upon, commence there, 
and with the level run backwards or up the 
ditch, always following, and never straining 
or forcing the level Irom its indicated di- 
rection. If the source can be more easily 
fixed, apply the level there and run towards 
the mouth, always observing one absolute 
requisite in hill-side ditching, viz: never let 
any part of the ditch near the source have 
a greater fall than any portion between this 
point and the mouth ; for if such should be , 
the case, the water in this steeper portion, 
having an accelerated motion, becomes re- 
tarded as it reaches the leveler section, de- 
posits its rolling sand, and heaps up upon 
the tt^atei in advance, and most probably 
causes a break in the ditch-bank just there. 
Where sudden curves occur in circling ab- 
rubt knolls, the ditch should be made wider 
and not steeper than the succeeding portions. 

The general direction of all ditches, if 
practicable, should be down the branch; for 
the water must, sooner or later, reach the 
bottom, and the lower down the bottom it is 
emptied from the ditches, the le«s injury 
sustained by the bottom lands above. 

The distances between ditches should be 
best known by the planters upon their re- 
spective farms, depending upon the declivi- 
ties of the land and the nature of the soil. 
On steep hill-sides, ditches should be dis- 
tant from each other from twenty to thirty 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



219 



^anls; upon gently iiu'lined planes, from 
sixty to two hundred yards; upon stitf clay 
lands, close together; upon loamy soils or 
sandy lands, further apart. In a similar 
way should the fall of* each ditch bo de- 
terniinoil, varvini: from two to four inches 
in every twelve feet, always cO)servini^ to 
have the first or upper half of <he ditch 
8li;;htly uiore horizontal than the last or 
lower end. 

Where the land is to be horizontalized, 



with the sliovel. Tliese sinks in the ditch 
act as deposits for the soil otherwise washed 
away, and can be emptied at leisure by scat- 
tering the sand in the wash below, which, 
when mixed with the clay |)revi«m.sly thrown 
there, produces an improved soil. 

DITCHING WET LANDS. 

Wet lands cannot be drained by li ill-side 
ditches, but must Iiave drains dug for the 
purpo.se, either blind or open drains. From 



the tlitehes should have somewhat more fall, the lowest spot of the wet plot (found by 
than where the grade system is adopted, j the level) run a straight line to the nearest 
simply because where the horizontalization ; point, where an exit from the fielder into 
is complete, not enough water flows in the : the creek can be obtained; along this lino 
ditch to wash it into a gully; and when ajdig the ditch circling, if necessary, any 
freshet occurs, any water-furrow tilling up intervening or inimoveable obstruction, and 
and breaking over, produces a "wash" from |when complete, observe if the water follows 
this point in a straight line to the ditch be- the course of the ditch. From the point 
low, and empties into the ditch at right where this drain began, continue the ditch 
angles, to its bank, a colunm of water which j through the wet spot until its source reaches 
will certainly wash away the bank, unIe.«JS | the opposite side, or perhaps the highest 
sufficient fall is given to the ditch to change point of the wet land. To be mo.st eflfectual, 
the direction of the water before this result ! the ditch should be left open. If necessary 
is produced. In the grade system, where to be closed, lay tiling in the bottom, and 
the ditch receives con.stahtly the rain-water i throw the dirt back upon this tiling. If 
as soon as it begins to flow in the water-fur- 1 tiling is not at hand, many substitutes can 
row, the injury to the ditch bank is not so be had by the planter. Three pine poles 
great, because the ditch carries off the , pealed, (the larger the better,) and two of 
water gradually from its commencement to, them laid in the bottom of the ditch, and 
flow. one just over these two, make a capital 

To make a hill-side ditch, run the first underground trough. An occasional rock 
furrow with the level; on the upper-side and thrown into the ditch covered with slabs, 
close to this furrow run three other furrows ^ the sawed face downwards, answers a good 
with a common shovel-plow. Draw the purpose. The ditch half-filled with small 
earth from these four furrows, with hoes or J stones, these covered with brush, and the 
scoops, to the lower side of the first furrow. I ditch filled with dirt, is the best method of 
Then require all hands there at work to i undcrdraining. 

walk several times the entire length of the I I once owned a sour spot of land contigu- 
ditch upon this earth, thereby compacting it jous to a road, in which there was always a 
for a bank, while the plowman is running I mud-hole. Along the edge, and through 
three more furrows just where the last three I the whole length of this sour pot, parallel to 
were run. Treat this earth the same as be- 1 the road, I dug a ditch tbree feet deep and 
fore, and run two more furrows on the up-; eighteen inches wide. From the middle of 
per side of the ditch, draw out the dirt, this ditch, and at right angles to it, a similar 
walk the bank thoroughly, and the ditch is, ditch was dug across the road, opening into 
complete, with an almost level bottom, there .the hillside below. These ditches were 
being a slight depression on the side next filled eighteen inches deep with small stones, 
the hill. [and the earth previously taken frou) these 

If a ditch should withstand the ordinary 'ditches returned upon the stones. To this 
rains of a season, and break over during an I day the road is dry in moderately wet 
extraordinary freshet, it should not be aban- 1 weather, and that sour spot of land mellow, 
doned, but should be deepened for ten or i fertile and productive. 

fifteen feet on either side of the "break," In draining wet spots on bottom lands, 
sufticiently to furnish earth for a new bank i the draining ditch should always be run in 
and to fill up partially the " wash" recently ^ a straight line to the creek or branch, enter- 
made, as fur as the earth can be thrown I ing the same at an acute angle, and the dirt 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



from this ditch invaribly thrown on the 
lower side of the ditch. 

DITCHING BOTTOM LANDS. 

The protection of bottom land, by a sue- 1 
cessful system of ditching, involves an out-| 
lay too heavy to be borne by the majority of | 
planters, particularly in the middle and | 
upper Districts of our State, and hence the ! 
unsightly banks of sand, the decayed and : 
dying timber, the crooked streams, and the 
prevalence of sickness on almost every plan- 
tation containing more or less of these 
valuable bottoms. Many planters, too, are 
prone to charge their willful neglect in this 
matter upon their next neighbor below. 
They say, "he will not ditch below, andi 
hence, ditching mine is only digging a ditch | 
to be filled up with sand." Such a plea is! 
unwarranted, because any bottom worth the 
labor to be bestowed can be successfully 
ditched, and protected in cultivation, regard- 
less of the bottoms above or below. 

Before the main ditch is dug, drains 
should be cut on each side of the bottom, 
through its entire length, and just where 
the adjoining hill-side and bottom come to- 
gether. The size of these drains is, of 
course, dependent upon the quantity of 
water flowing from the hill-sides after a 
heavy fall of rain, or upon the uses to which 
they may be put. If the bottom is to be 
enclosed with a fence, these drains may be 
three and a half feet wide at top, one foot 
at bottom, three foet deep and all the dirt 
thrown on the lower (or branch) side. Upon 
this bank an economical fence may be built, 
while the drain answers the purpose of car- 
rying off the rain-water coming from the 
hill-sides. If care is taken to give these 
drains a fall of one inch in twenty feet, and 
their exits made at the lowest ends of the 
bottom, the water they contain is kept en- 
tirely from the volume, which usually flows 
in the branch. These drains finished, the 
main ditch must be dug, which should only 
follow the channel of the branch when it is 
in the lowest part of the bottom, (which is 
not always the case,) or when it is nearly 
straight. The ditch should always be 
straight, in the lowest bed of the bottom, 
and large enough to draw the water of all 
ordinary rains. Unless, from necessity, it 
should never run through the middle o^ the 
bottom, but have at least two-thirds of the 
bottom behind the bank, there being but 
one bank to the ditch; then if the ditch 



has to encounter a freshet, only one-third of 
the bottoi^i crop is liable to be overflown, as 
the water tn this third must be as deep as 
the ditch bank before the two-thirds behind 
the bank can be injured. If the ditch be 
in the middle of the bottom, only one-half 
the crop is protected; and if the dirt be 
thrown on each side of the ditch, making 
two banks, either or both are liable to be 
destroyed, and the entire crop lost. These 
ditch banks should be made solely of earth, 
unless a foundation cannot be obtained with- 
out the use of logs. Logs and brush put 
into a bank, made to confine running water, 
are oftener than otherwise an injury to the 
bank: At such places leakage is almost cer- 
tain, and where either the logs or the brush 
project from the face of the bank, the con- 
stant laving of the water will, sooner or 
later, undermine the bank or percolate 
through behind the logs, and ultimately 
create a "crevace." If properly ditched, 
riQ lands remunerate the planter more hand- 
somely than his bottoms. If improperly 
ditched, no lands subject him to a greater 
and more useless expense. 

SYSTEMS OF CULTURE. 

Some agricultural writers are accustomed 
to speak of the different systems of culture. 
I incline to the opinion there should be but 
two systems of culture, viz: The horizontal 
and the grade systems. To speak of the up 
and down hill method of destroying land, as 
a system, is akin to calling ours a system of 
stock-raising, when our cattle and stock 
generally are turned out to seek a suste- 
nance upon the unenclosed pasture lands of 
our neighbors. The one is as systematic as 
the other, and both equally condemned by 
charity and science. 

Perfect horizontalization is certainly prac- 
ticable, but that is sure protectection to both 
land and crop against Freshets, however 
great, I hold to be an error. Innumerable 
causes, which the vigilant eye of the most 
skillful and energetic planter cannot pre- 
vent, will, at one time or another, produce 
"breaks" upon the hill-side, and often upon 
a comparatively level plot of land.. A tree, 
a stump, a rojk, an unfinished furrow, ir- 
regular plowing, and, most of all, shallow 
plowing, are all obstacles in the way of the 
horizontalizer. That these should discour- 
age him, is no argument, however, against 
the horizontal system of cultivating our 
crops. 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTEB. 



221 



The prime necessity in preparino; a field 
for horizontalizution is, to protect it perfectly 
t'ron all water except what falls upon itlroiu 
the heavens above. The adjoiuinir ibrests, 
or roads, should be so ditched as to prevent 
any water ilowing into the enclosure, for it 
is most often the running- water, and not tliC 
falling rain, which destroys the labor of the 
horizontalizer. 

This prevention being effected, the plan- 
ter is ready for his work, and begins hori- 
zontalizing by finding with his level, the 
highest point of the field, and the longest 
row or bed which passes through this point. 
The first corn or cotton bed may not be over 
ten feet long, and must be straight. On 
each side of this straight bed two or three 
more must be "laid off," each bending in- 
wards at the ends, until it meets a fellow 
at the oppositd|^de of the straight row. The 
plow^ team must never stop until the ends do 
meet, for stopping the team before the 
shovel reaches the end of the bed, leaves a 
mound in the water-furrow, which dimin- 
ishes its capacity to hold water, and often 
causes a "break." This irregular plowing 
will certainly be done, unless each plowman 
is instructed as to his certain duty; i. e., 
never to stop his mule until his shovel 
reaches the extreme end of the bed. 

These few being finished, at a distance 
from the last bed equal to the space occu- 
pied by a couple of beds, apply the level. 
It will, directly, as you follow it, diverge 
from the last bed, and assume a direction 
possibly the reverse of that indicated by the 
eye. But the horizontalizer should always 
bear in mind, he is to follow the level, and 
not the level follow him. This guide-row 
now laid off by the level, may reach the op- 
posite side of the field six or eight beds 
distant from the row from which it was \ ut 
six feet at the commencement. This di- 
vergence, which is strictly a spirical angle, 
must be filled up by short rows, the first 
being " laid off" paiallel to the long guide- 
row, and the return furrow parallel to the 
short completed bed, observing as above to 
make their angle of union conjplete, and 
not allow the plow to stop as soon as the 
team reaches the end of the row. 

This much done, the planter begins again 
with his level three, four, five or six (never 
more) rows below the lower end of the last 
guide-row, and.foUows his level in the op- 
posite direction from the row last run. This 
row may diverge and its end be five and 



twenty beds distant from the beginning of 
the row above. If so the level is again ap- 
plied in the angVe, and several short rows 
run, when the divergencies are filled in as 
directed above. If this method is followed, 
the lowest point of the field will ultimately 
be reached, and none of the work o( to day 
injured by the rains oi' to-night. The same 
direction should be followed in the cultiva- 
tion of the crop — always begin on the high- 
est point. If the planter begins to hori- 
zontalize at the foot of the hill, and climbs 
the hill, all the labors of to day may be de- 
stroyed by the rains of to-morrow. If 
galled places are to be encountered, the 
horizontalizer should not be deteried, but 
follow his level across them; it knojss how 
to manage broken as well as smooth surfaces, 
and will turn the planter up as he ap- 
proaches, and down as he recedes from these 
spots, without the assistance of a thought. 
If gullies are met with, they should be filled 
up by dtms of stone, brush, pine-tops, with 
the straAV pointing up the gully, or by driv- 
ing stakes, a few inches apart, across the 
gully, and interlining willow or green limbs. 
The last span or two of the level being in- 
clined slightly towards the gully, will, after 
a few heavy rains, furnish earth enough to 
partially fill an ordinary gully. 

A field in small grain stubble, or one 
previously cultivated in corn or cotton, is 
more easily horizontalized than one freshly 
broken up, because the smooth, worn stub- 
ble land, or the regular and equal undula- 
tions of the cotton or corn beds, do not 
present so many irregular depressions as the 
newly plowed field. The surface, more- 
over, is firmer, and does yield to the weight 
of the level. As the field is laid off hori- 
zontally, it should be bedded " out and 
out" immediately, or the irregular ridges 
between the horizontal furrows, not being 
themselves horizontal, will occupy the space 
which should be occupied by water after 
a rain, and a break is often the conse- 
quence. 

When one bed yields to the water, this 
running water does not stop until it reaches 
the hillside ditch below. Its passage 
across the beds may be a straight line, or it 
may be a zig-zag rill, washing througli one 
bed here and another there. To prevent 
these overflows entirely is practically impos- 
sible, for sometimes, falls of three, four or 
five inches of rain occur in a single after- 
noon ; and this quantity of water will fill 



222 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



up the water furrows and overflow the beds 
before the most thoroughly pulverized soil 
can absorb the half of it. On the 1 5th, 
IGth, and ITth of last May, my plantation 
was flooded by successive unusually heavy 
rains. My cotton, in stiff' clay land, had 
been planted in a scooter furrow on the 
bed, covered by a double-footed scooter 
plow, a.id harrowed off" as it was nearly all 
coming up. This harrowing had made the 
land comparatively level, and these heavy 
rains overflowed the entire crop in a sheet 
of water, without a perceptible injury to 
the land. Some of my corn was in sandy, 
loose land, planted on the top of very high 
beds, but had not been worked. The high 
horizontal beds became so saturated with 
water, and the subsoil failing to absorb it 
rapidly enough, they actually slipped, in 
regular land-slide fashion, down against the 
bed next below, without even diverting the 
young corn from its erect, growing position. 
No system of horizontal culture can sur- 
vive such freshets. ]5ut they do not often 
occur, and their evil effects must be remi- 
died afterwards, which I propose doing 
thus : Just where the break first occurs 
across any bed, a rectangular hole is dug, 
say eighteen inches wide, and three, four, 
six, or ten feet long, (as the damage done 
may require, parallel to the bed, and deep 
enough to furnish earth to replace the 
broken places in the next few beds below. 
The distance between this hole and the 
next hill-side ditch below is divided into so 
many equal parts, and at each point of di- 
vision a similar rectangular hole is dug, 
furnishing earth for the breaks below, and 
so on to the ditch. Should the ditch break 
over, the same kind of hole is dug in the 
ditch to procure earth for a new bank. 
These holes will, in time, be filled up by 
the constant plowing beside and near them, 
and by the rain-water draining into them 
from the adjacent water-furrows, bringing 
along with it more or less soil or sand. 
The hole in the ditch will, after the first 
rain, be filled with excellent soil, to be 
scattered upon the washed spots below. If. 
such rectangular holes be dug across gullies j 
at small intervals from each other, and the | 
dirt thrown on the lower side, they will 
rapidly fill up a gully, as the rain will 
soon fill the holes to their original level, 
with sand. 

GRADE CULTURE. 

The Grade culture is best adapted to hill- 



sides and wet spots. If the wet places are 
higher than the branch, they may some- 
times be dried sufficiently for cultivation 
by deep plowing and a gradual full given 
to each row towards the branch. Such 
places are generally dried by blind ditches. 
But on hill sides this system is more feasi- 
ble than the horizontal system, because it is 
impossible for a horizontal corn or cotton 
bed, on a steep hill-side, to contain all the 
water that falls into it. In practicing this 
system of culture, a furrow should be run 
by the level, with one inch fall to every 
span of the level, beginning at the highest 
point of the hill, on the side where the 
ditches empty, and running in a direction, 
crossing ditches, and not stopping until the 
hill is circled or the bottom reached. Fill 
in the angle as directed for horizontalizing, 
and, if short rows occur, th|i^ must have a 
slight inclination in the same direction. 
The reason for beginning these furrows at 
the mouths, and not at the source of the 
ditches is obvious. If a row with one inch 
fall begun at the source of a ditch having 
three inches fall, they must diverge from 
each other, and a furrow so run from the 
source of the second ditch, for instance, 
upon a hill-side, would very soon strike 
the first ditch above on the lower side or 
behind the bank, and having a descending 
grade, would empty its water against the 
bank and form a gully. 

There are circumstances under which the 
horizontal is the most destructive system of 
culture : 

In the first place, if the planter is not 
indefatigable and unceasingly watchful, all 
the little breaks over his horizontal beds 
will soon become gullies, never to be ob- 
literated. 

Secondly — If the seasons are too wet, 
his corn fires, and his cotton grows too 
much to weed. And if too dry, the roots 
of both corn and cotton are scorched. Du- 
ring the past season horizontalizing has 
been injurious to my own crop. An ex- 
cessive drought of eleven weeks and three 
days baked the la'nd until any little shower 
would deposit puddles of water in my hor- 
izontal water-furrows, which, when heated 
by the scorching sun, burnt the surface 
roots of both corn and cotton. 

And thirdly — Horizontalizing requires 
the planter to be content with moderate 
crops and an improving plantation, in lieu 
of large crops and speedy emigration. 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



228 



THE LEVEL 



The lovel being among instni i.cnts the 



luts near IhB house,) and allow the last 

fourth to rest. Prejiarc tliis resting fourth 



peas, vines and all. 

MANURING. 



, , , ,. ^ I "^ .• • ^ I ui , proi)erly and thorou;; i y in th<; ial , lor cot- 
planters reliance, a de.'jcnption is probably if * ,. -^ ^ • "^ i,i * 
^ . . 1. *i T .J c. ^iv,l. 't'>» the next spring. IMant corn next 
retnusito ot the one I use, and so often i , •' ^^ . . , 

•, 1- • *L- o 1 !• 1 !■ spring where cotton was this year, and sow 

spoken ot in this essay, heveral kinds ot i ' i'" • .i • i- n ,, "^ i i <• 

/ , , •'i . . ,• . 'small gram this fall upon the corn land ot 

levels are recommended — some too teuiousi , . *" „,, . i.', , , ,. ,i • 
. , ,, 1 4U ♦ i: , » 1 ♦• „l this year. J he stubble land ot this year 

to handle, and others too complicated tor ^ •' ^ •' 

, , . ' T • ' 1 p, rests next year, 

plantation purpo.ses. 1 use simply a ralter * • i . .• i i r .u 

{,,.*,'... 11 „ A similar rotation may be made ot the 

level ot twelve teet span, made by my own I ^ , . .i i i, . • 

. 1 w «i ♦., pet patches near the house. J'ut one in 

negro carpenter, and altoLretner accurate;^ ^ * • u «. i .. • 

u 1- au 1 1 * ' 1 4. • potatoes, one in barrey and one in turnips; 

enou'jh tor the planter. A phnnmet is or- 1 f^ ^ .i V .i ^ <j . • li 

,. ., ** 1 J * *k- I 1 1 * 1 let the fourth rest, t^ow .turnips on the 

dmanly attached to this level, but where j . i i , ^ n . • • i i i 

,. / . • 1 • •* I 1 rested land; follows turnips with barley, 

perfect accuracy is required, a spirit level! , , , '. . ^ ^ », .•'' 

r . . . -' , ' . -.' . , , and barley with potiitoes. how peas on the 

18 hint/rtf upon the cross-bar oi the level, . , •' , ^, , . ', , 

1 1 • 1 » X- I u- irestiny: land, and when ripe p ow under 

one end being made stationary by a hinge, i i- j if 

and the other fVec to move up and down. 

