178 WORCESTER SOCIETY. 



work, that I was encouraged to take up, adjoining it, in the 

 following autumn, nine and a half acres, after having bogged 

 and carted off two hundred loads for manure. About one third 

 of this latter, however, was not ploughed, until the spring fol- 

 lowing. The Avhole fourteen acres were made as smooth as a 

 garden. 



The four and a half acres, first ploughed, was mostly sowed 

 Avith buckwheat, about the 1.5th of June, remainder planted 

 with potatoes. For the latter I used about twenty loads of 

 green stable manure to the acre, spread and harrowed in. 1 

 had a very large crop of both. The nine and a half acres 

 were sowed the following season, with buckwheat, and yield- 

 ed two hundred and twenty bushels in all, there being a great 

 growth of straw. Now, in order to make up, if I could, for the 

 impoverishing nature of buckwheat, I provided myself with a 

 large quantity of manure, and planted the following spring, 

 with corn and potatoes, and such was the nature of a great por- 

 tion of the soil, being of excellent quality, that the effects of 

 the buckwheat crop would not have been particularly noticed, 

 except for those less favored portions, where only a part was 

 sowed with buckwheat. Here a very marked difference was 

 perceptible, which continues to be visible to the present day. 



On this land, I tried a number of experiments. On a part of it 

 I spread manure. 25 loads to the acre, and harrowed in and plant- 

 ed, having no manure iu the hill, in a manner that the seed should 

 not be below the level of the land. On another part, I used the 

 same quantity of manure to the acre, spreading fifteen loads, and 

 putting the remainder in the hill. In another portion, I used 

 the same quantity, putting all in the hill. The result was, that 

 the corn on the first portion, turned out better than on either of 

 the two lattei-, though it was not quite as early, and not so great 

 a growth of stalks. Oi] the second portion, I had less corn than 

 on the first, but greater stalks and earlier, so that there was less 

 soft corn. On the third, I had a very heavy growth of stalks 

 and it was earlier than the first, but the corn did not fill out as 

 well as on either of the two first, and was less in quantity. But, 

 subsequently, in the crops of oats and barley which followed, and 

 the grass crops up to this time, there was and is, a plain differ- 



