FARMERS' REGISTER. 



leaves or straw— occasionally they should be 

 cleaned out, twice a year at least, and the manure 

 thrown up in larfre piles on a level epot, and in 

 the shade if you can— if not, covered with planks 

 to prevent evaporation. One, or at most two 

 hands, used only occasionally, and hardly missed 

 Irom the crop, can gatherand haul all (he leaves. On 

 a plantation of Ibrty or more hands, a cart may be 

 Itept runnmg all the time, and one hand thus em- 

 ployed more profitably than in the crop,— with less 

 than that nun) her, perhaps it would be best to trust 

 to taking advantage of the weaiher, slate of the 

 crop, &c. to spare the hands from the field— the 

 manure thus formed, even if the leaves are not 

 thoroughly rotten, is very valuable lor cotton or 

 corn. 



The negro houses on every plantation should 

 be swept around and under at least once in 

 six months, for the sake of health; throw the 

 filth that is gathered in a pen, as far from the 

 quarter as can be done conveniently ; add to it all 

 the weeds cut down, all the corn cobs, all the 

 slacked ashes, and refuse of all kinds : the second 

 year it will be excellent manure. At least once a 

 year all the turn rows and fence corners should be 

 chopped down ; let these weeds also, instead of 

 lying to die and waste, be collected in pens, and 

 the manure may be made the first year. Mova- 

 ble pens for stock are admirable for manuring, 

 but they are troublesome and not within the reach 

 of every planter. While the methods of manur- 

 ing I have mentioned have been practised by all 

 without exception, the experience of many years 

 has shown me that in this way I can obtain, at a 

 nominal cost, one that I never tee\ at all, as much 

 manure oi' a very valuable kind as 1 can haul out 

 to the proper places at the proper period ; and that 

 while lam thus adding to the intrinsic value of 

 my property, I am every year most amply com- 

 pensated ibr the trouble and expense, by the 

 increase of my crop. I advise every planter to 

 do the same; I do not, however, advise them 

 to purchase manure of any kind ; and of this 

 a word hereafter— nor do I recommend them to 

 use those manures which make no present return, 

 but postpone their remuneration to a distant and 

 uncertain future. Although entirely opposed to 

 the system of straining and overworking ne- 

 groes, land and mules, and believe it to be 

 unprofitable, certainly inhuman, I yet go for as 

 large an income as can i)e made without such 

 means, and recommend nothing that will seriously 

 diminish an income so obtained Ibr any prospect 

 of gain hereafter ; being a firm believer in the old 

 maxim, that "one bird in the hand is worth two 

 in the bush." Short Stapi^e. 



PRESEnVATION OF FRUIT. 



From the Annates d'Hort. de Paris. 

 Dr. Loiseleur des Longchamps preserves ap- 

 ples three or four years, and pears more than one 

 year, by enclosing them in an air-tight box, and 

 depositing it in an ice-house. Previously to pla- 

 cing them in the box, each pear is wrapped in five 

 or six thicknesses of absorbent paper, which, in 

 (Base of decay, prevents one fruit li-om contaminat- 

 ing another. Burying the box, which may be of 

 zinc or lead, or perhaps an earthen-ware vessel, 



three or four feet deep in the soil, would answer 

 equally well ; and even a cool common cellar 

 might be used for the same purpose. 



ON THE CAUSE OF THE ACTION OF GYPSUM 

 ON LI1MEI> LAND. 



To ttie Editor of tlie Farmers' Register. 



Cambridge, Md., Dec. 1839. 



Reviewing casually the last August No. of your 

 Register, I read, with some attention and much 

 pleasure, an essay of " Senex" "on the cause of 

 greater value of oypsum on limed land." 



In the general sentiments of the writer, incideji- 

 tally communicated, I heartily concur; but I must 

 take exception to his theory in explanation of the 

 fact above stated, as the chief purpose of his com- 

 munication. 



His remarks upon the absurdity of the applica- 

 tion of carbon, in substance, as a manure, Irom its 

 insolubility in water, are undoubtedly correct ; it is 

 certainly from the carbonic acid alone that ve- 

 getables derive their carbon ; yet this is not wholly 

 through the roots of the plant, as he suggests, but 

 partly by the respiration, through the leaves, of 

 atmospheric air, containing a portion of it ; I ap- 

 prehend, too, that he inadvertently remarked, that 

 the sap, "as it passes up through the lubes of the 

 vegetable is decomposed," &c. &c. He is no 

 doubt acquainted with the fact, that the sap con- 

 tinues unaltered until it arrives at the leaves, where 

 it is elaborated for the secretions and growth of the 

 plant. 



His sentiments of Prof Armstrong's "Essays 

 on Vegetable Physiology," and liis recommenda- 

 tion o\' them to the reading public, cannot he too 

 oltcn, or too earnestly repeated ; to which might 

 be profitably added those of Prof Lindiey on the 

 same subject. Without a good general know- 

 ledge of the science, the great interest of agricul- 

 ture can never he advanced. Now, to his theory 

 " on the cause of greater value of gypsum on limed 

 land." I take the chief exception. 



It is my present chief purpose to demonstrate, 

 that his theory, which, he says, has been so long 

 satisfiictory to himsellj is unsound and unphilo- 

 Sophie; and secondly, and concisely, to oti'er a 

 substitute which I consider more consistent with 

 settled chemical laws. 



The theory of " Senex" is unsoimd and unphi- 

 lopnphic, being wholly fbunded upon a supposition 

 which 1 will prove erroneous — "of the mutual 

 action on each other, of the gypsum (sulphate of 

 linte, or plaster of Paris) and of carbonate of lime" 

 — by means of which " mutual action," he says, 

 "the vegetables growing on the soil, will obtain 

 an ample supply of carbon, and grow as they had 

 never been seen to grow before." 



The erroneous position assumed by him, of the 

 "' mutual action" between the sulphate and car- 

 bonate of lime, has led him into his false course of 

 reasoning; and necessarily into the false conclu- 

 sion, "that the plaster will faciliiate the extrica- 

 tion of the carbonic acid," &c. Thus, that the 

 sulphuric acid of the plaster, when this substance 

 comes in contact with the carbonate of lime, 

 previously applied to the land, quits its base of 

 lime, seizes the carbonate of lime, and extricates 

 the carbonic acid, which is thence ^vec to enter the 



