160 Review of Essays on Calcareous Manures. 



" But, however, we may differ on this head, there are few who will 

 not concur in the opinion, that our system of cultivation has been 

 every year lessening the productive power of our lands in general, 

 and that no one county, no neighborhood, and but few particular 

 farms have been at all enriched, since their first settlement and cul- 

 tivation. Yet many of our farming operations, have been much im- 

 proved within the last fifteen or twenty years. Driven by necessi- 

 ty, proprietors direct more personal attention to their farms — better 

 implements of husbandry are used, every process is more perfectly 

 performed — and, whether well or ill directed, a spirit of inquiry and 

 enterprize has been awakened, which before had no existence. 

 Throughout the country below the falls, and perhaps thirty miles 

 above, if the best land be excluded, say one tenth, the remaining 

 nine tenths, will not yield an average product of ten bushels of corn 

 to the acre ; although that grain is best suited to our soils in general, 

 and far exceeds in quantity, all other kinds raised. Of course, the 

 product of a 'large proportion of the land would fall below this av- 



erage." 



" Such crops can not in many cases remunerate the cultivator. If 

 our remaining woodland, should be at once brought into cultivation, 

 the gross product of the country would be greatly increased, but 

 the net product, very probably diminished — as the general poverty 

 of these lands would cause more expense than profit, to accompany 

 their cultivation under the usual system. Yet every year we are 

 using all our exertions to clear woodland, and in fact, seldom in- 

 crease either gross or net product — because nearly as much old ex- 

 hausted land is turned out of cultivation, as is substituted by the 

 newly cleared. Sound calculations of profit and loss would induce 

 us to reduce the extent of our present cultivation, by turning out 

 every acre that yields less than the total cost of its tillage," 



The green sand formations which yield the marl of Mr. Ruffin, 

 are to be found also in Maryland and in Jersey. In the latter State, 

 its use was commenced as early as 1805, by the Rev. John Single- 

 ton of Talbot County, and has been continued to the present time 

 with great success. His example has been followed by his neigh- 

 bors in the same county, and the practice has extended into Queen 

 Ann's ; but it does not appear that it has yet been introduced on the 

 western shore of the Chesapeake. In Jersey, the county of Mon- 

 mouth, at one time considered almost irretrievably barren, has been 

 raised to great productiveness by the use of this manure. 



