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F A R JNl E R S ' REGISTER 



[N(J. 8 



This fact points to a source of profit in grazing, to 

 which we have not been slow in resorting— as 

 many cattle being fattened in this section of coun- 

 try as in any other area of equal extent in the 

 Union. 



We sow a great quantity of clover and other 

 grass seeds, and use plaster liberally on every 

 plant which we attempt to raise, and this some- 

 times acts with an energy truly astonishing. We 

 work well — we plough well — we cultivate well. 

 But what constitutes good cultivation? not certain- 

 ly the deepest ploughing, as supposed by some, or 

 the most frequent ploughing and harrowing, as 

 advocated by Tull. Without pretending to any 

 skill in definitions, I should say, that is the best 

 cultivation, either for wheat or corn which most 

 completely destroys, or holds in obeyance, all 

 spontaneous vegetation, so as to give the crop a 

 monopoly of the soil. The most perfect cultiva- 

 tion for wheat would be, to plough in the spring, 

 to cross-plough after harvest, harrow — sow the 

 seed, shovel in, and then harrow again. But this 

 is not the Fauquier method of doing the business ; 

 neither is it the best way : a single good plough- 

 ing, by which I mean that the surface should be 

 completely turned under, with the wheat sowed 

 on the rough surface, if there be not too many 

 clods, and then two good harrowings are all-suf- 

 ficient. 



The reason for this is very obvious, which it 

 may be as well perhaps to state. When land is 

 first ploughed, the vegetable matter turned down 

 undergoes a decomposition more or less violent, 

 agreeably to the presence of heat and moisture. 

 When the grain is sowed, immediately after the 

 ploughing, it receives the gas as it is generated, 

 like a plant in a hot-bed. But if the land be 

 ploughed a great while before seed time, there is a 

 loss of all the volatile part of the manure, which 

 failed to combine with the soil. And the same 

 reasoning is applicable with still stronger force to 

 the corn crop. Fall ploughing for corn is now 

 rery generally abandoned. 



In farming, generally, we use much less manual 

 labour than our brethren m lower Virginia; we 

 depend more upon the cheaper service of the horse 

 and the ox. The plough has in a great degree 

 superseded the use of the hoe. It may be ad- 

 mitted, however, that we have too little manual 

 labour. And this proceeds from necessity. The 

 "cotton fever," which raged so intensely a few 

 years since, to the south, not only carried off some 

 of our most active and enterprising people, but 

 deprived us to a very mjurious extent of our ne- 

 groes. I shall not stop to bandy words with those 

 who may deem this a blessing ; it is sufficient for 

 my purpose now, barely to state that we, whose 

 interest is most affected, view it in a very different 

 light. 



In a country so rough as this is, where there are 

 so many stones, both in the ground and out of the 

 ground, and so many fences yet to be made out of 

 them, a very strong force might be used to advan- 

 tage, independently ol'that which is necessary for 

 mere cultivation. The farms, also, are generally 

 rather large, with a strong, but very natural ten- 

 dency to accumulation in the hands of the few, to 

 the exclusion of the many, "The rich are be- 

 coming richer," but the poor, not being willing 

 " to become poorer, " are going where they can 

 " get richer " too— thev are going to " the great 

 West." 



A great deal is generally supposed to depend on 

 a judicious rotation of crops ; but the most impor- 

 tant thing at last is not to cultivate the land too 

 frequently in any crop. Exposure to the influence 

 of the atmosphere is of much more injury to a 

 soil, than the loss of that portion of vegetable 

 matter, which constitutes a part, and only a small 

 pari, of the food of plants. A quick rotation is 

 generally ado[ited, from the fear of the effects of 

 blue grass; but this, like every other vegetable, or 

 animated production of the earth, has its period 

 of youth, maturity, and decay, and a sod of five 

 years' standing is more easily subdued by the 

 plough, than one of three, besides possessing the 

 advantage of being able to bring from a fourth to 

 a third more grain. The grazing of so many 

 cattle enables Ihe farmers of this neighborhood 

 to keep a large portion of their arable land con- 

 stantly and profitably in grass. This accounts for 

 the rapid improvement of the country, and the 

 prosperity of the people. 



The proprietors of upper Fauquier are general- 

 ly the builders of their own Ibrtunes. If we have 

 few very rich men, we have, on the other hand, not 

 many that are poor : the great mass is composed 

 of " middle interest men, " the bone and sinew of 

 every country. Some of the refinements and lux- 

 uries of the world may yet be wanting, but we 

 live abundantly, and, I hope, hospitably. To the 

 ornamental part of our protession but little atten- 

 tion has been paid ; our firms have nothing of 

 that garden-like appearance, with which Hazlitt 

 was so delighted on a long journey through Lom- 

 bardy; neither are our dwellings embowered in 

 trees, or embellished with tasteful enclosures, and 

 the beautiful shrubbery and flowers of the sweet 

 little cottages of England. But, the Bible says, 

 "there is a time lor all things." We now "go 

 for the main chance, " and hope to leave to our 

 children, the means, and there will be plenty of 

 room, for the exercise of all their taste in orna- 

 mental agriculture. 

 I remain. 



Your obedient servant, 



R. B. BUCKNER. 



St. Bernard, 20th September, 1838. 



For tlie Farmers' Register. 

 THE THEORY OF MANURING WITH LEAVES, 

 SUPPORTED BY A FEW EXPERIMENTS. 



There are no truths in the science of agriculture, 

 not immediately obvious to the senses, more sus- 

 ceptible of proof, than that much the greater part, 

 if not the entire substancej of every vegetable is 

 constituted of precisely the same elements, or ma- 

 terials, merely differing in their proportions; and, 

 consequently, that every vegetable substance, 

 when suitably reduced or decomposed, is food for 

 growing plants of other kinds. Hence it must 

 necessarily follow that every kind of vegetable 

 matter must be an alimentary manure; and if it 

 does not act as such, or to much extent, that it is 

 not because the substance does not possess the 

 raw material of which to make manure, but on 

 account of some inconvenience attending its form, 

 or defect in the mode of application. 



Upon such grounds, theory would pronounce, 

 even if practice had not at all confirmed it, that 



