^l)t iTarmer's iUcniijli) llisitor. 



try neRrly on h level with t!ie cretks iuul bays is 

 iiiideiluid with rich tmuls, mul ihct-e with otlier 

 marine manures, wherever aflvmitage is taken of 

 them, greatly contribute to ilie increase of crops 

 and to rise in llio Value of the hinds, 



Virginia does not want for piihlic spirited men 

 wlio are ardent in the cause of agricultural im- 

 provement. Twenty-five years ago the county 

 of Alliemarle had its Agricultmal Society over 

 which James Aladison, jate President of the Uni- 

 ted States, for several years presided : we fe- 

 incmher to have read his agricultnra! addresses 

 Ht that time. The same society for several years 

 Bt'terwnrds had for its distinguished head, Gov. 

 Barhour, who was Secretary of War under Mr. 

 Adams. It has now for its President Hon. Wil- 

 liam C. Rives, late minister of the United States 

 to France, appointed by Gen. Jackson, and now 

 /"or the second time a distinguished Senator in 

 Congress. Mr. Rives has a most magnificent 

 /arm in the county of Albemarle. This County 

 lies south from Washington in that beautifully 

 ^fertile range of counties along the foot of the 

 Blue Ridge: his farm consists of several thou- 

 sand acres, and is of itself a large fortune. He 

 represents the soil of his county as far better 

 than that of Fairfax; and from his description 

 ns well as that of other gentlemen intimate with 

 that part of the Old Dominion, we are free to 

 recommend it as a most desirable position for 

 free and independent gentlemen of the North 

 who wish to emigrate to a milder climate neaHy 

 equal to our own in all the elements of long life, 

 There is one difference between Virginia and 

 most of the Southern Slates and the States of 

 New England : they have very few or none of 

 our fine roads intersecting all parts of the coun- 

 try over which the traveller jiasses, and produce 

 is transjiorted with equal ease both sumujer and 

 winter. For several months in winter the Vir- 

 ginia roads are tllmosl impassable — they are nev- 

 er worked like the roads at the North: a bridge 

 or a causeway once washed away is seldom re- 

 paired — a pathway or carriage track once cut 

 down so deep as to be dangerous, the successive 

 travellers seek new means of passing by turning 



must bring this fiirin or plantatixi'n to a high state 

 of cultivation. 



FLEMISH AND IRISH HDSBANDtty AND MANUKAC- 

 TURKS. 



There is iro part of the world where the culti- 

 vation of the ground is pursued with so much 

 diligence and success as by the Flemings in the 

 Kingdom of Belgium. It was the Flemings who 

 first introduced improved agricultiue and manii- 

 fiictm-es into the island of iOreat Biilain. With 

 a soil not naturally propitious to agriculture, that 

 country is made to yield the greatest production. 

 For this jmrpose every species of manure is 

 gathered and preserveih The Flemings make 

 use of liquid manure preserved in tp.nk.«, am! thi.= 

 liquid, dropped over the ground and rej^eated 

 during the progress of vegetation, stimulates ton 

 rapid and lu.xiuiant growth. 



In a conversation with Mr. Serruys, the minis- 

 ter of Belgium to the United States" we gathered 

 the information, that barley and hops were ex- 

 tensively grown in Belgitun, and that iieer from 

 these was an article much in use and of consid- 

 erable trafSc, and that rye upon the lightest soil 

 was much raised and used for bread stuff. 



But the cultivation to which the Flemings give 

 their greatest care and attention is the rearing of 

 flax, in the manufacture of which the inhabitants 

 had attained to the highest degree of excellence. 

 The stimulating liquid manures were of much 

 value in tho growth of flax: the cleanliness of 

 tilth, the perfect freedom from weeds, which the 

 neat husbandry of the country secures, was well 

 adapted to the flax husbandry. Mr. Serrnys cal- 

 culates that one thiriy-sixtb jiart of the whole 

 country is each year covered with a growth of 

 flax, in which as cajefid cultiv.-.iion and as mi- 

 nute labor as that of American gardens is be- 

 stowed. This cultivation of flax o[ipns to that 

 country the manufacture of fine linens, in the 

 export of which the country gains great wealth. 

