88 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



heat, and contact of earth with the seed. In this region 

 about an inch and a half to two inches fulfils these condi- 

 tions in part, and pressure with the hoe or the machine com- 

 pletes. This statement illustrates how the same principles 

 may be secured in different ways, and brings out the facts of 

 the essentials which are to be secured. 



CtJLTIVATIOX. 



As soon as the corn has arrived at a height of about six 

 inches, if planted with a machine at uniform depth, it is a 

 good plan to run a light smoothing-harrow over the field. 

 This eradicates all the newly sprouted seeds of weeds, if 

 done on a hot day, and combs through the more deeply 

 rooted corn without accomplishing any material damage. 

 When the corn reaches a foot in height, it is well to com- 

 mence cultivation with a horse-hoe, and hereafter to go 

 through the field with this implement as frequently as other 

 farm duties will allow, but never less than tliree times. In 

 using the horse-hoe, the design should be to go as deeply as 

 possible, and as near the corn-plant as can be without 

 uprooting it. 



The object of cultivation is threefold, — the checking leaf- 

 growth on the plant, the controlling the moisture in the 

 field, the eradication of weeds. 



The first object is the one I have heretofore given the 

 name of "root-pruning," and concerns the plant. The law 

 of compensation of growth, first propounded by Goethe and 

 Geoffrey St. Plilaire, seems to apply here, whereby, when 

 much organized matter is used in building up some one part, 

 some other part becomes starved : otherwise expressed, ex- 

 cess of foliage is followed by a diminution of grain. Now, 

 the farmer desires, through the application of manure, to 

 secure the greatest vigor of growth. This vigor may be ex- 

 pressed in leaf-growth, which in excess is injurious. If, now, 

 the farmer can check this manifestation, and change this 

 vigor towards fruitage, he is securing a great advantage. 

 By using the cultivator to break the fibres of the growing 

 crop, under proper conditions, a check is produced in the leaf- 

 growth of the plant, and the plant is reminded, so to speak, 

 that its purpose is to grow grain. The vigor is in the end 

 not disturbed, because the act of breaking one root causes 



