ESSEX SOCIETY. 117 



experience, to say nothing of the easy access to our well con- 

 ducted agricultural journals, which keep up with every new 

 improvement in all departments of husbandry. If we have 

 succeeded in throwing some light and interest over the history 

 of this valuable grain, our aims are accomplished. 



In conclusion, we would say, that if America has furnished 

 the Old World with maize, the potato, tobacco, cocoa, vanilla, 

 and other plants useful to man, she is herself, indebted to the 

 Eastern continent for wheat, barley, oats and rice, for the coffee 

 plant, now one of her staple products, for oranges, lemons, 

 peaches, and many other plants, which now grow in great lux- 

 uriance, both in the tropics and in our temperate climates. 

 These plants, Europe had been receiving for more than twenty 

 centuries, from the Greeks and Romans, and from the nations of 

 the East, till they had accumulated in rich profusion upon her 

 Western shores. Now, many of them, together with many of 

 our own, are borne on to the islands of the South Sea, still 

 further West, whither the restless march of civilization is tend- 

 ing. The natural gifts of one country to another, facilitated 

 by commerce and the arts, are fast binding together the remot- 

 est corners of the globe. Let the full tide of civilization roll 

 on! Let commerce bear to every land, and to every island in 

 the sea, products which shall humanize mankind, and increase 

 the aggregate of comfort and happiness ! These are the fruits 

 of peace ! 



An Essay on the Cultivation of Indian Corn. 



By William R. Putnam. 



The cultivation of Indian corn is one of the most important 

 labors of the farmer. Accustomed to it from our youth, it is 

 not easy to discriminate what is necessary to be done. It will 

 be my purpose, to notice such incidents in the culture of this 

 plant, as have seemed to me most worthy of attention. My 

 ideas have been gathered in the field, and not in the closet. If 

 they are found rude and unpolished, my engagements, from 

 "early morn to latest eve," must be my apology. 



