22S 



F A R M E R S' R E G I S T E R. 



[No. 4 



hole aller the usual manner; and, when filled, the 

 boards were drawn out. This is done with ffreat- 

 erlkcility, hy putting a stick into the hole in the 

 upper end ot" the board, hy which it may lie raised 

 by a lever or prise, if too last to draw out, other- 

 wise. The boards beiii<j^ all removed, fill the 

 space they occupied with quick lime: if but par- 

 tially, it is better than if totally slaked, because as 

 it slakes it will expand and make the posts stand 

 very firm. It' altogether slaked, it also swells and 

 makes the post quite secure. From three to five 

 posts with hewn or uniform butis will require one 

 bushel of lime. Boards to surround the post half 

 an inch thick (and perhaps this thickness of lime 

 may be sutlicient) would not take half that quan- 

 tity. The liiue is all the additional expense, ex- 

 cept the extra labor, (which is very trifling.) to be 

 incurred by setting a It-nce, with that part of the 

 posts in the ground enveloped in hme. 



To prevent the ground Irom adhering to the 

 posts at the surliice, and occasioning iheir decay, 

 this part being the one which generally first be- 

 gins to rot, lime mortar is apjilied, plastering 

 round the posts with an elevation adjoining to the 

 wood. Into this mortar, gravel was pressed to 

 prevent the rains irom washing it away. This 

 mortar may be applied at any time most conveni- 

 ent after the (t;nce is made. — Memuirs of Phlla- 

 fielphia Society. 



For tlie Farmers' Register. 



^BIVIARKS SUGGESTED BY A VISIT TO WAR- 

 REX COUATY. 



By THE Editor. 



Warren iCounty, in North Carolina, is in tl"i.e 

 same geological range with the upper parts of 

 4>inwiddie and Henrico, in V^irginia, and other 

 lands lying over the belt of granite which Ibrms 

 the falls of all the rivers. The granite belt south 

 of the Roanoke, however, seems much broader 

 than in Virginia, and the surface of the earth to 

 furnish soils oi' very different and superior quality 

 to the more northern granite lands above referred 

 to, in Virginia. The liills of the Roanoke, extend 

 as far down as Weldon, fifteen miles below Gas- 

 ton, which of course fixes the southern visible 

 limit of the granite belt, and it is traced in the 

 cutting of the railway, and elsewhere along its 

 course, lor more than thirty-five miles above Gas- 

 ton. The railway, now constructing, passes along 

 the ridge which separates the Roanoke and the 

 Tar rivers, with no considerable deviation from 

 the summit of the ridge, except where the road 

 crosses these two rivers. Though, as usual in 

 our country, the ridge is very level, and therefore 

 furnishes an excellent railway route, the surface of 

 the county of Warren is generally broken, and the 

 land hilly, except on the summits of the ridges, 

 where it is invariably poor. The sloping and hilly 

 lands lying on the small streams, (very improperly, 

 throughout all the United States, called creeks,) 

 furnish all the good high lands of Warren; and 

 there is a very large proportion of good quality, 

 though none is very rich. The texture is of va- 

 rious degrees, from light loam to stiff clay — the 

 former, and that which approaches to it, beinsr 

 designated as the "gray" and the latter as "red 

 land." The red lands enjbriice sU the richest and 



best soils, and nearly or quite all the poor and level 

 ridifes are gray. 



If it were not that the fact is so general, and so 

 notorious, that it attracts no observation, it would 

 be a suipject of curiosity and wonder, that the soil 

 of level ridges should be poor, while the lands s'o- 

 ping from them, hilly and exposed to washing rains 

 as they may be, are superior in li*rlility, and some- 

 times even very rich, when the neighboring ridires 

 are very poor. M. Puvis, when treating of sim- 

 ilar soils in France, (in his article on "aro-ilo- 

 silicious" soils, given at length in vol. iv, of Far- 

 mers' Rpirister,) supposes that the last geologi- 

 cal chanire was the covering, by some great Hood, 

 of the whole siirfiice of the country, by a thick de- 

 posite of the earth which now forms the soil of the 

 ridges — which earth is what he designates as the 

 "argilo-silicious," and which is precisely what was 

 described in the Essay on Calcareous iManures as 

 the "add ridge lands'^ of lower Virginia. Accord- 

 ing to M. Puvis' theory, after the whole country 

 had been buried under this uniform and deep cov- 

 er of barren earth, other great floods, aiding the 

 slow operation of the streams which still flow, cut 

 down and washed away the earth, so as to expose 

 the present surfaces of the slopes, and reach the 

 more fertile earth below. But however plausible 

 this view may appear to speculative geoloffists, it 

 will not pass with tanners, or other practical inves- 

 tigators. If this poor surface earth had been thus 

 super-imposed, the different varieties, and richer 

 -strata which now present their edges to form the 

 hilly slopes, would still lie horizontally below the 

 ridges, and wouhl be reached and identified in 

 digging wells, and even exposed by the washing 

 away of the thinner portions, at the edges of the 

 barren cover. No such thing has ever been heard 

 of; and poor as the surface soil of a ridge is, no one 

 expects to find richer so/7 (though mineral manures 

 mav exist,) at any depth below. 



My short visit to Warren was induced by pri- 

 vate and personal objects, which permitted no 

 other than incidental and chance-directed, as well 

 as very hasty views of the soils and of the agri- 

 culture of the county— and of course such obser- 

 vations are worth very little. Even if there had 

 been an intention of niaking any thing deserving 

 the name of aijricultural observations, and time 

 and leisure could have been afforded lor that pur- 

 pose, I should have been deterred from making the 

 attempt, by the general and unvarying statement 

 made, in answer to my questions, that there was 

 no improvement or even preservation of existing 

 fertility made, or even attempted by any cultivator; 

 and that the whole system of agriculture consisted 

 in clearing as much forest land, every winter, as 

 possible, getlino' out of it as many and as heavy 

 crops as possible, (and all exhausting crops,) and 

 when worn down to sterility, sooner or later, to 

 "turn it out" waste, until somewhat restored, after 

 many years, by the improving operations of na- 

 ture — the sole improver of land in this region. 

 This is the earliest mode of cultivation in almost 

 every country — and therefore it would be idle to 

 look for exceptions, here or elsewhere. But when 

 such wide-spread, obvious, and deplorable exam- 

 ples of the effects of this system are exhibited in 

 the similar and not remote lands in Virginia, it 

 might be supposed that the intellisent planters of 

 Warren woukl see the expediency and the profit 

 of securing and preserving the natural fertility of 



