118 / »• 



lighter the better. Then increase the fires, and continue them until the stem is per- 

 fectly cured and dry. This produces a fine wrapping-leaf, worth 20 cents to $1 per 

 pound. . Flues and other modes of curing have been much used, but all growers who 

 have tried it now conclude that the method of charcoal-curing is preferable to all 

 others. Henry: The very best lands available are selected; new laud preferred; but 

 frequently a series of crops are taken from a newly cleared field before it is too much 

 exhausted to render furtlier cropping in tobacco profitable. Then it is put in small 

 grain and grasses and is soon renewed. No fertilizers are used. Hickman : No fertili- 

 zers are used, as the ground used for tobacco is mostly fresh land, and seldom planted 

 in tobacco more than two years. Hopkins : No fertilizers used. Larue : No fertilizer 

 on new ground ; on old, stable-mauui"e well rolled. Rarely grown on the same land 

 more than twice. Livingston ; Mostly grown on new land ; when on old, it is enriched 

 by barn-yard manure. Logan : Farmers use little or no commercial fertilizers. They 

 select new ground, or the best old they have, and use as much manure in the hill as they 

 can scrape up from the stable, barn-yard, «fec. Mason : Generally cultivate new ground 

 and use no manure ; or if any, stable-manure. Marshall : No fertilizer, except barn-yard 

 or stable-manure when raised on land which has been cultivated a few years. Generally 

 raised on fresh land. McLean : When old land is used, barn-yard manure is put in 

 the hill or spread ; no other fertilizer used. Meade : Generally clear up fresh land, but 

 some plant on old by using manure from the stable. Ohio : Fertilizers seldom or never 

 used. Fresh ground is generally selected and cultivated in tobacco three years, and 

 then some other crop is cultivated. Owen : Fing tobacco must be grown on fresh but 

 thin land ; usually an oak-growth is best adapted to it. Nothing is used in the curing 

 except to let it hang under a shed where it is not exposed to sun or rain. No fertilizer 

 used. After being cleared up the ground is usually put in tobacco two or three years, 

 and then not again till after years of rest in grazing. Pendleton : Gecerally cultivated 

 on new ground ; no fertilizers used. Eobertson : Use no fertilizers ; either plant on 

 new ground or sod-laud. Four-fifths raised is on the former, which will stand two 

 crops iu succession. Shell) y : Generally, though not exclusively, cultivated on new or 

 fresh lands. White-oak lands are the best for a fiue article. No fertilizer is used ex- 

 cept stable-manure, and that seldom, as it« product is a dark, coarse article, not very 

 salable. The plants are not allowed to blossom before they are topped, as recom- 

 mended by writers on tobacco-culture ; it would be too exhausting to the plant ; topped 

 as soon as they have as many leaves as will mature before frost. If set out early, 

 twelve to sixteen leaves are left ; if late, a less number. If the season is not too wet, 

 fire is seldom used in curing in the tobacco-house. Simpson : No fertilizers used ex- 

 cept barn-yard manure and wood-ashes. Todd : Stable-manure is used on old lands. 

 Follow clover with tobacco when we do not have fresh-cleared lands. Trigg : Usually 

 set in ground newly cleared, but latterly farmers' are rotating their crops ; tobacco 

 first, then wheat with clover and timothy; the third and fourth years' the hay- is cut 

 and the laud pastured, then i)lanted in tobacco again. No fertilizer except stable- 

 manure made on the farm is used. Warren : The best land is generally selected for 

 the crop, and barnyard manure only is used. Webster: Well-rotted stable-manure the 

 only fertilizer used. Boone : No fertilizers used. Gallatin : Generally planted on new 

 land or old soil, and no fertilizers used. Bad peculiarities mostly proceed from bad 

 culture : First, neglecting too long to thoroughly work the plant after setting, causing 

 it to run up in a spindling manner and the main stalk to harden and uiakcTio leaf. 

 In such case the best plan is to cut the fdant oft' at the ground, leaving one leaf and 

 bud for a second plant, which, properly cared for, may yet make good tobacco. A sec- 

 ond cause is too much wet weather after the plant starts to grow, causing it to " French," 

 as we term it: the leaf thickens, grows very narrow, dagger-shaped, frequently not 

 broHtler than a case-knife, and often as many as fifty leaves on a plant, all of them 

 spread out on the ground. In this case the best plan is to pull the plant up, as it is 

 worthless. Carroll : The White Barley takes its name of " white" from the peculiar 

 whitish appearance of the plants just before maturity. There is nothing different in 

 the mode of cultivaiiou from the old kind, except that it is desirable to plant ou new 

 ground. The plants then grow rapidly and mature before the sun has lost its full 

 warmth, thereby insuring the light and bright color which is so desirable with pur- 

 chasers. The beds should be sown as soon as the ground is dry enough to work, the 

 land well prepared by plowiug and harrowing — a ridge made by throwing three fur- 

 rows together, three feet apart and marked across same distance — that the crop may 

 be mainly cultivated with the plow. The plants are topped at from twelve to twenty 

 leaves. The time for cutting can only be learned by experience, but will be indicated 

 by the breaking of the leaf when pressed between the fingers. x\fter it is cut and hung 

 »n scaffolds out of doors it should remain so, exposed to the sun for ten days, or until 

 the leaf has acquired a bright yellow hue. It must then be put under cover in a house, 

 not ventilated, so that there may be no danger of " house-burning." This kind of 

 tobacco has been sold this year at from $1.5 to §25 per ewt., and often as high as $.50 

 when prepared for market with care. 



