AVEEAGE PRODUCE IN THIS COUNTY. 171 



Mr Geddes considers it the cheapest land in the States — 

 for those of course who have the money to buy it. By 

 men whose capital is in their bodily strength and indus- 

 trious habits, the wilderness land of more western 

 districts is alone attainable. 



The land is of a very useful kind, producing all sorts 

 of grain crops well, though not of equal quality. Thus 

 the produce per acre was stated by Mr Geddes to be, of — 



It is least adapted, he said, to the growth of potatoes ; 

 and turnips are as yet but little grown, as the raising of 

 fat stock is not much attended to. An average weight 

 of 32 lb. does not indicate a soil or climate well suited 

 to the oat crop. 



This land has been in many places ploughed for fifty 

 years without receiving any manure. I walked over 

 two large fields which have never been manured for the 

 fifty years which have elapsed since the present owner's 

 father cleared them ; and he thinks the land still as good 

 as ever it was. He reaps from it 50 to 60 bushels of 

 corn ; and, last year, ( 1848,) 30 bushels an acre of 

 wheat. The soil consists, for the most part, of crumbling 

 fragments of the green shale. When the older land 

 appears to become exhausted, the plough is put in a 

 little deeper, so as to bring up a little of the crumbling 

 rock, (green shale,) when it is said to produce wheat as 

 before. 



The rotation is Indian corn after lea, with manure — ■ 

 if any is applied — then oats, followed by barley or pease, 

 and finally, winter wheat, with seeds in spring. It is 

 kept in grass two years ; in one of which two crops of 

 hay are cut, and in the other it is pastured, as 250 sheep 



