378 



Crops in Alabama. — Setllefnents in Virginia. 



Vol. X. 



diatcly send out fibres which will greatly 

 assist the tree when it comes to be removed. 

 A little red paint for the bruises and wounds 

 of trees, I find to answer well. 



Yours truly, P. 



Newcastle Co., Del., June 1st, 1846. 



Crops in Alabamai 



To the Editor of the Faimcrs' Cahiilkt : — 



Dear Sir, — I have been highly pleased, 

 and I trust benefited, by the perusal of your 

 excellent agricultural journal, as every cul- 

 tivator of the soil must be, who takes a deep 

 interest in his honourable and useful avoca- 

 tion. I was in your city last summer while 

 on my first visit North; — I was born and 

 raised in the South, and never before tra- 

 velled North, although upwards of fifty years 

 of age. I endeavoured as far as it was in 

 my power to make my trip an agricultural 

 one; still a travel through the States with- 

 out acquaintances, affords but little opportu- 

 nity of observing much of the agricultural 

 operations going on. I however saw enough 

 not only of the high state of improvement 

 in many sections through which I passed, 

 but of the deep and abiding interest taken by 

 the farmers in many sections I travelled 

 through, to stimulate me to increased atten- 

 tion to my farm. I am at this time deeply 

 engaged in manure making. I am preparing 

 a coiTipost of blue marl and pine straw, that 

 is, the leaf of the long leaved pine. I have 

 set in to prepare fifty tliousand bushels of 

 compost manure, by hauling into a lot where 

 my cattle are penned each night on the 

 straw and marl. I prepared last summer 

 and fall, some forty thousand bushels of the 

 above compost; I spread it over my land at 

 the rate of eight hundred bushels to the 

 acre; the growing crop on the land manured 

 with the compost above, is at this time twice 

 as large as the crop on land equally good, 

 that I did not have manure enough to spread 

 over. The land I am manuring at the above 

 rate, was nine years past, a perfect forest; 

 the present crop is the ninth crop grown on 

 the land I now own, as I settled this place 

 in the woods in 1839. 



I am pleased to have it in my power to 

 inform your readers that the prospects of 

 the farmer are truly flattering at this time 

 through this entire region of country; we 

 have been blessed with fine seasons; the 

 lands being generally fresh and good, the 

 corn and cotton look well, and in our south- 

 ern climate much of the corn may now b 

 said to be made: it is, however, too early to 

 determine as to the cotton crop, as so mucl 

 depends on the months of July, August and 



September, as to the extent of our great 

 southern staple. 



I have a great desire to improve my stock 

 of cattle by a cross with some of the best 

 blooded cattle I can find. Will you so oblige 

 me as to inform me through the columns of 

 the Cabinet, at what price I can obtain a 

 good blooded young bull, or a cow with a 

 young bull calf; to be brought out to Apa- 

 lachicola in the month of October or No- 

 vember, with the name of the owner and 

 the cost to Apalachicola. I presume an ani- 

 mal can be sent out from Philadelphia as 

 cheap as from New York. 



Alexander McDonald. 



Eiifaula, Ala., 28th June, 1846. 



Settlements in Virginia. 



Our readers have noticed, and perhaps with some 

 interest, what has been said latterly in the Cabinet, 

 respecting the prospects in Virginia of new settlers 

 from the North. A few weeks ago the editor received 

 a letter on this subject from his highly valued friend, 

 Edmund Rukfin, of Old Church, Hanocer Co., Va.. long 

 known as the indefatigable and efficient conductor of 

 the Farmers'" Register, and now actively and success- 

 fully engaged in the improvement of his own estates 

 in Virginia, and stimulating his fellow citizens to simi- 

 lar exertions. Ho will, we 'rust, excuse the liberty 

 taken w ith his letter. The extracts given below, bear 

 so fully on the subject, and are withal so practical, 

 that we could not feel willing to withhold them from 

 our readers. 



After referring to a visit of observation paid this 

 spring by some New Jersey farmers to Petersburg, &c., 

 he says: 



" I have long been anxious, both in refer- 

 ence to public and private interests, for 

 such colonization of our comparatively tvasle 

 country, by the immigration and settlement 

 of a number of the industrious and frugal 

 farmers of the more Northern States. I 

 have felt satisfied that the low price of 

 lands here, added to the great facilities for 

 their high improvement, offered to such men 

 profits very far exceeding;- such as they can 

 make in their present locations; and per- 

 haps greater advantages — taking in view all 

 results — than even removal to the cheapest 

 or richest lands of the new Western settle- 

 ments. 



"Of what your countrymen themselves 

 saw and highly approved for purchase and 

 settlement, I need not say anything. Their 

 approval, in my opinion, was properly be- 

 stowed. But I wish them and others to 

 learn — and to ascertain fully by subsequent 

 examination — that there are other places 

 and plenty of space offering still oreater 

 advantages in cheapness of land, and facili- 

 ties for improvement by marl — though fur^ 



