Alfalfa in New Yokk. 401 



"An important question still remains to be decided, relative to 

 the propriety of sowing lucern alone or mixed with red clover 

 feed. I was prejudiced in favor of the latter mode from the fol- 

 lowing considerations: 



" First, I wished to know whether it was equally hardy with 

 clover? Whether, under similar circumstances, it was able to 

 contend with it in our climate? Experience has convinced me 

 that it will, and that in dry seasons it will flourish, while clover 

 is too faint and languid to raise its drooping head; and what is 

 more extraordinary, that this child of the summer better braves 

 the biting frosts of the spring and the keen autumnal blasts than 

 clover or any cultivated grass of this climate. These are im- 

 portant circumstances, when I am laboring to introduce it into 

 common husbandry in the face of prejudices arising from the 

 English experiments, which are far from encouraging to farm- 

 ers of moderate capital. I hope, however, to show that it is 

 infinitely better adapted to our climate than to that of Great 

 Britain. 



" Second, it having been constantly asserted that it takes three 

 years to come to perfection, and that the prospects are very 

 trifling the year succeeding that in which it is sown, by mixing 

 the seeds with those of clover, I expected, and indeed found, that 

 an immediate profit might be obtained; for the clover came for- 

 ward as early as if it had been sown alone, was supported by 

 the lucern, which added something to the crop, and both to- 

 gether yielded more than three and a half tons to the acre the 

 very first year; the merit of the last cutting being wholly due 

 to the lucern, since the drouth prevented the clover from ris- 

 ing a second time to the scythe, so that had this field been sown 

 with clover alone, it would have yielded 24 cwt. to the acre, 

 and less than it did by the addition of the lucern seed the 

 very first year. The second year's product is still more con- 

 clusive in favor of the lucern. 



" Third, as the clover is a beneficial plant, I expected that as the 

 lucern advanced, the clover would die out and leave the ground 

 free from weeds that might have robbed the heritage during the 

 minority of the lucern. Though this reasoning was plausible 

 •and influenced my conduct in my experiments this year, yet I 

 am not satisfied that it is just. I argued from English books of 

 husbandry, which, however, are not calculated in this particular 

 for our climate. The principles they maintain are: First, that 

 lucern does not attain any considerable degree of strength till 

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