210 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



ures, to get a crop of Indian corn. On the other hand, grass is 

 a native of the temperate climes. It requires a colder clime, 

 a colder atmosphere, a more moist soil than corn. Therefore, 

 grass and corn have not a special adaptation for the same kind 

 of soil; corn wants its warm soil, grass wants its cold soil. 

 But grass abhors stagnant water. When I say that grass 

 wants a moist soil, I do not mean that it wants a soil which 

 has water standing in it stagnant, on account of there being a 

 hard-pan strata below, or which has in it spring-water which 

 must seek its outlet, not down through the soil, but on the 

 surface of the soil. That is not the soil for grass. When I 

 say that we want a cool, moist soil, I mean one which is moist 

 and cool not in consequence of a water-bearing strata below, 

 which keeps the water stagnant there, or because there is 

 water flowing upon it from higher land, but land which is 

 moist and cool in consequence of its retaining and absorbing 

 power. That 'is what I mean by a cool, moist soil, which is 

 adapted to grass, — a soil which is perfectly dry, so far as 

 stagnant water, or water coming upon it from higher lands 

 is concerned, — but which is moist and cool because it has in it 

 either a slight amount of clay or a given amount of carbona- 

 ceous matter, so that it absorbs from the atmosphere and re- 

 tains a certain amount of rain-water when it falls upon it ; 

 that is precisely the soil for grass. 



Now, I have another remark to make in relation to our 

 mowing-fields, — and this will apply to Massachusetts in rela- 

 tion to the growing of grass as a market-crop to catch that five 

 millions of dollars which is going out of the State annually for 

 hay, — and it is this : that we must resort to irrigation. That 

 is nothing new ; everybody knows all about that. I tell you, 

 gentlemen, it is not because w^e do not know enough, it is 

 because we do not practise what we know ; that is what ails 

 us here in Massachusetts. We know considerable, but we do 

 not practise half as well as we know how ; but we are going 

 to be driven by necessity and cupidity to avail ourselves of the 

 immense advantages to be gained in the production of grass 

 by irrigation. Why, I have heard within the last two years 

 a Massachusetts man, an intelligent man, speak of the splendid 

 chances for agriculture in Colorado. What are they? They 

 have limitless fields of sage-brush and saline plants, but upon 



