330 INDIANA HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS 



shrewd farmer, says that "hedge is a good fence with 

 five rails and posts upon one side, and five boards and 

 posts, or a good ditch on the other, to keep the hogs and 

 cattle off, until it gets grown, say five or six years, as 

 browsing spoils the young plants. After that, you may 

 take away the fence on the field side, if you are careful 

 never to turn any stock into the field." To this extrava- 

 gant notion of Major Jones must every impartial observer 

 come at last ; for if the thorns are neglected a few years, 

 they grow into a row of trees absolutely worthless, as a 

 fence, and even with most careful trimming, they die and 

 form gaps or thin spots, through which cattle push their 

 way whenever they desire. As a fence against swine, 

 nobody pretends it is good for anything. 



Devon Cattle. — One of the handsomest herds of this 

 valuable breed of cattle in Delaware, or perhaps south of 

 New York, is owned by Mr. C. P. Holcomb, whose farm is 

 near New Castle, and is well worthy a visit from any one 

 curious to see how much science and Intelligence has the 

 advantage over mere bodily strength in the renovation of 

 a worn-out soil. Mr. H. retired a few years ago, on 

 account of bad health, from the Philadelphia bar, and 

 purchased this farm, which long years of constant crop- 

 ping and shallow plowing had so impoverished, that such 

 a herd of cattle as now fatten upon these rich pastures, 

 would then have starved to death. The principal source 

 of fertility and improvement has been sought after in 

 the soil, a few inches below where the former occupant 

 had never looked. To this has been added lime, which 

 has given the most luxuriant return of wheat, clover, 

 Timothy, and Indian corn, until now, a stranger who 

 views the crops, stock, barns, and general condition of 

 the place, can hardly comprehend that a few years ago, it 



(Maryland) Agricultural Society, 1849. Member of the committee 

 for Delaware at the pi-oposed fair of the National Agricultural 

 Society, 1842. Biographical and Genealogical History of Delaware, 

 2:1207; Nashville Agriculturist, 3:209 (1842); American Agricul- 

 turist, 10:343 (November, 1851); American Farmer, 4th series, 

 4:370 (May, 1849). 