 The cultivation of flax in the north of Ireland, 

 from which, as well as from Belgium, fine linens 

 are exported, has contributed much to the wealth 

 of that country. The city of Belfast, which is 



and it was then said that the seed of that field 

 would pay all the expenses of cultivation. Why 

 may not ficix beconie as profitable at the north aa 

 cotton at the south? and what forbids the manu- 

 fiicture of fine linens by machinery at Lowell, 

 Manchester and other places where cotton and 

 woollen goods are (irodnced ? 



nto the adjacent fields and woods. All the re- 1 the great empoVium for linens, in 1821 contained 

 pairs of the trodden path seem to come from the but 37,000 inhabitants: in 1831, it had risen to 

 cutting of new ruts and filling the old ones to | 53,000 ; and in J841 it contained nearly 70,000, 



be used wheti tho standing water in them shall 

 be soaked away. 



Northern neck, a tongue of luud between the 

 Potomac and Rappahannock rivers, was the res- 

 idence of the celubiated John Taylor of Caroline, 

 who was both u statesman and a farmer, and 

 whose valuable essays of Arator, published more 

 than forty years ago in successive newspapers, 

 and since republished in a volume of several 

 editions, form in themselves n sy.steni for the 

 farmer of the middle States. Hon. John Tal- 

 iafferro, who first came into Congress in the year 

 1801, and who since that period has been more 

 than half tlie time a member, resides in that part 

 of the State. His occupation has always l)ceii 

 that of a planter and farmer, and he still'delighis 

 in that occupation because he has been emiiviut- 

 ly successful. He says the civil law ought to he 

 made so as to deprive any nian of his land who 

 sliall abuse it, and that the man should be as much 

 punished for maltreating the soil as for maltreat- 

 ing the beings made from mother earth. 



Since his accession to office. President Tyler 

 has purchased a beautifid farm of POO acres in 

 Charles City Comity, on James river, about thirty 

 miles below Richmond, which he intends to make 

 his place of quiet retreat wlien retiring from his 

 present position: tor this farm he paid the .=ium 

 of twelve thousand dollars— some of it is river 

 alluvion, and all of it naturally very rich land. — 

 It is of that ground more or le.<!S liable in the fall 

 to bilious and autumnal fevers, although tho an- 

 nual mortality to those raised upon it does not 

 perhaps exceed that upon the higher grounds 

 deemed more healthy. The labor upon the Pres- 

 ident's farm is done by seventeen colored persons: 

 one old man tends a grist mill upon it which 

 gives three anil a half bushels of grain as toll 



having almost doubled in twenty years. The 

 linen manufacture and the linen trade are the 

 life and soul of Belfast — it is ex]iortcd to Lomlon, 

 to Spain, to the United States of America, to 

 British America and lately to China. 



A German traveller in Ireland in 1840 says, "a 

 great deal of the Belfast linen is still woven on 

 hand looms in the cottages of the peasantry, but 

 power loom weaving, or that of machinery, is 

 more and more trenching upon their domains. 

 The melancholy struggle between the hand loom 

 and the power loom, which in England has al- 

 ready terminated in favor of the hitter, is slill 

 going on at Belfast. The spinning of flax by 

 machinery was long a difficult proiilem to the 

 inventive beads of English mechanics. The 

 process was niuch more difficult than that of 

 wool or cotton siiluning, because the flax con- 

 sisted of a number of long single smooth fibres, 

 which were not so easily spun into nsuablo ma- 

 terials as the shorter and more comiccted tlueads 

 of cotton anil wool. At length it was proi)osed 

 to pass the flax through warm water previous to 

 spinning it. This process spliis, curls and en- 

 tangles the fibres, which are then e:isily spun in- 

 to a long connected tiu'ead. Thu.s by warm 

 water the manufacturers are enabled to do with- 

 out the busy and delicate hands of the spinning 

 girl, and one spinner can now, alas! superintend 

 machines, vvhicdi do the work of fifty-four spin- 

 ning wheels at once. — The bleachers are no bet- 

 ter otl than the spinners. Chemistry bus mndo 

 such nqiid pjogress, as to offer cliea|)erand more 

 expeditious methods of blenching than any which 

 the cottager can pursue. A great dejd of the 

 fine damask is now mantifactured at Belfast; and 

 since the linen manufacture ha* given so much 

 importance to this city, many other brancheK of 



Tobacco — Pkodccts of Co.vnecticut. — A 

 strange tuticle, by some imaccountable means, 

 got into our paper a few weeks since, respecting 

 the growth of Tobacco in this State. It was oiu- 

 intLMiticu tc have said that a greater amount of 

 Tobacco was grown in Conncciicut than in any 

 of the free States this side of the mountains — 

 that we groiv more of the article than any Stato 

 this £\Ap. of the tobacco region of Maryland and 

 Virginia. Pennsylvania comes next to Connecii- 

 cut; In our Slate there was produced in 1840, 

 according to the official return.s, 471,(i57 pounds. 

