1839] 



FARMERS' K K G 1 S T E K. 



653 



to be iiijun'J by tlip Hessian fly. Mr. Foote him- | in their nmchinery, anvl general iDanopement. 

 eelli whose, cliiiriicter as a fiirnicr is favornbiy An avliiilional arfiunieni in its favor is, that iiimli 

 known to several ot^is, says ofliiis wheat, (wliicli less ca|;ital siillic.es than in the beet sngar business, 

 he ealls early reil,_) tlial it" has a smooih head — A third auxihary to the wheal crop, and one in 

 has constiuiled about one hall'of his wheat crops reirard to the |)rc;fit of wliich not the sli<rhtest 

 i;ir llnrteen years, and has weiirlied from two to!(h>nlit onjflit lo exist, is, the broom torn cuhure. 



lour pounds per bushe! more than any ofhis other 

 kinds — die iuMviesi of it !)eiiig sixly-tin-ee pounds 

 and the huhiest sixty pounds. It ripens ii-oni the 

 lOih to the loth of June. He says that all earlv 

 ■vvlieals liave proved best with liim, but he il)inks 

 none of any kind worih sowintj, iirdess in land 



In some of our norlhern stales it has been carried 

 on liir a long time, anrt has been cominuaily unir- 

 mentimr, until the brooms and lirushes manulae- 

 tured of Ibid very valual)le jihusl have become ar- 

 ticles (il export to a great amount. In our own 

 state, we see them in almost every house, yei our 



capable of producinjf Ibrty or Ibrty-five bushels of climate is better adapted ihaii theirs lo the growth 

 corn per acre. In another part of his letter — of every variety oi' corn, and our lands are natu- 

 speakiuij of lime, lie expresses the belief that the rallv belter. 'Vo enable us, therei'ore, noi only to 



application of sixty or seventy bushels to the 

 acre will double our crops: but I presume he 

 means on a soil suited to lime. He seems to be 

 one of the few of our profession who practise 

 fully, what they preach; ior he informs me, that 

 he has already limed more than two hundred 

 acres this year, and expects to lime another hun- 

 dred before Christmas. This is a most laudable 

 example to us all, and well worthy of our imi- 

 tation. The foregoincr statement I have taken the 

 liberty to cive you from a private letter, for which 



sup[)ly our own brooms and brushes, on as good 

 terms as we now buy litem, but also to export 

 ihem, nothing is wanting but thai we shoidd be 

 iii:;cula;ed wiih a modicum of nonhern en:erprise, 

 industry and perseverance. This inoculation, 1 

 trust, will very soon be peribrmed for us by one of 

 our medical liiends, (a brother meinber,^ who is 

 now engaged witli another gentleman of this 

 town, in establishing a small manufactory of 

 broom-corn, on Conuner^e-slreet, I'o both of 

 them I most heartilv wish that success which an 



serves. From one of them 1 have received the 

 fbllowino; extract of a letter from a gentleman in 

 Connecticut ; 



" Oar fiu-mers plant their broom-corn in hills 

 two feet apart and the rows from three lo three 

 and a half wide. The average yield is from 600 



I hope Mr. Foote will excuse me. But having j undeitakin^g 'so laudable and^ promising well de- 

 al ways acted, during my whole life, upon the 

 principle of bestovvin<r praise wherever it was due, 

 I could not withhold it, in the present case. 



The alarming decrease of our wheat crops, for 

 several years, has produced many efforts to find a 

 remedy, in the culture of some new varieties oi 

 wheat. But it is, at least, very doubtful, .whether I to 1000 lbs. clean brush to the acre, and from six- 

 Ihey will succeed any belter "than the old kinds, | ty to one hundred bushels of seed. This, when 

 which have turned 'out far belter this summer, j well cleaned and ground, is esteemed htilf as 

 than they have done for manv harvests past. I <rood as corn, and is used in feeding slock of all 

 This strengthens the hope of their returnintr, af- I kinds. It is said to be better ihan oats for horses, 

 ter a few seasons more, to their former condition, and better than buckwheat for feeding hogs. In 

 Still let us try "the new brooms;" provided we ' planting, from twenty to twenty-five seed are put 

 do not hazard too much money in making the in a hill, but only ten are permitted to grow." 



experiment; although I should deem honest any 

 hazard worth incurrinu, rather than abandon our 

 good old molher, Virginia, as long as there is 

 even a shadow of hope of her resuscitation; and 

 that hope must ever remain, until the vital spark 

 is entirely extinct. 



Might we not also adopt advantageously, some 

 good auxiliaries fo the wheat crop? The culture 

 of the beet for makinnr sugar, has already spread 

 over a great part of Europe, and has been found 

 so profitable as oreatly to enhance the price of all 

 Buitable land. But the climate of many parts of 

 the United States has been well ascertained to be 

 even more favorable to the beet culture, than any 

 trans-allantic climate yet tried. Then why not 

 follow the good example cf Pennsylvania in form- 

 ing a company to try the experiment in Vircrinia'? 

 Our legislatures, although once laboring under a 

 kind of corporalion-phobia which threw them into 

 awful tremors at any thinjr that even smelt of a 

 charter, have, for years past, been so marvellously 

 fond of granting charters for all imaginable pur- 

 poses, both above and below ground, that we too 

 might reasonably hope to obtain one for making 

 beet sugar; unless indeed, their habitual repuff- 

 nance to doing any thing for agriculture should 

 prevent it. 



Again, the silk culture has long been carried on 

 in Connecticut, and with constantly increasinir 

 profit, in consequence of the great improvements 



It does not perhaps become me, a non-resident 

 of this town, all hough long connected by the ties 

 of consanguinity and friendship with several of 

 its inhabitants, and for more than half a century, 

 sincerely interested in iho welfare of all, to be 

 pointing out to them the great natural advantages 

 of their situation lor various kinds of manufactur- 

 ins; establishments, to which few places in Vir- 

 ginia are better adapted ; but I rely on my mo- 

 tives to plead my excuse, should any be deemed 

 necessary. These establishments, if once put 

 into operation, would not oidy give a great stim- 

 ulus to the ajiriculture of ail the counties con- 

 nected with Fredericksburg, but would call into 

 action much of the mechanical talent of the sur- 

 rounding country, and bring to their aid both 

 capital and skillYrom someofour sister slates. 

 As a source of individual wealth, cornfort. and 

 general prosperity, the improvement of these ad- 

 vantages to the utmost practicable exlenf, can 

 hardly be estimaled too highly : but as auxiliary 

 means of drawinir more closely the bonds of our 

 heretofore happy union, such developenient of na- 

 tural resources would be of incalculable value — of 

 inestimable worth. 



But let me return to my experiments, of which 

 I have ordy a i'ew more to stale, and these of 

 minor importance. Twice during the summer 

 and fall we suffered severely from drought. The 

 consequence has been, that my experimental 



