1858. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



399 



go West, to think on these things, and in this 

 particular "let your moderation be known unto 

 all men." I have lately seen a short article go- 

 ing the rounds of the papers, about the unoccu- 

 pied lands in the State of Maine. Here are lands, 

 according to all accounts, of the very highest or- 

 der, which can be bought cheap enough to satisfy 

 a Jew ; they are not "clear out of the world," but 

 in good old New England, near a good market, 

 BJid surrounded with all the advantages and bless- 

 ings of an old civilized community. Now if any 

 young or old man has the western fever, and is 

 bound to go somewhere — I would advise him to 

 take a strong dose of "Down East," and look at 

 these unoccupied lands in the State of Maine. 

 King Oak Ilill, 1858. Norfolk. 



PRODUCTIVE FARMS. 



To a person not familiar with the history and 

 statistics of English husbandry, the surprising 

 productiveness of the lands of that country will 

 appear incredible. Nearly nine-tenths of the 

 cultivated lands in England and Ireland are 

 rented to tenants who pay usually from four to 

 five pounds sterling, about twenty-five dollars, 

 per acre annual rent. 



Where is the farmer in this country who could 

 "live" under such a burden ? 



Here, a farm containing from eighty to a hun- 

 dred acres, is often rented for one hundred and 

 fifty dollars — and sometimes less — and even atj 

 this rate the tenant has a hard task! The culti- 

 vation, even where there are a large number of 

 acres in grass, will little more than pay the rent 

 and taxes; but in England, the result is wide- 

 ly different. The tenant who there pays five 

 pounds sterling, per acre, annual rent, and finds 

 all appliances, obtains not only the means of a 

 comfortable subsistence, but wealth, from the 

 prosecution of a calling which here would doom 

 him to want and destitution, and ultimately, 

 death, unless assisted by the town. 



In 1811, Mirwin estimated the produce of one 

 English farm of 890 acres at £8,578— or $38,000 ! 

 The (Quantity of manure applied was 13,746 one 

 horse cart loads in one year ; and 10,250 the next ! 



Now admitting the rent of this farm to be but 

 $12,00 per acre, and the cost of the manure and 

 its application $12,00 more, and if to these sums 

 we add, for interest or expenses, taxes, and vari- 

 ous contingent expenses of cultivation, &c. , 

 $12,00 more, we shall find, upon striking the bal- 

 ance, that there will remain a profit of $10,00 per 

 acre — amounting in the gross aggregate to the 

 sum of $10,000 clear gain to the occupant in a 

 single year ! 



In the vicinity of London, a hay farm, compris- 

 ing 160 acres, was rented. The rental, in this in- 

 stance, was $12,00 per acre — amounting in all to 

 $1920 per year. A heavy expenditure was re- 

 quired for manure — probably as much as many a 



New England farmer would have been willing to 

 give for the fee simple of the land, and yet the 

 tenant succeeded, and has since become wealthy, 

 and with no other income than the produce de- 

 rived from this one farm. 



In Ireland, a poor tenant had one acre of land, 

 erected a cottage, purchased manure aud farming 

 tools, and the first year cleared all expenses, and 

 had a balance of forty dollars left. And yet that 

 Irish peasant, in addition to the expenses and 

 outlays above enumerated, had a church tax to 

 pay, and be at the expense of purchasing his own 

 seed, and maintaining a family of four besides 

 himself and wife ! 



In this country we cultivate too much land. 

 Were we to concentrate our energies upon one- 

 quarter of the soil, we should derive greater profit 

 from our labor, and instead of exhausting our 

 farms, should keep them in a condition of con- 

 stant improvement. Look where we may, we find 

 that the independent farmers — the "good livers" 

 of the country, are, in nine cases in ten, the oc- 

 cupants of small farms. 



VALUE OP SHEEP TO THE FARMER. 



Sheep are profitable to the farmer, not only 

 from the product of wool and mutton, but from 

 the tendency which their keeping has to improve 

 and enrich his land for all agricultural purposes. 

 They do this : 



1. By the consumption of food refused by oth- 

 er animals, in summer ; turning waste vegetation 

 to use, and giving rough and bushy pastures a 

 smoother appearance, and in time eradicating 

 wild plants so that good grasses and white clover 

 may take their place. In this respect, sheep are 

 of especial value to pastures on soils too steep or 

 stony for the plow. In winter, the coarser parts 

 of the hay, refused by horses and cows, are read- 

 ily eaten by sheep, while other stock will gener- 

 ally eat most of that left by these animals. 



For these reasons, among others, no grazing 

 farm should be without a small flock of sheep — 

 for it has been found that as many cattle and 

 horses can be kept with as without them, and 

 without any injury to the farm for other pur- 

 poses. A small flock, we said — perhaps half a 

 dozen to each horse and cow would be the prop- 

 er proportion. A variety of circumstances would 

 influence this point ; such as the character of 

 the pasturage, and the proportion of the same fit- 

 ted and desirable for tillage. 



2 Sheep enrich land by the manufacture of 

 considerable quantities of excellent manure. A 

 farmer of long experience in t-heep husbandry, 

 thought there was no manure so fertilizing as 

 that of sheep, and (of which there is no doubt) 

 that none dropped by the animal upon the land 

 suff"ered so little by waste from exposure. A 

 German agricultural writer has calculated that 

 the droppings from one thousand sheep, during 

 a single night, would manure an acre sufficiently 

 for any crop. By using a portable fence, and 

 moving the same from time to time, a farmer 

 might manure a distant field with sheep at a less 