In using the level, I take with me into 
the field a small boy, with a hoc. Placing | To improve land by manuring, every 
the level where I wish to begin, he is made' vestige of vegetable matter left on the land 
to dig a hole in front of each foot of ' af\crMiurvesting should be plowed under, 
the level. 8t;irting in the direction I i and nothing should be burned, 
wish to go, the rear foot of the level I |f foreion manures are to be used, as 
is placed where the front foot stood, and guano or phosphates, they should be rolled 
as soon as the proper pitch or level is |in uioistencd cotton seed. The lint will 
found, " chop," is cried by myself, and the absorb the manure, and aflbrd the easiest 
boy digs another hole in front of the fore- ! „iethod of scattering it. This compost, 
most foot of the level. This proceeding is|^vhen used on small grain, should be sown 
continued to the end of the row or ditch. 'broadcast in such (quantities as the planter 
The fresh dirt from these holes can be seen 'thinks he can best aflord it. For cotton 
for many yards, and are plowed through by 'or corn it should be drilled. I have al- 
myself, leading my gentle mule, and a V ays found the heavier the manure, ca- 
trusty plowman holding the handles. I f^ris paribus, the more abundant the 
lead, following the course of the holes, and yield. 

he holds the plow ere:t; no line is used at, l^Voni thirty to fifty bushels of raw cot- 
all. I greatly prefer this extra labour to ton seed per acre, broadcasted, is fine ma- 
♦he "gee" and "haw" movements of the nuring for small grain; and from twenty 
very best plowman. Some planters u.-^e to thirty in the drill, is ecjually good for 
little sticks instead of digging holes with cotton or corn. My experience is, that 
the hoe. The hoc i.s easier carried than an cotton seed, composted with any kind of 
armful of sticks. If the level is followed, ,„anure, is UK.re profitable than the same 
and never driven, it will never lead the quantity of either applied alone, 
planter astray. • ^\]l home-made manures should be ap- 

The third, and probably most important plied broadcast. A large bulk in this way 
point, in improving lands, is the rotation covers but a small area of ground, but that 
of crops, and the accumulation and appli- area is procuctivc for several years, it mat- 
cation of manures. A few words will suf- ters little what is planted upon it. In the 
fice for my views (which is my practice) on drill or in the hill, such manures benefit 
these subjects. the immediate crop, but they must be ap- 

plied often to produce lasting effects. 

A minute description of the mndii.^ ope- 

Divide the plantation, as far as practica-' raz/r/t necessary to enlarge the manure 
ble, into four, ecjual parts— as many fields heaps, does not properly belong to this cs- 
as you please. Upon one of these fourths say, but the general methods of making 
plant cotton, upon another corn, upon a manure may not here be inappropriately re- 
third small grain, (wheat, rye, and oats — latcd. 
let the barley and turnip patches be peti Id the first place^ stated times and regu- 



ROTATION. 



224 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April, 



lar hands should be emplo}ed to collect 
trash, leaves, and litter for every spot where 
every kind of stock is required to stand 
or rest, night or day. The stables, the cow- 
house, the hog-pen, the stieep-house, and 
the lots surrounding these houses should be 
regularly littered. When this litter was 
well trampled in the lots, it should be 
raked up into large heaps under slwJier, 
during; dry weather; it should never be 
touched in wet weather* These heaps com- 
posted with cotton seed early in the spring, 
make the best possible manure for cotton. 
Stable, cow-house, or sheep-house manure, or 
all manures made under shelter, should be 
moved but once, directly from the shelter 
to the stubble land upon which cotton is 
to grow the following season. This stub- 
ble resting the entire year, may be manur- 
ed or " broken up" whenever time and the 
season will admit. Manure hauled out in 
dry weather (for in wet weather neither 
wagon or hoof should enter t\ field) during 
the spring, or summer, or fall, and throw 
in heaps of ten bushels each, will remain 
upon this stubble until time can be had to 
scatter and plow it in without a material 
loss of any of its virtues. It is, however, 
easier and more economical to scatter ma- 
nure from the wagon, and plow in as scat- 
tered. 

In the second place, no rainy days should 
be lost on a plantation, unless the rain falls 
very heavily and constantly. The simplic- 
ity of machinery has superseded the cotton- 
card and spinning-wheel, so that it is 
cheaper to buy than make thread. The 
time heretofore devoted to such in-door 
work should be spent making manures — 
either turning over that already made, or 
raking trash for new heaps. To expose 
negroes in this way, however, is only ec3n- 
omy when they are glad for the occasion. 
An oil suit can be made or purchased 
cheaply for each hand, which will, in one 
winter, save time enough to pay for itself, 
and it will last five or six years. 

In the third place, a sink should be dug 
in some convenient place and sheltered, 
into which is thrown the chips and trash 
from the wood-yard, sweepings from the 
house-yard, slops from the chambers, kitchen 
and wash tubs, bones, occasionally a little 
lime, salt and sand, and every dead chicken, 
pig, turkey, and, in fact, everything useless 
about the premi.'-es that can be made to rot 



The Edible Bird's Nests. 

The birds' nests which are esteemed so 
great a luxury in China have become an 
article of consumption in Paris. Although 
by far the greater portion of what is con- 
sumed under that name is nothing more 
than fish-glue, still the genuine nests can 
be purchased at about 1^70 per hundred 
weight in its crude state. The chemist, 
M. Paven, received some years ago sam- 
ples of an East Indian plant, known un- 
der the name of China moss. He recog- 
nized it as one of the alga of Java, the 
gelidium corneum. On submitting it to 
chemical analysis, he obtained clear gela- 
tine, far preferable in that obtained from 
fish. Comparing it with the Chinese birds' 
nests he found that the swalloAvs which 
make these nests must make use of the 
alga, working oiver its gelatinous matter as 
our swallows do in plastering up their nests. 
This solves a problem of long standing 
amonjr naturalists, whether the edible birds' 



with an amount of excellent manure, in- 
credible to those who have never tried it. 

In the fourth place, no planter should 
keep more stock than he can conveniently 
pen every night in summer, or house every 
night in winter. Too much stock will irre-^ 
coverably impoverish any plantation, and 
be themselves always poor. Just enough t 
stock will furnish droppings and compost 
manures worth infinitely more than the 
gleanings of which they have robbed the 
plantation. Every horse should be made 
to pay in nianure for the fodder and hay 
he eats during the year; sheep and cattle 
for the shucks they eat during the winter, 
and each hog for one-third the corn he 
eats, after penned for fattening. 

And, in the fifth place, if the planter's 
object be the reclamation of land, nothing 
should be lost — neither time nor labour; 
nor must he lack judgment or energy. In- 
deed, he must possess all the cardinal vir- 
tues. Patience must be added to his per- 
severance, idleness subtracted from his in- 
dustiy, carefulness multiplied by his vigi- 
lance, and his expenditures divided by 
economy. 

Respectfully submitted, 

D. WYATT AIKEN. 



^.^ ^ nests are of animal or vegetable origin; 

This sink will furnish the planter annually j they are both. 



I860.] 



TH£ SOUTHERN PLANT£E. 



226 



Tlio Kinp lind ■''•''i 

Arrlil)i»li()i) of Cuiilrrbuiy ^14 

Bisli.)!) of Cliiclii-^tcr IM 

Al)l)ot of Wfhiminhtcr 7 

Al)l)nt of F«»cniiip 135 

Bishop O>hofn 140 

Abbot of St. IVter's, Wiiichesitcr, 33 

Church of Battle 00^ 

Coiii.«s of Oro 190l 

Couu's Rofjer ... 818 

William of Bra lose 45Ji 

Abbot of St. EtI ward 21 

Comos Morit«m TjIjO 

William of Warrene Ojf)^ 

Olio and EUlrud 10 

The prcat proprietors granted the chi<if 
part of tlicir estates to the actual cultivators 
of the soil, receiving in general front the 



From the British Farmer » Afagazine. 

The Early English Agricultural Authors. 

IJY CUTIinEUT W. JOHNSON, ESQ., F.U.8. 

In a recent number of this valuable mag- 
azine I endeavoured to trace some of the 
earliest-written laws relating to the agricul- 
ture of our country from old IJritish days to 
the time of Henry VIII. It was in that 
reign that the fiist two works on English 
farming were pritited. These were the trea- 
tises of Bishop Grotehead (or Greathead) 
and of Sir Anthony Fitzherbert. To these 
very curious little works I propose in this 
paper to direct my readers' attention. 

It will be well, however, if we first briefly 
pause to remeniber what kind of tenantry — 

what sized farms were held by the husband- 'under-tenai.ts certain proportions of what- 
men to whom those two learned authors ad-; ever might be the productions of the farms, 
dressed themselves. As I have on a pre- 1 Thus we find one tenant stating, " I give 
vious occasion remarked, when alluding to, food to seventy swine in that woody allot- 
the early notices of English farming, the nient called Wulf'cudinlch, and five waggons- 
native Britons, it is very certain, appropria- Ifull of good twigs ; and every year an oak 
ted but small portions of tho land for rais-jfor building, and others for necessary fires, 
ing corn, or otlier cultivated vegetables, and and sufficient wood fi)r burning." (B/de, 
the rest of the country was left cni\Te\y\ I/isf. Append. /.Hi).) The rent of ten hides 
open, aff"ording a common pasturage for their ' of land were even regulated by two of the 
cattle, and 7>o//»«^/y'' for their swine. Under j laws of King Ina. They enacted that the 
the Koman government the extent of culti- tenant of such extent of land should render 
vated ground must have considerably in- ; to the lord ten vessels of honey, three hun- 
creased; yet the oldest writers agree that by dred loaves, twelve casks of Welsh ale, 
far the greatest proportion of the country ^ thirty of clear ale, two old rams, ten weth- 
was occupied by heaths, woods, and other ers, ten geese, twenty hens, ten cheeses, one 
unreclaimed wastes. cask of butter, five salmon, twenty pounds' 

When the Saxons established themselves weight of fodder, and one hundred eels; or 
in the island, an almost tot:il revolution in else tcji mittas of malt, five of grits, ten of 
the proprietorship of the lands must have! wheat flour, eight gammons, sixteen cheeses, 
occurred. The conf|uest was only accom- two fat cows, and in Lent eight salmon, 
plishfcd after a bloody struggle; and Vihixi ( Wt7/,his, Ltfjfs Snjro7i,2b, '^ ; Ga/r's J/ist. 
was won by the sword was considered to pos-; /j*,, 410.) Such grants were usually to the 
pess an Cijuitable title that the sword alone : tenant and his heirs forever, so long as they 
could disturb. In those days it was supiaff'orded tlic accustomed rent; and I am not 
pased that the lands of a country all be-; aware of any grant or lea.«e extending for a 
longed to the king; and oli this principle' shorter period than the life of the tenant, 
the Saxon monarchs gave to their followers An example of these occurs in the year 
whatever districts they pleased, as rewards , 852, when the abbot and monks of Mcde- 
for 'the assistance afibrded in the conquest, ■ hamsted let mmc land at Sempingham to 
reserving to themselves large portions, and a tenant named WullVed, for his life, on 
imposing certain burdens upon each estate, condition that he annually paid them sixty 
granted ( CV>/.T*« Litdrton^l, bS, 2 ; JUack-if other of wood, twelve fother of rfrir/an 
ttonr'n Comm., 45, <(t.) This was only a (coals.) six fother of turf, two tons of clear 
continuance of that feudal system that pre- 1 ale, two killed oxen, six hundred loaves, ten 
vailed upon the continent ; and ^ye may take casks of Welsh ale, one horse, thirty shil- 
the county of Sussex as an example how the , lings, and a night's lodging. {Sdjcon Chron 
land was carved out among the aristocracy iV/r, 75.) 

in the days of our Norman kings, reckoning As this feudal system declined, and was 
a hide at 100 or 150 acres: [finally cxtinguiebcd in the twelfth year of 



226 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[April 



Cliarlcs TI., so proportionalh did the hmdcd 
interest increase in prosperity. Freed from 
the burden of furnishing a soldier and his 
armour for every certain number of acres, 
and all restrictions as to land changing 
hands being removed, and the numerous im- 
positions being got rid of, with which the 
lords oppressed their sub-infeudatories, it 
fioon became a marketable species of proper- 
ty ; and, as money and nicrchandise increas- 
ed, and the proprietor lived less upon his 
estaie, it soon l»ecame the most eligible plan 
for both landlord and tenant, that the whole 
rent sliould be paid in money. 

Of the size of these early farms we have 
no precise information; but from the laws 
of Ina we may perhaps conclude that a hide 
of land, equal to about 100 or 120 acres, 
was the customary size ; for, in speaking of 
the produce to be given to the lord for ten 
hides, the law speaks of the smallest divi- 
sion of each county of which it was p:irticu- 
larly cognizant; namely, of ten families, or 
a tithing, as they were collectively called. 
Again, Bede expressly calls a hide of land 
familia, and says it was sufficient to support 
a family. It was otherwise called mansum, 
or manerium, and was considered to be so 
much as one could cultivate in a year. 
(^Ileiirf/ of ILuitiiic/dov, vi. 2,OG(3.) 

That in the time of Henry VIII. rents 
were payable in money, we have the evi- 
dence amongst others of Bishop Latimer. 
He flourished in the early part of the six- 
teenth century, and his father was amongst 
the most respectable yeomen of his time,-yet 
his farm probably did not much exceed one 
hundred acres. He observes in one of his 
sermons, " My father was a yeoman, and 
had no lands of his own ; he had only a 
farm of £3 or £1 a -year at the utmost, and 
hereupon he tilled as much as kept half a 
dozen men. He had a walk for one hun- 
dred sheep, and iny mother milked thirty 
kinc." — {iSf'n?ions, J). 30.) 

It is evident, from the constant reference 
to woods in these husbandry notices, how 
valuable the}' must have been in those days 
for fuel, since pit-coal was not then exten- 
sively available. Their value of course in- 
creased towards the northern portion of our 
island, so that we find the Scottish Parlia- 
ment dirccLing the planting of timber trees. 

In 15U3 (tlie Gth of James IV. of Scot- 
land) it was ordered " that everith Lord or 
Laird make them to have Purkcs with Deare, 
Stanks, Cuningares, Powcattes, Orchards^ 



Hedges, and plant at the least ane Aicker 
of Wood, quhair there is na greate Wooddes 
nor Forrestes." 

Other acts of a similar kind, for the pro- 
motion of the growth of timber, had been 
j previously made; and again in 1535. 
I The clergy and the rural life of those days 
seem to have had little reverence for God's 
I house or God's acre ; for in the same year it 
was ordered by the Parliament that "nor. 
Faires be halden upon Halie days, nor zit 
within Kirkcs nor Kirkezairdes upon Halie 
daies nor uther dales." 

Such were the primitive habits and modes 
of cultivation, down to the time of the two 
old agricultural authors, whose works I now 
propose to describe. 

Sir Anthony Fitzherbert, as I have in 
another place remarked, (^Quar. Jour. Arj.^ 
vol. ii., p. 491,) was the youngest son of 
Ralph Fitzherbert, of Norbury, in Derby- 
shire. He was educated at Oxford; and 
when called to the bar by the Honourable 
Society of Gray's Inn, "his great parts,. 
peiiCtrating judgment, and incomparable 
diligence," says his biographer, "soon dis- 
tinguished him in his profession." He was 
made a serjeant-at-law in 1511, and was 
knighted five years afterwards. In 1523 he 
became one of the Justices of the Court of 
Common Pleas, in which year he published, 
it is supposed, his " Boke of Husbandrie;" 
for a copy was possessed by the late Mr. 
lleber, bearing that datC; " imprynted by 
Ilychard Pynson." 

Fitzherbert's biographer adds, truly 
enough, that " he has held the oracle of 
law in his time." He evidently possessed 
the most undoubted courage and the most 
uncompromising integrity. He was one of 
the very few who dared to oppose Cardinal 
Wolsey in the height of his power. On his 
death- bed, at a period when alirost all were 
eagerly scrambling for the spoils of the 
Church of Rome, he solemnly warned his 
children on no account to accept of any of 
the sequestered property of the abbeys.' 

To this injunction his descendants inflex- 
ibly adhered. They have often been hon- 
ourably distinguished in the ranks of litera- 
ture and in the public service of their coun- 
try. J he family was ennobled in 1801, 
when Alleyne Fitzherbert was created Lord 
St. Helens. 

Sir Anthony Fitzherbert died on the 27tli 
of May, 1538, and lies buried in his own 
parish church of Norbury, where, on his 



I860.] 



THE SOUTllEllN PLANTER. 



22T 



gruvostono of blue marble, woa long to be ' be well tempered, it may the better b<^Ai|f- 
Bceu the luUowiiig short and modest inscrip- <'"ro.l " -^ 



tion : 

*' Of your chnritic, pray for the Soule of 
Sir Anthony Fitzhcrbert, Kny^ht, one of 
the Kin^^'s Justices of his Coinnioii IJencli,' 
and sonietinio Lo. ami patron of this Tdwnc, 
and Doiuthy his Wifo, dair^htcr of Sir lien- ; 
ry Wi I lough by, Kny^ht, ».V:e., which 8ir An- 
thony deceased 27 -Ha}, l').')S." 

Of his great law works, by wliich he is 
BO well and so honourably known t«) the law- 
etu'lent, this is hardly the place to describe. 
His " Natura IJreviuni," and his grand 
" Abridgment of the Laws," the great !^ir 
Edward Coke has well described, when 
he is speaking, in his preface lo his Eighth 
lleport, of the first named, and of the last 
Bays, ** it is an exact work, and ex(piisitely 
penned." (Preface to Tenth Report. ) 

In the liibrary of the British Museum 
will be found a small iluodecinio volume, 
entitled "The Hoke of Husbandry," by Sir 
Anthony Fitzhorbert, published in 15o4; 
and this is certainly the earliest extant work 
on husbandry, that prolcsses to be icrittcn 
by an Englishman. 

It commences by saying, " Here bcgyn- 
eth the lioke of Hu.sbundry, and fyrstc 
whereby husbandcmcn do l}ve." 

An early section is of "divers manor of 
plowes." 

It is evident from this that, even in those 
days, thefc were different kinds of ploughs 
used in various parts of England ; for, as 
our author remarks, 

"One plowc will not serve in all places; 
wherelore it is neccs>ary to have dyvers 
Bortes. In Somersetshire, Dorsetshire, and 
Gloucestershire, the share beam, that in 
many places is called the plov head, is four 
or fyve foote longc, made very broad and 
thinnc; and that is because the land is very I 
toughc, and would suck the plowe into the 
earth, if the share beams were not very 
longe, broade, and thinnc. In Kent they 
alter muche in fashyon ; lor there thc^egoe 
upon whecles, as they do i-i some parts of 
llartfordshirc, Susscxe, and Oorncwalle. 
But," adds Fitzherbert, very wisel}', " ney- 
thcrwyll Istmd toostryctl) on thcyr i'ashyon, 
sythe thcyr is no countyc but customc or 
experience hath instructed them to make 
choycc of what is avaylable; and he that 
wyll lyvc in any countrye may by free char- 
ter learnc of hys neighbours, and howso- 
ever any plowe be made or fashyoned, so it 



fercd. 

Sir Anthony, like Bishop Greathead, "wat 
a decided advocate for the u.se on heavy 
soils of «»xen in hu>bandry. He had evi- 
dently thought much on the subject. It is' 
curious to see how clo.sely the argument.^ oh ' 
the subject by a larmer o4n years since, 
resembled those of modern agriculturist^ ' 
At the conclusion of a section devoted tc^ 
the subject, he remarked : *' If any .sorange^ 
bctyde a hor.sc, jls old age, bruyByingj*^ 
blyndncss or laujcness; then is he worth 
nothynge except for a kennell of noyse-be- 
gettyng hound.s, (we might suspect from 
this reujark, that the learned judge was no 
friend to the delights of the chase.) But if 
myschief befall an ox, for ten sh}llyngs at 
any tymc he may be fed, and then he i^ 
man's ineatc, and in that degree better than 
ever he was. These reasons and circum- 
stances considered, I am of the poet's opyn- 
}on, that the plowe of oxen is much more 
profitable than the plowe of horses, to 
whych the Holy Scryptures condescend ; 
for wheresoever it speaketh of husbandrye, 
it only sayth the oxc to hys yoke for la- 
bour." 

After telling the farmers of his time how 
they should ])lough differe?it kinds of land 
''all times of the yceare," he then proceeds 
in a natural order of arranging his work, to 
seed .sowing. He connnences with a seed, 
which should be mingled, in fact, with all 
other kinds, and which he thus describes : 
" There is a seed called dyseretyon, if a 
husbandman have of that seed, and myngle 
it amonge his other eorne, they wyll grow 
doubtless much the better." And he adds: 
*' Thys secde of dy.^cretyon has a wondrou.«» 
vyrtue, for the more it is eyther taken of or 
lent, the more it is." 

To Sowc Barley is the title of a section 
at page 10. It seems that in those days 
there were *' thre manner of barleys, that is 
to say : spot barleye ; longe care ; and berp 
barley, that some menne call bigge." 

" To f>owe ,Otca" is the rjcr^t titl/y of a 
section. Our author says of this crop, ** It 
is to be knowen that there be III. manner 
of oats, that is to saye : redde otes, black 
otcs, and roughe otes. Redde otcs are the 
best otes, and vcrye good to make otemcle 
of." Black otes he deemed inferior t(^ the 
red, and he adds, '* the roughe otes be the 
worst : they be very lighte, and have long 



228 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



tayles, whereby they wyll hange eche one 
to other." 

He goes on to say, " all these manner of 
otes weare the grounde very sore, and 
maketh it to bear quyche." 

He leaves the quantity of seed oats to 
the farmer ; " hys wysedome and discretion 
muste discerne it." 

