30 AN AMERICAN FARMER IN ENGLAND. 



the world, any where in the northern United States, is fortu 

 nately to be procured much more cheaply than a long summer 

 would be, if that were wanting. The other thing needful, 

 judging from the experience of England for a length of time 

 past record, in addition to the usual requisites for the cultiva 

 tion of ordinary farm crops, is abundance of lime. This is 

 experience ; and science confirms it with two very satisfactory 

 reasons : first, that apple-tree wood is made up in a large 

 part of lime, which must be taken from the soil ; and, second, 

 that before the apple-tree can turn other materials which it 

 may collect from the soil and atmosphere into fruit, it must 

 be furnished with a considerable amount of some sort of 

 alkali, which requisite may be supplied by lime. 



There is but little else that we can learn from the English 

 orchardists, except what to avoid of their practices. The cider 

 orchards, in general, are in every way miserably managed, 

 and the greater number of those that I saw in Herefordshire 

 were, in almost every respect, worse than the worst I ever 

 saw in New England. The apple in England is more subject 

 to disease ; and I should judge, from what was told me, that 

 in a course of years it suffered more from the attacks of 

 insects and worms than in America. The most deplorable 

 disease is canker. This malady is attributed sometimes to 

 a &quot; cold, sour&quot; soil, sometimes to the want of some ingre 

 dients in the soil that are necessary to enable the tree to 

 carry on its healthy functions, sometimes to the general bar 

 renness of the soil, and sometimes to the &quot; wearing out of varie 

 ties&quot; The precaution and remedies used by gardeners (rarely 

 by orchardists) for it, are generally those that would secure 

 or restore a vigorous growth to a tree. The first of these is 

 deepening and drying the soil, or deep draining and trenching. 

 The strongest and most fruitful orchards, it is well known, are 

 those which have been planted upon old hop-grounds, where 



