PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL SCIENCE. 357 



doubt it will be done ; but it seems to me it is right, in looking; 

 forward to the future, to recognize the fact that this waste must 

 go OB, and the question then is, how shall this waste be met ? 



Prof. Peckham. I fully agree with what has been stated by 

 Prof. Brackett and Prof. Feruald, but there are occasionally local- 

 ities in which the experience of the residents seems to contradict 

 such assumption. I spent last summer in Western Pennsylvania, 

 in Washington county, which is one of the greatest hay growing 

 counties east of the Rocky Mountains — exceeded only by some in 

 California. They have an exceedingly fertile soil, and deride the 

 idea of anybody's undertaking to farm it in New England. They 

 boast of wasting more of the produce of a hundred acres than can 

 be raised on an equal area in New England ; and I think they do, 

 from what I saw. They are very slovenly farmers. They raise 

 great quantities of oats, wheat, and hay. The hay is all taken off 

 the farms ; not a cent is spent for any foreign fertilizer ; some of 

 the best farmers burn a little lime and spread it upon the surface ; 

 and 3^et I was assured that the annual produce of their farms was 

 greater than it was forty years ago ; and they have done nothing 

 but carry on what is seemingly an exhaustive process of agricul- 

 ture from the time the country was settled, eighty or ninety years 

 ago, to the present time ; and still they maintain, and I think the 

 testimony was reliable, that their farms improve steadily. 



Mr. Samuel Wasson. I had occasion recently to estimate the 

 number of producers and non-producers in my own county, (Han- 

 cock,) and, if I was correct, forty-two per cent, of the population 

 are producers, and fifty-eight per cent, non-producers. To these 

 forty-two must the one hundred persons look for their bread and 

 butter. That is, the forty-two must supply themselves and the 

 fifty-eight who are not producers. 



We often hear the idea advanced, that it is necessary to con- 

 sume what is grown upon our farms. I know it sounds well to 

 talk about consuming upon the farm what is grown upon it, but 

 we want to discriminate. There are certain products that should 

 not go off the farm, or only as small a proportion as possible. 

 There ax'C other products that may go off the farm. Those who 

 do not produce must have their bread and butter, and their pota- 

 toes and beef, and we must furnish them. 



Mr. S, F. Perley. On this question the middle ground is the 

 safer one. Some farmers may sell their produce, others had better 

 not. Somebody must supply the cities. Their inhabitants must 