He proceeds to treat of " how to harowe 
all manner of corne." 'Jhe ploughing of 
those days was evidently ill done, and the 
harrows heavy and rudely constructed. 
Fitzherbert remark's, " it is a great labour 
and payne to the oxen to goo to harrowe, 
for they were better to goo to the plowe two 
dayes than to harrowe one daye. It is an 
old sayinge — 

The ox is never woo 

Tyll he to the harrowe goo. 

It. is because it goeth by twytches and not 
alway after orve draughte." 

It seems from what he says in his chap- 
ter "' howe forkes and rakes should be made, 
(p. 19,) that the husbandnaen of that time 
made their own." 

When he speaks of haymaking, p. 20, 
he truly enough remarks, '' good teddynge 
is the chief poynte to make good h<ey." 

Of artificial manures, they were evident- 
ly in those times not altogether unacquaint- 
ed, for Fitzherbert in his chapter of " how 
to make barrayne grounde brynge forth 
good corne," recommends the mingling of 
saltpetre, dregs of oil, and pigeons' dung 
with the seed. 

Then he has a chapter on " howe to car- 
rye out manure or dunge, and how to spreade 
the same." He advised his brother-farmers 
that it should be " layed up in small heaps 
neere together ;" '' to spreede it cvenlye ;" 
to leave none where " the greate heepe 
Btoode," and not to let the heaps stand too 
long, lest if they took a shower of rain the 
goodness of the manure should " runne 
into the grounde where the heape standes, 
and the rest when it is spreade wyll lyttle 
profyt." He also recommends the use of 
'^ marie." 

Another of the books into which the 
work was divided, is devoted to the 
*^ breedyng, oderyng, and usage of cattell 
by the whatsoever els appcrtaynes to theme, 
and fyrst of shecpe." fn this, when speak- 
ing of " what thynges rottethe sheepe," he 
gives a list of things, such as " the grasse 
called spear-woorte," and another called 



"penny-grasse," and also "all manner of 
grasse that the lande floode runneth over;" 
all "marrishe grounde and marshe groundes, 
salt-mashes only excepted.^^ And then he 
adds, " hunger rotte is the worst rotte that 
can be." 

It is ever noticeable that in all barbarous- 
countries, and even in those approaching 
towards civilization, to the women is as- 
signed labours for which men are better 
adapted. It is more especially so in the 
warmer climates of our globe ', but even in 
northern England, in Fitzherbert's book, 
we find the following grave assignment of 
hard duties to a farmer's wife of the time of 
Henry VIII.— 

" It is the wyfe's occupatyon to wynnow 
all manner of corne, to make malt, to wash 
and wringe, to make haye, to sheere corne, 
and, in tyme of needs, to help her hus- 
bande to fyll the muckwayne or dunge-cart; 
to dryve the plowe, to bade corne, &c. ; to 
go or ryde to the market, to sell butter, 
mylk, cheese, pygges, and all manner of 
corn,^' &e. 

After describing the sundry duties of the 
wife in attending the market, our author 
goes on to remark— 

" And also to bye all manner of necessa- 
rye thyngs belongynge to householde, and 
to make a trewe rekenynge and a compte to 
her husbande what she hath receyed and 
what she hath payed -, and if the*husbande 
go to the market to bye or sell, as they ofte 
do, he then to shewe his wyfe in lyke man- 
ner. For if one of them shoulde use to 
deceyve the .other he deceyveth hymself, 
and he is not lyke to thryve, and therefore 
they must be trewe eyther to other. I 
could, peradventure, shewe the husbandes 
dyvers poynts that the wyves deceyve them 
in, and in Tyke manner howe husbandes 
deceyve theyr wyves; but if I shulde do 
so, I shulde shewe more subtyll poyntes of 
deceyt than either of them i:newe of be- 
fore, and therefore me semeth beste to holde 
my peace." 

The "Thyrde Boke" of husbandry is 
upon planting timber trees, of which he 
was evidently enlightened enough to per- 
ceive the private and national advantages. 
Then there is added to the work sundry 
domestic matters, which Fitzherbert most 
probably never intended to appear in a book 
of husbandry — such as the sections on the 
use of the cinnamon, cloves, pepper and 



ISGO.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



220 



other Bpiccb — receipts for "a balme," and 
•*an approved reccjUj for the gowtc." 

His " Fourthe liooke" is still iiiorc of a 
domestic nature, "contaynyn«r theorderying 
of an liouseholde." In this lie is particular 
in hisdiroctioiisliow the men-servants should 
be kept in order and honest, for he had evi- 
dently a strong suspicion that in those days 
thej were roguishly inclined. Then he pro- 
ceeds to give directions for breeding all 
kinds of poultry — how many eggs should " be 
Bettc under your henne," and says the num- 
ber should " be odde," either a "fyftcene or 
nynetee," according to the season ; and then 
he has several other little sections on similar 
subjects, and so rarely makes a mistake in 
his common-sense observations, that we arc 
the more amused when he tells us very 
gravely, when speaking of swans, that 
"when they waxe olde they do declare the 
tyme of theyr owne death to be neere ap- 
proachyng by a sweete and' lamentable note 
whych they then syng." 

Towards the close of this book, Fitzher- 
bert has sundry chapters full of quotations 
from the holy fathers regarding pleasing 
God, almsgiving, prayer, &c. Living how- 
ever, as he did, in very ticklish Protestant 
and Popish days, when heresy was treated 
in a very summary and fierry manner, he 
thought it well to add — 

*' I make protestation before God and man 
that I intende not to wryte anythinge that 
is or may be contrary to the fayth of Cryste 
and of Holy Church ; but I am rcdye to re- 
voke my sayinge if anythinge have passed 
my mouthe for want of lernynge, and to sub- 
niytle myself to correction, and my boke to 
reformatyon." 

"Go lythell quere, and recommende me 

To all that this treatysc shall se, here or rede ; 

Prayenge them therewith content to be, 

Ami to amende it in places where, as in nede, 

Of eloquence they may perceyve I want the 

sede. 
And rethorykc in me doth not abounde, 
Wherefore I have sowe such seoils as I foud.'' 

At page 91, Fitzherbcrt thus concluded 
his book — 

" Thus endeth this rygnt profytable boke 
of husbandry, compylcd sometyme by Mays- 
ter Fitzherbarde of charytic and good zelc 
that he bare to the weale of this moostc 
noble realme, whyche he dydde not in his 
jrouthe, but after he had exercysed husband- 
ry with great experyence xl. years. 

" Imprynted at London, in Flete-street, in 



the house of Thomas Bcrthelet, nere to the 
condite, at the syngc of Lucrcce. Cum pri- 
viclgio." 

In the same volume of the British Mu- 
seum Library is also bound up another work 
of Fitzherbert's entitled, " Surveyinge, A. D, 
15;i9." 

The work of Bishop Grotchcdo, or Great-* 
head, disputes with the Boke of Fitzlicrberl' 
the merit of beiug the first English treatise 
on agriculture. The chiims of both theg^ 
interesting works have been, on a recent oc- 
casion, too fairly and clearly stated by the 
editors of the "Cottage Gardener" to need 
any other description ("Cottage Gardener," 
vol. xxxii., p. 52) 

After alluding to the edition of Fitzher- 
bcrt printed in 1523 by Richard Pynson, 
they add — 

There is as early, if not an earlier, work, 
liowever, even than that of Fitzherbert's. — 
It is entitled as follows : — 

" Here begynneth a tratyse of Husband- 
ry which Mayster Groshedc, somelyme by- 
shop of Lyncoln, made and translated it oul 
of Frenshe into Englyshe, which techeth 
all manner of men to govern theyr londes, 
tenements, and demense, ordinatly as in the 
chapytres evidently is shewed." 

Now, whether or not this "tratyse" was 
written by " Master Groshedc," it isjquile 
certain that it was printed by AVynkn de 
AVorde, who was Pynson's contemporary, 
their earliest books being printed in the 
same year, 1403, and they continued rivali 
and publishing the same books until the 
date of Wynkyn de Worde's death in 1534. 
A few instances may be quoted. De Worde 
published Mons. Pirfcctwnis in 1407, and 
Pynson did so the same year; Pynson pub- 
lished Diufs aud Pauprr, in 1493, and De 
Wordc is.sued it in 1496 ; Dc Worde brought 
out The Sirtjc of Trnif in 1503, as did Pyn- 
son in 1513. That Wynkyn de Worde did 
print the " tratyse" is proved by the copy, 
the only one known to exist, in the I'nivcr- 
sity Library at Cambridge. It has his mo- 
nogram, and is, beyond a doubt, from the 
same sharp, broad-faced old P]nglish type, 
and of the same black, unbroken ink as gave 
birth to other acknowledged works from his 
press. It is without a date ; but cither ii 
was published as a rival to Fitzherbert's 
" Boke," or this " Boke" was published to 
oppose Grosscteste's " Tratyse." 

It is a small quarto of twelve leaves. On 
the first page is a woodcut representing a 



230 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



• • 

•V. 



a steward or other party of authority, who, 
with hands outstretched in astonishment, is 
reprehending a woodman, who certainly 
needed the reproof, for he is cutting off the 
top of a tree by the hlows of an axe, which 
have made a ruinous gap half-way up the 
trunk. 

As it certain that it was printed by Wynkyn 
de "Worde, so is it equally beyond a doubt 
that it treats of English husbandry. Gros- 
hede may have first " made" it in French, 
and then " translated it out of Frenshe into 
Englyshe," but still the truth is apparent 
that it is written concerning English hus- 
bandry, all the measures are English, and so 
are all the attendant particulars. The best 
evidences of this that can be placed before 
our readers are the following extracts : — 

The first is what we should now call a 
"Table of Contents"— 

" The i chapytre telleth how ye shall spende 
your good and extende your londes. 

" The ii chapytre telleth how youre londe 
shall be mesured, and how many perches 
maketh an acre, and how many acres maketh 
a yerde of londe, and how niany yerdes 
maketh an hyde of londe, and how many 
hydes maketh a kny2:htes fee. 

'^ The iii chapytre telleth how many acres 
of londe yt a plough may tele in a yere. 

"■ The iiii chapytre telleth a plough of 
oxen or a plough of hors may tele more londe 
in a yere and which is more costly. 

" The V chapytre telleth in what season 
ye shall begynne to falowe all maner of 
londes. 

'^ The vi chapytre telleth how ye shall lay 
youre londe at sede tyme. 

^'The vii chapytre telleth how your londe 
shall be sowne in all seasons. 

'' The viii chapytre telleth how ye shall 
chaunireyour sede and nourysshe your stub- 
ble. 

" The ix chapytre telleth how ye shall 
nourysshe your dounge and wede your corne, 
and how it shall be mesured out of the barne, 
and how moche an acre shall yelde agayn 
more than your sede yt ye sholde have wyn- 
nynge therby. 

^' The x chapytre telleth how ye shall 
chaunge all maner of catell in season. 

" The xi chapytre telleth how ye shall 
thange youre werke bestes and wene youre 
calves, and what prouffyte ye shall have of 
your kyne, and vayll to butter and ches6. 

" The xii chapytre telleth how ye sholde 
nourysshe youre swyne and your pygges. ^ 



" The xiii chapytre telleth howe ye shall 
nourysshe your shepe and dyvers medycynes 
for theym 

. " The xiiii chapytre telleth what profytes 
ye shal have of youre ghees and hennes. 

"The XV. chapytre telleth how ye shall 
by and selle and preve youre weyghtes. 

" The xvi chapytre telleth how ye shall 
take a compte of youre balyf ones a yere." 

Of these '' Chapytres" I will republish 
four : — 

" The ii chapytre. 

"It is to wete that thre barly cornestake 
oute of ye myddes of the eer maketh an 
ynche, and xii ynches maketh a fote. And 
xvi fote and an halfe maketh a perche, and 
xi perches in length and iiii in brede maketh 
an acre of londe, and iiii (acres) maketh a 
yerde of londe, and v yerds maketh an hyde 
of londe; and vii hydes maketh a knyghtes 
fee. 

" The iii chapytre. 

" Some men say yt a plough may not tele 
viii score or ix score acres of londe a yere. 
But I shall prove it by good reason yt a 
plough may do it. For ye shall understonde 
than an acre of londe is in mesure xl perches 
in lengthe and iiii in brede, and the mesure 
of a perche is xvi fote and an halfe. And 
so ye brede of an acre of londe is xlvi fote, 
and so ye go with youre plough xxxiii tymes 
up and doune the londe and see the fyrst 
forowe be a fote and eche of the other be in 
lyke qantyte and then is an acre ered. And 
wl an the forowe is as strayte as it may be 
than is it xxxvi tymes up and doune the 
londe though it be a large acre. And the 
plough be never so feble attemost ye have 
gone but Ixxii tymes up and doune ye londe, 
which is butvmyleway. Now truly the 
hors or oxe is feble that from the morowe 
maye not go softely iii myle from home and 
come agayn by none. And by this other rea- 
son ye undstonde that there be Iii wekes in 
the yere, take viii weeks for holy days and 
other lettynges and. there remaneth behynde 
xliiii to werke in the se xliiii wekes ben cclx 
days besyde Sondayes. Also a plough shall 
ere thryes in the yere | yt is to say in the 
wynter, in lenten, and in leke sede time. — 
In wynter a plough shall ere iii rodes and a 
halfe a daye. And on eche other season an 
acre on the day at the lest. Now knowe yc 
whether it maye be done or not, but by cause 
ploughmen carters and other fayne and werke 
not truly. It is behovefuU yt men fynde a 



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281 



renicdy ajjainst tlieir sorvaontes. And there- 
fore it is necessary that the hAyi' or sonic 
of tlie lordes offyeers be with them the fyrste 
da}e of iloyriire folowyn^e and sowynjjje to 
so } f tliey do theyr werkes truly, «& let theyni 
answer you as niocli werkeas they dyde the 
fyrste day. Also it is necessarye tliat youre 
bulyf oversc youre werkeuien ones in a daye 
to wetc yf tliey do theyr werke truly as they 
onjrht to do, and yf ye fynde theyni con- 
trary lie shall ehastysc theyin reasonable 
therefore, and by dysereyon, kc. 

*' The iiii chapytrc. 

^* The ploui;h of oxen is better than the 
plough of hors, but yf it bo upon stony 
grounde yt whiehe «rreveth sore the oxen in 
theyr fete. And yt plou^^h of hors is more 
cosily than ye })louj:h of oxen & yet shal 
your ploui;h of oxen doo as luuch werke in 
a yere as youre plough of horse, thou^rh ye 
dryve your hors faster than ye do your oxen, 
yet in what ^ronde so ever it be yyure plough 
of oxen, yf ye tele your londe wel and 
evenly, they shal do as nioche werke one 
daye with a nother as your plough of hors, 
yf the gronde be tough your oxen shall werke 
where y.)ure hors shall standc styll. And yf 
ye will Rnowe liow nioche the one is costlyer 
than ye other I shall teche you. It is a cos- 
tume yt bestes yt go to the plough shall 
werke from ye festeof 8aynt Luke unto the 
feste of Saynt Elen in Maye, that is to saye 
XXV wcekes, and yf youre hors sholdc be 
keptc in a good plyglit to werke he ni"ust 
hauc dayly the syxt parte of a bushel of 
otes pryec ob. \nbolux, a farthing] and in 
gresse in sonier season xii d. And every 
wekc that he standeth at drye mete one with 
another ob. in strawe for lyttcr. And in sho 
ygc as often as he issliodde on all foure fete 
iiii d. at the lest. The sonime of his ex- 
pense in the yere is ix s. vi d. ob., besyde 
hay and chafe and other thynges. And as 
for the oxc ye may kepc him in good plyght 
dayly to doo his jour. icy gyuyngeliym euery 
weke thro oten sheves prycc i d. by ause x 
oten sheves }elde a bushell of otes yf they 
be made by the extent and in somer season 
xii d. in gresse. The somme of liis ex- 
penses by the yere is iii s. i d. be syde strawe 
and chafe. And yf a liors be overset and 
broug'it downe with labour it is adventured 
ever he recover it. And yf your ox be over- 
eetteand brought dt>une with labour ye shall 
for xii d. in somer season have hym so pas- 
tured that he shal be strong ynough to do 



your werke or ellcs he shall be so futto that 

he may selle him for as uiocho uioneye as 
he costo you. 

" The xiiii chapytre. 

''(ihccsand henncs shall be at the dely- 
ueraunce of youre baylyf or lete so feruie a 
goo.s for xii d. in a yere Fyue hennes and 
a eocke for iii s. in a yere and there be .some 
baylyfs and deyes that say nay to this pruutf- 
ytes. liut 1 shall preuve it by reiu*on, for in 
halfe a yere be xxvi wekes, and in these 
xxvi wekes ix score daye.s, and in eche of 
these dayes ye shall have an cgge of echo 
henne cV: yt is ix score egges of echo hcnno 
in that half yere, it is a feble sale of egges 
t't XXX egges be not worth a petiy and yt ony 
of theym syt in that halfe a yere or some 
daye in delautc of lyenge, ye shall be re- 
compensed there fore, and of vi more to here 
out the ferme ye cocke, and wt the sale of 
the chekensyt youre sytfynge hennes br> nge 
forthe in that other halfe yere. Nowe shall 
ye se whether I say sothe or nay the pecocke 
shall answere as nioche theforieders (feath- 
ers) as the shepe for his wolle. Every cowo 
^hall answere you a caife. And every modcr 
shepe shall answere you a lambe. Every 
female swyne shall answere you xiii pygges 
at thrye farowyges at two tynies at eche 
tyme iii and the thyrde tyme fyve the 
X for tythe. Every henne shall answere 
you of ix soore egges or of chekens to ye 
value. P^very goos shall answere you of vi 
ghoslyngs And yf ony of this catell be 
baryene ye baylyf shall answere you of the 
yssue that is lost thrugh his euyll kepynge, 
by cause that he dyde not selle theym and 
put the sylver to other prouffytes to the 
value." 

The last three or four pages are devoted 
to (jiardening, and this portion has this com- 
mencement : — 

" Hero begyneth the plantyngc of trees 
and of vynes." 

It is quite unworthy of the previous part, 
being a mere collection of the mis-statements 
of the Greek and Roman writers relative to 
altering the colour of fruits and similar in- 
dulgencies of the imaginati(m. 

It has been doubted whether Rishop Gros- 
sctcste wrote all the works of which a list is 
given in his life by I'egge, as well as in Tan- 
ner's Blhliothcca Mouastica. It has been 
truly said that they are equal in number to 
those produced by any of the great Arabian 
Philosophers. Indeed, in one department of 



232 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



literature — Poetry, he surpassed them, for 
we have his " Chastel d' Amour" among the 
Harleian jMSS. But, the works enumerated, 
and mostly remaining in MS., are generally 
very brief, and do not exceed, even if they 
equal, in number of pages, the varied works 
published by Fitzherbert, who, also, found 
time, notwithstanding his profession, to write 
his " Boke of Husbandry." 

Let us remark, also, that this is not the 
only work of Grossesteste that was thought 
worthy of being printed so many years after 
his decease, for his Treatise de Art thus Lihe- 
ralihus and his Comtnentary on Aristotle 
were published at Venice in 1514. 

Bishop Robert Greathead, for he was an 
Englishman, and his real name was only 
foreign ed by such translations as " Grost- 
head" and <' Grosseteste," was a man of high 
attainments, and of a mind enlarged far 
above the generality of his contemporaries. 
He was a friend of Roger Bacon, and studied 
as he did the Natural Sciences. He was, 
says Sharon Turner, " intrepid and patriotic, 
foremost in every useful pursuit of his day, 
the friend and cultivator of poetry, scholast- 
ic philosophy, Arabian science, natural phi- 
losophy, mathematics, divinity, and canon 
and civil law. He was also the fearless and 
successful assertor of the liberties of the 
English Church, and a protector of the Eng- 
glish clergy against the taxation and tyranny 
of the Pope." — Turner's Hist, of Middle 
Ages.) 

His letter to Pope Innocent in 1253 may 
be read in the Chronicle of Matthew Paris, 
and was so displeasing to the PontiflF, that he 
threatened to hurl upon him confusion and 
destruction. Greathead went fearlessly on 
to declare the Pope both a heretic and anti- 
christ ; and after death the Bishop was be- 
lieved to have visited the Pope, and to have 
threatened and terrified him from his pur- 
pose of having the Bishop's bones dug up 
and thrown out of the church. The diffu- 
sion of such an idle tale implies the popu- 
larity of Bishop Greathead, and the preced- 
ing facts readily explain why the applications 
to Rome for canonizing him were but coldly 
received.— -( Wilkins' Concilia^ ii., 287.) 

There is no sound reason, then, for doubt- 
ing that Bi.shop Greathead wrote the " Tra- 
tyse (f Husbandry;" and if he did, it is 
certainly the earliest relation we have of 
English Agriculture in the 13th century, for' 
he died in 1253, at Buckden, the episcopal! 
residence of his see, and the agriculture he ; 



describes was that of the reigns of Henry 
II. , Richard I., John and Henry III. 

