276 INDIAN CORN. 



He may vainly attempt to divide the blame be- 

 tween an incorrigible soil on the one hand that refuses 

 to reward a slovenly mode of culture, and an obstinate 

 class of animals on the other, that do not choose to 

 fatten upon neglect : but if he will reflect upon the 

 nature of his business, and consider how many separate 

 and distinct operations there are upon which the 

 profit of his butter and beef mainly depend, he will 

 find his want of success easily explained. , He will 

 discover that, in all the different processes from which 

 pork, mutton, and beef are the final result, no one of 

 them can be overlooked or disregarded, without some 

 diminution of his ultimate profits. 



This important reflection, though seldom duly 

 weighed, deserves the serious consideration of every 

 man who cultivates the soil. Between the planting 

 of the corn and the slaughtering of the ox there are 

 more than a score of separate operations, each one of 

 which produces an effect on the cost of the beef. 



If the farmer plants his corn a little too deep, or 

 too late in the season, or too close together, or too far 

 apart ; if he applies the wrong kind of manure, or the 

 wrong quantity, or at the wrong time, or fails to apply 

 any ; if his ground is imperfectly ploughed, or ploughed 

 at the wrong time ; if he handles the horse-hoe care- 

 lessly or too seldom ; if his corn is cut out of season or 

 defectively cured ; if it is fed to his animals in an un- 

 suitable condition, neither ground, cut, nor steamed ; 

 if they are fed too seldom, or too much at one time 

 and too little at another ; if the feed is deficient in 

 variety, or combined in the wrong proportions ; each 



