1859. 



NEW ENGLAND FAR:MER. 



67 



to rye — so at the South and West many contend 

 that winter wheat in such circumstances will turn 

 to chess or cheat. 



In 1826 or 1827, being in the north-western 

 part of Maine, I brought home winter wheat, and 

 the next year sowed it in my garden, to test the 

 correctness of this notion, not that I believed it, 

 but to convince my neighbors of the error. I 

 continued to sow that from year to year for many 

 years, and nearly every year since have sowed 

 that or some other M'inter wheat, and though of- 

 ten partially or wholly winter-killed, it never 

 turned to chess or rye. 



My impression is, that winter wheat being a 

 tender plant, gets injured and killed, and gives 

 way to rye or chess, which ever kind there may 

 be of stray kernels in the ground. There being 

 no chess here, rye is the only chance seed to sup- 

 ply the place of the killed wheat. My father used 

 to raise barley and sell considerable quantities 

 for seed, because he kept his grain clean and free 

 from oats, and he was never troubled with its 

 turning to oats. 



He used to sow some barley mixed with wheat, 

 under the impression that then prevailed that 

 wheat with barley would not rust or blast as 

 when sown alone. I know not if there was any- 

 thing in that impression, but it was curious to 

 see the operation of the practice. Sometimes for 

 a series of years the wheat part of the mixture 

 would dwindle and nearly all disappear, and then 

 for another series of years the wheat would gain 

 on the barley, and nearly exterminate it. This 

 practice of mixing wheat and barley sometimes, 

 so far as I recollect, operated well, and generally 

 produced good crops, and it made good bread, but 

 I believe he used to make the experiment on his 

 best land. Barley was easily raised and was a sure 

 crop on my father's farm formerly, bui for the 

 last twenty or thirty years it is almost an entire 

 failure. The fact is difficult to amount for, as it 

 was why the wheat should give way to barley 

 and at other times the reverse. 



RuFUs McInttre. 



Parsonsfield, Me., Dec, 1858. 



THE SUNLIGHT. 



In Lewes' "Seaside Studies," is *he oiiowing 

 fine passage : "And now, reader, as you ramble 

 through the corn-fields, and see the shadows run- 

 ning over them, remember that every wandering 

 cloud which floats in the blue deep retards the 

 vital activity of every plant on which its shadows 

 fall. Look on all flowers, fruits and leaves, as 

 air-woven children of the light. Learn to look at 

 the sun with other eyes, and not to think of it as 

 remote in space, but nearly and momentarily con- 

 nected with us and all living things. Astronomy 

 may measure the mighty distance which separ- 

 ates us from that blazing pivot of life ; but biol- 

 ogy throws a luminous arch which spans those 

 millions upon millions of miles, and brings us 

 and the sun together. Far away blazes that great 

 centre of force, from which issues the mystic in- 

 fluence, 'Striking the electric chain wherewith 

 we 're darkly bound.' For myriads and myriads 

 of years has this radiation of force gone on ; and ' 

 now stored up force lies quiescent in corn-fields 

 of vast extent, once all pure sunlight hurrying 

 through the silent air, passing into primeval for- 



ests, before man was made, and now lying black, 

 quiet, slumbering, but ready to awaken into bla- 

 zing activity at the bidding of human skill. From 

 light the corn-fields came, to light return. From 

 light came the prairies and meadow lands, the 

 heathery moors, the reedy swamps, the solemn 

 forests and the smiling corn-fields, orchards, gar- 

 dens — all are air-woven children of light." Yet, 

 after all, it is but an amplificatio'n of Stevenson's 

 well-known reply to Buckland, on the power that 

 was drawing the railway train. 



For the New England Fanner 

 ON" THE USE OP FRESH MANUBS. 



Mr. Editor: — I saw a piece in the Farmer 

 of Nov. 27th, signed "R. Mansfield," on "The 

 use of fresh manure." He thinks that manure 

 made and kept in a barn cellar is not as good as 

 that thrown outside, where it receives the rains, 

 snow, frost, &c. He says, "I believe it is good 

 policy to have our yards for manure outside the 

 barn, where swine can have free access to them 

 during the daytime ; and fifty per cent, more ma- 

 nure in value may be made than in the more 

 modern way of keeping both manure and swine 

 in a cellar." 



Now I wish to give you some of my experience 

 and practice in making manure in a barn cellar, 

 and you may make such use of it as you think 

 proper. My barn is seventy feet long by thirty-six 

 wide, with a cellar under the whole of it. I keep 

 from thirteen to fifteen cows, one yoke of oxen, 

 one horse ; sometimes tAvo. 1 made from sixty to 

 seventy loads of manure a year before I dug the 

 cellar, which was six years ago ; but since then I 

 have made from 150 to 175 loads in the same time. 

 My cellar is made so warm that the manure or 

 loam does not freeze in the winter, and it is a fine 

 place to keep my roots to feed to my stock in the 

 winter. I commence tying up my cows nights, the 

 first of Sept. I make from them, by the midule 

 of November, from twenty- five to thirty load" of 

 manure, which I cart out and put it in a heap 

 where I intend planting the coming year, and 

 cover it up well with loam. I then put in thirty- 

 five to forty loads of loam for the winter ; I put 

 my loam under the barn floor, except eight or ten 

 loads under the stable. I make a pen for my 

 shoats under the bay, where I keep six through 

 the winter. The horse manure is thrown into 

 the pig-pen, and every few days a little loam, and 

 in this way I make thirty If^ads first-rate manure. 

 The middle of the cellar being the lowest, the 

 water from the cow stable settles between the 

 loam and manure, and is absorbed by the loam 

 and thrown upon the manure heap once or twice 

 a week through the winter. In this way, I save 

 all the water and mix it well with the manure, 

 which is carted out in the spring, on my corn 

 ground. It is not uncommon to have the ma- 

 nure so saturated with the urine that it will drip 

 from the cart, which I think is much better for 

 the land than to be filled with the water from the 

 eaves of the barn, snow. Sec. I put no corn stubs 

 or orts, from the cows' manger, into the manure, 

 unless it is run through a cutting-machine. 



You will see from the above that I increase 

 my manure more than one hundred per cent, in 

 quantity, and I believe more than twenty-five per 



