CULTIVATED MOWING-LANDS. 127 



Question. The point that I was after was this, — Some 

 muddy lands may have hard-pan underneath; some may have 

 sand : would you treat all those varieties in the same way ? 



Capt. MooKE. The piece of land I have described to you 

 ran into every thing you have named. Some was all mud, 

 in some jou would strike down to white sand, and in some 

 you would come down to where it was blue gravel. I do not 

 care about ploughing very deep. I have an idea that it is 

 no particular object to plough most grassland more than 

 five or six inches deep. 



Question. Did you mix any sand with it where it was 

 all mud? 



Capt. Moore. If it was a new piece of land that never 

 had been cultivated, if I came down to mud, or came down 

 to peat particularly, I should not expect to grow grass there, 

 unless I put on loam, sand, or any material that I could get 

 handiest; because Timothy will not grow and stand up on a 

 piece of peat-land, without something to make silicate to 

 strengthen the stalk. 



Mr. J. P. King (of Peabody). I belong in the eastern 

 part of Essex County, and we do not believe in top-dressing 

 land to any great extent. I, for one, believe that if manure 

 is put in piles in the fall of the year on our grassland, and 

 allowed to remain through the winter, nearly one-third of 

 its value evaporates in the air. I am fully aware that many 

 do not believe this ; and, if I have a right to my opinion, it 

 is because of experiments I have tried. I do not believe in 

 top-dressing as a general rule. If my grassland needed top- 

 dressing, I should turn it over, and take my pulverizing- 

 harrow, and get the manure into it as best I could by thor- 

 oughly pulverizing it, perhaps in the month of September, 

 and then I would sow on my grass-seed ; and I should expect 

 a first and second crop the next year. 



We have a new way down in Essex County of getting our 

 land into grass. We like to sow winter rye. I would not 

 ordinarily, for a crop of rye, sow more than one bushel and 

 a peck to the acre, but we do sow and get a good catch by 

 using two bushels to the acre ; and the consequence is, we 

 get a crop of rye, ordinarily, of two tons to the acre, and it 

 makes nearly as good hay, cut early and before it has seeded, 

 as herd's-grass or red-top. Now, if that can be done as I 



