•226 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



farms, on his paper, very scientifically and very successfully. He knows 

 nothing of failures, while out in the field we meet with ten failures to one 

 success. So far as an experiment is concerned, a failure is as important as a 

 success. Let none of us from a feeling of diffidence withhold our failures, for 

 considered from a bread and butter standpoint, the most practical of all, 

 failure or success is a matter of life and death with us. 



DISCUSSION". 



The discussion on Mr. Davenport's paper had reference chiefly to the amount 

 of heat rendered latent or of which the earth is deprived by the evaporation of 

 water, calling for some additional statements from Mr. D. in elucidating the 

 portions of his paper referring to that. 



Secretary Baird stated that it took about seven times as much heat to con- 

 vert a given quantity of boiling water into steam as it did to bring cold water 

 to the boiling temperature, and this might give us some idea of how much 

 ■warmer the soil would be from which the surface water was carried off by 

 means of drainage as compared with the soil where the surplus water had to 

 <be taken off by evaporation. 



KOTATION OF CROPS. 



BY WM. H. MERRICK. 

 [Read at Hastings Institute.] 



In speaking on this question I shall probably drift into that of mixed farm- 

 ing as the two subjects are connected together in no small degree. Of course 

 no one can adopt a system of rotation of crops unless his farm is first prepared. 

 When we first clear away the forest it is only necessary to lightly stir the veg- 

 etable mould to prepare it for the seed and a bountiful crop is sure to follow, 

 but by continued cropping the virgin soil is soon exhausted and something more 

 becomes necessary in order to keep up the fertility of the soil that a fair return 

 may be had for the labor. It is true that good crops may be raised in succes- 

 sion, if the soil is rich in the plant food adapted to those crops, but sooner or 

 laier the failure is sure to come, and the larger the crops the sooner the land 

 will be exhausted. 



There has been a great deal of discussion upon the subject of the relation 

 that science holds to agriculture. My own belief is that there is no other 

 occupation that calls to its aid so many of the natural sciences as farming, 

 but how few there are who realize it. I have often noticed than when persons 

 fail to make a living in other occupations that they will in some way procure a 

 piece of land, thinking, no doubt, that anybody can farm it, all that it is nec- 

 essary for them to do is to plow and sow and Dame Nature will reward them by 

 pouring a bountiful store into their laps, and the result is a failure. Farmers 

 are slow to learn that there is no permanent success without some system of 

 rotation of crops. 



There is danger to the farmer who makes a specialty of any one crop. For 

 instance we will take one who devotes his farm to wheat raising. In the first 



