210 



THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



in top-dressins clovers in March and April, at the 

 rate of 50 to 200 bushels per acre, and usually 

 applied in moist weather, when the effects are very 

 great and certain. The calcareous matter they 

 contain imparts the warming and sweetening 

 quality that is found attached to all residual suh- 

 Btances from combustion ; and accordingly the use 

 of coal-ashes, and of all alkaline and saline mat- 

 ters, is always recommended on all soils that 

 produce sorrels, rushes, and mosses, in order to 

 banish those plants, by depriving the land of 

 the peculiar properties liiai are necessary for 

 their production. But it may be observed, 

 that such plants cannot exist where (iirming pre- 

 vails, and that the action of manures should be 

 restricted by every possible means to the promo- 

 tion of those plants which the cultivator uses as a 

 crop. In inland situations, where the supply of 

 ashes is limited, an excellent use may be adopted 

 by throwing them into the night-soH reservoirs, 

 where they will absorb the liquid pgrts, and ulti- 

 mately form a solid mass, thoroughly impregnated 

 with the urine ; and in the neighborhood of towns, 

 where they can be got in quantity, and where the 

 pulverization of the ashes is sufficiently fine, they 

 may be very beneficially used as a top-dressing ; 

 or probably equally, if not more beneficially, by 

 being mixed in a compost with good earths, and 

 applied in the spring on grain lands, and harrow- 

 ed in with the seed. Coal-dust, or the pulverized 

 panicles of coal produced during the different 

 operations at the pits, has been Ibund useili! in 

 some cases on siiff lands; but, it is evident, that 

 the action in that case would arise wholly from 

 mixing with the soil, and opening the texture as 

 an earthy ingredient ; for the substance apfilied 

 contains none of the elements of vegetation, to 

 be supplied directly by itself, or the power of pro- 

 ducing thereby any stimulating and reciprocal 

 action. Ashes, in a fine or riddled state, are 

 useful for mixing with bones, at the rate of 1 to 

 20, in order to produce heat before sowing; though 

 practice is far from confirming that process as 

 being essentially necessary, which may arise from 

 different temperatures of soil, and air during the 

 applications. J. D. 



MELItOT. 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Register. 



J)ear Sir: — In ycur January number, some 

 contributor, who signs no name, either real or 

 fictitious, nor mentions the county in which he 

 lives, has made a eulogium upon melilot, which 

 eeems to require some notice, lest it should be- 

 tray young farmers into an experiment which 

 they will repent as surely as they venture to 

 make it. The writer just mentioned states, 

 that about old settlements, " rendered calcareous 

 by ashes, melilot grows with amazing luxuri- 

 ance ;" but that " he could easily turn it under, 

 when necessary, by bis large Clute and Reagle 

 ploughs." He says, moreover, that '= it affords ffne 

 grazing for sheep and cows during winter ;" and 

 that "it will not grow in other than calcareous 

 lands." He concludes with hoping " that you 

 will hear from it again }" and I shall no w endeavor to 



fulfil his hope, (if you will permit me,) by a few 

 statements somewhat difl'erent from his. 

 • Melilot is an old acquaintance of some forty or 

 fifty years' standing, and many a fruitless effort 

 have I made to extirpate it from every foot of 

 land with which I have had any thing to do ; 

 but it has bid me defiance. It will certainly grow 

 with " amazing luxuriance," about "old settle- 

 ments,"— even to the height often of six or 

 eight feet. But I must be permitted to doubt 

 the possibility of any such growth hein«r ensily 

 turned under, by any plough ever yet constructed. 

 It is true that I never saw, nor heard of a Clute 

 and Reagle plough, and therefore will not take 

 upon me to say what one of them could or could 

 nut do. But i have been and used all the most, 

 celebrated ploughs ever introduced into middle 

 Virginia, and can affirm, without (ear of contradic- 

 tion, that even the best of them could not possi- 

 bly perform such a (eat as to turn under melilot 

 growing as thick and as tall as it generally doep 

 at maturity — about old settletrients. Nay, it will 

 grow e'-sewhere with equal luxuriance ; (or 1 know 

 that a part of the celebrated farm in Gloucester 

 county, called Todsbury, formerly the properly 

 of the late Philip Tabb, esq., Vv-as so infested with 

 it, that none of his ploughs, although uncommon- 

 ly good, could plough the land at all, until the 

 melilot was burnt off. 1 must conclude, therelijre, 

 that when your correspondent speaks of easily 

 turning it under with his Clute and Reagle plough, 

 he means that he can do it before this plant 

 reaches half its ordinary growth in good land. 



His next assertion is, that " it affords fine 

 grazing for sheep and cows during winter." 

 Novv, i( it remains green during that season in 

 his climate, I can only say, that in ours, which is 

 about 38°. it continues as dead as a door nail for 

 the whole of that period, and until late in the 

 spring, i can moreover assert, that if his sheep 

 and cows are fond of it in any season, ours, so 

 far as I' know and believe, will not touch it at 

 any time. It has a strong, and very ofl^ensive 

 smell, such as I should suppose would stink in 

 the nostrils of quadrupeds quite as much as it does 

 in our own. ^^ De guslibus nil disputanduvi''' — 

 there is no disputing about tastes in men ; and 

 therefore it seems equally reasonable that there 

 should be none in brute beasts ; consequently ] 

 have not a word to object to the fancies of his 

 stock quoad melilot. Much and long may they 

 chew tlie cud upon such a dainty, if their owner 

 imagines that they enjoy it. He farther says, that 

 " it will not grow in other than calcareous lands." 

 But if you are right — as I believe you are — we 

 have precious little, if any such in Virginia, unless 

 they have been made so, h^ the application of 

 marl, lime, or ashes ; yet I have seen melilot 

 grovvinir in almost every gart of the state which 

 I ever visited. 



As to the fertilizing properties ascribed to it by 

 your correspondent, I believe that it possesses 

 some, if ploughed into the lands. But many 

 other plants possess as much, if turned in of the 

 same weight, with this diH~erence in their favor, 

 that they will not interfere with any subsequent 

 crop of small grain, as melilot inevitably does. 

 It certainly has more vegetable matter after it 

 reaches maturity, than any of our high land 

 plants, for it grows taller, and equally thick. 

 But in that state no plough ever yet formed can 