It is refreshing to review works like these. 
They came forth as soon as printing was in- 
troduced into our island ; plainly written lit- 
tle books for the small farmers of their time.^ 
Printing, indeed, when it first showered its 
blessings over other classes, did not neglect 
the agriculturists. It has since been the 
handmaid of all the sciences, all the know- 
ledge which have gradually raised the Brit- 
ish farmer to his present proud position. — 
Printing — and printing only — enabled Fitz- 
herberd and Grotthead to so well address 
their brother-cultivators of 1532. They 
were well followed by Tusser in the same 
century, Old Worlidge and others in the 
seventeenth; and Jethro Tull (the greatest 
benefactor to his country of them all) in 
1732, exactly two centuries after the publi- 
cation of the first English " Boke of Hus- 
bandrie." 



From the Bri'ish Farmer'' s Magazine. 

On the Production of the Sexes Among 
Sheep. 

[translated from the FRENCH OF THE 
"JOURNAL d'aGRICULTURE PRATIQUE.'^ 

The interesting researches of Giron dd 
Bazareingues into generation, and particularly 
on the production of the sexes amongst do- 
mestic animals, are now known but by very 
few persons, having the misfortune to be of 
too remote a date. On the other hand, 
meeting with a very varied reception on 
their appearance, they have had the fate of 
all contested things — they have left in the 
mind nothing but ideas undecided as to their 
value. Zootechny, in fact, was too little ad- 
vanced at that period, for the art of animal- 
production to think of extracting from such 
a study facts for its use. 

Daily observations, conducted and ar- 
ranged with the calculation in hand, in a 
sheepfold of great importance — that of the 
Dishley-Mauchamp merinos of M. J. M. 
Viallet, at Blanc, in the commune of Gail- 
hac-Toulza (Haute-Garonne) — have enabled 
me to comprehend the laws which, accord- 
ing to M. Giron de Bazareingues, preside 
over the production of the sexes. If I am 
not deceived, I have gained some new hints; 
but, however this may be, the reader will 
see in the following notes only an exposition 
of facts, designed simply to draw attentioh 
once more to this curious question. And, 



18G0.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



233 



as the establishment of any natural law 

whatever has at all times it.s utility even in 
practice, it is perliaps desirable still to find 
it of iujportanco in the economic manage- 
ment of animals in certain positions. 

The general law which Giron de Baza- 
rcingues has rcco;;nized on the subject of I 
the procreation of the sexes is as follows : 
The sex of the product would depend on 
the greater or less relative vigour of the in- 
dividuals coupled. In many experiments 
purposely made, ho has obtained from the 
ewes more males than females, by coupling I 
yery strong raujs with ewes either too young 
or too aged, or badly fed; and more females 
than males, by an inverse action in the 
choice of the ewes and rams he put to- 
gether. 

This law has developed itself regularly 
enough at the shccpfold of Blanc, in all 
cases in which circumstance of different 
vigour between the rams and ewes have been 
observed in coupling them. Witness two 
Btriking examples of it: 

In 1S58, births, the issue of young ewes 
by a Dishley-Mauchamp merino ram, ex- 
tremely vigorous and high y fed, produced 
25 males, and 9 females only, or 71.73 per 
cent, of males, and 28.27 per cent, of 
females. 

At a later period, the same ram, still in 
full vigour, having been put to some ewes 
that had done nur.<ing their lambs — a period 
at which the ewe is found very weak — there 
resulted, in IS/iS, 8 male births against 4 
females; and in 1854, under similar cir- 
cumstances, 17 male against 9 female births. 
The two occasions united yielded 05. 78 per 
cent, of 
females. 

But the following fact has 
common with those related by Giron 
Bazareingues, and which has been repeated, 
with small variation, every year, from 1853 
— the period at which the observations I 
have noted down began. 

This fact consists: 

1st. In that, at the commenecment of the 
rutting season, when the ram is in his full 
vigour, he procreated more males than 
females. 

2nd. When, some days after, the ewes 
coming in heat and in great numbers at 
once, the ram was weakened by a more fre- 
quent renewal of the exertion, the procre- 
ation of females took the lead. 

3rd. The period of excessive exertion 



males, and 34.22 per cent, of 



nothing in 
de 



having passed, and the number of ewes in 

heat being diuiini.shed, the ram also found 
less weakened, the procreation of males in 
majority again comnienced. 

In order to show that the cause of such 
a result is isolated from all other influences, 
of a nature to be confcmnded with it, I 
shall take the year 1855-G, in which, by 
the efl^ect of a degree of equilibrium of age 
and vigour between the rams and ewes, the 
male and female births were found, rela- 
tively with each other, nearly upon a par in 
numbers, being 25 males to 23 females. 

The following table, drawn up with the 
dates of birth, exhibits the facts in detail. 
The letter M. indicates the male, and F. the 
female births. 

It will be seen that, the list of births 
having been divided into three successive 
series, and in mean proportions almost equal, 
we have for the first, of eleven days, from 
the 27th December to the 8th January, 13 
males against 4 females; for the second, of 
nine days, from the 9th to the 18th January, 
3 males only against 15 females; and for 
the third, of eleven days, from 19th to 29th 
January inclusive, 9 males against 4 females. 

Table of the Dish/rt/-Mauchamp Merino 
Lamhhig, at the Shccpfold of Blanc, in 
December and January, 1855-56. 

FIRST SERIES. 

Dec. 27 . . M. Jan. 4 . . m. Jan. . . ji. 

30 . . M. 4 . . M. 7 . . K. 

31 .. M. 4 .. M. 8 . . M. 
Jan. 3 . . M. 5 . . M. 8 . . m. 

3 . . F. 5 . . M. 8 . . p. 

3 . F. 6 . . M. 

Males, 76.8 per cent.; females, 23.9 per cent. 

SECOND SERIES. 

Jan. 9.. F. Jan. 13.. f. Jan.lfi.. f. 

9 . . V. 1 .') . . F. 16.. F. 

11 .. M. 15 .. r. 16 .. F. 
V2 .. F. 15 .. M. 17 .. r. 

12 . . F. 16 .. p. IS .. M. 

13 .. F. 16 .. F. 18 .. F. 
Males, 16.66 per cent.; females, 83.34 per cent. 

THIRD SERIES. 
Jan. 10.. M. Jan. 20. u. Jan. 24.. m. 
1 9 . . M. 20 . . F. 24 . . M. 

19 .. F. 22 .. F. 29 .. M. 

19 . . F. 22 . . M. 

20 . . M. ' 23 . . M. 

Males, 69.23 per cent. ; females, 30.77 per cent. 

At the end of each month, all the ani- 
mals of the Blanc shccpfold are weighed 
separately; and, thanks to these monthlj 
weighings, we have drawn up several tables, 
from which are seen the diminution or in- 



234 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



crease in weight of the different animals, 
classed in various points of view, whether 
according to age, f ex, or the object for which 
they were intended. 

'i'wo of these tables have been appropri- 
ated to bearing ewes — one to those which 
have borne and nursed males, and the other 
to those that have borne and brought up 
females. The abstract results of these two 
tables have furnished two remarkable facts. 

1st. The ewes that have produced the 
female lambs are, on an average, of a weight 
superior to those that produce the males ; 
and they evidently lose more in weight than 
these last, during the suckling period. 

2nd. The ewes that produce males weigh 
less, and do not lose, in nursing, so much as 
the others. 



Tobacco. 

There are two plants, the produce chiefly 
of the Southern States, the value of which, 
as commodities of export, equal all the 
other exports of the country put together, 
— viz., cotton and tobacco. 

Tobacco is indigenous to the soil of 
America, and has always shown a prefer- 
ence for the States of Virginia and Mary- 
land. The tobacco plant is one of those 
sources of national wealth which Nature 
has assured to us by a peculiar adaptation 
of soil and climate for its production, and 
which no other country, excepting perhaps 
the Island of Cuba, possesses in an equal 
degree. The tobacco plantations may be 
certainly calculated upon as yielding from 
thirty-five to forty millions of dollars annu- 



If the indications given by these facts „ t? xu i ^ ^ i. .1 u 

. , n J 1 -^ . , r. ally. 1^ or the last lorty years, the crop has 

come to be confirmed by experiments sut- ,*^ . a - -l - \ 

n • ^^ X J X 1 -11 u shown a steady increase : — it is, however, 

iiciently repeated, two new laws will bC] ,. n j • 1 , xi . ^i, j 

1 J I, ii • J r xi i. X.- x. n- J I chiefly during late years that the produc- 
placed by the side or that which Uiron de;,._ /__ 7 , r. x-.-j.j t. -tor.-! 

Bazareingues has determined by his obser- 



vations and experiments. 

On the one hand, as, at liberty or in the 
savage state, it is a general rule that the 
predominance in acts of generation belongs 
to the strongest males, to the exclusion of 



tion has most largely extended. In 1821, 
the value of tobacco exported was $5,648,- 
962, and for fifteen years the amount taken 
for foreign consumption continued to aver- 
age about that value. In 1836, the export 
reached $10,058,640, and in 1841, $12,- 



.. 1 J 1, 1 • • 5/6,703, from which point it fluctuated 

the weak, and as such a predominance is ■■ ' ^ , , r. \ 1 ,<? ^^y o 

P 11 . xi, S V xi 1 down to about lour and a hair millions 01 

favourable to the procreation 01 the male , ,, ... . -loAn xi v x 

,, r. ,, ^ .1 , ,1 , r. dollars, until in 184o the shipments 

sex, it would follow that the number of, ' , , cjo ^-70 o^n 

,' iix jx • xi xi, J amounted to $8,4/8,2/0. 

males would tend to surpass incessantly that! 11 

of the females, amongst whom no want o^'l The following table will show the annual 

energy or power would turn aside from | export from that period up to the present 

generation; and the species would find in it ^^^®- • 

Annual Exports of Tobacco from the United 
States, from the year 1847 to 1859. 



a fatal obstacle to its reproduction. But, on 
the other hand, if it was true that the 

strongest females, and the best nurses 'v„^, v^i„o 

amongst them, produce females rather than g^^ $7 242 086 

males, Nature would thus oppose a contrary 
law, which would establish the equilibrium, 
and, by an admirable harmony, would secure 
the perfection and preservation of the species, 
by confiding the reproduction of either sex 
to the most perfect type of each respectively. 
Martegoute, 
Former Professor of Rural Economy. 



1848. 
1849. 
18.00. 
1851, 
1852. 
1853. 
1854, 
1855. 
1856 
1857 
1858, 



7,551,122 

5,804,207 

9,951,023 

9.219,251 

10,031,283 

11,319,319 

10,016,046 

14,712,468 

12,221.843 

20,662,772 

17,009,767 



To Dye an Orange Color. — Boil the 

skins of ripe onions half an hour ; take out j^^^^ 21,074,038 

the skins, and add one ounce of alum to one rpj^^ exports for the year 1859 were the 
quart of dye; put in the silks, stir often j^^^ of any period in the history of the 
for half an hour; dry, wash and iron quite x^.^j^ rp,^^ amount shipped in 1857 was 
*^a°iP- I nearly equal, being less by only $412,266; 

The most delicate, the most sensible of but from reference to the table it will be 
all pleasures, consist in promoting the ' seen that that was quite an extraordinary 
pleasures of all others. [year. The average export for the twelve 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



236 



years cndinjx with 1858 is nbout eleven 
and a ((uartcr iiiillions of dollars, wliith it 
will 1)0 i»l)served is nearly doubled by tbe 
anioiiiit of last year. Nearly tbree-fourtbs 
of last year's e.\|)ort was takrii by England, 
Franco, Bremen, and Uollanil. 

The amounts taken respectively by those 
countries is as follows : 

Exportrd to F.njrinnd $r).*302,81() 

Finnco 4,:U)2,17i.» 

Hrcinen 3,V>8.'>,17S 

Hollaml 1,1»I>>,5*J7 

The remaining one-fourth has been ex- 
ported to the several ports of the world in 
amounts varyin<? from S-jO to the Central 
Republic, to 81U0,44S to lielgium. 

It is remarkable lu»w universal is the de- 
mand lor this product. The official re- 
turns show IX list of one hundred and 
twenty-live different articles of export; and 
out of that number, with the exception of 
grain, there is not one that is shipped to sol 
man}" different countries as tobacco. The i 
Government report enumerates seventy-one 
difTercnt foreign markets to which our pro- 
ducts are exported ; and out of that num-| 
ber there are only six that do not buy ouri 
tobacco, viz: Madeira, the air of which isj 
possibly too pure to be polluted by the I 
fumes of the weed, Kgypt, San Domingo, : 
Greece, Bolivia and K(juador; — most of, 
which j>laces produc# their own. j 

The value of the tobacco exported from ; 
the United States last year was nearly live | 
times that of our sea products, fifty per. 
cent, more than the products of tbe forest. 
Dot <|uite three millions of dollars less than | 
the w hole export of vegetable food, and i 
rather over an eighth of the value of the i 
cotton crop. 

It is clear that the general tistc for to- 
bacco smoking is steadily increasing, whether 
to the j)ublic injury or otherwise we leave! 
for those better skilled in the doctrines of j 
narcotics than ourselves to decide. The 
fact is, that despite of King James' coun- 
terblast, and Urban's excommunication, and 
tbe ever-issuing anti-nareotic fulminations 
of our modern physicians, —the people are 
most resolvedly intent upon haying the 
weed ; and this being the ca.se, our tobacco 
planters will continue to grow it and pros- 
per. — U. S. I^conomist. 

< • • • > 

Affluence might give us respect in the 
eyes of the vulgar, but will not recommend 
us to the wise and good. 



Dark Stables. 

It cannot be doubted Miat /it/ht exercises 
a very important influence upon animal as 
well as upon vegetable economy. Every 
one's feelings bear witness to the stimulus 
afl'orded by its agency ; a dark day or a 
dark room induces lassitude and repose, 
which is quickly dissipated by the bright 
sunshifie. Many diseases are much more 
virulent in shaded situations; and the eye 
especially cannot long retain it.s full jtower 
if deprived of light. From mistaken notions 
on this subject, or from false economy, it is 
a general practice to exclude light from the 
stables of horses and other animals. It is 
supposed by many that they thrive best in 
the dark. Where the animal is stabled for 
a brief period of rest, darkness will un- 
doubtedly favor his repose. In the sea.son 
when flies are troublesome it also may be 
well to darken the stable to exclude them, 
but when animals arc stabled permanently 
in darkness, they cannot but suffer in va- 
rious ways. The horse, especially, is very 
much subject to diseases of the eye, and 
there can be but little' doubt that this ten- 
dency is increased by confining him perma- 
nently where the eye, in waking hours, is 
strained to an unnatural position to perceive 
objects around him. Horse jorJcn/a find an 
advantage in the use of such stables. The 
animal being brought into the glare of day 
is confused and startled, and by his high 
stepping and h If uncertain nuuiner, im- 
presses a novice with an idea of his spirit 
and action. Even if the quiet induced by 
darkness may favor increase of fat, it is not 
conducive to njuscular strength, Musdes 
deprived of the stinjulus of light become 
flaccid, and the apparently high condition 
induced by this means is soon lost by active 
exertion. Men, whose employments confine 
them to poorly lighted apartments soon lose 
the color and the energy of full health, and 
the same results follow similar treatment ol 
animals. 

Besides this, a dark stable will seldom be 
kept in that cleanly condition which favors 
full health. The " corners" will be neglected, 
especially if the care of animals be entrusted 
to the *' help " who are usually content if 
the stable looks nice. AVhcn building sta- 
bles, ample provision for light will cost but 
little !i ore than imperfect fixtures, and in 
the end will be found more profitable. 

— :^ — Maine Far. 



236 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[April 



Breadstuffs. 

The table following shows the quantity of 
breadstuffs exported from the variour ports 



of the United States, to Great Britain and 
the continent, from Sept. 1st up to the pres- 
ent date for the year 1859-60, and three 
preceding years : 



Exports of BreadstufFs from the United States to Great Britain, Ireland, and the Continent, from 
Sept. 1 to date, for the years following : 

Flour, Meal, Wheat, Corn, Rye. 

bbls. bbls. bush. bush. bush. 



Year— 

1856-7.. 
1857-8.. 
1858-9. 
1859-60. 



963,460 
846,951 
124,074 
236.228 



184 

123 

20 



9,164,663 

3,505,328 

498,498 

517.360 



3,243,738 

1,344,867 

331,039 

29,546 



157,254 



From this statement, it is apparent that 
the aggregate export of breadstuffs for the 
current year is somewhat below that of last. 
Under the head of flour, there is an in- 
crease of 111,254 barrels, and the export 
of wheat shows an excess of 18,862 
bushels; but the decrease on corn is 301,- 
493 bushels. As compared with the years 
1856-7, and 1857-8, the falling off is im- 
mense. In 1856-7, the quantity of flour 
shipped was more than that of the present 
year by 727,232 barrels; of wheat 8,647,- 
303 bushels; and of corn, 3,214,192 
bushels. The decrease of this year, as 
compared with 1857-8, is on flour, 610,723 
barrels; on wheat, 2,988,968 bushels; and 
on corn, 1,315,321 bushels. 

The cause for this remarkable decline in 
grain and flour exports is attributable to 
the absence of an active demand from 
abroad. The British mavket has been sip- 
plied with a fair home crop, and its defi- 
ciencies have been made up to a large ex- 
tent by imports from European countries, 
thus leaving our own produce to the 
chances of speculative shipment, which, 
depressed as our great grain-growing sec- 
tion has been, have not been sufficient to in- 
duce any extensive consignments. The 
yield of the last crop was but little under 
an average, and there must, therefore, be a 
considerable proportion of the season's pro- 
duce still in the hands of the farmers and 
the grain merchants, waiting for more fa- 
vourable chances of export have been dis- 
appointed, and those who based thereon an 
expectation of a revival of the Western 
trade this Spring have found their calcula- 
tions mistaken. Whilst the action of the 
grain-holders in keeping their produce out 
of the market has tended to check the im- 
mediate recovery of the West, it yet shows 
favourably, that they should be able to hold 



their stock, instead of forcing it upon the 
market at depreciating prices. It is to be 
remembered, however, in comparing the 
movements of the present year with those of 
1856-7 and 1857-8, that those years were 
quite exceptional in the history of the 
trade, the exports being for the former 
$55,624,832, and for the latter $33,698,- 
490. The lower aggregate value of 1857-8 
was caused not so much by the export of 
a less quantity of produce, as by the lower 
prices ruling during that period ; the average 
price of wheat flour during 1856-7 was 
$6 23, whilst during 1857-8 it was only 
$4 73 — a decrease on the former year of 
about 33 per cent. Making, however, all 
allowance for this circumstance, there i^ 
every prospect that the export of bread- 
stuffs for the current year will fall below an 
average, and that at the close of the 
grain year there will be a large amount 
of produce in the hands of Western 
dealers. 

U. S. Economist. 



Iron Manufacture of the United States. 

From a statistical summary given by Mr. 
J. P. Lesley, in his " Iron Manufacturer's 
Guide to the Furnace, Forges and liolling- 
Mills of the United States," we derive the 
following information respecting the iron 
manufacture in the United States : 

" The entire production of raw material 
in the United States in 1856, was a little 
over eight hundred thousand tons (812,- 
917,) being an increase of twelve per cent, 
from 1854. For the year 1856 the whole 
iron production advanced only six per cent, 
over the previous year, but the anthracite 
branch of the manufacture reached the ag- 
gregate of 394,509 tons, being very nearly 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



287 



one-luilf the whole iron product of the 
country, and showin*^ an increase of thir- 
teen per cent, over the previous year, a 
fact to be explained by the conversion of 
charcoal furnaces into anthracite furnaces. 
The industry naturally tends to concentrate 
itself about the gcolo<rical centre of 
fuel in Pennsylvania, a fact shown by the 
decline of this branch of the iron industry 
outside of Pennsylvania by an annual rate 
diich 



From the American Stock Journal. 

Why it is Important to Feed Fattening 
Animals Regularly. 

In all cases of fatteninj^ animals it should 
be the aim of the feeder to have his animals 
kept, and fed, in such a manner as is most 
conducive to the object to be obtained ; and 
it would be most desirable to know what 
kind of food, and feeding, will promote the 
the! formation of fat an<l muscle. M. Florins 



of over SIX per cent., wtucli raises ..._ 

Pennsylvania anthracite increa.se to over has «^iven more li{::ht than any other man 



twenty-two per cent. 

**The grand total of iron of all kinds, do- 
mestic and foreign, used in " 
States in 185G, is set down at 1,330,548 
tons, which is distributed thus : 



Rollod and 
baminered, 
Pig Iron, 



Domestic. Foreign. Total. 



510,081 
337,104 



298,275 
55,403 



on the subject of the physioloj^ical construc- 
tion of the several animals; and has, by 

nZ T",lu^A his many experiments, shown the chemical 

tlie Unitedi , -^ ,.' ^i r. j j i* •* 

chanj^es which the lood undergoes alter it 

is deposited in the stomach. Among the 
many experiments tried, he has given the 
result of his researches. He says " stall- 
fed anin)als must be refjulnvli/ frd \\\ order 
^g./'r,57 1 that they may eat and repose for digestion. 
"'' ilf you i'eed irregular, it has a great effect 
1.209,013! upon the rnrrutsc of the animal. If wo 
'disturb fattening animals, it creates a waste 
which has to be made up by the food." 



