444 



FARMERS' REGISTER 



[No. 7 



othi^r of iho (ipii;.! liniivtone commeoL-es. and con- 

 liriiii^? \vit!i tx|iial rpo-r,larit,y. At the lalls, whir.h 

 ;in^ sin-on ijiiles from the mounlairi riil<rp, lliis is 

 ihrt only rock to he, seen, wliifh in its turn is over- 

 laid by the liornPtone or cnrnilifoi'ous limeslone, 

 upon wliich the water!? of t lie Niaijara flow, af;er 

 heino; discharired irom Lake Erie. It", therefore, 

 as some writers suppose, the (alls are Gradually 

 recedinij, the iiornstnne will oiler a barrier at 

 which I heir proi^ress will be arrested, and which 

 thev can never by [)osdibility overcome. 



Havinrj dwelt, perharis too lon<r on subjects of a 

 iieneral character, I shall defer, until another 

 month, the remarks I propose to offer on other 

 niatiers. 



[To be continued.] 



COMPARISON OF HORSKS AND OXEN. — ESTI- 

 MATR OF THIi WORTH OF CORN-STALKS 

 AS MANURE. 



To the Editor of the Farmfirs' Register. 



I observe that in j'our last number there is a let- 

 ter to you from Mr. Burfoot, menlioninir a passage 

 in Sir John Sinclair's 'Code of A<rriculture,' in 

 which a paper on horses and oxen, by the late Pre- 

 sident Madison, published in the American Far- 

 mer, is mentioned with approbation, as well as 

 two papers published in that work from G. W. 

 Ervinu, and T. Pickering, on ihesame subject, and 

 requesting you to publish ihese writings in your Re- 

 gister, to which you add a note that they shall ap- 

 pear in your next number. 



Mr. Madison's paper, as it is called, is no doubt 

 his address to the Agricultural Society of Albe- 

 marle, on various topics of husbandry — a respec- 

 table essay certainly, and written in a style of pu- 

 rity and neatness that generally belongs to Mr. 

 Madison's writings. It contains some very good 

 advice to cultivators, but I think a number of errors, 

 which is not extraordinary, considering- that Mr. 

 Madison's time was engrossed by public affairs. 

 That part of it which relates lo the comparative 

 value of oxen and horses in cullivation, I think the 

 most strikingly erroneous, and I rather believe that 

 you yourself would regret to find that Mr. IBur- 

 foot, or any other respectable farmer, should be led 

 away by it, to discard the use of horses, and sub- 

 stitute that of oxen. That both are valuable in 

 their places, I have no doubt; but for the main ob- 

 jects of husbandry, on a wheat and corn plantalion, 

 I think horses, beyond all question, preferable. 

 As Mr. Burfbot has relerredyou to the 'American 

 Farmer,' I would ask your attention to the latter 

 part of a letter to the editor of that work, vol. 2d, 

 p. 140, which presents such views as I have al- 

 ways had on this question, though perhaps rather 

 more favorable to oxen than they ought to have 

 been; still I think them in the main correct.* 



It would be a remarkable and extraordinary 

 fact that Sir John Sinclair and Arthur Young, 

 who have both written a great deal on agriculiure 

 with ability, and have given much usefulinforma- 

 tion to farmers, should have taken up the question 

 in favor of oxen with so much zeal, in opposition 

 to the general and almost uniform practice of the 

 most judicious cultivators of ilie soil in i)oih Ens:- 

 land and Scotland, were it not understood that 

 neither of them was considered a good practical 



*The article referred to will ha copied below. — Ed. 



farmer. The point, so far as 1 understand, is now 

 settled in England, as well as Scotland ; and 

 horses are employed for all kinds of labor that re- 

 quires long and severe exertion, though oxen are 

 occasionally used with advantage Ibr short dis- 

 tances, with fiecjuent interruptions to load and un- 

 load. 



In Virginia there may be examples of active 

 and successful husbandry on grain farms, where 

 oxen are used instead of horses, lor the principal 

 crops ; but 1 have never met with any such on 

 farms of a good size; and am willing to believe, 

 and indeed io hope, that no material change in this 

 respect is likely to take place among us. 



Ot)servinn: in your Register, various and contra- 

 dictory opinions on the value of corn stalks as a 

 manure, I will ofi'er my views of the subject ; 

 they are probably of little or no value, but you can 

 take them tor what they are worth. 



That the corn stalk is of some value by itself for 

 manure, 1 have no doubt, as it is a vegetable sub- 

 stance ; but I should rank it very low in the scale 

 of vegetable manures, if it were turned in, or spread 

 on the soil, in jls natural state ; still I consider it as 

 a highly valuable manure, when used as it is by 

 the most judicious farmers of my acquaintance. 

 In a firm pen, with a good clay foundation, hollow 

 in the centre, corn stalks hauled in from tin>e to 

 time in the winter season, and trampled by cattle, 

 become saturated with the urine, and more fluid 

 dung ; and in this way, a single htrht load of corn 

 stalks, may be converted into seveial heavy loads 

 of rich manure. 'Tis true the stalk iiself furnishes 

 but a small proportion of this substance, but as 

 much the greater part of" it consists of a pith that 

 absorbs fluids like a sponge, and, as I think, in a 

 considerably greater degree than straw, leaves, or 

 any other vegetable substance that can be used 

 for the purpose, it is in proportion more valuidile. 

 In England, Flanders, and other well cultivated 

 countries in Europe, we are infbrn)ed that flind 

 manures from cattle, are carried out in casks lor 

 irrigating their lands, and sand and earth are fre- 

 quently carried into farm pens, that they may be- 

 come impregnated with this kind of manure, and 

 then spread on their lands. I think corn stalks 

 unquestionably preferable for this object, and in- 

 deed am so partial to them, employed in this way, 

 that I verily believe if two grain liirms were equal- 

 ly well managed in other res|)ects, one of them 

 with, and the other without the fi-ee use of corn 

 stalks in the farm pen, the former might be in an 

 improving, and the other in a declining condition. 

 My notions on this point, may be carried too flir, 

 but I thitdv it unquestionable that, used in this 

 way, corn stalks are a most useful and convenient 

 vehicle lor a highly valuable manure. 



Extract from the American Farmer, of July 28, 

 1820. 



"This subject brings to ray recollection the 

 opinion of another foreign writer of great celebrity, 

 upon a question that has been much canvassed in 

 your pa[)er ; whether horses or oxen are preferable 

 for the plough? In the middle states, horses I 

 believe are very generally employed, while in New 

 England oxen are almost universally preiJ^rred, 

 and most of the writers whose opinions are eriven 

 or quoted in your paper, are in favor of the latter. 



