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NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



For the New England Farmer. 

 HINTS FOR FARMERS. 



BY M. C. SAWYER. 



I notice, with pleasure, that the "New England 

 Farmer, with its frank agricultural countenance, 

 now finds its way among our hills, to instruct and 

 entertain the farmer and throw an additional charm 

 around his cottage home, these long winter even- 

 ings. And through its columns I wish to say a 

 few words on a subject of vital importance. 



The fashion, or fever, long prevalent, of cutting 

 down all trees, not bearing fruit, is decidedly 

 reprehensible. Even shade-trees, in pasture lands, 

 are sacrificed to this gormandizing policy. 



Look at the naked acres of New Hampshire, as 

 bare as a desert, yielding a small per cent, of grass ! 

 Here, large farms have depreciated in value, in pro- 

 portion as they have been shorn of rural beauty. 

 If, by stealth, or what he calls poor husbandry, 

 the bushes get a start, on some side hill, the bush 

 scythe is soon in motion, and the ground burnt 

 over, to obtain a meagre crop of rye ! This is a 

 bad practice, and radically wrong. These bushes, 

 left undisturbed, in a few years, would have been 

 trees, and the necessary tillage land not at all 

 diminished. Within thirty years, I have known 

 thousands of acres of woodland "cleared" and the 

 wood burnt on the ground, under the mistaken 

 idea that cleared land was the more valuable ; and 

 that hemlock trees were worthless, saving the 

 small value of "Baric," for tanning purposes. Not 

 a vestige now remains, where once stood the prim 

 itive Pine, with its cotemporary, the Oak. That 

 ancient race has become extinct — no germ of theirs 

 succeeding ! 



I observe that people not only go to the city for 

 flour, but also to purchase "clear stuff" for modern 

 dwellings ; and will at no distant day, if this ex- 

 terminating policy is continued, have to go there 

 for then- fuel. 



"O, woodman, spare that tree !" 



Seedlings and sprouts, if properly secured from 

 the ravages of cattle, with a little care in pruning 

 and manuring if need be, will in a few years b 

 come sturdy saplings, and noble trees for the next 

 generation. Here are farms, now well wooded 

 with "second growth," that would be of little 

 value if the wood was all cut off. . • 



One cause of those vegetable diseases which 

 scathe the farmer's crops, and sweep over his un 

 protected fields, is the want of a proper atmos 

 pheric balance which the woodlands formerly held 

 over the preponderating gases. These gases, now 

 set free, settle in low places, where the wind 

 wliirls not, and miasm, deadly with mildew and 

 disease, is evolved, to the great damage of grains, 

 and esculent roots. And those myriads of insects, 

 that formerly seldom left the forest, but thus lived 

 fecundated and swarmed, now resort to orchards 

 fruit trees and fields of cereal grain, for that pur 

 pose ; hence their apparent increase. 



Farmers should learn the value of the sub-soil 

 plow, and reclaim their worn-out lands — cultivate 

 less surface, but more depth, and get larger crops 

 They should improve their meadows, and leave 

 their surplus acres to become wooded, making an 

 investment in "Rural Stocks," for the good of pos- 

 terity. M . c. S. 



Bristol, Dec. 22, 1851. 



Remarks.— We thank our obliging correspond- 



ent for his complimentary words ; that is just what 

 we are striving to do ; to give the Farmer an in- 

 teresting "agricultural countenance," considering, 

 when Ave have accomplished this, that one great 

 point is gained towards sending it into some thou- 

 sands of families where it is now a stranger. And 

 strange as it may seem to those not so immediately 

 interested as ourselves, it is our settled conviction 

 that it would really "instruct and entertain the 

 farmer, and throw an additional charm around his 

 cottage home." We commend the hints of the 

 writer to every one who loves a tree, whether they 

 own it or not. Patience almost ceases to be a vir- 

 tue, with the Vandal spirit that robs the earth of 

 its beauty and its conservators of health. On our 

 way to the State Fan* at Manchester last Septem- 

 ber, we passed over a tract of country which a few 

 years since was densely covered with a fine forest. 

 Noble old oaks, and pines and hemlocks, stood 

 there, representatives of other generations, and 

 stretching forth their arms as a welcome shelter to 

 the traveller from the burning sun or beating 

 storm. Their blackened trunks were prostrate on 

 the earth ; not one was left to catch the passing 

 breeze, and sing the requiem of its murdered fel- 

 lows ; bleak and smouldering desolation presided 

 over the late beautiful scene that a Druid might 

 envy, and the cottages, stuck upon the hill-side, 

 and seething in the broiling noonday sun, looked 

 like the homes of Despair. It would not be an 

 uncommon case to find these same persons earnest- 

 ly at work next spring in digging out the stumps of 

 the trees lately cut down, and transplanting a few 

 sickly shoots for ornament and shade about their 

 dwellings ! What untamed spirit is it, in man's 

 bosom, that impels him to this desecration of the 

 useful and beautiful ; cutting, as it were, a path- 

 way for the storm-spirit to rage through unmolest- 

 ed, and and an opening for August suns to smite 

 the heads of his unoffending wife and children ! 



For the New England Farmer. 

 THE WHEAT CROP. 



BY II. POOR. 



Mr. Editor : — It is indeed gratifying to see so 

 deep an interest manifested in growing wheat. In 

 some of the counties in Maine, they have raised suf- 

 ficient for then' own bread. In Massachusetts, 

 Vermont and New Hampshire, the farmers are get- 

 ting their eyes open to the subject. Is it not time ? 

 The past year, and the previous, have wrought 

 wonders in this comparatively new branch of farm- 

 ing. Do we need more proof? We would flatly 

 and unqualifiedly say no, and listen to the voice of 

 experience rather than to newspaper editorials that 

 would make a bugbear of a world, or smut or rust 

 the dread avengers of all coming time. We would 

 say to all, "thank God and take courage." 



Every farmer knows well the cost of a barrel of 

 flour, and some of them know, that the last pig, 

 the last calf, the last load of hay, must be parted 

 with to buy flour to feed his hungry little ones 



