THOROUGH TILLAGE. 97 



judiciously planted with Timber possibly if well set 

 in Fruit but tilling it from year to year is a thank- 

 less task ; and its owner may better work by the day 

 for his neighbors than try to make his bread by such 

 tillage. 



So with fields soaked by springs or sodden with 

 stagnant water. If you say you cannot afford to 

 drain your wet land, I respond that you can still less 

 afford to till it without draining. If you really can- 

 not afford to fit it for cultivation, your next best 

 course is to let it severely alone. 



A poor man who has a rough, rugged, sterile farm, 

 winch he is unable to bring to its best possible con- 

 dition at once, yet which he clings to and must live 

 from, should resolve that, if life and health be spared 

 him, he will reclaim one field each year until all that 

 is not devoted to timber shall have been brought into 

 high condition. When his Summer harvest is over, 

 and his Fall crops have received their last cultiva- 

 tion, there will generally be from one to two Autumn 

 months which he can devote mainly to this work. 

 Let him take hold of it with resolute purpose to im- 

 prove every available hour, not by running over the 

 largest possible area, but by dealing with one field 

 so thoroughly that it will need no more during a long 

 life-time. If it has stone that the plow will reach, 

 dig them out; if it needs draining, drain it so 

 thoroughly that it may hereafter be plowed in 

 Spring so soon as the frost leaves it ; and now let 

 soil and subsoil be so loosened and pulverized that 

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