38 CHRONICLES OF A CLAY FARM. 



said to steam, water, and machinery, "do this," 

 and they do it, but has never known what it is 

 to try and guide out of the old track, a mind 

 that has run in the same rut "this forty year and 

 more." * 



* Perhaps the most disheartening obstacle the real im- 

 prover of lands has to encounter in all his movements, is the 

 obstinate prejudice and ignorance of his laborers, a speci- 

 men of which is so well narrated in this chapter. In fact, 

 no one should presume to undertake a work of this kind, 

 unless he have his mind thoroughly made up to override 

 every petty impediment that may oppose him, however 

 annoying they may be. His only course must bo to lay 

 out his plan of operation intelligibly, and persevere to 

 the end, regardless of the clamor of either prejudice or 

 ignorance. 



The "tile drain" is here adopted by our author. This 

 mode of underdraining has been introduced into the United 

 States, within a few years past, from England, as the most 

 durable and efficient of all other modes, excepting the open 

 drain, where the latter becomes necessary to carry off larger 

 bodies of water than the tilo will admit. For the better 

 illustration of the subject of draining, at large, with which 

 the reader may not be familiar, (the author of our volume 

 supposing his readers already so,) wo annex to the book two 

 prize essays of the New York State Agricultural Society on 

 that subject, together with cuts of the necessary tools to 

 perform the labor of ditching for the tiles, and examples 



