SOLON ROBINSON, 1851 491 



to advise & just as Janna thinks best will satisfy me. I 

 wish he would let me know whether he can collect money 

 enough to pay taxes and interest on sinking fund debt or 

 not. If he cannot I will send him some. I think that 

 interest is about $25 or 28$ now, as part of the principal 

 is paid. 



I shall not hear from you again till I get to New York & 

 perhaps shall not write again till then. 



With love to each and every one, mother, brothers, sis- 

 ter, uncle, cousins, all I remain your most 

 Affectionate father 



Solon Robinson. 



Benefit of Deep Plowing. 



[Augusta Southern Cultivator, 9:114; Aug., 1851'] 



[May 22, 1851] 



Mr. Editor: — I have an item to communicate upon 

 this subject. I spoke in my former letter of the excellent 

 red lands of Florida. One of the great difficulties of cul- 

 tivation of the hills of that State, as well as all the South, 

 is the terrible destruction occasioned by awful deluges of 

 rain that fall in such floods as are unknown to any other 

 country. One of these terrible storms passed over Talla- 

 hassee since I left there, sweeping many an acre of the 

 soil of the South into the Gulf of Mexico. Many hill-side 

 ditches entirely failed, and horizontal plowing without 

 ditches proved almost useless. Ditches, however, that 

 were large and well made, saved the plantations from de- 

 struction. And so did deep plowing. I have just had a 

 conversation with Major Ward, of Tallahassee, whom I 

 saw last winter breaking up his land with a two horse 

 plow, such for instance as Allen's No. 19, followed in 

 every furrow with a bull-tongue as deep as one stout mule 

 could pull it. The beneficial results of this were seen dur- 

 ing the storm mentioned. The deep tilth of the soil seemed 

 to absorb the water as it fell, and while adjoining lands 

 that were plowed upon the old system were almost ruined 



'Reprinted from the Columbus, Georgia, Soil of the So2ith. 



