458 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



where a calcareous soil has been specially fertilized by carbon- 

 ate of lime ? And if so, what are the conditions that generate 

 the anomalous result ? 



Again, within two months, I have seen in a single number of 

 a popular agricultural periodical, two communications, both in 

 a very positive tone, taking precisely opposite grounds on the 

 question whether, in salting hay, the salt may be thrown on the 

 top of the mow and left to inter-penetrate the mass, or must 

 be cast into each separate forkful, or layer, as the hay is 

 pitched from the cart. 



Again, the Deerfield farmers, in this State, close by the cele- 

 brated residence of Henry Colman too, dispute one another to 

 this day, as to the value of the " old tore," to a grass crop ; 

 some of them insisting that it helps the next yield, and others, 

 that it is better to keep the sward close. 



Or, once more, what is the right law of producing fertilizing 

 agents ? Must we continue the old fashion of spending the 

 winter in feeding out all that we spend the summer in gather- 

 ing in, copying the circle of the snake that swallows his tail, 

 or is there some better way ? And will more be gained by 

 following the famous aphorism of the Earl of Leicester, " The 

 more meat a ploughing farmer sends to Smithfield, the more 

 corn he may sell at Mark Lane," or by raising young cattle ? 



Now what may be asserted of each of these mooted points 

 is, not that every one of you may not have an opinion upon it, 

 and be very sure he is right ; but that his next door neighbor 

 is likely to have an opposite opinion; whereas, both being 

 reducible by experiment to fact, there ought to be, not opinions, 

 but knowledge. The conditions of a given result ought to be 

 as clearly determined as the oxidation in electro-magnetic 

 machinery, combustion under a steam-engine, or the proportions 

 of chlorine and hydrogen in thirty-seven pounds of muriatic 

 acid. In looking over the reports of the several county socie- 

 ties for the last year, I see complaints on half the pages of 

 non-compliance with the rules of the committees in reference to 

 ■accurate returns. One reason, I suppose, is, that a farmer 

 begins the season with no idea of competing, and therefore 

 keeps no record; but unexpectedly finding Nature has la- 

 yered him with a remarkable product, he takes it to the exhi- 



