60 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



HAMPSHIRE, FRANKLIN AND HAMPDEN. 



Statement of Edmund Smith. 



The piece of swamp meadow which I offer for your atten- 

 tion is situated in the cast part of Iladley, containing nineteen 

 and a half acres. I purchased it in 1840, for twelve dollars 

 and fifty cents per acre. Six acres, at the west end of the lot, 

 was swamp mowing laud, except an acre on the south side, 

 which was called " high land," fit for tillage. These six acres 

 had been rented for nine dollars per year. The east part of 

 the lot was a brush pasture. This piece of land lies at the 

 south end of a large tract of swamp — being the lowest part. 

 The water stood in so large a quantity in the spring of the 

 year, that nothing of any value would grow. In October of 

 1840, I mowed the brush on four acres on the south side of the 

 pasture and ploughed it. The next May, it was planted with 

 corn, manured in the hill, and a good crop was secured. Oata 

 and hay seed were sown the next season, and a good crop of 

 oats followed. It mowed well the next season. I made a 

 ditch across the lot north and south — in 1842 I think — which 

 took off a great part of the water from the meadow. I think 

 it was in the last of May, 1843, that I ploughed two acres of 

 this low meadow. The furrows drained it to the south, and a 

 ditch then conducted the water to the main ditch. Potatoes, 

 manured in the hill, were planted, yielding a good crop. The 

 next spring I spread on manure, cultivated and harrowed in 

 oats and hay seed without ploughing. The oats were light, 

 the hay came in well. This piece of land I mowed six years, 

 obtaining a ton and one half per acre, yearly. I mowed the brush 

 in 1843, the last part of the season, on three acres east of the 

 ditch in the lowest part of the land on the lot. Two years 

 after mowing the brush, I mowed the land on which the water 

 stood through the spring and first part of the summer, in such 

 quantity that the hay mowed was of no value. The season in 

 August, 1845, being very dry, I dug the stumps on this tliree 

 acres, and put them into a fence. In the same month I ploughed 

 this piece of land with four yokes of oxen and a large plough, 



