GREEN CORN-FODDER FOR MILCH COWS. 291 
find much to approve. It should be borne in mind that only five years 
have elapsed since the agriculture of the State was utterly prostrated. 
The people waked up as out of a dream, to see their labor system over- 
thrown, and their lands lying idle. Nearly all kinds of farm stock had 
been swept off by the hurricane which passed over the country, and but 
few agricultural implements remained. It was not to be supposed that 
the former servants, suddenly enfranchised after two hundred years of 
bondage, would be otherwise than unsettled by the change; but large 
numbers gradually returned to steady habits, quite as steady, perhaps, 
as could have been anticipated by the most hopeful. They still consti- 
tute the great bulk of the labor of the State; and valuable labor it 
is, in spite of many irregularities. The Virginia farmer, at least in East- 
ern Virginia, could not get along without it. With kind treatment and 
payment according to contract, the negro is as tractable as ever; and 
in time the interests of the two races, instead of appearing diverse, will be- 
come one. 
A striking mark of progress is the change in the policy of the planters 
toward the outside world. Formerly they were indisposed to encourage 
immigration from other States. There was, therefore, no accession to 
the population of the rural districts from abroad. The same traditions 
and habits descended from father to son through successive generations. 
Now all this is altered. Strangers from every State and every country 
are cordially welcomed whenever they show any disposition to become 
permanent settlers and industrious citizens. The consequence is, that 
in many counties a strong tide of immigration is setting in, bearing with 
it improved stock and better implements, which cannot fail to impart 
a healthy impulse to improvement. 
Upon the whole, we regard the signs of the times as evidently auspi- 
cious of future progress. From astate of desolation and almost despair, in 
1865, the agricultural productions of the State have steadily increased 
in amount and value until, in 1870, we find the tobacco crep one of the 
largest grown in the State for many years; that of cotton greatly in- 
creased; the Richmond mills supplied to their full capacity with wheat ; 
and the crop of corn plentiful in proportion. Improved methods of 
farming are being gradually adopted; more attention is,paid to the 
accumulation of manures; the area of cultivation is being reduced; and 
high culture is taking the place of the old. This is the direction to 
which agriculture is tending in many parts of the State; by degrees we 
may expect it to extend over the whole; and it may be confidently pre- 
dicted that the man: who survives to see the Virginia of fifty years 
hence will not be able to recognize in its features the Virginia of 1870. 
GREEN CORN-FODDER FOR MILCH COWS. 
The practice of sowing corn broadcast, or planting it in drills, to be 
cut daily and fed in a green or slightly dried state to milch cows, in 
August or later months, mainly to supplement the supply of grass in 
the driest portion of the season and equalize the consumption of milk, 
making material, is almost universal among enterprising aud intelligent 
dairymen. In supplies for-farm animals, our abundance, which actually 
runs to waste, is not distributed through the year; the prodigality of 
the flush spring-time, the season of rain and verdure and succulence, is 
followed, in midsummer, by drought and a stinted measure of tough, 
