88 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



for market, it is almost indispensable. For convenience in 

 watering crops a ccmiprehensivc and convenient sjstcm of 

 pipes should be laid through the fields, and if there is a 

 head of a hundred or more feet it will be found more con- 

 venient for use. Droughts in Massachusetts do not appear 

 to be the exception, and one of the great problems for the 

 farmer to solve to-day is how to avoid the bad effects of a 

 drouoht. 



Our soils have by a course of injudicious cultivation, ex- 

 tending back over two hundred years, become partially ex- 

 hausted, and only skill and high cultivation will bring them 

 back to their original fertility, and the methods adopted by 

 the market gardeners are in that direction. The aim of 

 every cultivator of land, who has the true interest of the good 

 old Commonwealth at heart, should be not only to secure a 

 crop, but also to improve his land at the same time. And 

 those statements of colossal farming in the western country, 

 in the gro\Ying of wheat by the thousands of acres by Dal- 

 rymple and others, should not have any attraction for us, for 

 at the best it is nothing but downright robbery, a depletion 

 of the soil of its fertility, leaving nothing but sterility and 

 ruin in its wake. 



The persons engaged in market gardening, in my opinion, 

 Avork harder and more hours in a day than any other class 

 of farmers. The nature of their business compels them to 

 do it, for a few days' delay even in getting their crops to 

 market might change the result of a crop from a profit to a 

 loss. 



They work in all weathers, and even in spite of the 

 weather. It has been said that they are so scrupulous that 

 when they have promised a certain amount of produce for 

 the next day, that no rain however hard ever prevented their 

 gathering it in season for the time promised. Such labor 

 is and ouirht to be well rewarded. 



And in conclusion let me again call your attention to the 

 great importance of this interest, not only for the value of its 

 products, but also for the example it sets before the farmers 

 of the higher cultivation of the soil, which means more 

 thorough pulverization, more liberal manuring, promptness 

 in putting the seeds and plants in at the right time, and 



