On Gypsum. 61 
sowing it broadcast among Indian corn after it is 
up, may improve the crop 25 per cent: that sown in 
June it may not improve English grass; that sown in 
August and covered, it may improve the land, though 
drought succeeds; that sown on wheat in November, 
it may neither benefit the wheat nor land; that about 
three pecks to the acre immediately sprinkled on clover 
seed sown on the surface, may cause it to come up, live,. 
and thrive better; that a similar quantity sown on the 
surface in March may treble the burden of bird-foot 
clover; that sown broadcast from the 1st of January in 
breaking up or listing corn ground, the same quantity 
will probably add considerably to the crop; and that it 
may not improve the high land meadow oat if sown in 
February. 
I have witheld experiments tending to prove the uti- 
lity of combining enclosing with the use of gypsum, 
because they are yet defective ; and some others, on ac- 
count of the length of this letter. 
If my poor experiments can in the least degree ad- 
vance the laudable design of your institution, I shall be 
always willing both to communicate them, and that you 
should either select extracts, or suppress them as you 
please. [expect this year to complete a project for drain- 
ing 200 or 300 acres of land, subject to tide water, musk- 
rats, and a creek having two mills on it above. It isa 
considerable work for a farmer, and has been conduct- 
ed at very little expence. Would a circumstantial ac- 
count of it be agreeable, should it succeed ? 
I have been obliged to use the common names of se- 
veral grasses, from an ignorance of the botanical. Some 
of them have not I believe been named by the adepts 
