FARMERS' REGISTER 



733 



which will nearly balance the litter bestowed on 

 the land by wheat. Not only ihecjnantiiy oCthe 

 vegetable matter produced by corn, is Car ^renter 

 thrui the qiiaHlily pioduced by wheat, but the 

 quality is belter, and the risk ol' loss from evapo- 

 ration les?. The straw ol' wheat after it is ripen- 

 ing or ripe, standing or lying out on the ground, 

 is vastly diminished in weight by moisture, and in- 

 jured after it is cut, even by dews. I thinU I have 

 known it thus lose two tliirda of its weight. Amonc 

 the several kinds of litter furnished by corn, the 

 shucks and cobs lose nothing of their value by eva- 

 poration ; the rind of the stalks seems intended by 

 nature to resist if, that the farmer may have time lo 

 save them both as Ibod and litter; from the same 

 rind the top derives some securitj', and the fodder 

 is only exposed to it as grass is in bemg made in- 

 to hay. But the quality of every part of the corn 

 offal is better as manure than the wheat offai. 

 The cob is said to be a valuable Ibod, reduced to 

 meal ; if so it probably contains an oil. The stalk 

 abounds in salts lar beyond wheat straw. The 

 tops and blades, cured green, save from evapora- 

 tion salts lost by straw. And even shucks, being 

 more nutritious as Ibod, must be allowed some de- 

 gree of richness beyond the straw. The whole ol 

 the corn offal is better lood than wheat straw, 

 but its blades and lops are so greatly superior, 

 that cattle prefer them to hay, and will fatten 

 on them as well. The corn oifal can iherelbre 

 maintain a fat herd, furnishing abundantly that 

 which (brms a compound with vegetable matter, 

 of the richest consistence. To this object the 

 etraw is incompetent. 



Let us now compare corn and wheat as farina- 

 ceous food only. Corn, in a proper climate (or it, 

 produces moie farinaceous matter than wheat to 

 the acre, from the richest down to the poorest 

 soil ; and hence also results a greater return to the 

 earth. The highest product of corn I have, heard 

 of in the United States is 125 bushels to the acre, 

 of wheat 60, a difference somewhat diminished by 

 the difference of weight. Fifty bushels of corn to 

 the acre are almost invariably produced by land 

 v/ell manured and well cultivated, whereas even 

 half that crop of wheat is extremely rare. And 

 in districts where the average crop of wheat is 

 five, that o( corn is usually about fifteen bushels 

 an acre. Besides, corn, both growing and gather- 

 ed, is less liable to mislortunes than v/hea^. 



Indian corn may be correctly called meal, mea- 

 dow and manure. To its right to the fust title, 

 almost every tongue in the larirest portion of the 

 United Stales can testily ; to the second, an ex- 

 clusive reliance on it (or fodder or hay, in a great 

 district of country during two centuries, gives 

 conclusive evidence ; but the riieliil countenance 

 of this same district, either disproves its claim 

 to the third, or disallows any pretension of the in- 

 Jiabitants to industry or agricultural knowledge. 



In Europe no husbandman expects a tolerable 

 crop of any kind, except the land has been well 

 manured within seven years at most; here we 

 have obtained for two centuries from Indian corn, 

 bread, meat, and fodder, without giving it, gene- 

 rally speaking, a dust of manure, or allowing any 

 rest to the land which produces it. Is there any 

 country in Europe able to bear this draft for such 

 a period, without exhibiting the cadaverous as- 

 pect of the corn district of the United Stales 1 



But not content with bestowing on other crops 

 Vol. yin.-93 



the meager modicum of manure, which happened 

 to lie unavoidably in the wav of ignorance, whilst 

 the maintenance of every thing was required of 

 corn, without allowing it any, we have suffered 

 the manure provided by corn itself to waste and 

 perish ; and having both withheld from it Ibreign 

 aids, and transferred to other plants the small por- 

 tion of Its own resources for manure, which acci- 

 dent may have saved, and permitted the residue 

 to be lost, we charge it with being an exhausting 

 and killing crop. 



Such is the cxprimental process hitherto pur- 

 sued, but it must be reversed, before the question 

 can be tolerably understood or fairly determined. 

 It will be reversed by converting every dust of its 

 offal into manure, and manuring highly for corn. 

 With good cultivation, an acre of well manured 

 land seldom produces less than fifty bushels. 

 This crop furnishes also other food equivalent lo a 

 tolerable crop of hay, and such an abundance of 

 means lor raising manure, that I have no doubt if 

 properly applied, it would be a resource for our 

 even shortening the English manuring rotation, 

 which embraces the whole Ih'-m every seven 

 years at most. Hence I conclude that corn, be- 

 sides being the most productive of any farinaceous 

 crop, is also the least impoverishing, and even an 

 improving crop aided by inclosing. 



The brevity I have prescribed to m3'se!f, inducer 

 me to pass over several inlerior superiorities of 

 Indian corn, and to conclude its encomium with 

 one of peculiar value. As a fallow crop, it is un- 

 rivalled, \i', as fallow crops ought constantly to do, 

 it receives the manure. Arthur Young proves 

 ihe vast superiority of a fallow crop over a naked 

 lallow in England, where a crop greatly inlerior 

 to corn in value, is necessarily used. Thi^ is usu- 

 ally peas or beans. It is less productive, less va- 

 luable as bread siufT', less fraught with Ibdder, al- 

 most wholly destitute of litler lor raising manure, 

 more precarious, mere liable to disaster after it is 

 gathered, more chargeable in point of seed, and 

 requires more skill, trouble and expense in its cul- 

 tivation. Under all these disadvantages, a fallow 

 crop in England is prelerable to a naked fallow. 

 Under all the advantages of using corn as such, 

 it becomes a brilliant object in America, if attend- 

 ed with a complete manuring, as fallow crops in 

 England invariably are. In that case, fifty bush- 

 els of corn and thirty of wheat may be expected 

 from good culture. No value is produced in Eng- 

 land by the fallow crop and the fallowing wheat, 

 equal to eighty bushels of bread irrain. But credit 

 to corn the savings and additional produce arising 

 from Ihe above enumerated considerations, and it 

 certainly promises to the American fiirmer, far 

 greater benefits Iromagood system o( husbandry, 

 ihan any crop wiihin Ihe reach of an English 

 farmer. 



The plant which contributes in the greatest de- 

 gree to national subsistence, best deserves the pa- 

 tronage of skill and industry ; and yet Ihe cultiva- 

 tion of maize rem.ains as it was borrowed from the 

 aboriginal farmers of America, except, that if 

 product i? the test of science, they must be al- 

 lowed to have been more accomplished husband- 

 men than their imitators. As the Indians cer- 

 tainly made better crops to the acre, and preserved 

 the earth in better heart, than we do, we may at 

 least hope to accomplish a degree of perfection, 

 which from their success we know to be attainable, 



