492 INDIANA HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS 



for the present season by a single shower, the deep plowed 

 part was but very little injured. This alone would be 

 sufficient to warrant the extra amount of labor, but this 

 is not all. Major Ward tells me that parts of his plan- 

 tation which had been very much worn out by washing 

 and cropping, have been restored to their original pro- 

 ductiveness almost wholly by the system of deep plowing 

 which he has been practicing for several years. 



I believe you will concede that my opportunity to see 

 the mode of cultivation of all kinds of crops and soils, in 

 nearly all the Southern States, has been equal to that of 

 any other individual ; and should the question now be 

 asked me, whether I would recommend deep plowing upon 

 all Southern soils, no matter what their constituents I 

 should say, yes, most unqualifiedly. But I would not rec- 

 ommend deep turning of light lands, while I have no 

 doubt if a better description of stirring plows were used, 

 followed by a bull tongue, coulter, or other sub-soiling 

 plow, that the benefits would be commensurate with the 

 increased labor in yearly crops, while the danger of losing 

 all title to the land during the first hard shower, would be 

 greatly lessened. 



Planters upon James River, in Virginia, and upon Ro- 

 anoke, in North Carolina, in several particular instances 

 which I could name, have found it extremely profitable to 

 plow their bottom lands with four stout horses to a 

 turning plow, and follow that with three more to a sub- 

 soil plow, in every furrow. Some of the poorest old fields 

 have been renovated by this process ; particularly when 

 connected with a system of manuring by lime, plaster, 

 salt, bone dust, and guano, the whole of which, most par- 

 ticularly the latter, is purchased and applied to the poor- 

 est land in those States, with great profit. I do not ad- 

 vise cotton planters to purchase these fertilizers, only 

 just far enough to try the experiment fairly, to see if it 

 would be profitable. But I do advise them immediately 

 to commence looking a little deeper beneath the surface 

 for that quality of the soil that God must have placed 



