604 



THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



have to be resorted to; but on hill-sides, or in 

 crossing the ordinary 10 or 11 leet bed, I ibund no 

 difficulty. 



Upon tlie whole 1 think the a£rriciiliural public 

 greatly indebted to Mr. JM(;Corinick Ibr tiie talent 

 and perseverance he has displayed in originating 

 and perlecting the Virginia reaper,, as in a lew 

 years I am satisfied it will, wherever circum- 

 stances admit, entirely supersede the cradle, and 

 farmers will wonder how they could have gotten 

 on before its invention. As It has not appeared in 

 the Farmer's Register, I will first a[)pend a certifi- 

 cate I gave the elder Mr. MiCormick, when he 

 left my house, (who remarked at the time, that 

 unless I was perlecily satisfied that the reaper had 

 come up to the advertisement, he did not wish to 

 be paid for them.) 



'' Certificate.— I have had three of Mr. C. H. 

 McCormick's reapers at work this harvest, under 

 my immediate obeervation ; one on the larm on 

 which 1 reside, and two others on farms under 

 my management, and take pleasure in stating 

 that the operation ol' all has been i'uily eriual to 

 my expectations, and indeed rather exceeded it, 

 as indeed that ol a I others who witnessed the ope- 

 ralion of the machine. Mr, McCormick's adver- 

 tisement is fully sustained. It will certainly cut 

 from 15 to 20 acres per day, if well attended to, 

 and leave not a str.ivv that can be brought in con- 

 tact with the cutter. It has been worked this 

 harvest under every disadvantage which it was 

 possible almost to b ing to bear against it, in con- 

 sequence of the unpreiedenled wet weather we 

 have had. It will cut any wheat that it is not too 

 low for the reel and teeth to reach. It does not 

 appear to me to be as liable to get out of order as 

 a common cradle, and I should think it would be 

 very durable. The reaper has cut all descrijdions 

 of wheat — green, ripe, rusted as bidly as wheat 

 could have it, lying and standing ; and I have 

 no hesitation in saying, that I believe ii one of the 

 most important ngricullura! improvements of the 

 day; and, I think, that every larmer ctitting fifty 

 acres of decent wheat, would find it to his advan- 

 tage to have one. No weather has prevented the 

 reaper from working, except when the ground 

 was 60 soft as to mire the wheels." 



1 am, respectfully, yourSj 



CoRBi\ -Braxton. 

 June 28 iA, 1842. 



EDITORIAL NOTICES TO SUBSCRIBERS. 



The undersigned has the gratification of an- 

 nouncing to the friends and supporters of the 

 Farmers' Register, that the property in and 

 direction of that publication wiil be transferred, at 

 the close of this year and of the current volume, 

 to Thomas S. Pleasants, who will thereafter be 

 the editor and publisher. To those persons who 

 know this gentleman intimately, any recommen- 

 datioD would be superfluous. To others, and to 

 the agricultural public in general, the undersigned 

 begs leave to say, that Mr. Pleasants is well qua- 



lified, by the acquisition of general and varied in- 

 formation, and by extensive reading i-nd sufficient 

 practical experience in agriculture, and also as an 

 excellent writer, to conduct an agricultural perio- 

 dical of a high grade of character. The under- 

 signed trusts that his present subscribers and the 

 li'iends of the work will continue their support to 

 the Farmers" R»>gister under the editorial charge 

 of his successor; whose abiliiies are likely to be 

 as useful in discharge of that duiy, and his edito- 

 rial services and efforts more acceptable to the 

 public in general, than have been those by which 

 the publication has been recently corHJucted. 



Edmund Ruffin, 

 Editor of Farmers' Register. 

 Petersburg, Va., Nov. 7, 1842. 



The much larger portion of all the remainder 

 of this volume, even with an extension of the 

 number of extra pages allowed Ibr the new edi- 

 tion of the ' Essay on Calcareous Manures,' will 

 necessarily be taken up by that publication; all 

 the essential portion of which will thus be given 

 in (or as a supplement to) the current volume of 

 the Farmers' Register. Sliould some other sheets 

 of the Appendix to the Essay, of connected but 

 not essential matters, be still excluded from this 

 volume, they will be printed afterwards, and for- 

 warded wiihout charge to all the present and con- 

 tinuing subscribers who shall have paid their pre- 

 sent dues betbre the close of this year. 



The necessity for thus giving up so much ofthe 

 remainder of the Farmers' Register to the 'Es- 

 say' wiil not cause the lessening of the usual 

 amount of new and original matter; of which, as 

 it will be seen, the portion of that work which 

 accompanies this number, principally consists ; 

 and of such matter as, it is hoped, will not be un- 

 acceptable to its readers. This arrangement how- 

 ever will necessarily cause the postponing to the 

 beginning of the next volume of the Farmers' 

 Register, sundry communication?, and especially 

 those of greatest length, which it would be very 

 gratifying to the editor to usher himself to the 

 public. However, this necessary delay of these 

 snd ol any subsequent communications will ena- 

 ble his successor to commence his editorial career 

 with more eclat, as well as with more of usefulness 

 and gratification to the supporters of his labors. 



Of those indebted subscribers who may see this 

 notice, and whose payments are in arrear merely 

 because of iDattention, it is earnestly requested 



