10 WHAT THE SISTER ARTS 



light on other facts observed yesterday or to be observed to-mor- 

 row. Not to supersede experience, but to elevate it to a stand- 

 point whence its range of vision will be broader, and its deduc- 

 tions more reliable, do we plead for Science in Farming. 



What is in effect contended for by the advocates of Book-farm- 

 ing is simply this that a farmer, like any artisan, while he needs 

 practical experience, may also profit by the practical experience of 

 others. For example : A new plant or vegetable is introduced, 

 which our anti-book farmer concludes to try, though totally igno- 

 rant of its nature and season. Let us suppose the nearest neigh- 

 bor who has ever grown this plant lives five miles away. Now, 

 will not this new experimenter, if he have a decent share of com- 

 mon sense, ride over and ask the experienced cultivator what 

 soil is best adapted to this plant ; what manures are best for it, 

 what time it should be planted or sowed, how cultivated, &c., &c. ? 

 Plainly, it would be sheer madness for him to omit such inqui- 

 ries, and go on as if there had been no preceding experience, to 

 answer all these questions and determine all these points for him- 

 self, by hap-hazard planting on every variety of soil, at every 

 possible season, with any or every sort of fertilizer ! By so doing 

 he must spend several hundred dollars to determine what he 

 might readily have ascertained at the cost of a dollar. Well ; if 

 he could turn to the proper page of an Agricultural Dictionary or 

 Encyclopedia, and there learn exactly when this new plant should 

 be sown in this latitude, how manured, how cultivated, &c., would 

 not that be still easier and cheaper than to ride over to his dis- 

 tant neighbor's ? Would it not be highly probable that the 

 directions contained in the book, being founded on a wide range 

 of experiments, would be more reliable and complete than his 

 neighbor's counsel, based on his narrow personal experience 1 A 

 prudent man would probably consult both book and neighbor, and 

 then follow either only so far as his own judgment should dictate ; 

 but how can any one approve his taking counsel of one man's 

 experience, yet condemn a course which is, in fact, but paying 

 deference to the experience of many thousands ? 



II. But some say, " Consult and profit by all the experience 



