IMPROVEMENT OF PASTURES. 19 



the ground, on the decrease of the moon in August, will never 

 become fully masters of the situation. 



But the process of mowing bushes is merely conservative, 

 having, like all conservatism, no higher aim than that of keeping 

 " things as they are." For permanent improvement more 

 radical measures are necessary, and the plough, where it can be 

 used, is the most approved agency for initiating them. One of 

 the principal reasons for the neglected condition of pasture lands 

 is to be found in the reduced number of oxen kept by farmers, 

 and the constant demand for their labor away from the farm. 

 In the olden time, when every farmer kept oxen, and kept them 

 at home, except as he " changed work " with his neighbors ; 

 when, next to skill in wrestling, men prided themselves upon 

 their skill in " holding a new ground plough ;" when cattle shows 

 were not invented, and the farmer's principal holidays were 

 when they gathered, with their teams, to break up the rough 

 pasture of some neighbor whose turn had come to furnish the 

 liquor, — which could be bought anywhere for notes secured by 

 mortgage, — bushes were kept in much better subjection than 

 they are in modern times, when rum is too poor to be drunk and 

 too costly to be wasted ; and when the four, five or six dollars, 

 which a man with his team may readily earn in a day abroad, 

 causes him to look upon time and labor spent upon his farm as 

 almost thrown away. Now, if we must choose between the 

 liquor and the bushes, let us have the bushes by all means. 

 But either is a nuisance which no good farmer will tolerate on 

 his premises, except under coercion. 



But little feed is expected from old pastures after midsummer. 

 If they are then ploughed, the furrows thoroughly pulverized 

 with the harrow and the ground laid to grass, with suitable ferti- 

 lizers, or even without, if nothing better can be done, they will 

 be ready for feeding the next season, the herbage largely 

 increased in quantity and improved in quality, with no loss of a 

 crop and without the cost and labor of fencing usually incident 

 to the raising of cultivated crops on pasture land. These sug- 

 gestions have reference only to such land as is used solely for 

 pasturage. Where land is of suitable quality, and so subdivided 

 by fences that it may be used alternately as tillage land and 

 pasture, a different course may be advisable. 