850,235 353,678 

" Which results give seventy percent. do-| 

mestic to 30 per cent, foreign iron. The! ,,;. „ , ., . .,. .,, . 

^ n , J . * 1 I *!. * *• *• " e all know that it we go without our 

creat hicts demonstrated by the statistics! , 1 ^u • i *• p *u 

^ ,, , , , ^, . . T "^ . • ^- regular meals, there is an exhaustion or the 
collected by the American iron Association' .' , a n r ^ r ♦ i • * 1 

,,.*', , T.)-w> re • . • vital powers. All lood, alter being taken 

are, that we have nearly IJOO ethcient iron • . ., , , • • -i * j u Tu 

, ^, yr „ 1 c/x 1 • I into the stomach, is assimilated by the ani- 

works in the United fetates, producing an- , n i 'x • x 

,, , ^ 0-/1 n/. A X V- xi 1 ^nal name, and it is necessary to repose in 
nually about hDU,UUO tons ot iron, the value j xi * ; ; 4- v * 

« r. , . ' ,. • i-Px 1 order that a chemiral action may be set up 

ot which, in an ordinary year is tilty mil-i. .1 , it/ • 1 • r j 

i. o \ u r u- 1 xu 1 r >" the stomach. Ji an animal is led regu- 

hons ot dollars, 01 whicii the large sum ot , , ., ,. ,. .1, , , , f, 

^oc/vi.n/knn • j j i- i u i | larly, the digestion Will be regular, and the 

♦35,000,000 IS expended lor labour alone.' • 1 x* n e 1 u* *i * -n 

' * ^ i animal frame will soon form habits that will 

"Mr. Whiting, in his Mcfalic Wealth o/*, require food at the stated times; the crav- 
ihe United States, estimates the iron pro-ings of an empty stomach will require it; a 
duct of the world at 5,817,000 tons, of great uneasiness is felt until the food is pro- 
which 1,000,000 are set down for the, vided, and, during this irregularity there is 
United States, Great Britain producing that co?^^>7a7J/ iraste of what has accumulated, 
year 3,000,000 When we remember that, after supplying the natutal waste of the 
so late as 1845, the total product of the body, as all excess of blood produced is con- 
United States ic iron had not reached half verted into cellular and muscular tissues, 
a million tons (486,000,) and that in 1850 which causes the animal to lay on fat and 
it was only 600,000 tons, it will be seen 'flesh. x\]l the food we feed our stock with, 
that the progress in this important industry, contains a greater or less proportion of chem- 
in the first six years of this decade, has ical substances, and the oil is the predomi- 
been at the rate of over twenty per centum nating one that forms the /a/! of all animals, 
per annum. The operation of this law of Graziers well know the great waste in get- 
increase will soon, it would seem, put an'ing their fat animals to market, with all the 
end to all importation of iron, and points care used, and that the loss is from 15 to 20 
even to an export of this great staple at no per cent. This is ascertained by weighing 
distant day. The stock and varieties of ! at home, and afler they arrive at market, 
iron-ores and coal in the United States is Why this great loss? It is the want of 
such as seems adequate to meet the dc-\ the re</nlar/erjj and the constantly disturb- 
nands of the world, as fast as the laws of /«y of the animal^ which caiuscs a waste of 



commerce will permit their development. 
Year Book of Science and Art for I860. 



the fat and muscle. I will here state what 
Prof. Yoemans says : " Every animal is busy 



238 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



in drawing- in -and throwing out air — an un- 
ceasing tidal ebb and How. The oxygen of 
the air passes through the membrane of the 
lungs, is taken up by the blood, and is car- 
ried to all parts of the body. It does here 
what it does everywhere — it burns. Slow 
combustion goes on in the body, and car- 
bonic acid and water are produced. This 
combustion is necessary to keep up heat, and 
the oxygen of the air must have carbon and 
hydrogen in the form of fond ami drink to 
feed upon. Cut off the animal from all 
food and drink, and the oxygen at every 
breath will cut away a portion of his frame. 
The most combustible parts are first con- 
sumed; he grows more emaciated every 
hour. First, the fat disappears, then the 
muscles are assailed ; and lastly the devour- 
ing giant, oxj/ge)i, attacks the brain and 
nerves, and death closes the scene. Men 
say he has starved to death, but the scien- 
tific truth is, he has been burnt to cinders.'' 

0. 



Efficacy of Salt applied to the Tobacco 
Crop. 

As many inquiries have been made re- 
specting the efficacy of salt as a preventive 
of the formidable diseiise, called " Black 
Fire or Rot in Tobacco," and as we have 
been particularly requested to do so, w^e re- 
produce the following article, which ap- 
peared in the May number, for 1858, of the 
Southern Planter, on that interesting sub- 
ject. The article was communicated by Dr. 
Spraggins, of Charlotte — though bearing 
the modest signature, "A." — and, as will 
be seen, contained reference to the expe- 
rience of several of his neighbours, con- 
firmatory of the truth of his theory. Be- 
sides these it has been further corroborated 
by the successful use of the remedy by 
Wm. M. Watkins, Esq., of Charlotte, (from 
whom we hope to hear further on the sub- 
ject in reply to inquiries addressed to him 
through this paper,) by Dr. R. H. Nelson, 
of Hanover, and others, among whom we 
may mention R. W. N. Noland, Esq., of 
Albemarle, who has been reported to us as 
having attained most satisfactory results 
from bis experiments in the use of salt on 
his Tobacco crop. We hope he will favour 
us with a communication detailing his prac- 
tice and experience, and the result of his 
experiments. — [Editor. 



Salt as a Preventive of Black 
Fire, or Rot, in Tobacco. 

Mr. Editor — Doubtless most, if not all, 
who have cultivated tobacco, have observed, 
formed on the stems of the leaf, a salt, 
closely resembling saltpetre, and ginerallj- 
so called. From frequent observation the 
writer came to the conclusion that the ripest 
and richest leaves were most disposed to 
throw out this salt — conceiving .this idea, 
he sought to ascertain its truth as far as 
practicable, by inquiring of experienced 
planters. The result has been a full con- 
viction of its truth. This, again, suggested 
the idea that the elimination of the salt 
might be inunediately connected with the 
maturation of the plant, and that, as a con- 
sequence, whatever would furnish material 
for the formation of this salt, would encour- 
age the ripening and enrich the plant 
Farther investigation led to the conception, 
that the black fire, or rot, the disease so 
often disappointing the sanguine expecta- 
tions of the planter, was the result of the 
condition of the plant directly antagonistic 
to maturation, and if so, that whatever 
would encourage and hasten the process of 
ripening, would prevent the disease. In- 
quiries as to the truth of this supposition 
have confirmed the hypothesis and fixed 
the conclusion, that a want of the material 
to form this salt constitutes the cause of the 
disease, and that furnishing the material or 
elements, would be a sai'eguard against its 
ravages. Since arriving at this conclusion, 
and before he had made experiments to test 
the truth of the theory, by the suggestion 
of a friend, he was induced to use ground 
alum salt, with Peruvian guano, as a prep- 
aration for tobacco, merely to cheapen the 
manure, two parts of the guano with one 
of the salt being regarded as equal to all 
guano as a fertilizer, which he has lound to 
be true. Since using this mixture he has 
found that he has had no black fire. The 
last season, which was very favourable to 
produce this disease, he saw but one or two 
plants fired in his whole crop. This led to 
inquiries of his neighboring planters, which 
resulted as follows : 

Mr. M., crop 150,000— land peculiarly 
liable to fire — whole crop salted except 
about 30,000 new land — no fire on the old 
land to attract notice — part of the new fired 
badly. Mr. C, crop about 250,C0J— land 
much less liable to fire than Mr. M.'s — used 



18C0.] 



TUE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



no salt — fired very badly, and forced to cut 
prematurely to save tVinn fire. Col. G., 
about i:00,00e'— no salt— fired badly. Capt. 
15., about ::00,000— no salt— last cutting 
bejian to fire rapidly. .Mr. II., alout ILO,- 
OOU— :_00,OUO salted— no fire — 45,10 J— 
guano without salt — fired con.siderably — 
5,0U0 new land — no manure — fired very 
badly. Mr. IJ., the friend at wboc^e sugges- 
tion the writer was first in-iueed to use salt, 
says he liad not thought of its being a pre- 
ventive of the fire, but upon reflection re- 
collects that whereas he occasionally had 
the fire before u.sing the salt, he has had 
none since. In view of these facts, the 
writer regards the conclusion legitiniate, 
that ground alum salt is a preventive against 
the black fire, or rot. 

Perhaps the maximum to the acre should 
not exceed a bushel. This seems to be the 
opinion of most who have used it, I'caring 
that u more liberal dose may render it more 
difficult to secure a good stand. Without 
question it may be advantageously ap])lied 
during the cultivation, alone or mixed with 
guano or the phosphates, and possibly with 
even better effect. A. 

Cub Creek, Charlotte. 



For the Southern Planter. 

Ashes and Wood's Mould. 
King William, Feb. 22nd, 18G0. 

Last April, 1859, 1 commenced cutting up 
and piling all the old trees in my woods, 
and during wet seasons, burning them into 
ashes for agricultural purposes. Timber 
getters from Maine had been at work on 
my land, leaving large quantities of white' 
and red oak to rot, (mostly in ravines and i 
gullies, inaccessible to hauling with ordina- 
ry team,) all this was piled up long enough 
to dry, then burnt, and the ashes raked up 
with the wood's mould convenient. Hun-! 
drcds of loads of rich compost have thus 
been made, with but little expense, and ' 
ashes so much needed by our lands and so 
hard to get, freely supplied. I think there i 
is wood enough rotting in our Ibrests to fur- 
nish ashes for agric dtural purpo.ses gcne-| 
rally, and I hope many may be induced to 
search out and use it. 

Ashes from brush burnt in "new 
ground," may be hauled to the compost 
heap with profit, and when mixed with 
wood's mould and plaster, and sifted, are 



worth more thiin guano to (frifl in with 
wheat. 

Mattaponi. 

• 

V. S. — Some of this compost was carted 
out last I'all, and s[)read on wheat land after 
seeding; and today, February 21st, I am 
carting and sj)reading on wheat; some was 
used Un clover intended for next lall's fal- 
low, and a large quantity mixed with all 
the available manure on the jiremises, will 
be used on the ]»resent year's corn croj). I 
am now making a compost of saw-dust and 
this ash compost, for Irish potatoes — (a root 
by the way tar preferable to turnips as a 
teed for hogs and cattle.) 

Manure— An Agricultural Problem. 

I have met several trains of wagons every 
uiorning, on my way to my office, tilled with 
fresh stable manure. 1 his morning 1 slop- 
ped an inteUigunt negro driver, and made 
some inquiries as to where he intended car- 
rying his load, and the use he intended to 
put it to. His answer was, that it was in- 
tended as manure for a garden, and for 
corn — it was intended to enrich poor soil 
upon which to produce a crop the coming 
season. 

Just at the point where I happened to 
stop, the street was remarkably muddy, with 
a black stiff loam produced by decom})osi- 
tion of vegetable matter and offal from fac- 
tories, kitchens, etc. 

" Why don't you haul this mud out of the 
street, and mix with your stable manure?" 

" I don't know, sir." 

" Don't your master know that this very 
mud is much better for his purpose than 
what you are hauling'/"* The negro's re- 
ply was pertinent: 

'• I don't spec ho docs!" 

And so I believe : very few indeed do 
know the I'act that our couunon street mud, 
such as you find in front of your office, is 
better manure for immediate use than any 
now u.sed. It contains more of fixed alkali, 
nitrogen and amrnt.nia, than the best stable 
litter, the latter containing a large quantity 
of free ammonia, which dissipates upon ex- 
posure to the air, while in the former it is 
fixed in the form of salts, aiid entere at once 
into the general composition of the soil with 
which it is mixed. 

I give this suggestion in hope it may clicii 
further inquiry and free discussion. 

P. B. E. 



240 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[April 



The Contented Farmer. i 

Once upon a time, Frederick, King of 
Prussia, surnamed " Old Fritz," took a ride, 
and espied an old farmer plowing his acre by 
the way side, cheerily singing his melody. 

" You must be well off, old man," said the 
king. " Does this acre belong to you, on 
which you so industriously labor?" 

" No, sir," replied the farmer, who knew 
not that it was the king. 

" I am not so rich as that, I plow for 
wages." 

^' How much do you get a day ?" asked 
the king farther. 

" Eight groschen," (about twenty cents) 
said the farmer. 

"That is not much," replied the king; 
can you get along with this ?" 

" Get along and have something left.'' 

" How is that ?" 

The farmer smiled and said — " Well, if I 
must tell you ; two groschen for myself and 
wife ; and with two I pay my old debts ; two 
I lend away, and two I give away for the 
Lord's sake." 

" This is a mystery which I cannot solve," 
replied the king. 

^' Then I will solve it for you," said the 
farmer. 

" I have two old parents at home, who 
kept me when I was weak and needed help, 
and now that they are weak and need help 
I keep them. This is my debt, towards 
which I pay two. groschen a day. The third 
pair of groschen, which I lend away, I spend 
for my children, that they may learn some- 
thing good and receive a Christian instruc- 
tion. This will come handy to me and my 
wife when we get old. With the last two 
groschen I maintain two sick sisters, whom 
I would not be compelled to keep — this I 
give for the Lord's sake." 

The king, well pleased with his answer, 
said — 

''Bravely spoken, old man. Now I will 
also give you something to guess. Have you 
ever seen me before ?" 

" Never," said the farmer. 

" In less than five minutes you shall see 
me fifty times, and carry in your pocket fifty 
of my likenesses." 

" This is a riddle which I cannot unrav- 
el," said the farmer. 

" Then I will do it for you," replied the 
king. 



Thrusting his hand into his pocket, and 
counting him fifty bran new gold pieces into 
his hand, stamped with his royal likeness, he 
said to the astonished farmer, who knew not 
what was coming-— 

" The coin is genuine, for it also comes 
frtm our Lord God, and I am his paymas-" 
ter. I bid you adieu."— -[ German Reform- 



From the Southern Homestead. 

The Use of Muck. 

Messrs. Editors : — In this day of fertil 
izing humbugs, I fear that many farmers are 
disposed to overlook the mines cf valuable 
manure they possess in the shape of muck. 
I believe that there is not one farmer in 
twenty fully appreciates it. Perhaps this is 
because it is too cheap and too easily pro- 
cured. 

Muck is simply decomposed matter that 
has accumulated in low spots by drainage, 
&c. That wo may more clearly examine its 
true character, let us briefly review its va- 
rious actions with reference to growing 
crops. 

1. It furnishes by its decomposition fer- 
tilizing gases and minerals which are imme- 
diately available as food for plants. 

2. It acts as an absorbent and retainer in 
transitu, of plant feeding materials which 
may come within its reach — readily yielding 

I its accumulated stores to the roots of plants, 
j but not readily to other influences. 
I 3. It increases the power of the soil to 
absorb moisture. 

4. It adds to its heat. 

5. It improves its mechanical condition, 
rendering it more easy to cultivate and less 
liable to become crusted on the surface. 

Thus we can easily sum up a few of the 
benefits arising from its use, but there 
are many more that might be brought for- 
ward. 

If the farmers of Tennessee will pay more 
attention to this cheap article, they will cer- 
tainly find their reward in the increase of 
their crops. F. G. L. 

January, 1860. 



.! 



The tongue of the wise useth knowledge 
aright; but the mouth of fools poureth out 
foolishness. 

A soft answer turneth away wrath : but 
grievous words stir up anger. 



.-A,:. :^M.. . 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



241 



« For th* Sottthern Planttr. 

"Vegetable Physiology." 

Mr. Editor — Some nior.ths iil'o, yuii paid 
my work on " Scientific and rractical Ag- 
riculture," the conij)linjent of copying into 
your valued pa])er, the chapters on Veiictu- 
ble Physiology. In one of those chapters 
the following pas.sage occurs : 

." The food taken up by the roots and 
carried by the sap to the leaves, there meets 
with the gaseous food from the air, all to- 
gether forming by their solution ' crude 
sap.' This is greatly modified during its 
circulation through the leaf, if an abundant 
supply of air be present. The change which 
the plant-food thus undergoes, we call * di- 
gestion,' because of its resemblance to the 
changes produced on animal food by animal 
digestion. When the sap has thus been 
prepared for nourishing the plant, it is 
called ' latex,' or ' true sap.' It is then con- 
veyed by the circulating organs to the vari- 
ous portions of the plant, and in some mys- 
terious way, under the guiding finger of 
Omnipotence, assumes various forms of or- 
ganic structure, producing stems and leaves, 
flowers and fruits. Here we have a beauti- 
ful analogy between the circulation of sap 
in plants, and the circulation of blood in 
animals." 

The March number of the Southern 
Planter, which has jufst come to hand, has 
a criticism on certain points set forth in the 
foregoing paragraph. It is from the pen of 
Mr.' Yardley Taylor. He objects— 1. To 
the '' theory of the downward circulation of 
the sap in plants." 2. He critici.ses the 
use of the word '' dissolved," as expres.sing 
the condition of the gaseous food, (viz: 
carbonic acid) absorbed from the air by the 
sap. 3. He would substitute electricity for 
heat, as the chief agency "in the decompo- 
sition of carbonic acid gas in the sap of 
plants, and thus, (as he says,) making mat- 
ters ready for a.ssimilation through an up- 
ward circulation alone, we have a theory for 
growth that accords well with the simplicity 
of Nature's laws, and will account for all 
we see without bringing in mysteries to our 
aid." 4. In the mean time he takes occa- 
sion to throw out, for my benefit, the very 
sage and important suggestion, that " it 
would be well for those who are preparing 
elementary works, to examine into all recent 
discoveries in science, and profit thereby." 

I am much obliged to Mr. Tavlor for his 
IG 



very suggestive article ; and shall always be 
obliged to him, or any one else, who may 
correct my scientific errors, or add to the lit- 
tle stock of inlormntion which 1 have been 
able to treasure up For 1 am yet a learner, — 
a mere gleaner m the grcit field of scien- 
tific research — a field too broad to be passed 
over in one short life-time, and too lull of 
unsolved mj/stcrics, for the j)rcsent genera- 
tion, or even the next, to clear its way at 
every point. 

Willingly, therefore, would I sit at the 
feet of Mr. Taylor, or any one prepared to 
give me instruction — especially one who can 
so readily solve the mysteries of vegetable 
growth. Will he be so kind, then, as to 
multiply his solutions ? But, if he should 
find his pupil a little slow of apprehension, 
not always ready to adopt liis " theories," 
and sometimes disposed to set up facts and 
authorities to be demolished, he must "take 
it all in good part," and only ply his argu- 
ments with greater vigor. 

First, with reference to the circulation 
of sap, he seems to admit with me, that 
" the sap ascends from the root to the leaf, 
and carries with it in solution a portion of 
the material necessary for the nourishment 
of the growing plant;" and that "plants 
derive a large portion of their nourishment 
from the air, through their leaves, in the 
form of carbonic acid gas." So far we 
agree. Having, now, " a portion of the 
material necessary for the nourishment of 
the growing plant," brought up from the 
roots to the leaves; and another portion 
collected by the leaves from the air, we are 
left to infer, (so far as Mr. Taylor tells us 
anything to the contrary,) that it all remains 
in the leaves, except the water evaporated 
through their pores. On this point, some 
very reliable authorities differ from Mr. 
Taylor ; and some still more reliable " known 
facts" are very much in the way of this 
new and very debatable theor}' — a theory 
advanced sonic time since, but not generally 
adopted. Who are our authorities } 

The " New American Cyclopaxlia," on 
which Mr. T. rests his faith, says that "the 
ingenious Dr. Draper, of New York, has 
made some important observations" on the 
nourishment of plants, &c., — and this inge- 
nious Dr. Draper says : " by their action, 
(referring to the spongioles,) the fluid i.s 
forced up through the sap-wood into the 
leaves, and there exposed to the conjoint 
agency of sun and air. A change is thus 



242 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



[AlRIL 



accomplished, and, from being crude, it 
turns into elaborated sap, and n.ow descends 
through the bark, to be distributed to every 
part of the plant." — [Fhysiohgy^-p. 87.] 

The same Cyclopaedia, under the article 
*\ Bark," has this language " It [bark] is 
also the channel through which the sap 
descends from the leaves. 'J he true bark, 
■which separates from the wood, is only 
found in the exogenous and gymnospermous 
classes of plants. Its construction is of 
cellular tissue, traversed longitudinally by 
■woody tissue, which is composed of woody 
tubes, through which the sap elaborated in 
the leaves descends/' 

But, under the head of " Agricultural 
Chemistry," this Ncic American Cyclopsedia 
had already said : " The vague ideas of the 
older vegetable Physiologists, according to 
which there is a constant circulation of sap 
in plants, an upward and a downward flow — 
the sap ascending in the outer wood to the 
leaves, there being eloborated, and return- 
ing through the inner bark to the roots, de- 
positing new matter on its way, must be no- 
ticed here as an exploded but still oft-re- 
peated error. There is no evidence that 
there exists any but an upward and outward 
current." Now, will Mr. Taylor take 
American Cyclopaedia, vol. I., or American 
Cyclopaedia, vol. II., as reliable authority ? 
The two volumes certainly take opposite 
sides of the question. 

