X BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



portant auxilaries in the manufacture and saving of composts, 

 manures and fertilizers — and the greater value of manures thus 

 protected will more than pay the expense of building such sheds 

 and cellars. In his own experience he had applied twenty-five 

 loads of manure to the acre for corn, and by observing a proper 

 rotation had kept his fields in good condition, and produced good 

 crops of corn. In the winter of 1871-2, in consequence of a light 

 hay crop, farmers were obliged to use western corn to " help out" 

 the hay-mow. This corn could be purchased at 70 or 75 cents 

 per bushel, at the depots in this State. This low price of corn 

 had led many farmers to believe they could purchase western corn 

 for feeding, cheaper than they could grow it, and they had been 

 raising potatoes to sell for the purpose of purchasing corn. But 

 it was a bad system and was sure to reduce the fertility of the 

 fields — as but little manure was used in their culture, the crop 

 was generally light, and prices low. This was a wrong course. 

 Farmers should make and protect their farm dressing, manure lib- 

 erally, and depend upon raising, themselves, rather than purchas- 

 ing, their corn and other staple crops. Following this Mr. Shaw, 

 the President of the Board, read a paper on some points of gen- 

 eral farming as conducted in Maine, and the session closed with 

 an essay and discussion on Co-operation, the former of which, by 

 Mr. D. M. Dunham of Bangor, is published in full. In the even- 

 ing Prof. II. Cariaichael of Bowdoin College, and one of the 

 Members at Large, delivered a lecture on the Beet Sugar Industry. 

 It has been my hope to give this lecture as delivered, in this re- 

 port, but owing to a multiplicity of college and professional duties 

 the author has been unable to place a copy in my hands for this 

 purpose ; consequently I am forced to content myself with a brief 

 outline of the same in this place, and to substitute it, farther on, 

 with an essay on the same subject, to which I invite particular 

 attention, from the pen of Prof. Alfred E. Aubert of the Maine 

 State College. The lecture of Prof. Carraichael was accompanied 

 with large tables and diagrams showing the chemical analysis of 

 the sugar beet ; increase of sugar production from the beet for 

 the past thirty years in France, and the different kinds of ma- 

 chinery used in the manufacture of sugar. These diagrams were 

 fully explained by the professor while lecturing, and the following 

 brief abstract of his remarks will give an idea of the points to 

 which he referred : Of the 3,000,000 tons of sugar consumed in 

 the whole world the last year, 700,000 were the product of the 



