108 WHAT I KNOW OF FARMING. 



plied something that balances its loss. " I perceive 

 that virtue has gone out of me," observed the Saviour, 

 because the hem of his garment had been touched ; 

 and every field that had been cropped might make a 

 similar report whenever its annual loss by abstrac- 

 tion has not been balanced by some kind of fertilizer. 

 The farmer who grows the largest crops is the most 

 merciless exhauster of the soil, unless he balances his 

 annual drafts (as good fanners rarely fail to do) by at 

 least equal reinforcements of the productive capacity 

 of his fields. 



The good farmer begins by inquiring, " Wherein 

 was my soil originally deficient ? and of what has it 

 been exhausted by subsequent crops ?" I judge that 

 my gravelly hill-sides would reward the application 

 of two hundred loads (or tuns) of pure clay per acre, 

 as I think the clay flats which border Lake Cham- 

 plain would pay for a like application of sand or fine 

 gravel where that material is found in convenient 

 proximity ; and yet I know very well that, on at 

 least three-fourths of our country's area, such appli- 

 cation would cost far more than it would be worth. 

 Every farmer must act on his knowledge of his soil 

 and its peculiar needs, and not blindly follow the dic- 

 tum of another. Yet I know few farms which, were 

 they mine, I would not consider enhanced in value 

 by a vigorous application of some alkaline substance 

 Lime, Salt, Ashes, or some of the cheaper Nitrates. 

 I should be very glad to apply one thousand bushels 

 of good house-made, hard-wood Ashes to my twenty 



