530 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



[No. 9 



ence of soils, would be to commit a great error, 

 and to condemn the system of cropping in the eyes 

 of those agriculturists, who are too little enlight- 

 ened to think of introducing into their grounds the 

 requisite changes. 



Clover and sainfoin are placed amongst the ve- 

 getables that ought to enter into the system of 

 cropping, but these plants require a deep and not 

 too compact soil, in order that their roots may fix 

 themselves firmly. 



Flax, hemp, and corn require a good soil, and 

 can be admitted as a crop only upon those lands that 

 are fertile, and well prepared. 



Light and dry soils cannot bear the same kind 

 of crop as those that are compact and moist. 



Each kind of soil, then, requires a particular 

 system of crops, and each farmer ought to estab- 

 lish his own upon a perfect knowledge of the 

 character and properties of the land he culti- 

 vates. 



As in each locality the soil presents shades of 

 difference, more or less marked, according to the 

 exposure, composition, depth of the soil &c, the 

 proprietor ought so to vary his crops, as to give to 

 each portion of the land the plants for which it is 

 best adapted; and thus establish a particular rota- 

 tion of crops upon the several divisions of his es- 

 tate. 



The wants of the neighborhood, the facility 

 with which the products may be disposed of, and 

 the comparative value of the various kinds of 

 crops, should all be taken into the calculation 

 of the farmer, in forming his plan of proceedings. 

 There is another point in regard to crops that 

 ought to be well weighed by the farmer; though 

 his lands may be suited to cultivation of a particu- 

 lar kind, his interests may not allow him to enter 

 upon it. The more abundant any article is, the 

 lower will be its price; he ought then to prefer 

 those crops of which the sale is most secure. If a 

 product cannot be consumed upon the spot, it is 

 necessary to calculate the expense of transport- 

 ing it to a place of sale in countries where it is 

 needed. 



A proprietor ought to provide largely for the 

 wants of his animals and of the men living upon 

 his estate, before arranging for the disposal of sur- 

 plus crops; he will then calculate his various har- 

 vests in such a manner, as to be always secure of 

 receiving from the earth the means of subsistence 

 ibr those employed in performing the labor. 



An intelligent farmer, whose lands lie at a dis- 

 tance from a market, will endeavor to avoid the 

 expenses incident to the transportation of his pro- 

 ducts; and in order to do this, he will give the pre- 

 ference to those harvests of fodder or of roots 

 which may be consumed upon the place by his de- 

 pendants and his animals. 



There is another circumstance which must be 

 attended to in sowing those lands which are light, 

 or which lie upon a slope; for these it. is necessary 

 to employ snch vegetables as cover the soil with 

 their numerous leaves, and unite it in every direc- 

 tion by their roots, thus preserving it from being 

 washed away by rains, and at the same time pro- 

 tecting it from being too much dried by the burn- 

 ing raya of the sun. 



DECREASE OF THE BLACK POPULATION IN 

 THE "FREE STATES." 



A late No. of the Journal of Commerce states, as 

 "a curious and instructive fact, that while the colored 

 population in the slave states increases with astonish- 

 ing rapidity, in the free states it increases scarcely at 

 all. The increase in Providence during the last five 

 years is oidy 10, and in this city [NewYork] only 

 1019, which we presume is less than the amount of 

 immigration from the south during the same period. 

 In Dutchess County there is a decrease of colored po- 

 pulation since 1830 to the number of 417; or one 6th of 

 the whole." 



The fact that the emancipated negro race in this 

 country has either decreased in numbers, or increased 

 very slowly compared to the slaves, may well be "in- 

 structive" — but it is not at all strange. It accords 

 precisely with the laws of population applied to the 

 general habits and circumstances of the negro family. 

 Still, however striking may be the facts cited, they do 

 not present a fair example of the operation of these 

 laws. Where a few free negroes only are found, as is 

 now the case in both the northern and southern states, 

 they may subsist, and even increase, as paupers or 

 pilferers, at the expense of the far more numerous in- 

 dustrious, or wealthy part of the community — just as 

 as fragments of the gypsey tribe have lived in Eu- 

 rope. But if half the population of the north consist- 

 ed of free negroes, or if all the slaves in the south 

 were at once made free, and forced to subsist on the 

 fruits of their own labor, the rate of decrease would 

 be far greater. These anticipated results were stated 

 in a passage in the earliest number of this journal, 

 which will be copied here, as being even more appro- 

 priate to this juncture, than when first presented. 



"Undoutedly the condition of a slave is deplorable, 

 and it must ever be afflicting that such a state should 

 exist, and be extended so widely over the globe, as to 

 seem to be the inevitable lot of a large portion of 

 mankind. But in our benevolent zeal for the removal 

 of slavery, we should not forget that there are afflic- 

 tions, numerous, wide-spread, and unavoidable, in the 

 most refined and advanced state of society, that are 

 even more intolerable than the slave's toil, stimulated 

 by the slave-owner's lash. The substance, though not 

 the name of slavery, is to be found almost every where 

 in this miserable world — and the few favored spots now 

 free from such causes of human suffering, must in 

 their turn be visited with like inflictions. Except in 

 • newly settled countries, or in others having as yet a 

 sparse population, and plentiful means of subsistence, 

 and a free goverment withal, the laboring poor are 

 slaves in fact, either to individuals, to government, or 

 to their own craving and never satisfied necessities. 

 The negro slaves of Virginia present striking exam- 

 ples of the first kind — the people of Egypt, and eman- 

 cipated Hayti, of the second — and the entire laboring 

 population of free and philanthopic England, of the 

 third. Of these three kinds, personal slavery, as exis- 

 ting in Virginia, is the most injurious, or the least 

 profitable, to the masters, and attended with the least 

 unhappiness (so far as mere animal comforts are 

 considered) to the slaves; and where hunger is 

 the only task-master, its victims are the most mise- 

 rable of slaves, and yet compelled to yield the greatest 

 possible nett amount, by their labor, and abstinence 

 from enjoyment. If a rich English manfacturer, or 

 land-holder, was offered all the laborers in his employ- 

 ment, with their wives and children, and all their pos- 

 terity, to be held precisely as the negro slaves are 



