13 



these views against our system of agricultural production are not weakened by 

 the amouut kept in such pastures. 



But our correspondence gives hopeful encouragement that there is a better 

 cultivation coming. Farmers appear to be awakened, even in the rich lands of 

 the west, to the necessity of improvements, for these lands are seen to be not 

 inexhaustible. To keep up the vegetable matter of the soil is a duty that begins 

 to weigh on the minds of reflecting agriculturists, and that farming which 

 secures large crops at the expense of the soil is being condemned, as a present 

 profit based on the impoverishment of the generation that is to follow. A cor- 

 respondent from Michigan, quoting our remark, that no greater misfortune 

 could befall our country than the impoverishment of its soil, says : " I fully 

 concur in that sentiment. The formers in this county have felt the full force of 

 its truth in years that are passed. Ten years ago. by continual cropping, our 

 land run down to such a condition that ten bushels of wheat per acre were con- 

 sidered a large crop, but within the last ten years we have resorted first to rota- 

 tion, then clovering and plastering, and the use of every load of manure we can 

 make. At this time, in this section of our State, the average is twenty-five 

 bushels of wheat per acre." 



2. The use of lime and piaster. — The column in our table relating to the in- 

 crease of the use of these fertilizers is favorable, when the scarcity and high 

 price of labor are considered. In Connecticut, Michigan, and Indiana, the in- 

 crease is from 20 to 27 per cent., and in Maine, Illinois, and Wisconsin, 10 per 

 cent. In nearly all the other States, it is not below a general average. 



The clover crop is the basis of general manuring: in small places, for special 

 crops, where high prices for the product may be obtained, guano and the phos- 

 phates may be employed ; but for the farm generally, the chief reliance must be 

 on clover crops and stable manure. 



Whilst the number of acres in clover is about an average, the proportion of 

 full ci'ops turned under is below it. This was caused by the scarcity of fodder 

 and hay, requiring the farmer to mow the second crop, instead of ploughing it 

 in for wheat. But this is a temporary evil, and, therefore, it need not be dwelt 

 upon. The important question is, how can lime and plaster be best used to 

 increase th& clover crop? 



We have placed these two manures together, and consider them in connexion 

 with clover, because the three should not be separated. Common lime rock is 

 composed of 43.7 per cent, of carbonic acid, and 5G.3 per cent, of lime. By 

 burning, the first is driven into the air. Plaster has, sulphuric acid 46, lime 33, 

 water 21 per cent., and red clover 27.80 per cent, of lime and 4.47 per cent, of 

 sulphuric acid. Besides this food directly supplied to clover, and by it as di- 

 rectly given to wheat, the lime hastens the destruction of vegetable matter, 

 thus preparing it for the latter crop, and the plaster attracts moisture. Hence 

 in soils having much vegetable matter and little lime, the effects of plaster are 

 highly beneficial in this way. 



As an instance of the proper mode of applying plaster, and of its beneficial 

 effects on soils abounding in vegetable matter, we take the following from the 

 article on The Wheat Plant, published in the Annual Report for 1S62 of this 

 Department. 



General Orr, of Laporte county, Indiana, one of the most intelligent and suc- 

 cessful farmers of the country, thus states his experiment : 



"The field contained thirty-seven acres; was of a light, loamy soil of medium 

 gravity; had been covered with scattered trees of burr oak and hickory, with 

 frequent patches of hazel ; was brought into cultivation ten years ago ; had pro- 

 duced three crops of wheat, two of corn, one of oats, and in March, 1853, was 

 sowed to clover among wheat, all without manure. It was pastured in the fall 

 of 1853, and up to the first of June, 1854, Avhen everything was turned off, and 

 on the 10th and 11th of June we sowed six barrels of plaster on twenty-eight 