Prof Asa Gray, of Harvard, in his 
" Structural and Systematic Botany," p. 128, 
(Ed. 1858, a year after vol. I. of the New 
American Cyclopaedia was published,) gives 
utterance to his views thus : '' These last, 
[the proper cells of the liber or inner bark,] 
as they are peculiar to this part of the bark, 
arc seldom if ever absent; they contain an 
.abundance of mucilage and proteine, and in 
all probability they take the principal part 
in the descending circulation of the plant, 
if it may be so called, i. c, in conveying 
jloir/n wards, and distributing the rich sap 
which has been elaborated in the foliage.'' 
On the next page he says : " While the 
new layers of wood abound in crude sap, 
which they convey to the leaves, those of 
the inner bark abound in elaborated sap, 
which diey receive from the leaves and con- 
vey to the cambium layer or zone of growth. 
The proper juices and peculiar products of 
plants are accordingly found in the foliage 
and the bark, especially in the latter.'' 
Prof Gray is certainly one of the leading 



botanists of this country- and one who 
would not be apt to advance theories which 
had been entirely "exploded." We might 
multiply recent authorities, but these may 
suffice for the present. 

Let us now look at some of the " known 
facts." The New American Cyclopaedia,^ 
vol. 1., agrees with vol. II., and with most 
other books in the opinion, that carbonic 
acid, as an element of plant food, " is ra- 
jyidly absorbed by the leaves of growing 
plants under the influence of sun-light, and 
undergoes decomposition in the vegetable 
cells, carbon being retained and assimilated, 
while the oxjgen is set free, wholly or in 
part, and exhales from the leaves." — [Art. 
Agrl. Chemistry.] Admitting this as a 
" known fact " — and it has been repeatedly 
proved by experiment — pray tell us where 
this carbon is " retained and assimilated." 
Is it in the cells of the leaves alone ? If 
this were so, we should find the leaves to be 
the largest and firmest part of the plant; 
but the " known fact" is just the reverse. 
Mr. Taylor thinks that, if the sap were to 
pass down from the leaves into the branches 
and trunk, '' it is more reasonable to infer 
that the matters would be more deposited 
near the leaves than they are, thus making 
the top grow faster than the body." I sup- 
pose he will admit that the mineral matter 
formed in the plant comes from the soil 
through the roots. Then would it not be 
reasonable to suppose that these mineral 
"matters would be more deposited" near 
the root, than in the branches and leaves ? 
Such, however, is not the case. The parts 
of nearly all plants most remote from the 
roots — the twigs and leaves — abound most 
in mineral substances, which have traversed 
both root and trunk. Might we not then 
reasonably suppose, that the carbon from 
the air could be carried down by descend- 
ing sap, without being necessarily deposited 
more freely during the first, than during 
the last part of its descent ? 

Again he says : " It would be a mysteri- 
ous way, indeed, to suppose a downward as 
well as an upxyard movement of the sap; 
the downward being much thickened by 
the evaporation of the superabundant water 
at first contained in it. This difficulty is 
not overcome by supposing the descent, be- 
neath the bark, where most of the growth 
is made, for it must pass through the stem 
of the leaf where there is no known evi- 
dence of their passing each other. Accord- 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTEK. 



248 



ing to this theorj it mast puss through the I 
pores of the sap-wood too, for it is well| 
known that tlicso poivs gradually become j 
more and njure filled up by niatter, until the 



texture of the heart-wood is assumed 

9" 



How 



does this matter g(^t there?" Here our 
author finds himself in two points of diffi-| 
culty, on tlie supposition that the elaborated 
sap has to return from the leaf into the 
sialk. First, it must pass the ascending 
sap into the stem of the leaf. Sfcondh/, it 
must find its way back to the cells of the 
sap-wood, in order to furnish the matter 
necesy;uy to give this the "texture of the 
heartwood." 

^ The microscope has done more than all 
other instrumentwS and means combined to 
solve the problems of vegetable and- animal 
physiology; and, among other things, it has 
solved the two difficulties here presented. 
It has shown us, in the first place, that the 
leaf consists of two somewhat distinct classes 
of cells. The first class, consisting of the 
woody tissue, is so arranged as to form the 
main body of the stem, with its almost innume- 
rable divisions and sub-divisions, making up 
the whole frame-work of the leaf. The 
second, consisting of cilhilar tissue, is more 
soft and pulpy in its structure, and is called 
"parenchyma." The cells of the paren 
chyma contain the green substance of the 
leaf, and are found in the stem and its 
divisions, as well as in the blade of the leaf 
The woody tissue of the »tem is found to be 
connected with the sap-wood, and from it 
receives the sap and conveys it to the cells 
of the parenchyma in every part of the 
leaf, but chiefly to the lower surface of ordi- 
nary leaves, where it is condensed by evapor- 
ation and charged with carbonic acid from 
the air. It then passes from cell to cell of 
the parenchyma, undergoing that process of 
elaboration which fits it for nourishing the 
various parts of the growing plant, and pass- 
ing through the lines of these cells to the 
inner bark, with which they are connected, 
it is attracted by " endosmosis" to all parts 
of the plant demanding nourishmcnL It 
finds its way to the sap-wood, and even to 
the heart-wood to some extent, through those 
lines of cells that connect the inner bark 
with all the layers of wood, forming what 
are called "medullary rays." Here, then, 
we have Mr. Taylor's second point of diffi- 
culty sat aside. 

I will add one or two facts, which any 
one may readily verify, and which tend to 



confirm the theory of a descending circula- 
tion of the elaborated sap. 1. Let a strong 
cord be tied tightly around the body of a 
young and rapidly growing tree. As the 
tree increases in size, the tightening of the 
cord will check the downward flow of sap in 
the Itark, and the j)art above the cord will 
grow more rapidly than the part below, the 
difference becoming very ])crceptible in two 
or three years. A similar result will follow, 
if instead of using the cord, a ring (tf bark 
a quarter of an inch, or less, in width be 
cut out carefully all around the trunk, in 
sucli a way as not to injure the soft outer- 
layer of the sap-wood. While the part 
above the ring grows larger than the part 
below, tlic ring will be gradually closed over 
from the vpp r side — showing an accumu- 
lation of matter from above. 

" Analogy" does not necessarily imply 
very close resemblance, but only "likeness 
between things in some circumstances or ef- 
fects, when the things are otherwise entirely 
different." AVhen 1 speak of the ^^avnloyi/ 
between the circulation of sap in plants, and 
the circulation of blood in animals," I do 
not mean, that they bear any very close re- 
semblance, for then I should not have used 
the word " analogy." Things may bear an 
analogy to each other which is very remote; 
but the degree of remoteness must be de- 
termined by what the mind already knows 
of the things brought under comparison. If 
Mr. Taylor, or any one else, wishes to know 
how nearly I regard the circulation of sap, as 
analogous to the circulation of blood, let 
him read the XXVI. chapter of my work on 
Agriculture, which gives a concise outline of 
Animal Physiology. 

Saondii/. As to the second point of Mr. 
T.'s criticism — the use of the word " dis- 
solved" — I have only a few words to say in 
reply. The terms, '• di.ssolvc," "solution," 
"soluble," &c., are to be found in every re- 
spectable work on chemistry, and are used 
to express the relation of certain ga.«C8 to 
water and other fluids, when these two furmjj 
of matter manifest a greater or less degree 
of affinity for each other. For examplci 
" chlorine is soluble to a considerable extent 
in water," [/o?rwrs]. "One measure of 
water will dUgolve one* measure of carbonic 



•Mr. Taylor sny?, "it is well known that 
wnter lia.s a preat nftinity for that pa««, nii'l will 
imbibe several times its bulk of it without pres- 
sure." Is this one of his "recent discoverieB ii* 
science" ' ^fy own experiment? have fully con- 



244 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



acid/' [^SfockhardQ. "At ordinary tempe- 
rature and pressure, water dissolves the third 
of its weight of ammonia," (a gas) [AW 
Am. Cjjcloppedia! Tliese forms of expres- 
sion have become incorporated into the 
language of science, and cannot now be 
easily eradicated. 

Tliirdlij. His objection to giving light 
the credit of doing the chief part of the 
work in decomposing carbonic acid, will 
liardly bear the test of either authority or 
experiment. Recent writers speak thus : 
*' The process of decomposition of carbonic 
acid takes place onhj during the day, as 
lir/ht is absolutely necessary for this process." 
[Am. Journal of Science and Art — Nov. 
1858.] Again: "To undergo this import- 
ant change (assimilation), the chide sap is 
attracted into the leaves, or other green parts 
of the plant, which constitute the apparatus 
of assimilation, where it is exposed to the 
(ir/ht of the sun, under which influence alone 
can this change be efl"ected." \_Groy, 1858.] 

Let my friend now try the following, or 
some similar experiment. Take a dozen 
(less or more) of open boxes or barrels, and 
having planted an equal number of hills of 
potatoes, turn a box or barrel bottom up- 
ward over every hill. Then bore several 
small holes in each bottom, and insert 
straight pieces of wire, so that they shall be 
in contact with the potato plants and the 
ground at one end, and shall rise as high as 
may be convenient into, the open air. These 
wires will convey more electricity from the 
air to the plants, than they would collect in 
the ordinary way. Let them be kept thus 
covered, and well supplied with water and 
everything else they may demand except 
light, and if a half crop, or a tenth of a 
crop is produced, I shall yield the point at 
once. 

No one has ever denied that electricity 
exerts an influence in the vegetable, as well 
as the animal kingdom. But when Mr. 
Taylor, or any one else, brings in the opera- 
tions of electricity to solve the mysteries of 
natural phenomena, let him not forget that 
he is dealing with the most hidden and in- 
explicable of all mysteries. An agency, of 
which Prof. Faraday, the Prince of elec- 
tricians, says: "There was a time when I 
thought I knew something about the matter; 
but the longer I live, and the more carefully 

vincerl me, that water must be made very coUl, 
before it will absorb near its own volume of car- 
bonic acid under ordinary atmospheric pressure 



I study the subject, the more convinced I 
am of my total ignorance of the nature of 
electricity." 

If we would avoid the folly of attempt- 
ing, at this stage of scientific development, 
to solve, and especially of saying we have 
solved, all mystery in the growth of cither^ 
plant or animal, we must call in the help of 
some better known agent than electricity. 
We had better attribute much to " the guid- 
ing finger of Omnipotence,^' than to say, 
"we know all about it — Electricity has 
solved the whole mystery." 

Fourthly. The very gentle hint in regard 
to " examining into all the recent discoveries 
in science," 1 shall thankfully accept, and 
endeavor to " profit thereby." Meantime I 
shall be glad to hear from my good friend 
again, although I have not the pleasure of a 
personal acquaintance with him. If either 
he, or " the philosophic editor of the Flore 
des Ceres," can bring forward facts well 
authenticated, and, by a legitimate process 
of reasoning based upon these facts, can 
show mc that I am entertaining erroneous 
views, or advocating unsound theories in 
any department of science, instead of quar- 
relling with him, I shall tender him my 
most sincere thanks, and class him amongst 
my real benefactors. 

J. L. Campbell, 

Washington College, Lexivgton, Va., \ 
March, 1860. | 

For the Southern Planter. 

Culture of Broom Corn. 
Mr. Editor : 

Having seen a notice in the March num- 
ber of the Planter, that there is to be a broom 
manufactory in Kichmond, and wishing to 
aid in encouraging Southern manufactures, 
I send you the following article on the 

CULTURE OF BROOM CORN, 

as my experience in raising the crop for the 
manufactory : 

Plough and prepare the ground as usual 
for other corn. Lay it off in rows, three 
feet apart. If the land is strong and rich,' 
put it in drills — if not, put it in hills two 
feet apart. One peck of seed to the acre is a 
plenty. Work it as 30U do other cora pre- 
cisely. 

In the Southern climate the brush is 
ready for harvesting about the middle of 
July, for the manufacture of brooms, as it 
should be cut when green, while the seed is 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER 



245 



in milk. If the seed is required by the 

farmer, it can remain until tully ripe, but 
the brush will not eounnand so gixul a price. 

In harvestinj?, it should be cut off from 
the Bt;ilk from six to eiuht inches. The seed 
is usually whipped off by hoKlint^ the brush 
on the cylinder of a thrcshinji; machine. In 
a small way, it can be cleaned oH' with a 
hackle. 

In preparing it for market, dry it well in 
the sun, and tie it up in bundles of about 
ten pounds each. 

The crop will yield from six to eight hun- 
dred pounds per acre, according to the 
quality of the soil. 

The usual price paid is about $100 per 
ton. 

In order to compete successfully with the 
Northern manufactories, it is desirable to 
obtain penitentiary labor in making up the 
brooms. Respectfully, 

J. C. Marsh. 

BaUimore, March 17, 1860. 



More about Salt as a Preventive of Black 
Fire or Rot in Tobacco. 
Since our call on Mr. Noland, page 238 
of this number of our journal, the following 
letter has been received from hii: by our 
friend, Mr. Rufhn, and kindly placed at our 
disposal. It fully and satisfactorily answers 
to the object we had in view, when calling 
on Mr. N. for a detailed st tement of his 
practice and experience in 'reference to the 
remedial or rather preventive effect of salt, 
used with reference to the formidable dis- 
ea.se — ** fire-rot " —to which there is such a 
prevailing tendency in our growing crops of 
tobacco. — Editor. 

Rox, March 21st, 1860. 

F. G. Evffin, Exq., 

1>E.\R Str : — You ask my experience in 
the u.^e of salt as a preventive of fire in to- 
bacco. I have used it for two years, at the 
rate of from one and a half to two bushels 
per acre — applied broadcast at the time of 
hilling. The first year I applied it only to 
a portion of my crop, and was so well satis- 
fied of its value that I intended using it 
upon the whole crop last year. My supply, 
however, did not hold out, and I left a few 
thousand hills unsalted. This, as was the case 
with all the crops in my neighborhood, suf- 
fered much from firing, while the salted por- 
tion of my crop escaped almoi-t unharmed. 
My protracted absence from home prevented 
my observing the eflfects of this application 



as closely as I otherwise wonid h 

but my overseer and neighbors testily tu the 
efficacy of salt as a preventive of fire ; and 
the condiMon of my crop now coming inio 
market is stronger evidence still in its favor. 
Yours trulv, 

R. \V. N. NOWLA.ND. 
For the Southern Planter. 

Seed Com. 
Mr. Editor : 

The many questions asked me concerning 
the inij)roved seed-corn advertised for sale 
by me in your last number of the Planter, 
have induced me to communicate the mode 
by which I have effected the improvement. 
Twenty years ago I selected my seed-corn 
from several places, of different kinds; some 
soft and some hard and flinty. I took the 
nubs off from both ends of the ears; shelled 
the corn and mixed it before planting, al- 
ways carefully avoiding in my selection the 
blue, yellow or red grains, and the red husk. 
Since then I have carefully selected each 
year, at shucking time, such cars as I liked 
best — always keeping in view a deep grain 
and a white husk. At planting time, if 1 
thought my corn was too hard, I selected 
more soft, to mix in with the seed. Ry doing 
this I found that I could make my crop hard- 
er or softer, to my liking. 

Yours, respectfully, 

Garland Hank.*?. 

I will give you my method of planting 
and working the corn in time for your next 
number. G. II. 



On Science, as a Branch of Edacation. 

The following is an abstract of a lecture 
on the above subject, recently delivered be- 
fore the Royal Institution, London, by Pro- 
fessor Faraday. The high position of this 
gentleman always secures attention for his 
opinions ; but, upon this topic especially, 
his views will be examined with great in- 
terest. 

The development of the applications of 
physical science in modem times has become 
so large, and so essential to the well-being of 
man, that it may justly be used as illustrat- 
ing the true character of pure science, as a 
department of knowledge, and the claims it 
may have for consideration by governments, 
universities, and all bodies to whom is con- 
fided the fostering care and direction of 
learning. As a branch of learning, men 



Jk '^m.: 



246 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



are beginning to recognize the claim of 
ficience to its own particular place; for, 
tliouuh flowing in channels utterly differ- 
ent in their course and end to those of lite- 
rature, it conduces not less, as a means of 
instruction, to the discipline of the mind; 
whilst it ministers, more or less, to the wants, 
comforts, and proper pleasure, both mental 
and bodily, of every individual of every 
class in life. Until of late years, the edu- 
cation for, and recognition of it, by the bo- 
dies which may be considered as giving the 
general course of all education, have been 
chiefly directed to it only as it could serve 
professional services, — namely, those which 
are remunerated by society ; but, now the 
fitness of University degrees in science is 
under consideration, and many are taking a 
high view of it, as distinguished from lite- 
rature, and think that it may well be stu- 
died for its own sake, — i. e., as a proper ex- 
ercise of the human intelligence, able to 
bring into action and development all the 
powers of the mind. As a branch of learn- 
ing, it has, without reference to its applica- 
tions, become as extensive and varied as lit- 
erature ; and it has this privilege, that it 
must ever go on increasing. Thus it be- 
comes a duty to foster, direct, and honor it, 
as literature is so guided and recognized ; 
and the duty is the more imperative, as we 
find by the unguided progress of science 
and the experience it supplies, that of those 
men who devote themselves to studious edu- 
cation, there are as many whose minds are 
constitutionally disposed to the studies sup- 
plied by it, as there are of others more fitted 
by inclination and power to pursue literature. 
The value of the public recognition of 
science as a leading branch of education may 
be estimated in a very considerable degree 
by observation of the results of the educa- 
tion which it has obtained incidentally from 
those who, pursuing it, have educated them- 
fielves. Though men may be specially fitted 
by the nature of their minds for the attain- 
ment and advance of literature, science, or 
the fine arts, all these men, and all others, 
require first to be educated in that which is 
to be known in these respective mental paths ; 
and when they go beyond this preliminary 
teaching, they require a self-education di- 
rected (at least in science) to the highest 
reasoning power of the mind. Any part of 
pure science may be selected to show how 
much this private self-teaching has done, 
and by that to aid the present movement in j 



favor of the recognition generally of scien- 
tific education in an equal degree with thatj 
which is literary ; but perhaps, electricity, 
as being the portion which has been left 
most to its own development, and has pro- 
duced as its results the most enduring marks 
on the face of the. globe, may be referred 
to. In 1800 Volta discovered the Voltaic 
pile — giving a source and form of electrici- 
ty before unknown. It was not an accident, 
but resulted from his own mental self-educa- 
tion. It was, at first, a feeble instrument, 
giving feeble results; but, by the united 
mental exertions of other men, who educa- 
ted themselves through the force of thought 
and experiment, it has been raised up to 
such a degree of power as to give us light, 
and heat, and magnetic and chemical action, 
in states more exalted than those supplied 
by any other means. In 1819 Oersted dis- 
covered the magnetism of the electric cur- 
rent, and its relation to the magnetic nee- 
dle ; and as an immediate consequence, other 
men, as Arago and Uavy, instructing them- 
selves by the partial laws and action of the 
bodies concerned, magnetized iron from the 
current. The results were so feeble at first 
as to be scarcely visible ; but, by the exer- 
tion of self-taught men since then, they 
have been exalted so highly, as to give us 
magnets of a farce unimaginable in former 
times. In 1831 the induction of electrical 
currents, one by another, and the evolution 
of electricity by magnets, was observed, — 
at first in results so small and feeble that it 
required one much instructed in the pursuit 
to perceive and lay hold of them; but 
these feeble results, taken into the minds of 
men already partially educated and ever 
proceeding onwards in their self-education, 
have been so developed as to supply sources 
of electricity independent of the Voltaic 
battery on the electric machine, yet having 
the power of both combined in a manner 
and degree which they, neither separate nor 
together, could ever have given it, and ap- 
plicable to all the practical electrical pur- 
poses of life. To consider all the depart- 
ments of electricity fully, would be to lose the 
argument for its fitness in subserving educa- 
tion in the vastness of its extent; and it will be 
better to confine the attention to one appli- 
cation, as the electric telegraph, and even 
to one small part of that application, in the 
present case. Thoughts of an electric tele- 
graph came over the minds of those who 
had been instructed in the nature of elec- 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



