ROTATION OF CROPS. 151 



able to tell you just what crop to plant first, just what crop 

 should follow that, and just what crop should follow as the third 

 one, to get all the virtues of the soil, and keep it in good condi- 

 tion. Well, after I have taken off a good crop of grass for a 

 year or two, that ground may be in very good condition, because 

 it has recuperated itself, and the virtues which were exhausted 

 by the preceding crops have been restored. Then I will go 

 to work, remanure and prepare it, and perhaps raise another 

 crop of apples, and so go on. That is the point I wish to bring 

 to your notice. 



Mr. Ward. Mr. Johnson stated that he had raised ninety- 

 three bushels of corn to the acre. I would like to inquire the 

 distance he planted his hills apart, and whether he planted it 

 in drills ? 



Mr. Johnson. Three feet and a half one way, and as near 

 three feet and a half as they could be the other way. They 

 might fall two or three inches short, on the average. 



Mr. Flint. It occurs to me that the members of the Board 

 have done most of the speaking this afternoon, and, in fact 

 through the day. I am sure there are very many experienced 

 cultivators of vegetables in this vicinity, — in Dighton, Somer- 

 set and other neighboring towns, — who could not only enlighten 

 the Board, but interest the audience, and I really hope we shall 

 have an opportunity to hear from some of them. 



Judge Lapham. At the present moment I am not much of a 

 farmer. My early experience was in that business, and some 

 part of my subsequent life has been connected with it, and it 

 has been a source of very great gratification and pleasure to me 

 to listen to the remarks that have been made here upon the sub- 

 jects that have been under discussion. Perhaps it may not be 

 amiss to say that the suggestions which have been made by the 

 chairman in regard to the rotation of crops correspond to the 

 operations of nature. Among my early recollections is one of 

 a forest of oak, chestnut and walnut of very large growth. 

 Some of those trees were cut down, and there came up, in the 

 midst of those large old trees that were left, as thick a growth 

 of white pine as I ever saw anywhere, and the trees grew with 

 remarkable rapidity, and with entire thriftiness and health. 

 That entire growth of pine was subsequently cut away, and 

 and there came up a growth of maple, chestnut and oak ; there 



