178 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



of which will doubtless be furnished by the committee on 

 grains. 



Prom an experiment made in Dorchester two years ago, it 

 was found that a mixed crop of corn and some lesser vegetable, 

 as cabbage, which docs Jiot shade the land, and which lets in 

 light and air, was more profitable than corn alone. Our farmers 

 sometimes substantially adopt this method, when they alternate 

 four or five rows of corn with as many of potatoes. May wo 

 not suggest that the experiment should be repeated by many 

 individuals ? Prom a comparison of results, it might be seen 

 whether the plan of mixed crops ought to be gradually adopted. 

 As a matter of literary curiosity, we quote a few lines from 

 one of the earliest European navigators who ever saw Indian 

 corn. They will show, that we follow the Indian method of 

 cultivation to a great extent, — that we do, in fact, merely per- 

 petuate fashions set by the first cultivators. In 1607, the Sieur 

 de Champlain, captain in the Prench navy, touched at the mouth 

 of the Kennebec River. In his journal he says : " Here we saw 

 Indian corn, which they sow, three or four grains in a place, 

 covering them with earth. At a distance of three feet they 

 plant as much more, and so on. In each hill of corn they plant 

 three or four beans of various colors. They plant their corn in 

 May and gather it in September." At the Saco River, " the 

 savages told us that all who inhabited this region cultivated and 

 sowed the land like those we had seen." At Cape Cod, July 

 21st, " we landed and passed through a field of corn, planted 

 like those we had seen before. The corn was in blossom and 

 about five and a half feet high. There was also other less 

 advanced, having been planted later. There were also several 

 fields not cultivated, being left to recruit in fallow." After 

 having passed round Cape Cod, they " found much land well 

 tilled in corn and other grains. All the people of this place are 

 industrious, and make provision of Indian corn for the winter, 

 which they preserve in the following fashion. On the declivity 

 of the hills they make trenches in the sand, five or six feet 

 deep, more or less, and having put the corn into sacks made of 

 grass, they deposit it in these trenches, and cover with sand 

 three or four feet deep. The grain is as well kept as in our 

 granaries." " Arrived again at Saco, September 21st, and 

 found that the Indians had gathered their corn." Prom these 



