1856. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



371 



the leaves, and that the soil in which it grows 

 should be moist, but not too moist, and should have 

 a certain degree of warmth. These necessities of 

 vegetation will enable us to understand the me- 

 chanical operations on the soil demanded by good 

 farming. 



"The soil should be light and be finely pulver- 

 ized, in order that the little fibres sent out by the 

 roots in search of nourishment may be easily per- 

 meated in all directions. It should be porous to be 

 easily penetrated by air and water, and as its own 

 weight and the filtering of rains tend constantly to 

 bed it down into a compact mass,' it needs frequent 

 stirring." 



THE CLOVER. 



The surface of the earth at this time is almost 

 everywhere covered with that rich, beautiful and 

 fragrant plant, clover, of one kind or another. It 

 covers broad fields, waiting for the scythe, and 

 meanwhile scattering its fragrance over towns and 

 villages ; it springs in wide pastures, dots the hills 

 where sheep roam, checkers the valleys where cat- 

 tle graze and perfumes them with its sweet breath. 

 From it bees are busy laying up stores of honey 

 which may yet come to our tables. The dusty 

 way-side and the crevices in the dry rock are redo- 

 lent of the clover blossoms, and the bleak bank and 

 deep excavation of the railroad track are cheered 

 with its beauty and fragrance too. It is not a new 

 setting of gems in the sweet grass, but a multipli- 

 cation of them, with fresh brilliants added. It 

 comes to us daily, not only on our senses, but to 

 our physical nature, in the golden butter, tender 

 sirloins or lamb ; in the cream for our fruit and 

 ices, and grateful milk during the fervid heat ! 



"The clover is every where," people say, "and 

 how came it there ?" Fields at hand are now so 

 thickly covered with it that it can no longer stand. 

 But those fields were not seeded by man. Last 

 year some of them were sowed with oats that are 

 now dense with clover alone ; and so it is with pas- 

 tures, and even some low grounds where clover 

 has rarely, if ever, been seen before. It is every 

 where. Grows in the garden and corn field. 

 Here, holds up its modest head in the hot high- 

 way, and there, looks clean and prim by the spring, 

 or laves its blossoms in the cool brook as the lim- 

 pid waters pass along. 



Well, welcome, welcome, to the clover, for it 

 sheds innumerable blessings on us, for, with the 

 other grasses it forms the basis of agriculture. No 

 wonder the Flemings said, that "without clover, 

 no man in Flanders would pretend to call himself a 

 farmer." The introduction of clovers, and the cul- 

 tivated grasses, is one of the greatest improvements 

 in modern husbandry. The commencement of im- 

 provements in the different species of live stock, 

 in the mode of cultivation, and in the superior qual- 

 ity, as well as quantity, of the crops of grain, may 

 be dated from the period when the sowing of clo- 

 vers and grass seeds was generally introduced. 



But where have the clovers come from now, ap- 

 pearing so suddenly and so universal in extent ? 

 We cannot tell — can you ? — but our theory is, that 

 their present appearance in such quantity, making 

 the earth rich and lovely, is the effect of the 

 drouths of 1854 and '55. During those seasons, 

 not only the surface of the earth became as dry as 

 a puff ball, but in digging some eight or ten feet, 

 scarcely a handful of moist earth could be found. 

 It was then that the secret stores of the earth 

 were called on to supply the enormous evaporation 

 from the surface. The moisture from below came 

 up, bringing with it the minerals in its way, and 

 among them something — perhaps the sulphate of 

 lime — having an affinity for clover seeds and put 

 them into an active condition ; they germinated and 

 grew and covered the earth with their foliage, fra- 

 grance and flowers. 



If this theory be a plausible one — or if it is not 

 — drouths have their office to perform as well as 

 winds and showers and storms. Indeed, we have 

 no doubt of the fact ; and though they wasted our 

 fields, and the water-courses were dry, and cattle 

 went weary and thirsty to their parched valleys, 

 and returned to their heated stalls hollow and thin, 

 yet they were carrying on the operations of that 

 wise and Omnipotent Power who always knows 

 what is best. 



It is our theory that the same causes — that is, 

 the introduction of mineral substances from below 

 — that ruined so many wells after those drouths, 

 and that contaminated the Cochituate water, where- 

 by tens of thousands were deprived of the pure 

 beverage, bring this abundance of clover, and may 

 feed innumerable other plants for years to come, 

 for the benefit of both man and beast. 



We cannot now pursue the suggestions that 

 crowd upon us, but some of our learned and ob- 

 serving correspondents, may do the agricultural 

 world, at least, a favor, by giving the subject some 

 investigation. 



SaXTIRREL NAVIGATION. 



The instinctive ingenuity of animals almost equals 

 the deductions of the human reason. We have 

 read of an ingenious device of a company of mon- 

 keys to cross a narrow stream, by uniting their 

 tails firmly together, and swinging across from a 

 high tree on one bank, to a tree on the opposite 

 bank, but we have never before heard of squirrel 

 sagacity in fording a wide stream. We take the 

 incident from the Presbyterian : 



"What I am going to relate appears so extraor- 

 dinary, that were it not attested by numbers ot the 

 most creditable historians, among whom are Klein 

 and Linnfpus, it might be rejected with that scorn 

 with which we treat imposture or credulity; how- 

 ever, nothing can be more true than that when 

 these animals, in their progress, meet with broad 

 rivers and extensive lakes, which abound in Lap- 

 land, they take a very extraordinary method of 

 crossing them. Upon approaching the banlvs, and 



