536 



FARMERS' REGISTER— CEDAR HEDGES. 



hoe or mattock for himself and son, delves hard on 

 the road all da}-, whilst his more fortunate neigh- 

 bor rolls by in his pleasure carriage unconcerned 

 at the unequal privileges granted him by the law. 

 Depend upon it, to retain this usefiil class of citi- 

 zens amongst us, and prevent them fi'om emigra- 

 ting to states where their rights are better guarded, 

 we must make a thorough and radical change m 

 our road system. I hope your correspondent R. N. 

 Avill not relax his efforts in this cause until he 

 points out the benefits resulting from the more 

 equal and just road law of Pennsylvania and Ohio, 

 and what is not less important, their mucA greater 

 efficiency. I would suggest to the consideration of 

 R. N. the propriety in the first place of the state 

 appointing an engineer who is fully competent, 

 and will firmly discharge his duties, to review, 

 and re-locate where necessary, all tlie stage routes 

 of the commonwealth, placing them on the surest 

 and best ground, with an eye solely to the benefit 

 of the public at large, regardless of the murmurs 

 of a single individual, wlio will perhaps grumble 

 though benefitted. And to }jrevent the possibility 

 of doing injustice to such individual, and the hea- 

 vy damages given by juries, I would make it 

 the duty of the county courts to ascertain the 

 actual value of such lands, and pay over to such 

 individual sucii actual value at so much j^er acre. 

 Thus it would be mipossible as now, fur an obsti- 

 nate selfish person to obstruct a work of great pub- 

 lic utility; or to bribe a sheritT (lor they are like 

 other men) to summon juries, whose sentiments 

 he is acquainted with, and who he knows will 

 give exorbitant damages; and we must not forget 

 too, the more flaws, and the less satisfiictory these 

 verdicts are to the courts, the better for the 

 sheriff, for he is paid jgo (ofien more than the 

 condemned land is worth) for every jury sum- 

 moned. 



When the roads are thus located by an able 

 and perfectly disinterested engineer, they should 

 be given up to the county courts, whose duty it 

 should be to appoint commissioners for roads, to 

 be paid for their services out of the road fund to 

 be raised by a moderate tax for that purpose, and 

 whose duty it would be to apply such funds to the 

 hire of laborers, for opening and keeping in repair 

 the roads — giving to those interested, the option 

 to pay the tax assessed for that {)urpose, in money, 

 or in work at a fair per diem allowance. But I 

 have already exceeded my limits and must leave 

 the subject to the abler pen of R. N. 



CEDAR HEDGES. 



To tlio Editor of tlie Fanners' Register. 



Cumberland Stony Point Mills, } 

 26 th Nov. 1834. 5 



You will confer a singular favor on me, and 

 others who are now present, requesting that I 

 should apply to you for information in relation to 

 live fencing from the cedar, which abounds here in 

 great numbers. At what season should trans- 

 planting take place, and how should they be plant- 

 ed — deep or shallow, the size of the bush, &c.? — 

 and when and how the berries should be drilled? 

 It is allegeil by a gentleman now present, that they 

 will come up freely after passing through the body 

 of a robin, and that they do not come up from sim- 



lily placing them under ground. Is this so, or not? 

 Please to write freely and fully to this point. 



SAMUEL, IlOnSOX. 



[We cannot answer the foregoing inquiries better 

 than by giving the following extract from Taylor's 

 Arator, on cedar hedges. Our personal experience 

 on tliis subject is very limited — but such as it is, its 

 fruits are readily otfered. For the purpose of testing 

 the means of overcoming the first duficult)', (that is, 

 the transplanting, without killing or materially injur- 

 ing the young cedars,) a row of eight or ten yards' 

 length was set out as recommended by Taylor, (ex- 

 cept being in a single line.) The trial was made in a 

 foul bushy piece of ground which formed part of a hog 

 lot, and on a compact clay soil. The young cedars 

 stood very thick around, so that they could be trans- 

 planted without being moved more than a few yard!. 

 A trench was first dug about ten inches deep, and ra- 

 ther wider than the spade. Each plant was dug up in 

 a square mass of soil, of the width of the spade, and 

 from six to ten inches deep, and immediately lifted and 

 placed in the trench. The interstices were afterwards 

 filled with loose earth, and the whole then trodden 

 down so as to be compact. No farther care was used, 

 nor an)' after-tillage, or protection from the trampling 

 of the live-stock — and yet by the next summer only 

 one of the plants was killed, or apparently injured by 

 the change of place. But this want of care, and the 

 growth of a cedar thicket over the whole space, of 

 course served to thin the plants, and destroy its hedge- 

 like appearance. The trial was only intended to.show 

 if the transplanting could be safely effected, and in tl/at 

 respect, it was successful. The plants varied from six 

 to eighteen inches in height. If a distant removal had 

 baen necessary, the labor and the risk would have been 

 greatly increased. No attempt was made to apply the 

 plan to use for enclosing fields, because live fences can 

 never succeed in Virginia so long as the law pei-mits 

 hogs to range at large, and debars the owner of a field 

 from all remedy for their depredations. Whenever 

 this objection is removed, thesowingof the cedar seeds 

 will probably be found a cheaper mode than trans- 

 planting. It is supposed, that they will not vegetate 

 until after having passed through the body of some 

 animal: but the same end may be reached by using a 

 proper degree of artificial heat. Bordley found the 

 same difficulty with the seeds of hedge thorns, and 

 overcame it, both by mixing them with the food of 

 cattle, and by keeping them in a moderately warm 

 fluid for several days, after which they sprouted well. — 

 See Bordle'/s Husbandry. '\ 



From Taylor's Jlralor. 

 Live fences. — This subject, so extremely mate- 

 rial to a country requiring to be raised from the 

 dead, by vast and repeated doses of the only genu- 

 ine terrene elixir, testifies in qvctv quarter of the 

 United States, to the scantiness of our agricultural 

 knowledge; and is one of the presages, that it is 

 doomed to live and die an infant. If it is an idiot, 

 its case is hopeless; but if it is oidy a dunce, it must 

 in time discern the ^■ast saving of labor to be appli- 

 ed to draining and manuring, the vast saving of 