24T 



trieity as bood as the conductiun uf that 
power with extreme swiftness through me- 
tals was known, anil grow as the knowledge 
of that branch of science increased. The 
thought, as realized at the present day, in- 
cludes a wonderful amount of study and de- 
velopment. As the end in view presented 
itself more and more distinctly, points, at 
first, apparently of no consequence to the 
knowledge of the science, generally rose 
into an importance which obtained for them 
the most careful culture and examination, 
and the almost exclusive exercise of minds, 
whose powoi-s of judgment and reasoning 
had been raised first by general education, 
and who, in addition, had acquired the spe- 
cial kind of education which the science in 
its previous state could give. Numerous 
and important as the points are, which have 
been already recognized, others are conti- 
nually coming into sight as the great devel- 
opment proceeds, and with a rapidity such 
as to make us believe that, much as there is 
known to us, the unknown far exceeds it ; 
and that, extensive as is the teaching of 
method, facts and law, which' can be estab- 
lished at present, an education looking for 
far greater results should be favored and 
preserved. The results already obtained 
are so large as even in money value to be of 
very great importiince; — as regards their in- 
fluence upon the human mind, especially when 
that is considered in respect of cultivation, 
I trust they are, and we will be, far greater. 
No intention exists here of comparing 
one telegraph with another, or of assigning 
their respective dates, merits or special uses. 
Those of Mr. Wheatstone are selected for 
the visible illustration of a brief argument 
in favor of a large public recognition of 
scientific education, because he is a man 
both of science and practice, and was one of 
the very earliest in the field, and because 
certain large steps in the course of his tele- 
graphic life will tell upon the general argu- 
ment. Without referring to what he had 
done previously, it may be observed that, in 
1840, he took out patents for electric tele- 
graphs, which included, amongst other 
things, the use of electricity from magnets 
at the communicator, — the dial face, — the 
step-by-step motion,— and the electro-mag- 
net at the indicator. At the present time, 
1858, he has taken out patents for instru- 
ments containing all these points j but these 
instruments are so altered and varied in 
character, above the former, that an un- 



taught person could not recognize thcni. 
The changes may be considered as the re- 
sult of education upon the one mind which 
has been concerned with them, and are to 
nje strong illustrations of the effects, which 
general scientific education may be exj)eeted 
to produce. In the first instruments power- 
ful magnets were used, and keepers, with 
heavy coils associated with them. When 
magnetic electricity was first discovered, the 
signs were feeble, and the mind of the stu- 
dent was led to increase the results by in- 
creasing the force and size of the instru- 
ments. When the object was to obtain a 
current sufficient to give signals through 
long circuits, large apparatus were employ- 
ed, but these involved the inconveniences of 
inertia and momentum ; the keeper was not 
set in motion at once, nor instantly sto]>ped; 
and, if connected directly with the reading 
indexes, these circumstances caused an occa- 
sional uncertainty of action. Prepared by 
its previous education the mind could per- 
ceive the disadvantages of these influences, 
and could proceed to their removal ; and 
now a small magnet is used to send sufficient 
currents through 12, 20, 50, 100, or several 
hundred miles; a keeper and helix is asso- 
i eiated with it, which the hand can easily 
I put in motion ; and the currents are not sent 
j out of the indicating instrument to tell their 
j story, until a key is depressed, and thus ir- 
regularity contingent upon first action is rc- 
I moved. A small magnet, ever ready for 
action and never wa.sting, can replace the 
Voltaic battery; if powerful agencies be 
required, the electro-magnet can be employ- 
ed without any change in principle or tele- 
graphic practice; and as magneto-electrio 
currents have special advantages over Vol- 
tiiic currents, these are in every case re- 
tained. These advantages I consider as the 
result of scientific education, much of it not 
tuU^rial but of self: but there is a special 
privilege about the science branch of edu- 
cation, namely, that what is personal in the 
first instance immediately becomes an addi- 
tion to the stock of .scientific learning, and 



passes into the l^ndsof the tutor, to be used 
by him in the education of others, and 
enable him in turn, to educate himself. How 
well may the young man, entering upon his 
duties in electricity, be taught, by what is 
past, to watch for the smallest signs of ac- 
tion, new or old ; to nurse them up by any 
means until they have gained strength ; 
then to study their lajrs, to eliminate the 



248 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



essential conditions from the non-essential, 
and, at least, to refine again, until the in- 
cumbering matter is as much as possible dis- 
missed, and the power left in its highly de- 
veloped and most exalted state. The alter- 
ations and successions of currents, produced 
by the movement of the keeper at the com- 
municator, pass along the wire to the indi- 
cator at a distance ; there each one for itself 
confers a magnetic condition on a piece of 
soft iron, and renders it attractive or repul- 
sive of small, permanent magnets; and these 
acting in turn on a propelment, cause the 
index to pass at will from one letter to an- 
other on the dial-face. The first electro- 
magnets, i. e.y those made by the circulation 
of an electric current round a piece of soft 
iron were weak ] they were quickly strength- 
ened, and it was only when they were strong 
that their laws and actions could be succes- 
sively investigated. But now they are re- 
quired small, yet potential. Then came the 
teaching of Ohm's law ; and it was only by 
patient study, under such teaching that 
Wheatstone was able so to refine the little 
electro-magnets at the indicator as that they 
should be small enough to consist with the 
fine work there employed, able to do their 
appointed work when excited in contrary 
directions, by the brief currents flowing from 
the original common magnet, and unobjec- 
tionable in respect of any resistance they 
might offer in the transit of these tell-tale 
currents. These small transitory electro- 
magnets attract and repel certain permanent 
magnetic needles, and the to-and-fro motion 
of the latter is communicated by a propel- 
ment to the index, being there converted 
into . a step-by-step motion. Here every 
thing is of the finest workmanship; the pro- 
pelment itself requires to be watched by a 
lens, if its action is to be observed ; the 
parts never leave hold of each other ) the 
vibratory and rotatory ratchet-wheel and the 
fixed pallets are always touching, and thus 
allow of no detachment, or loose shake ; the 
holes of the axes are jewelled; the moving 
parts are most carefully balanced, — a conse- 
quence of which is, that #gitation of the 
whole does not disturb the parts, and the 
telegraph works just as well when it is twist- 
ed about in the hands or placed on board a 
.ship, or on a railway carriage^ as when fixed 
immovably. 

Now, there was no accident in the course 
of these developments; — if there were ex- 
periments; they wer^ directed by the pre- 



viously acquired knowledge ; — every part of 
the investigations was made and guided by 
the instructed mind. The results being I 
such (and like illustrations might be drawn | 
from other men's telegraphs, or from other 1 
departments of electrical science,) then, if 
the term education may be understood in so- 
large a sense as to include all that belongs 
to the improvement of the mind, either by 
the acquisition of the knowledge of others, 
or by increase of it through its own exer- 
tions, we learn by them what is the kind of 
education science ofi'ers to man. It teaches 
us to be neglectful of nothing ; — not to des- 
pise the small beginnings, for they precede, 
of necessity, all great things in the knowl- 
edge of science, either pure or applied. It 
teaches a continued comparison of the small 
and great, and that under differences almost 
approaching the infinite : for the small as 
often contains the great in principle as the 
great does the small; and thus the mind be- 
comes comprehensive. It teaches to deduce 
principles carefully, to hold them firmly, or 
to suspend the judgment — to discover and 
and obey Imo, and by it to be bold in apply- 
ing to the greatest what we know of the 
smallest. It teaches us first by tutors and 
books to learn what is known to others, and 
then, by the lights and methods which be- 
long to science, to learn for ourselves and 
for others; — so making a fruitful return to 
man in the future for that which we have 
obtained from the men of the past. Bacon, 
in his instruction, tells us that the scientific 
student ought not to be as the ant, who 
gathers, merely; nor as the spider, who 
spins from her own bowels ; but rather as 
the bee, who both gathers and produces. 
All this is true of the teaching aftbrded by 
any part of the physical science. Electri- 
city is often called wonderful — beautiful ; — 
but it is so only in common with the other 
forces of nature. The beauty of electricity, 
or of any other force, is not that the power 
is mysterious and unexpected, touching eve- 
ry sense at unawares in turn, but that it is 
under law^ and that the taught intellect can 
even now govern it largely. The human 
mind is placed above, not beneath it; and 
it is in such a point of view that the mental 
education afforded by science is rendered 
supereminent in dignity, in practical appli- 
cation and utility : for, by enobling the mind 
to apply the natural power throiigh law, it 
conveys the gifts of God to man. — {Annual 
of Scientific discover}/, 1859. 



I860.] 



TUE SOUTHERN TM. AXTER 



m 




C^e Southern |]hnttr 



RICIIiMOND, VIRGHNIA. 



ill Iciist, u liiuraiiiro ol a strictly Southern cliar- 
ncter 

The growing dccmlence of the power and in- 
fluence of Virginia, and the growth ami pro- 
gress of New York in these elements, are shown 
in the following table, cxhibitiug the representa- 
tion of these two States in the Congress of the 
United States for eiicli defaik*, from 17'JU to 
1850 inclusive : 



Virginian Independence.* 

In the speech referred to in the note below, 
the object of the speaker in addressing the 
members of the State Legislatxire and others on 
die independence of Virginia in her commercial, 
agricultural and educational relations, seems to 
have been to show, by an imposing array of 
facts and figures industriously collected and 
judiciously collocated, that the course of former 
legislation, and of the practice of our citizens, 
has been such as to operate disastrously to the 
several State' interests referred to, and in effect 
to discriminate against Virginia, and in favor of 
her Northern rivals, and most persistent, imjjla- 
cable and malignant traducers. He also shows 
that whilst Virginia, as the legitimate fruit of 
her impolitic legislation, and suicidal policy, has 
been shorn of her power and just influence, the 
North has fattened upon the spoils wrested 
from her in the struggle for supremacy — a strug- 
gle rendered unequal only by self-imposed dis- 
abilities on her part; and that whilst Virginia 
has been "degraded" by misgovernmentj the 
North whohasbeen '•bencfitted''athcrexpense — 
has tauntingly exulted in what has been Vir- 
ginia's slow progress and development, in com- 
parison of what they would have been under a 
wise and patronizing system of legislation, and j 
of self reliant adherence to, and liberal support 
of home industry and her home institutions, 
and also a more exclusive devotion of her 
resources to the u))-building of her own educa- 
tional institutions, and the fostering and en- 
couraging of a literature peculiarly her own, or, 

• Speech of Daniel H. London, Esq., on the 
Commercial, Agricultural and Intellectual Inde- 
pendence of Virginia sind the South — deliveretl 
in tlie Hall of the House of Delegates, on the 
5th of January, 1860. A Pamphlet of 5.2 pages, 
fo be procured at Randolph's. 121 JMain Street, 
Richmond. 



Virginia had 

New York had 


it 

10- 
6 


i 
11) 

10 


* JO ji 

■22 23 '22 
17 2731 


as 

Jl|l5 
I0i34 


c 

13 
33 1 



•' But the commerce of these two States," saye 
Mr. London, " presents a picture worthy of the 
profoundest attention." 

Passing by the commercial statistics (which 
he adduces) of Virginia and Maryland com- 
bined, as compared with New Y'ork,for the period 
extending from 1750 to 1770 inclusive, we cite 
the comparison of "Viginia alone,^^ with New 
York," as found in the following tables showing 
the imports and exports of these two States in 
1791, and onwards to the close of the fiscal year 
in 1850. 

" 1701— Virj,'inia imports, $3,180,000 

Virginia exports, 3,131,000 

New York imports, 3,022,000 

New Y'ork exports, 2,505,000 

"At this period (1791), these two States were 
nearly equal. 

"Let us now see the appalling picture of the 
exports and imports of these two States in the 
years following: 



Virginia. New Y'ork. 



Imports in the year 1821, $1,07^,490 

Exports " " 1821, 

Imports " " 1830, 

lExports " " 1830, 

Imports " " 1840, 

Exports " '• 1810, 

Imports " " 1850, 

(Exports " " 18.50, 



3,079,099 
405.739 

4,791,644 
545,085 

4,778,220 
420,599 

3.41.5,646 



$23,629,246 
13,162,917 
35,624,070 
19,697,983 
00.440,750 
34,264,080 

111,123.524 
52,712.789' 



" By whose action," asks the speaker, "has 
this condition of affairs been produced? Who 
has deprived Virginia of her once flourishing 
foreign commerce? Who has neglected her 
interests? Who has plundered her husband- 
men of their labor ? Who has turned her sea- 
ports into neglected villages ? Whose blighting 
liand has dwarfed her representation in the 
national legislature, till she is too feeble even to 
be respected where she was once powerful? In 
vain is it answered, that the institution of slavery 
has produced this rcult. Slavery existed in Vir- 
ginia in the days of her prosperity as well as it 



250 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



does now. It cannot be answered that it is due 
to a want of intelligence and adaptation for 
commercial or agricultural pursuits in our peo- 
ple. Such an aflirmation is a libel on the most 
virtuous and intelligent people in the United 
States. 

***** '"To these questions," and 
others here omitted, "there is but one, and only- 
one answer, and that is this:— -It is the per- 
nicious HAND OF GOVERNMENT whicli has degraded 
lis and benefited others." 

The speaker then introduces".^ Table^ show- 
ing the number of Vessels, Tonnage, Men employed, 
and the Bounties in the Whale, Mackerel, and Cod 
Fisheries,''"' which, for the sake of brevity, we 
omit, extending over a period of sixty-seven 
years. Deducting " the years of war," in which 
no bounties were paid, it appears that in sixty- 
three years, the aggregate of bounties paid was 
$12,120,532, averaging, annually, $192,389 40. 
• The effect of this legislation of the Federal 
Government, during all this protracted period, 
has been "to transfer the results of the toil of 
the people of Virginia, and of the Southern 
States, to the benefit of others ; and at this very 
time, about three hnndred thousand dollars are 
paid, annually, out of the Federal Treasury to 
the citizens of Massachusetts, New Hampshire 
and Maine, for catching cod fish ; and the statis- 
tics disclose the fact, that more than $12,000,000 
of jiublic money have been, by the act of a 
common government, extracted from the people 
of this State, in part, to be lavished upon a 
vocation in which the people of Virginia have 
no interest; for, if there is anyone article of 
food, in all the world, not used by our people, it 
is cod fish." 

" The navigation laios,^^ continues the speaker, 
"by which foreign vessels are forced out of the 
coasting trade, and their exclusion from our 
ports, except under regulations designed to 
benefit the ship owners of the Northern States, 
where it was and is known that this interest 
chiefly exists, are detrimental to our interests. 

"The reciprocity treaty, by which Canadian 
wheat and breadstuffs are admitted free, brought 
into Northern markets, in 1857, ten millions one 
hundred and ninety-one thousand rive hundred 
and thirty-two dollars worth of grain and fiour, 
to exclude the grain and breadstuffs of Virginia 
and other Southern States. (See Commercial 
Relations in 1858, page 60.) 

"These items are not all to which allusion 
might be made, but they suffice to justify the 
statement, that Virginia and her sister Southern 
States 'can look to the action of the Federal Gov- 
ernment with no prospect of justice and con- 
sideration. 

" But the worse than indifferent, yea, the 
baneful legi.<lation which has been pursued by 
Virginia herself, affecting her own commerce 



and her own agriculture, must now be examined. 
Surely, it is not necessary to say [The Italics 
ours] that the legislation of any free people is de- 
fective, when the laws that should protect the laborer 
and secure to him the fruit of his oivn toil, are so 
framed as to wrench from his hand the just equiva- 
lent for his labor, and place it in the possession of 
another, especially when that other is not a friend. 

"The laws respecting merchants' licenses are 
so framed as that the grossest inequality pre- 
vails throughout the whole State, and the opera- 
tions of the tax for merchants' licenses is a 
direct bonus to every retail merchant in the . 
State, to go beyond the limits of Virginia to pro- 
cure his supplies." 

These positions are sustained by facts and 
arguments, which it would lead us too much into 
detail to present here, but we cannot overlook 
the remarks of the speaker regarding the unjust, 
unequal, and, in some cases, the oppressive 
operation of one of these laws. We mean the 
license law: — 

"This section, it will be ^us seen," referring 
to the 12 classes unto which the tax bill decid- 
ed the merchants "is a positive and malignant 
injustice to the small and feeble merchants, and 
bears heavily on them ; whilst the princely ana 
powerful are burdened so lightly a? to make the 
conclusion inevitable that if the legislature had 
any object in view, it was to oppress the small 
retailer, "of whom the poor are obliged to buy in 
many instances, and to protect the large and op- 
ulent merchant from bearing the same propor- 
tionate burden as the poor man engaged in the 
same vocation bears, for the privilege of selling 
goods, wares and merchandise upon the soil of 
Virginia. If sales are to be taken as an index 
to the property or capital of the merchant, then 
apply the same rule to all. * * * ^ 

If the object has been to derive the largest rev- 
enue from the amount ot goods sold in the State, 
then the means adopted have been the least sa- 
gacious, for the largest operator pays the very small- 
ess pro rata tax; but if the object has been to 
induce the interior merchant to seek the markets 
of other States to procure his supplie.^, the wis- 
dom of this clause in our tax bill may be com- 
mended, as it in fact operates as a bonus of from 
one to two state taxes — in many instances a dis- 
crimination against our own citizens, from whom 
the State has demanded and received a license 
tax to carry on a lawful business, on the soil of 
Virginia. Was this the object of the law? If 
so, continue it; but if any other purpose can be 
divined for the measure, then show the end and 
object of its existence." 

In vindication of the assertion thatthe license 
law operates "to induce the interior merchant to 
seek the markets of other Stales to procure his 
supplies," the speaker shows, that " $100 worth 
of goods brought into the State of Virginia from 
any other State by a merchant selling," the mean 
average of " $40,000" worth of goods per an- 
num sold to a jobber" "and then sold to a retail- 



I860.] 



»«{ SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



UL 



cr" — the effect will be a-tiiscrimination against 
Virginia, ami an inducement to the retailer to 
purchase goods elsewhoro of 1 10-UOOtlths per 
cent, on the value of his purchasers, which is 
deroonstratei! as follows: 

" The wholesale dealer woiild pay $i) Oi 

2d. The jobber of class No. 9, would pay 61 

3d. The retailer would pay in class No. 7. 1 01 

Whole amount of taxes collected by the 

State i^2 17 

But if the retailer, No. 7, will ^o out of the 
State and buy his stock, and sells thcui 
in VirKinia,he will pay only 1 01 

Balance in favor of buying out of V^^iuia 

by the laws of this Stale $1 16 

The inequality and injustice of this is plainly 
seen in the light of our State Constitution, which 
"indicates equal justice to all vocations, the 
poor and the rich alike." 

But a still greater inequality and more obvious 
injustice is perpetrated by this license law, first 
in the discrimination it makes in favor of the 
beginner upon a larj;e scale, and against the mer- 
chant of like extent of business on the second 
year or his mercantile operations — a discrimina- 
tion so jcreat as to operate as a temptation and 
an inducement to the merchant to change his 
business and begin anew every year ! and se- 
condly, in its reverse operation it burdens and 
oppresses the poor trader, who, "unless h6 "Can 
swear that his capital is less than $500, must 
pay the same sum, [sixty dollars,] without reganl 
to his sales or his capital." May not a change 
be effected in this law, which, while the same 
amount of revenue shall be derived from it, will 
operate more justly and equally, and of conse- 
quence more advantageously '' upon the com- 
mercial, agricidtural, and manufacturing inter- 
ests of Virginia.'' The remedy proposed by the 
speaker is the adoption by the State of the fol 
lowing "principles, namely, that no article of 
merchandize ought to pay more than one State tax 
oil its sale in Virginia, and that no merchant, no 
matter how wealthy, or how large his business, 
ought to be allowed to prosecute it, without con- 
tributing the same pro rata upon his pales, that 
the poorest man is made to pay for a like privi- 
leged • . • • • •He 
continues: "The principles suggested above, 
can bo safe)/ and judiciously embodied in the 
provisions of any act which may be passed 
upon the sid)ject of merchants' licenses. Fmm 
time immemorial, Virginia has discriminated in 
favor of the agricultural products of her own 



peoplo, and of all the other States," and for 
many yeirs" "she ftid not tax any goods told on 
her soil, except those from foreign countries. She 
nuiy now properly apply principles which she 
has exercised to her own detriment Ibr eo long 
a time, and make them of great advantiigo to 
every interest. The following are wotihy of 
consideration, in the number of ariiele^ to be 
sold, without any discrimination against them, 
viz: Raw cotton, rice, brown sugar, molasses, 
wheat. Hour, and all other bread>tuHs. tubaoco, 
all products of the forests of the southern slave 
States; hemp, flax, wool, indigo, madder, log- 
wood, an<l all other dye stufls ; gypsum, guano, 
horses, mules, asses, meat, cattle, hog.<', sheep, 
and other live stock; beef, pork, lard, meats, oil 
of all kinds, fishes, minerals of every kind ob- 
tained in any slave State; and any goods, M'ares, 
or merchandise, the product of any •♦lave State." 

"It i^due to our j)ecuniary interests as a peo- 
jile, that all direct importations from abroad 
should be exempt from every luirden. when we 
are advised of the fact that one ."ingle vessel of 
800 tons coming to James river from Liverpool 
with salt even, discharging and laUingin a cargo 
of Hour and tobacco lor Europe, will disiiibute 
as much money as almost every ve-sol now en- 
gaged in the coasting tratle di-tril^utes in a whole 
year. This fact can be shown by competent 
testimony ; but beyond this, another liict that 
our |)roducts find a market in foreign countries 
chiefly, and not in the northern States, retulersit 
too clear that our true intcre^-ts mu.ct in«licate 
the most direct and untraunnelcd intercourse 
with those who consume our products. But the 
fact that we have been deprived of Owr foreign 
commerce by the laws of the ieileral govern- 
ment and our own State government conduned, 
njust suggest the duty of u.«iing xXwreservcd pow- 
ers of the State for regaining that trade which 
has been driven away from our own seaport 
towns. But, as the acts of o»>r own State are 
now before us, the pilot laws of Virginia must 
constitute a subject of remark ;, and that the fol- 
ly of these measures may be brought to view, it 
is only necessary to state that it is made obliga- 
tory on every vessel, unless loa<ied with coal, en- 
gaged in the foreign trade, to employ a pilot, 
whether he be needed or not, wl^cn she ap- 
proaches our waters; whereas no con.-ling ves- 
sel is required to employ a pilot unless she 
choo.«?es. 

