THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



391 



he must ahamion his exhausted antl worn outfields, I hijrhly benefirial in -liie hands of our /iirmers 



to seeiv a subsistence lor hiiiiseil' iuul family 

 in Pome other business, orin some other region, 

 where the hand ol' man has been less wasieliil 

 of ihe bounties of nature. 



Instead then of his scanty manuring often cart- 

 loads to the acre, which will give liini but thirty 

 linsheis of corn, let him apply thirty loads. This 

 additional twenty loads, at the usual price of ma- 

 nure in this part of the country, will cost him 

 thirty dollars. But he now, instead of thiity 

 bushels of corn, gets eixty bushels, and the in- 

 creased (|uanlity of stover will more than pay lor 

 the excess of labor re'^iuired in cultivating and 

 harvesting the large crop over that of the small 

 one. He has then added thirty bushels of corn 

 to his crop by means of twenty loads of manure, 

 which at the usual price of one dollar per bushel, 

 pays him, in the first crop, for his extra outlay. 

 His acre of land is laid to grass after taking ofl 

 the corn, and the eHect ol his twenty loads of 

 additional manuring will be to give him, at the 

 lowest estimate, three additional tons of hay in 



iiid oi)tuined at a far lees cost. I jim inlormed 

 that Mr. JJosson, of tiie Yaid<ee Farmer, has, 

 with a highly praise-vvortliy zeal in the interest 

 ol agriculture, imported from England a eul)sod 

 [dough, which may he worked with a less power- 

 lul team than the one comntonly in use in that 

 conntiy. 



In a climate like our own, which at that sea- 

 son of the year when our crops, particularly our 

 root crops, most need the benelit of moisture that 

 may be derived Iroin deep i)loughing, and are 

 most likely to suH'er from drought," i^he'use of the 

 subsoil plough would be amended with unques- 

 tionable benefit. On a field of my own, which 

 had been set to an orchard, and therefore kept 

 under the plough lor some years, in attempting 

 lo underdrain a part of it that was usually Ifooded 

 by water in the spring of tlie year, I noiicrti what 

 the English call the "upper crust." This lay 

 some inches below the surliace, at the depth to 

 vviiich the land had bren usually ploughed,' Ibrm- 

 ed by the treading of the oxen and the move- 



the three first years of mowing it. worth filteen j merits of the [)lough over it. This J Ibund to be 

 dollars a ton standing in the field. Now look so hard as to be apparently as impeneirable by 

 at the resul- ^^" *'' j-h-— >-j •■.... .u.. - - ■- ,■ .. ... 



extra mar 



crop, and at the end of three years more he will 



have received lorty-five dollars profit on his outlay 



. luii e.f.iiuiii:i 111 liic uciu. iiuiv ii^i^n oK^ iiuiu aa lu nc ap|)riitijuy ds impeiieiraDle by 

 psult. His thirty dollars expended lor i ihe roots as apiece of marble, and discovered to 

 nuring was paid lor in the first year's | me at once the cause of the liailure, in a freat 



of thirty dollars : and in addition to this, his laud 

 is improved, and in much belter condition (or a 

 second rotation. There is no delusion in tliis. 

 It is a practical result, of the reality of vyhich any 

 fiirmer may satisfy himsell, who will take tlie 

 trouble to try the experiment. 



From no item of outlays can the farmer derive 

 so ample and so certain a profit, as liom his ex- 

 penditures for manure to a certain extent. Tliis 

 has been most strikingly verified by some of our 

 West Cambridge larmers. It is not uncommon 



measure, of my crop of potatoes the year belbreo 

 Having discovered what I supposed to be the 

 cause of the lailure, I set about devising mea- 

 sures to remedy it. 



i have never seen a subsoil (ilough, there never 

 having been one seen or made in this part ol the 

 counlij'. 1 consulted my ingeriious liiends, Messrs. 

 Prouiy & Mears, and at my'requesr, they made 

 an instrument ol' very cheap and simple construc- 

 tion, consisting ol' a wooden beam, about three 

 inches square, and three iijet long, with three 

 lines or teeth of the common cultivator, placed 

 in a direct line in the beam, extending about eight 



among some of the farmers in that town, to put | inches below the beam; tu this handles were 



on their grounds one hundred dollars' worth ol 

 manure to the acre, and in more instances than 

 one, the gross sales of produce from ten acres 



attached similar to the handles of a plough. On 

 trying this by running after the diill |Vlough, I 

 ibund, in my hard stony subsoil, it was quiie" in- 



under the plough, have amounted to five thou- I adequate to the business, being too light and of 

 sand dollars in one season. This is the result olj insufficient strength. I then had one constructed 



high manuring and judicious cultivation, of a soi 

 too which is exceedingly poor and sandy." 



The subject of subsoil ploughing is one upon 

 which there has been little said, and less done, 

 in this part of the country. In all our grounds, 

 except those which are very loose and sandy, 

 there is no doubt that great benefit would be de- 

 rived Irom the use of the subsoil plough. In 

 England, the effieci of subsoil ploughing in in- 

 creasing their crops, as stated by some agricultu- 

 ral writers, would seem almost incredible. By 

 this means, the crops in that countiy have been 

 doubled, and in many instances trebled. The 

 expense, however, is stated to be very great — so 



ol similar plan, but much heavier and strontrer. 

 The beam five feet long, six inches square^ of 

 white oak, well ironed, with three tines in nearly 

 a right line, made of the best Swedes iron, one 

 and a half inches square, extending twelve inches 

 below the beam, with a spur at the loot, some 

 less than that of the tine of , the cultivator, with 

 strong handles and an iron beam extending from 

 each handle to the centre of the beam, by which 

 the balance is easily preserved. This implement, 

 drawn by two yoke of oxen, Ibllowed the drill 

 plough in getting in carrots, gnd perlbrmed the 

 work better than I had anticipated. The "upper 

 crust" gave way, the resistance made by the hard 



great as to be beyond the means of most ol our [gravelly bottom and smaller stones was readily 



larmers. In one case the expense of subsoil overcome. The earth was loosened in most 



ploughing on a farm of over five hundred acres, places twelve or fourteen inches Irom the surlace, 



was estimated by the owner to cost the enormous and though not so thorouo-hly pulverized as it 



sum of thirteen hundred pounds sterling. This probably would have bee n° by a perfect subsoil 



calculation took into consideration the use of the plough, yet in my very hard, siony subsoil, 1 am 



heavy JJeanston plough, which always required inclined to believe, that for simple drill husbandry, 



four, and in some stiff clays, six horses to work it. this will be found to be a valuable substitute lor 



lam aware that an implement might be con- the English subsoil plough. And considerintr 



structed, which though it might not do the busi- the small price of the implement, and the greate" 



ness quite so well, could, nevertheless, be made ease with which it is worked, the friction beino- 



