No. 4.] EXHAUSTED FARMS. 383 



THE EESTOEATION OF EXHAUSTED FAEMS BY PEAG- 

 TICAL METHODS. 



BY ELBRIDGE CDSHMAN OF LAKEVILLE. 



What is an exhausted farm? This, like many another, is 

 a question more easily a^ked than satisfactorily answered. 

 If we were to question a number of practical men, we should 

 expect a wide range of answers. Some would picture con- 

 tinued robbery, where the rich treasures of the soil had been 

 carried away by annual croppings without an adequate return 

 of i)lant food ; while others might cite instances of neglect 

 and careless husbandry, where nature was o'ershadowing the 

 bounds of cultivation and again asserting her right to supreme 

 control. Still others might point to localities naturally poor. 

 Such spots are found almost everywhere, and, like the unfor- 

 tunate of our race, are always with us. Early history teaches 

 us that even before the Anglo-Saxon possessed these shores, 

 the " red man," in the cultivation of his patches of " Indian 

 corn," had found it for his advantage to draw upon the rivers 

 and the ocean for fertilizing material. But it is our purpose 

 in this connection to speak more particularly of those farms 

 that have known better days, the " old homesteads," where, 

 •within the memory of those now living, peace, plenty and 

 good cheer did abound. 



It h{\s been the writer's lot to own and cultivate four dif- 

 ferent farms, many of the fields upon either of which might 

 properly be termed exhausted lands. Former generations 

 had successively cropped them with special crops, without 

 regard to rotation or fertilization, until they had ceased to 

 yield remunerative returns. It has been our life work to 

 restore these fields and farms to something of their former 

 fertility and productiveness. From our standpoint the work 



