498 - ^^''' Forage Crops. [November, 



We therefore do not feel bound to submit any apology for submitting 

 our ' reflections ' to your perusal. 



Firstly, then — of the economics of forage. The slightest reflection 

 must make it manifest to any intelligent mind that the economy of 

 Agriculture is in this country but slightly considered ; and that as 

 an agricultural people, we, of all people, have given the least heed to 

 agricultural economy. This has proceeded doubtless from the fact 

 that, as a people, there has been among us at no time a lack of gen- 

 eral plenty. The rewards of industry have ever been abundant — • 

 the soil of our wide and widening domain has ever been fertile, the 

 seasons fruitful, and the aggregate products of our husbandry pro- 

 lific. The stern monitions of necessity have consequently been al- 

 most unknown among us — the pinching demands of a great scarcity 

 have never been urged upon our attention — destitution has never 

 stretched forth hor scourging rod to inculcate those rigid lessons of 

 economy which are among the first that husbandry learns, and among 

 the last that even wealth abandons, in countries less favored than 

 our own. And in nothing is this lack of economy so manifest as in 

 the lavish manner in which we supply our farm stock with feed. 

 This lavishness is perhaps not so much in the quantity we give, as in 

 the market value of the crops we employ. Our ordinary domestic 

 animals consume of cereal crops as much as would supply a large 

 proportion of our population with bread, greatly superior to that on 

 which the peasantry of Europe rely as their staple and most savory 

 food. Our stock literally live on the fat of the land. Instead of re- 

 ceiving their subsistence from the wholesome and nutritious, but 

 coarser, esculents, they riot on the richest grains and grow discon- 

 tented and dainty over the finest and most fragrant forage. 



Moreover, owing to the usual abundance of our forage supplies, 

 as before alluded to, American farmers, and more especially western 

 farmers, are the most lavish and extravagant in the use of forage of 

 any farmers in the world. In many instances that have fallen under 

 our observation, this extravagance has become absolutely wasteful, 

 and therefore sinful. In the "West, it is a sight not uncommon to 

 see hay, that had been timely cut and finely cured, smelling as fra- 

 grant as ' the balm of a thousand flowers,' thrown loosely from the 

 fork and scattered widely upon the oozy soil of the farm yard, with 

 nothing to secure it from ' the trampling hoofs ' that ' brook no de- 

 lay ' in pursuit of the precious morsel thus slovenly presented; and 

 in this way, certainly full fifty per cent, of the forage is wastefully 