 In Penn.sylvania there was grown iho same year 

 325,018 pounds. 



The products of Connecticut, ns exhibited by 

 the returns of the last census, aflbrd an agreea- 

 ble pictuje to her sons. Although there are but 

 two States of less territory, the agricultural la- 

 bors of Connecticut show a return liiat will com- 

 pare with some of the larger States. We were 

 astonished on comparing the returns of Con- 

 necticut with those of Massachusetts, to find that 

 w iih scarcely half the number of acre.^, we about 

 equalled her in many of the most important ag- 

 ricidtural staples, that in some, we actually ex- 

 celled her. As it is a matter of interest and 

 instruction, we introduce some of the princi|)al 

 staples of the two States. 



Massacbusettii. 

 Oai.s, bushel.--, 1,319,680 

 ,5.36,014 

 89,000 

 l,80!),192 

 5,385,653 

 941,900 

 509,395 



Massachusetts has an area of 8500 square 

 miles; Connecticut has an area of 4764. Mas- 

 sachusetts has a population of 737,699 — Con- 

 necticut has a population of 310,015— yet the 

 result of agricultural labor in this State as com- 

 pared with that of Massachusetts in the articles 

 sfiecified, is highly complimentary to the industry 

 and Ihrift of our citizens. Were not the facts 

 which we publish of undoubted authenticity, few 

 would be persuaded to believe ihat there was 

 such a dis;:roportion, as that with less than half 

 the population, and but about half the territory, 

 we produced an almost equal amount of the 

 most important agricultural products. — Hartford 

 Times. 



Rye, 

 Buck-wheat, " 

 Indian Corn, " 

 Potatoes, " 



Pounds of Wool, 

 Tons of Hay, 



Connectiout. 



1,453,262 



737.424 



303,043 



1,-500,441 



3,414,243 



889,870 



426,704 



daily. The President had under cultivation land j cominerco and industry have, of course, sprung 

 Bufticient the last summer to produce 2500 bush- iqi to supply the wants' and share the prosperity 

 els of Indian corn. He is (iist increasing the ca- of the lincii manufacturers." 

 pacity of this farm by clover cidtivation. The Can there be any doubt that much of tlie soil 

 past summer, among his items of improvement of the United States is as well adap-ted to tho 

 was five thousand bushels of lime, which was growth of flax as that of Belgium or Ireland .• A 

 contracted to tie delivered near his premises at I few years ago, in the county of Washington, New 

 e'ght '.'eiits tht bus hf'I. His couvsc in a few i rave ' York, « e s;>^« a fi«ld of about f.i>v pr-rci of flciv ; 



Wonderful Cow. 



In ilieOlii nujnbcr of the "American .Agricul- 

 turist," published in the city of New York, wo 

 noticed an account of one of the most extraordi- 

 nary cows for butter we have ever heard of — 

 particid.-uly in the large q.iamily of butter pro- 

 <!uced from so small a quauiiiy of milk. The on- 

 ly cert:iin test of the dairy properlie.-; of a cow is 

 in the milk-pail and chmn. 



Mr. Schenck, the owner of the cow. says, " I 

 never, until the summer of 1842, kept her nillU 

 separate (rom three other cows, and then for ex- 

 periment, I tried it only one wcvk. She then 

 gave iB cpiarts i>er day, and her milk m.ide 15 

 poimils of butter." 



Now 16 quarts per day, would be 12G quarts 

 per week, from which 15 lbs. of bniler was pro- 

 duced, which would bo one pound from n frac- 

 tion over eiglit quarts of milk. 



'■On the 21st of Alay,'' continued Mr. S., "I 

 commenced keeping an accurate account of her 

 milk, and the butter it made. She at no time ex- 

 ceiided 16 quarts per day, nuil on tin; 10th of 

 June, being 21 days, she made (iSi pounds of 

 butter of the best quality." Thisalmo.t exceeds 

 creduliiy. Sixteen quarts per day for 21 days, 

 makes 33t) quart.=, from which 6,5i potmds of 

 builer was produced, which would be 1 pound 

 of butler from 5 quarts of milk! I Why, it is 

 generally coiifiilcred a good cow, who>e it;ilk 

 will produce one pound of butter from ten quarts. 

 But how gan we doubt, when .Mr. S. say.s, '• This 

 was *n incredible I coidd scarcely believe my 

 ')>\ n sniso-i .Hbliongli I ivpighcd th" butt' r ot ev- 