The charge on plaster for pilotage to Rich- 
mond, when brought directly frtun the placet 
where it is protluced, is as much as twice its 
cost frequently* an«l upon other articles, in the 
same ratio b5' the fool, according to the draft of 
the vessel, upon no other pretext, as app«'ars by 
the law in the Code, than that >he is engcged in 
the foreign trude, whether owne<l or not in this 
Stale. Surely all reasoning is at an end with 
the law-making power of the State, when it 
shall be necessary to argue that an agricultural 



252 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



people ought not to burden the vessels of their 
own citizens and otliers which are enirnged in 
bringing them articles of prime necessity and of 
general use, whilst the vessels of those who have 
sometimes been purloininp^ their property in open 
violation of the laws of the State, are allowed 
to enter onr waters, participate in our commerce, 
and come and go with cargoes of any size, with 
not a single farthing exacted of them without 
the positive contract of the captain of their ves- 
sels ; and this, too, whether the vessel is owned 
or not by a Virginian. This unwise discrimina- 
tion against onr foreign commerce is, as a mea- 
sure of State policy, in no way defensible." 

* * * * * u jf ti^e pilots of 

Virginia cannot subsist without this measure, in 
the shape in which itnow stands, then it vi^ill be 
better to make a direct appropriation from the 
treasury of the State for their benefit, and let 
the vohintary principle be applied to them and 
their interests. When a captain wishes to em- 
ploy a pilot, let him do it at such charges as 
may be thought reasonable, or make alt vessels, 
whether coastwise or foreign, pay the same and 
be compelled to take the first pilot that ofiers his 
services, when the vessel approaches the waters 
of Virginia." The charges for pilotage will be 
seen to be most oppressive, when we are told 
that there are imposed by the existing laws 
'' charges of from one dollar and fifty cents to two 
dollars and twenty-five cents from S3a to Hamp- 
ton Roads, and a further charge of four dollars 
and thirteen cents to Richmond, per foot, mak- 
ing the average of more than six dollars the foot 
up to our chief town and nearly as much going out 
— together about twelve dollars." No wonder 
then is it that " but few, if any of our citizens" 
engage " in direct foreign trade," when by em- 
ploying any coasting vessel "to transport the 
cargo to New York or elsewhere out of the State, 
we may escape thes6 charges in Virginia alto- 
gether." ***** jY corres- 
pondent of Mr. London's states the following 
significant fact: "A vessel drawing 15 feet of 
water, coming to Richmond with plaster from 
Nova Scotia direct, ha.s to pay $1 00 to-fl 50 for 
a pilot, equivalent to $1 per ton tax on plaster, 
while a vessel from Massachusetts or Maine, 
with a coasting license, takes no pilot, brings 
plaster subject to no tax, and pays the northern 
man his profit." Now who is it that pays this 
tax of one dollar per ton on an article of prime 
necessity and therefore entitled, if any thing is 
so entitled, to immunity from taxation ? We ask 
again upon whom does this tax fall of two him 
dred and fifty per cent, upon its cost (40 cents 
per ton) in Nova Scotia? Upon the farmers and 



planters of Virginia, of course. And to whom 
goes this extra dollar of the cost of this fertili- 
zer, but into the pockets of their Yankee ene- 
mies ? 

Similar losses are entailed uj)on Virginia by 
the operation of those laws as regards our West 
India trade where we find a ready market for 
"flour, corn, meal, staves, hoop-poles, and pro- 
visions," and from whence we receive in return 
" sugar and cofiee," articles of general use and 
prime necessity. " Surely," says Mr. London, 
" the legislative body will bear no longer t^ie 
humiliatinj£ attitude that they present to the 
world, of wing the powers of the State to im- 
poverish our own people so as to benefit those 
who have already received so much from the 
labour of the people of Virginia and the South." 
He then introduces the following table, attribu- 
ted to M. R. H. Garnett, Esq., showing " that 
each man in the South pays the following un- 
equal sums as compared with the North in the 
years named, to wit : 



Years from 1791 to 1800, 
1801 to 1810, 
" 1811 to 1820, 

1821 to 1830, 
1831 to 1840, 
1841 to 1845, 



T3 




n3 




rt 




d 




o 




<D 




-S 












!- 




<D 




<a 




Ph 




eu 




r^ 




^ 












o 




i 




$21 


60 


$11 


25 


31 


27 


13 


56 


32 


37 


10 


37 


34 


71 


7 


12 


27 


42 


4 


29 


10 46 


1 


99 



And that the South lost in the foreign trade the 
use of $133,472,827 of her capital in the year 
1848, and the North gained it — besides paying 
to the federal government as taxes the sum of 
$26,000,000, twenty-three millions of which 
was spent beyond our borders. For the year 
1858, upon the same principles, the South lost 
the use of about $225,000,000 of her capital, 
taking our exports and imports as the basis of 
the calculation. These figures are frightful 
when the fact is disclosed that the citizens of 
Massachusetts absolutely receive two dollars in 
pensions and bounties whilst they pay only 
$1 99 in taxes. The amount yearly taken from 
the labour of the South to benefit the Northern 
people by the laws of Congress is too .huge for 
any freeman to contemplate with patience, and 
for the Legislature of Virginia to be iiitercept- 
inp a trade which might go directly from her 



I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



268 



producers to tliose who need their products, and 
to divert these articles of trade into the hands 
(.r those who are not our friends, and thnt, tot), 
lit so frightful II cost, is too absurd to be antici- 
piited." 

Mr. London then adverts to tlie transactions 
of the Virffinia Cnnks, and points out what ho 
conceives to be tlie hurtful tendencies of their 
operation in regard to the interests of Virginia, 
\'c., but space fails us for pursuing tlje 
subject further. We must c*»ncUule by refer- 
ring tlie reader to the speecli itself, exhorting 
the farmers and planters of Virginia to stand 
up to the defence of their own best interests, 
by abstaining from the use of everything of 
Northern origin which they can produce at 
home, and to patronize their own institutions of 
learning, their own literature, their own nie- 
chanifs and artisans, produce their own hay, 
manufacture their own brooms, and, in fine, to 
establish to the extent that may be foimd prac 
ticable, a home market for their productions 
through the exchanges of commodities that 
must naturally occur between the farmer and 
mechanic to their reciprocal advantage. 

W. 



Richmond Enterprise. 

We have here several new factories of differ- 
ent kinds ; among them the Mills of Messrs. S. 
McGruder's Sons and S. Hartman for grinding 
bones, and Manipulating Guanos. Mr. F. G. 
Ruffin, and Messrs. Edmond Davenport & Co., 
Irave had mills in operation for some months! 
for the 3atne purpose; so that our Virginia far- 1 
mers can buy at home, manipidated guano, j 
ground bones, super-phosphate of lime, &c., &c.[ 
Nay, more, if they do not want to buy, but' 
merely to satisfy any curiosity they may have 
as to the manner of preparing these fertilizers,' 
they can at all hours of the day find the Mill 
doors open, and are free to give everything in 
them a careful inspection, while their gentle- 1 
manly owners wHl take pleasure in showing! 
them every part of their process, and in an-j 
swering any questions they may feel disposed 
to ask. j 

They have no secrets as \ft the articles out of 
which their fertilizers are compounded, but 
everybotly is invited to come and examine for 
themselves. 



Improved Stock and Farming Imple- 
ments. 

We extract from the Enquirer of the 21st of 
March, the article below, (to which our atten- 
tion has been called by a friend to merit and a 
patron of public improvement.) respecting the 
claims of our esteemed friend, Dr. John R. 
Woods, of Albemarle, to "the gratitude and 
respect" of the agricultural public for his "con- 
tributions .... in the cause of improvement 
in stock-raising, farming implements, and gen- 
eral husbandry." We have frequently ailverted 
to Dr. Woods' public spirit and enterprise in 
introducing high types of improved breeds of 
stock, and have often heard his farm manage- 
ment nnich extolled, but we have not yet ful- 
filled a, too long deferred, purpose of visiting 
his hospitable mansion, whereby we may, like 
" Agricola," be enabled as an eye-witness to 
testify of the things whereof we have seen. 
We.readily adopt as our own his article sub- 
joineil with but this exception, that until '^Ram^' 
shall, by universal suffrage, be voteil out of the 
circle of the Zodiac, and be replaced by the 
more euphonious and delicate (?) but hirsute 
cognomen of '• Suck' — a name patent only so 
far as sheep are concerned to Major Jack Doun- 
ing's " Old .BJ//," the interchangeable synonym 
of Buck — we shall insist, with all t^e vehe- 
mence of Unkle Toby, upon calling a Ram — 
Ram! 

" improved stock and farming implements. 

"The merits of politicians and their public 
services, rarely fail to be sufficiently noticed 
through the press; public admiration and re- 
spect are freely invoked in their behalf: but it 
sometimes happens that efforts matle by jientle- 
men to promote the good of the commnnity, in 
the more humble but not less important depart- 
ment of agriculture, do not receive the acknow- 
ledgement that their liberal public spirit de- 
serves. I am led to make these rellcctions by 
the contributions made by Dr. John R. Woodz^ 
of Jllbemnrle, in the cause of improvement in 
stock-raising, fariiiing implements and general 
husbandry. 

"Dr. Woods has been very attentive to the 
different fertilizers in use for some years jiast, 
and has been active in recomniending. by his 
example, their introduction into general use, 
and thus, perhaps, is entiilctl to much of the 
credit of the great improveinent of lands^ in Al- 
bemarle. To his example anil efforts, in a good 
degree, is to be attributed the now general pop- 
tdarity of the wheat drill, the most valuable 
accessory to the success of wheat culture. 

" In the improvement of the breed of horses, 
he has tnade sonte sacrifices. Two years ago 
he nndertook to import two stallions from Eng- 



264 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 



land, ' Havclock' and 'Napier.' The first a 
Cleveland bay, arrived safely, but did not meet 
liis expectations ; and Napier, of a more high 
bred stock, and said to be one of«. the finest 
horses ever raised in England, died on the pas- 
sage to America. He did not succumb under 
these disappointments, but ordered another 
Cleveland bay, and in this last instance has 
been eminently successful jn procuring a splen- 
did specimen of a liorse for general utility. 

"His horse 'Symmetry' is a dark, dapple bay, 
sixteen and a half hands high, of commanding 
presence, full muscle, and pov/erful bone. 
Owing to the jjcrfect proportions of all his parts, 
you do not realize that he is a very large ani- 
mal until you stand close to him. 

"Dr. Woods has laboured a good deal in the 
improvement of hogs and sheep. He has just 
imported a most magnificent buck, of the 
Cotswold stock, to cross on his present flock, 
that will compare with any, I presume, in Vir- 
ginia. 

" The sight of these two imports will repay 
a visit of one hundred miles to his hospitable 
mansion ; which, in examining the results of 
his good farming, can scarcely fail to be a 
source of profit as well as pleasure to any one, 
as it certainly was to 

" Agricola." 



For the Southern Planter. 

Experiments with American and other 
Guanos. 

Mr. Editor: — In the March number of the 
Southern Planter you ask for experiments with 
the Amer*can Guano. Having, last year, made 
some experiments with it and with other gua- 
nos, in order To test their respective merits, ap- 
plied to both corn and tobacco, in which I was 
very particnlar, and, I believe, accurate, I now 
submit the results of the experiment on corn, 
and will, if you desire it, communicate hereafter 
the particulars of the one on Tobacco. 

I selected a very poor piece of land for the 
experiment on corn, such as would not have 
produced more than five bushels per acre, if as 
much.-— the selection being made of land thus 
poor, the better to test the strength and produc- 
tiveness of the different guanos used. I marked 
off" three acres, all as nearly equal as could be 
determined by the eye, and alter thoroughly 
ploughing and preparing the land, I applied on 
the 30th of April to one acre 200 lbs. of Ameri- 
can Guano, costing .^10 per ton of 2000 fts., 
which was an outlay of .$4 ])er acre; on another 
acre I applied 200 lbs. of Kettleweli's Manipu- 
lated Guano, costing -'^.'32 per ton of 2000 ibs.r— 
an outlay of $'5.20 per acre; and on the 
third acre 200 lbs. of Peruvian Guano, cost- 
ing .1^50 per ton of 2000 lbs.— -or $5.90 per acre. 
These several applications were made broad- 
cast, and the guanos thoroughly incorporated 
with the soil. The corn was all planted on the 
same day, and the after cultivation was neat 
and thoroijgli, but in the month of August it all 
suiTcred intensely with drought, for about three 
weeks, which I think curtailed the crop very 



much. It is proper that I should state that the 
same number of stalks grew upon each acre — 
there being not a missing hill in either. In the 
month of November, the product of each acre 
M'as carefully gathered and stored away by it- 
self; and in January, after having become tho- 
roughly dry, each parcel was shucked, shelled, 
measured and weighed separately, and the re- 
sult is as follows: 

The American Guano made 784 ffis. per acre, 
which was 196 lbs. of corn for each dollar ex- 
pended, and it weighed 55 lbs. per bushel. 

The Kettleweli's Manipulated made 1176 lbs. 
per acre, which was 226 lbs. for each dollar ex- 
pended, and the corn M-eighed 56^ B5s. per bu- 
shel. 

The Peruvian Guano made 1224 fts. per acre, 
which was 207 ibs. of corn for each dollar ex- 
pended, and the corn weighed 54 ibs. per bushel. 

These experiments were fairly made, are cor- 
rectly stated, and prove conclusively that the 
manipulated guano is the best and cheapest ap- 
plication for corn. But every gentleman can 
test the calculations, judge for himself respect- 
ing the peculiarity of the season, and deduce 
from the premises his own conclusions. 

All which is respectfully submitted, 

' R. H. Allen, 
Oral Oaks, Va. 

March 23d, 1860. 

We are very much indebted to Mr. Allen for the 
above communication, and will be still further 
obliged to him for the resuls of his experiments 
on Tobacco, which he so kindly offers to furnish. 



Maryland State Agricultural Chemist. 

We are under obligation to Philip T. Tysom, 
Esq., "State Agricultural Chemist," for a copy 
of his report to the Legislature of Maryland. 
We shall fully avail ourselves, in a future num- 
ber, of some of the many facts and valuable 
suggestions with which the report abounds, by 
laying them before our readers. We regret 
having to delay their publication on account 
of the pre-occupation of our columns at this 
time. 



Broom Corn. 

Mr. P. Horton Keach tells us that the aver- 
age price of Broom Corn, per ton of 2,000 lbs., 
will be about one hundred dollars, A first 
rate sample will bring rather more than the 
price named. 



Lieut. Maury's Speech before the Agricultural 
and Manufacturing Association of Nortlt* Ala- 
bama, has been received. We will pay our 
respects to it in our next issue. 



I860.] 



MiB SOUTHERN PLANTBBf 



266 




EHLERS.ENG 



Hampshire Boar. 

Above our readers have an engraving of Mr. 
Peyton Johnson's ''Frank," copictl from a pho- 
tograph taken after he was fatted for the butcher. 

"Frank" was a beauty before so much fat 
was deposited upon his carcass as to destroy all 
resemblance to his former self. We considered 
him one of the finest lookinj; hogs we ever saw, 
both as regarded form and color; and we are 
sorry that it has been necessary to "save his 
bacon." From an injury he received, his use- 
fulness as a boar was destroyed, and he was not 
long since killed. We hope Mr. J. will raise a 
worthy successor to him. 



Khaisi Cattle. 

Messrs. Kuhn & Martin of this city, own a 
bull called " Mazeppa," bred by Doctor John 
R. Woods of Albemarle county, which is a cross 
of the Khaisi, with the thorougb-bred Durham. 
He is the most perfectly beautiful animal that 
we have ever seen, of any breed, and the calves 
sired by him, have all grown very rapidly, an<l 
promise to be valunble for either the dairy or 
the butcher. The impression has generally pre- 
vailei^we believe, that the Khaisis arc entirely 
unsuited to our wants ; and yet, from what we 
have seen of their crosses upon Durham and 
native ^tock, we cannot help believing that they 
have been too hastily judged, and that the value 
of our native slock would be greatly enhaoced 



by crossing with them. Two of our neighbors 
have owned "'half Khaisi cows,' which were 
very valuable — one of them giving five gallons 
of milk a day, and the other rather more than 
four. 

I The thorough-breds are rather too active and 
' frisky, as they cannot be restrained by any ordi- 
! nary fence ; but cattle with one-fourth Khaisi 
I blood would make first rate oxen, as they would 
possess more activity and spirit than our native 
stock. 

I We advise our country friends, who are fond 
I of seeing fine cattle, to go and take a look at 
"Mazeppa," when they visit this city. They 
can obtain directions for finding him hy calling 
I at the office of the Virginia State Agricultural 
I Society, or at this office. 

We hope Messrs. Kuhn & Martin will exhibit 
I " Mazeppa," in company with a lot of his calves, 
i at the shows of our Agricultural Societies next 
I fall. 



Orchards and Orchard Houses. 

We return thanks to C. M. Snxton Barker & 
Co. of New York, for a copy of a most cxw- 
lent work on the best modes of constructing 
Orchard Houses^ Dicarfing Fruits, ifC. ifc 

This book is admirably adapted to the wants 
of all those who are engaged in cultivating 
fruits for market, where it is an iinportant item 
of profit to have thciu early. 



256 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



[April 




For the Southern Planter. 

Lines for a Lady's Album. 

BY JAMES A. AUGUST. 

You ask me to indite a rhyme. 

Fit ofTring for this volume fair^ 
Whose leaves should glow with thoughts sublime 

And words like jewels rich and rare ; 
I promis'd in a luckless hour 

Tribute worthy of its pages, — 
Oh! that man had always'power 

To fulfill what he engages. 
'Twas on a soft poetic night, 

Pen in hand — trimm'd fair and taper — 
I boldly sat me down to write 

Upon finest gilded paper, 
Invoking first the muse's aid 

,^fler old establish' d fashion, 
To my dismay, the gentle maid. 

Answer'd in a downright passion ! 
The sheet lay spread in all its grace. 

Fair as that lily hand of thine — 
The pen deserves in verse a place. 

The ink was good, the light divine; 
But vain was all this tempting show, 

Vain these pretty preparations, 
Poetic thoughts refused to flow, 

Fervent though my invocations. 
I trimm'd my light and trimm'd again, 

Until it beamed a lustrous blaze. 
But all my trimming was in vain 

To brighten fancy's dying rays. 
Then finding all bright visions fade 

Like moonbeams on a misty night, 
I caird the muse a fickle maid — 

I own, 'twas very impolite. 
My very inkstand seem'd to leer, 

Mocking at my vain endeavor; 
I rose in anger from the chair, 

Turning ink and table over! 
Then overcome with dark despair, 

I threw myself, with all my woes. 
Into a friendly rocking-chair. 

And soon began to dream and doze: 
Then sweet sleep stole gently o'er me. 

All dark mem'rys fled like bul4)les, 



And such visions rose before me. 

As supplanted all my troubles. 
T saw a fair and joyous throng 

Of maidens on a flow'ry lawn, 
And as they gently tripp'd along. 

Each looked as lovely as the dawn. 
But one there was whom well I knew, 

And Lady! all but you might tell, 
On whom, each nymph a garland threw — 

Oil whom, each rosy chaplet fell. 
Many a lovely child of air 

Was floating in that smiling train ; 
The graces, hand in hand, were there, * 

And beauty with her magic chain. 
There music, too, trill'd softest tune, 

How could the gentle sylph refuse; 
And Lady — doubt it not — there shone, 

In all her wonted charms — the muse! 
" Poor simple youth !" began the maid ; 

" Think you that I could tamely bear 
That one should call on me for aid, 

In ofl''ring at a shrine so fair, — 
Drink insjoiration from yon eyes, 

When fancy's flame is burning low, 
And beaming from their kindred skies, 

A far diviner ray will glow !" 



Agricultural Hymn. 

BY REV. JOHN PIERPONT, D. D, 

To God. the gracious Giver, 

Of sunshine, dew and rain, 
Of hillside, vale and river. 

And broad and fertile plain, — 
Who giveih to our mountains 

The glory of their trees. 
And poureth out the fountains 

That fill our inland seas. 

Who wrappeth Winter's bosom 

In his soft, woolly snows. 
And openetli every blossom 

That Spring around us throws,— 
To Him, our. tribute bringing. 

Of thankful hearts, we come, 
Willi joy and gladness singing 

Our hymn of " Harvest Home." 

Shall we, Thy sons and daughters, 

Withhold. our grateful lays, 
While all Thy winds and waters 

Are vocal in Thy praise? 
No ! while all earth rejoices 

In Thy paternal care. 
Will we lift up our voices, 

O, God, in praise and prayer.