SECRETARY'S REPORT. 55 



•one hundred tons of hay. The otiier crops, wheat, barley, oats and roots, 

 you saw and can judge of.* The hay must have averaged three tons per acre. 

 I would say, then, to the farmers of Maine, stay where you are ; if you 

 have many tilings to discourage you, don't suppose that others are free from 

 all care and vexation. The world always puts the best side out, and few care 

 to show their troubles and trials. In times like the present, many a merchant 

 prince, or western land-holder, or southern patriarch, would be willing to 

 e.Kchange places even with the humble farmer of Maine." 



Other replies are appended, as follows : 



" To exhaust and emigrate, is ruinous to the individual, the neighborhood, 

 the town, State and country at large. Any land which the Creator ever 

 designed for cultivation, may and should be so husbanded, that the husband- 

 man may live independently upon it." 



S. F. Perley, Naples. 



"Exhaust such lands still further? By no means, for then dearth will 

 surely follow, and we must emigrate. Have flxith in the land, and by the 

 application of works, a generous culture, fertility will be restored, and com- 

 petence and even plenty, ensue. As a general thing, farmers have not faith 

 enough in the capabilities of their soil, and consequently do not put forth 

 eflforts sufficient to develop its resources." 



E. E. French, Chesterville. 



"It is the better policy to recover such lands, to a general degree of pro- 

 ductiveness, rather than leave and emigrate, even ip a pecuniary point of 

 Tiew, to say nothing of the inconveniences to which we should be subjected, 

 and the numerous privileges which we now enjoy, and of which, we must 

 necessarily be deprived by emigrating into a new country." 



C. B. Sumner, Appleton. 



"If a man has lived upon a spot of soil, until that spot will no longer 

 affi)rd him a living, it should teach him the great truth that Dame Nature 

 can't be cheated. INIother earth should no more be expected to yield her 

 fruits, without a corresponding return of nutriment, than the former should 

 be expected to perform his labor without his accustomed food. In my opinion, 

 it would cost far less to recover these partially exhausted lands to a " gener- 

 ous degree of productiveness," than it would to emigrate to the west, where 



* The writer here refers to a farm in the extreme eastern part of the State, visited 

 in the course of my tour the past summer, and to which I may have occasion to 

 allude in connexion with the u*e of bones, as a manure. It is one of a number in 

 that vicinity, an examination of any oj which, will not only yield a high degree of 

 gratifioation, but prove conclusively that by the application of skill and energy, 

 farming may be made a lucrative, as well ari safe business. 



