644 



BOONE COUNTY, NEBRASIvA. 



Instead of plowing this whole amount up and cultivating 

 to trees, I lay the ground off into strips, twelve feet apart 

 each way, with the strips about four feet wide. This width I 

 cultivate, while the twelve feet between the strips I leave un- 

 touched, as it is the prairie in its native state. I herewith 

 append a diagram, by which my plan can be more readily 

 understood : 



Planting trees out in this way, I liave not the work to 

 perform in hauling straw to mulch them with, as though com- 

 pelled to scatter it all over the ten acres. By my plan of 

 planting out trees I have only the four feet strips to cover, 

 the twelve feet between being as stated the native prairie, cov- 

 ered with grasses. In this way, I have a beautiful, inviting little 

 forest in five years' time, which is an ornament to any farm, 

 and something that I may ever be proud of, to say nothing of 

 ■the deep satisfaction to the passer by to see how easy it is to 

 raise timber in Nebraska. 



In presenting the advantages of this State another thing 

 is to be considered. A farmer here has no stones or stumps 

 to contend with, but rolling prairie or bottom lands, that lie 

 contingent to sparkling streams, abounding in fish and wild 

 fowl. Ye sturdy sons of toil, on these broad, shining prairies 

 of Nebraska, God beckons you to come and convert the acres 

 of wild grasses into vast fields of golden ears of corn and yel- 

 low waving wheat, nodding their heads to the blue vaulted 

 heavens. 



