INTRODUCTION 



TO 

 KEVISED EDITION OF 1868 



" To render Agriculture more productive and beneficial to all, it is necessary that its principles 

 should be better understood, and that we should profit more, from the experience of each other, and 

 by the example of other countries which excel us in this great business." BUEL. 



THE FARMER'S AND PLANTER'S ENCYCLOPEDIA here presented to the American 

 public, is based upon the well-known " Farmer's Encyclopaedia and Dictionary of 

 Kural Affairs," originally published in England by CUTHBERT W. JOHNSON, than 

 whom no higher authority exists upon matters connected with agriculture in a country 

 where this great branch of industry is carried to such perfection. All the informa- 

 tion collected and condensed by this eminent author is of that accurate and practical 

 kind which cannot fail to diffuse the most valuable instruction. This rule has been 

 applied in regard to materials subsequently added in order to adapt the work to the 

 wider field offered by the diversified climate and soils in the United States. 



The absence of speculative views, with the very practical and matter-of-fact character 

 of the information given upon all subjects treated of, will perhaps be found to consti- 

 tute the highest recommendation of " C. W. Johnson's Farmers' Encyclopaedia, and 

 Dictionary of Rural Affairs." 



The comparatively limited range of English Agriculture is strongly contrasted with 

 the diversity of culture met with in the United States. A work limited to an account 

 of productions of the soil and climate of England would leave out many of the 

 most important crops which exact the attention of the American farmer and planter. 

 Hence the necessity of adapting a book of the kind to the new localities into which 

 it is introduced. This, as may be well supposed, presents a task of no small labour. 



It has been charged upon agriculturists, that improvements in husbandry encounter 

 great opposition, and generally work their way very slowly ; whereas inventions and 

 improvements made in the manufacturing and mechanic arts are seized upon and put 

 to profit almost as quickly as promulgated. The late and justly celebrated Mr. Coke, 

 of Holkam, England, the great benefactor of his own country, and, indeed, of every 

 other country where agriculture is cherished, succeeded, by the adoption of an en- 

 lightened course of tillage, in converting a sandy and comparatively sterile district 

 into one of very great productiveness. But, though his improvements were on so 

 large a scale, and the results so very striking to observers, such was the general 

 ignorance, apathy, or prejudice prevailing in the neighbouring counties, that he esti- 

 mated the rate at which his improved process spread around him, at only about three 

 miles a year. A better condition of things would seem to exist at present in the 

 United States, doubtless owing to the extension of education. It is but a few years 

 since the treatises on agricultural chemistry by Liebig and J. F. W. Johnston were 

 introduced into this country, and although these abound in the technicalities of 

 science, they have been so eagerly sought after that many editions of each work have 

 passed through the press. 



The advances in agricultural improvement have, of late years, been in what matin 

 maticians call a geometrical ratio, the pace increasing with great celerity at every sue 

 cessive step. In proportion as the influences of modern education become diffused, the 

 savage characteristics of man are softened down, and the better feelings of his nature ac- 

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