THE FARMERS' REGISTER. 



413 



lift will be contlemned ns one who prosumpliini]f.|y 

 |irotends to leorli, wliili' Ik; ouglil yet to be piilin<f 

 at the leet of (Taiimliel. " lie writes better liiaii 

 lie plants." If a more dainnalory specimen ol 

 liiint |)raise were ever uitercil, I have not had the. 

 inislbrtunc to hear it. JMy iinaginatiou can con- 

 ceive ol' nolhiii<i: more killm;,^ 



I am surprised that the |)!anlers ol" lower ('a- 

 rolina have as yet derived no benelit Irom the 

 publication ol" one ol the most valuable and prac- 

 tical est^ays ol" the age, (1 mean IMr. IJulIin's 

 Essay on Calcareous Manures.) Several years 

 iiave elapsed since its first publication, and not- 

 wiihstandin^ the knowledge that it has revolu- 

 tionized agriculiurc in lower V^irginia, 1 believe 

 (hat hitherto not one planter in South-Carolina 

 has used lime but as a petty and useless ex- 

 periment. 



The book came out, too, at a [leriod when 

 South-Carolina was eulfering severely Irom the 

 emigration e)!' lier citizens. Exhausted fieldt;, 

 lying over large beiis ol" lime, were deserted, in 

 some instances they were literally abandoned, 

 and at l)esl they were sold as lands hopelessly 

 worn onl, and their proprietors went to the great 

 western valley to seek richer lands, amain feature 

 in the constitution ol' which was the ()resence ol 

 lime. Notwiihstandiiig the known character ol' 

 JVlr. RufTin lor intelligence and probity; not- 

 withstanding tlie labored details ol' experiments 

 which leach the reader that he has got among 

 stubborn lads, and not idle theories; notwith- 

 standing tl'.at it is a history ol" what has been 

 effie.cted in lower Virginia, a territory difiiering 

 but little in character and climate from our own, 

 yet the book which unlblds its benelicial agency 

 IS with ue almost unknown ; the lime remains in 

 its natural bed undisturbed ; its very existence is 

 by many questioned, and the fields lying but a 

 lew leet atiove it, and which with its application 

 can be pul in a stale ol" progressive improve- 

 ment, are undergoing yearly a progressive dete- 

 rioration. 



The extent of" the lime-slone [or marl] region 

 in South-Carolina is as yet unknown. There is 

 every reason to believe that it coinmences inune- 

 (liaiely below the lalls of the great rivers, and 

 continues to the sea. The stratum varies con- 

 siderably in thickness, i apprehend that its 

 maximum thickness is at or near its termination 

 in the uplands, and that its minimum is at or near 

 the sea coast. It is certainly much thicker at the 

 Kutaw Springs than in the known localities twen- 

 ty miles below. 



The position of the lime is various. At the 

 Eutaw Springs and in its vicinity, in the neigh- 

 borhood of McCord's Ferry and near Monk's 

 Corner, on Cooper river, it l"requently rises to the 

 surface and a little above it. On the elevated 

 lands bordering on the various swamps and creeks 

 which lorm the head of the latter river, it has 

 been Ibund as low as from ten to twenty feet be- 

 low the surlace. On the margins of creeks, and 

 near the point of junction of upland and swamp 

 land, its depth below the surface is but a lew 

 inches, and generally, except where the land rises 

 abruptly to -a considerable elevation, it may al- 

 ways be found at the depth of Irom four to eight 

 feet. 



Iff might presume to propose a general rule 

 from my limited observation, I would suggest 



the lollowing ns the indication of a bed of lime, 

 viz: — whenever the upland adjacent to a el ream 

 of water produces a growth of hickory, rod oak, 

 dogwood, locust or walnut, lime may be dug fijr 

 with a certainty of success; when, on the con- 

 trary, the uplands produce only long leaf [lines 

 and scrub-oak, the search lor lime will be unavail- 

 iiiUT. The slreaiurf of the former class abound in 

 muscle shells and cravv-lish, and the uplands in 

 snails ; none of ihcm, certainly not the muscle, 

 will be liiund in the pine land streanis. 



The appearance of the lime varies in different 

 localities, but the I'ragnienls which have been 

 subjected to analysis, exhibit generally about 

 ninety per cent, of alkaline earth, — how large a 

 portion of this is macnesia, is a question not yet 

 settled by the chemists In some places .near 

 Siulee river, below ihe Eutaw, and at Godfrey's 

 lerryon the l*eedee, the lime is found in a bed 

 of loose shells partially pulverized, and may be 

 carried immediately from the pit to the field, 

 without liinher fin^paration. It is uenerally a 

 hard rock full of i'ussil-shells ; frequiuiiiy the rock 

 is so hard thai, when smartly struck wiih a ham- 

 mer scinti'lalion will follow. This of course will 

 require either fire or ihe hanmier to render it fit 

 lor the field. If a quantity of this hard stone is 

 thrown up in the fall, and exposed throughout 

 the winter months, it undergoes disintegration (6.) 



I have no correct data lor ascenaining the 

 amount of" labor necessary for obtaining time. 

 Mr. lIulTln, who has been in the habit of spread- 

 ing from three hundred to seven hundred bushels 

 ol' calcareous earth to the acre, (equal to from 

 one hundred to two hundred and thirty bushels of 

 Carolina lime,) states that a single man, em- 

 ployed throughout the year, will dig enough to 

 manure sixty acres of land. Two years ago, six 

 men in three weeks dug lijr me eighteen hundred 

 bushels — this was equivalent to the labor of one 

 man for nine weeks or fifty-lour days. With this 

 amount of lime I manured eighteen acres ol" land. 

 I believe that my hundred bushels ol lime are 

 fully equal in value to Mr. IJuffin's three hundred 

 bushels of calcareous earth. Now as it required 

 ihe labor of three days to manure one acre, if we- 

 take an average number of two hundred and 

 seventy days as the number of working days in 

 the year, then the labor of one man would ai that 

 rate of manuring furnish enough lime to cover 

 ninety acres of land. If the relative values of 

 the Carolina and Virginia manures have been 

 justly stated, we may presume that the value of 

 the products of labor will be greater in Carolina 

 than in Virginia, because it is to be supposed that 

 when the liming is pursued as a systematic part 

 of the operations of the farm, the means employ- 

 ed in procuring it must be more convenient than 

 any I could command, when only engaged in a 

 crude experiment. 



Following the practice universally adopted in 

 Carolina, viz: — to devote our attention to the 

 market crops almost exclusively, considering every 

 other as a secondary object, my experimenis with 

 liriie have been made only on cotton. I have 

 made two experiments; the first in 1839, a year 

 remarkable lor dryness and great productiveness ; 

 the second in IS-iO, a year as remarkable for hu- 

 midity and comparative liiilure. In each year the 

 result Wits most gratifyinfj; the most decidedly 

 marked success was in the dry year, Aficr one 



