64 ESSEX SOCIETY. 



Value of tops, 



One half of manure to land, . 



Deduct expense, 



Net profit, . . . . 1 161 80 



Danvers, Nov., 1849. 



Danvers, Oct. 30, 1849. 



Dear Sir, — I am pleased to learn that yon will prepare a 

 Report on the Cultivation of Roots, notwithstanding our culti- 

 vators have failed to forward statements of their crops the pres- 

 ent season. It seems to me qnite as important to take notice 

 of the failure of crops, and to trace the causes thereof, as their 

 success. I will state, briefly, such facts as have come to my 

 knowledge, from intercourse with the cultivators of this neigh- 

 borhood, to be used at your discretion. 



1st. As to the Onion crop. — In this there has been a failure. 

 Not more than half the usual quantity raised to the acre, upon 

 an average. The cause of this failure is thought to have been, 

 not so much the drought, as the extreme warmth, in the early 

 part of the season. Shortly after the warm days referred to, 

 the onions began to falter, and in many places became lousy, 

 j or covered with a small light-colored insect, that stints and im- 

 ' pedes the growth of the plant ; some fields were entirely des- 

 troyed in this way. This happened quite as extensively among 

 the most careful cultivators as others. More on ground long 

 appropriated to the onions, than new land. Some fields suf- 

 fered from the drought, where the ploughing had been shallow 

 for several successive years ; — but, generally, the failure in the 

 crop is supposed to have been occasioned by the cause first 

 mentioned. Very few have obtained more than three hundred 

 bushels to the acre, where they expected four or jive hundred ; 

 generally the crop has been less than two hundred bushels to 

 the acre. Taking into view that three hundred acres, at least, 

 of our best lands, the present season, were appropriated to the 



