ON MEADOW AND SWAMP LAND. 35 



EDWIN M. STONE'S LETTER. 



To the Committed on Meadow and Swamp Land : 



Gentlemen, — If, in your judgment, it comports with the objects 

 of the Essex Agricultural Society, I should like, through you, to 

 urge, briefly, upon the attention of farmers, a subject which, for 

 several years, has been one of increasing interest to me, and consti- 

 tuting, in my view, a most important department of agriculture. I 

 mean the reclaiming of meadow and swamp land. 



At what time attention was first drawn to this subject in Essex 

 County, I am without means of determining ; but it is now something 

 more than forty years since the late Benj. T. Reed, Esq., of Mar- 

 blehead, tested the utiUty of reclaiming wet lands by ditching, cover- 

 ing with gravel, &c. He owned four or five acres of this kind of 

 land, that produced grass of so poor quality as to be hardly worth 

 mowing. This same land, after being drained and suitably prepared, 

 yielded from three to four tons of good hay per acre. Mr. Reed's 

 experiment attracted attention, and doubtless was instrumental iu 

 promoting similar improvements elsewhere. Many years ago, the 

 late Peter Dodge, of Hamilton, reclaimed a piece of meadow land 

 with a success that won the admiration of his neighbors, and that in- 

 duced others to engage in ^''Peterizing^^ their bogs, as the process 

 was famiharly denominated. Since then, the practice has been ex- 

 tensively adopted. 



This work has not, however, been pursued to the degree its impor- 

 tance warrants. There are still, in this county, thousands of acres 

 of meadow and swamp land in their primitive state. This land, now 

 comparatively worthless, would, if reclaimed, be highly valuable. I 

 have in my mind at this moment, a tract for which the owner would 

 not now accept one hundred dollars per acre, that a few years ago 

 was worth not more than fifteen dollars. I believe no land remu- 

 nerates labor so well. An occasional dressing of gravel or sand, to 

 keep down the foul grasses, and a thin coating of manure once in 

 three years, will, in common seasons, ensure an abundant crop of 

 English hay. 



While the value of such land, when reclaimed, is acknowledged by 

 all, some farmers object to the improvement on the ground of expense. 

 They say that the labor of reclamation costs so much, that they feel 

 compelled to sacrifice their preferences at the shrine of prudence. 

 But this objection loses its weight, when it is considered that farmers 



