MAINE STATE SOCIETY. 43 



also applied for premium on one hundred and thirteen bushels 

 of winter r3'e, grown on four acres and thirty-five rods of burnt 

 land. Value $142, and at a cost of $35. But as it did not 

 appear to come within the conditions, which were for " the best 

 conducted experiment," no premium was awarded. 



Benjamin Morse of New Gloucester, also applied for premium 

 on forty-six and a half bushels of rye, from one bushel and two 

 quarts sowing, on one and one-fourth acre of burnt land. Ex- 

 pense §13.50; value of crop $57.12. No premium awarded, 

 for reason as stated above, the object in bestowing premiums 

 being not for a great crop, so much as to encourage carefully- 

 conducted experiments, which shall elicit information as to the 

 best mod.es of culture, manuring, &c. The man who carefully 

 and systematically conducts an experiment, the results of which 

 are of value to the community, even though it results in failure, 

 is better entitled to a premium, than one who succeeds by acci- 

 dent or by cropping virgin soil, in obtaining a large return for 

 his labor, 



E. H. F. Smith of Gorham, aged eleven years, raised three 

 bushels of ears of rice corn on five rods, (or at the rate of 

 ninety-six bushels to the acre,) with four days work of himself. 



W. D. Dana of Perrj^, obtained a premium on specimen of 

 spring Iowa wheat, grown on a clayey loam, which in 1852, 

 yielded only one-half ton hay per acre ; cropped with oats in 



1855, after two years pasturing — the wheat sown in spring of 



1856, with two hundred pounds guano per acre — plowed ten 

 inches deep — harrowed well. 



Statement of John Kezar, East Winthrop^ of one-half acre 

 corn, on ichich no premimn was awarded. The land on which 

 we raised the half acre of corn on which we have entered for 

 premium, had been pastured for a number of years, previous to 

 1855. A small part of it had the wash of the barn yard, and 

 was very rich, and the remainder had received considerable 

 manure by being pastured. About the 25th of May, 1855, it 

 was plowed, and a part planted with corn, and a part sowed 

 with oats, without adding any manure. May 19th, 1856, ten 

 loads of mixed manure, of good quality, was spread on such 

 parts of about two and one-half acres, (including the one-half 

 acre entered,) as was not considered rich enough for corn. 



