NEW ENGIiANB FARMER. 



PUBLISHED BY J. B. RUSSELL, NO. 52, NORTH MARKET STREET, (at the Aouiculti uai. Warkhouse.) — T. G. FESSENDEN, EDITOR. 



VOL. X. 



BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 22, 1832. 



NO. 32. 



ORIGI^AL AGRICULTURAL ESSAYS. 



J)5-Tho following is tho successful Dissertation, for which 

 author, the Rev. Morrell Allew of Pembroke, Ms. was awarded 

 a premium by the riymouth County Agricultural Society, at thoir 

 late anniversary at Bridgewater. 



DISSERTATION ON THE MIXTURE OF 

 SOILS. 



The Author of natiu-e constructed llic earth to 

 produce, spontaneously, a vast variety of plants 

 and trees. Uninhabited regions, with a few ex- 

 ceptions, are found covered with a vigorous growth 

 of some sort of vegetable substances. 



When the hand of cultivation is first applied, 

 and the natural gro\vtli subdued to make room for 

 Kuch plants as are esteemed more useful, the soil 

 is always found in a stateof gi-eat richness to pro- 

 duce cultivated plants. It is in a course of im- 

 prudent cultivation, soils are ever rendered un- 

 productive ; by what is called severe cropping in 

 taking away the produce, and not returning a just 

 compensation. The art of successful agriculture 

 chiefly consists in devising and applying the most 

 effectual means of restoring to soils, those qualities 

 which are taken from them iu the removal of 

 crops. The perfection of this art is not to be at- 

 tained without very deep research in some of the 

 most intricate branches of philosophy. 



It is nesessary to analyze both plants and soil, to 

 discover, with minute accuracy, what ([ualities are 

 best adapted to the vigorous growth of certain 

 plants ; but the art may be acquired in sutKciMit 

 measure, for the most useful purposes of life, by 

 observation and a course of experiments within 

 he reach of every practical man. 



Diligent attention to the designs and operations 

 of nature, in the vegetable world, will qualify us 

 to make, iu many cases, certain returns to the soil 

 of properties which we shall perceive has been 

 taken from it, in a course of cropping. The veo-- 

 etable substances which abound in newly cleared 

 lands, in different degrees of decomposition, and 

 cause the soil at first to yield crops in great abun- 

 dance, are in a few years exhausted ; after which, 

 some soils, especially those that arc warm, loose 

 and naturally favorable for grain, become extreme- 

 ly barren. Here it seems scarcely possible for 

 any man to mistake the cause, or err in his judg- 

 ment of the most eflicacious application, to restore 

 energy to the soil. It wants nothing but the stim- 

 ulus of decayed vegetables. This stuiiuluscan be 

 applied in various ways. It is applied with the 

 greatest iimuediate influence, in the form of ex- 

 crementitous manures, but these are not attainable 

 in the ordinary situations of farmers, to an extent 

 sutficient for all the purposes of an improving 

 cultivation. It is also apphed in mixing plants, 

 in the most vigorous state of their growth, with 

 the soil, and it is applied in mixing one kind of 

 soil with another. The mixture of soils, even 

 when there is very little apparent difference in the 

 qualities, is always attended with some good 

 eftects. 



Particles in a soil, which had long been iu con- 

 tact, and, in consequence of long connexion, lost 

 much of the energy of their action on plants, are 

 separated in iriixiug soils, placed in new connex- 

 ions and act with renewed vigor. But the most 



permanent and liest effects are always to be ex- 

 pected from the mixture of soils of different quali- 

 ties. When the object is to produce as much im- 

 mediate influence as possible, merely to assist one 

 short rotation of crops, to have the application we 

 make, act chiefly as manure, then we may take 

 our materials from any situation, where we know 

 vegetable substances have fallen and decayed. 



We may go into forests, and, in certain stages 

 of the growth of the wood, without any percepti- 

 ble injury, skim the surface of the whole lot. — 

 This soil of the woods, carried in sufliciently large 

 quantities on to old fields, will restore them to 

 original productiveness. And this will sometimes 

 prove an inexhaustible i-esource for renewing 

 old fields ; for as often as the fields decline, the 

 soil in the wood-lot will be again renewed and fit 

 to remove. For the same purposes, the earth 

 should be carried from the sides of walls and 

 fences, where the leaves have been lodged from 

 the forests. It should also be carried from hol- 

 lows and temporary ponds, which, in certain sea 

 sons of the year, become dry and afford immense 

 quantities of vegetable matters, m different stages 

 of decomposition, and suitable to apply to any 

 kind of soil. 



Where streams of water occasionally overflow 

 tiie banks, an abhndance of vegetable and earthv 

 matter is lodged on the meadows, which in many 

 cases, especially where there is not much extent 

 of meadow to receive the substances conveyed by 

 the stream, it is prudent to remove on to higher 

 land. It will there act as manure and at the same 

 time gradually alter the texture of the soil, render- 

 ing it more retentive of dew and rain, and easily 

 penetrated by the fibrous roots of plants. Of the 

 value of those substances which are carried iu 

 streams of water, to enrich soils, we have most 

 con^•inci^g proof in the unexampled productive- 

 ness of interval lands. It is not exclusively the 

 vegetable substances carried onto these lands, that 

 makes them so astonishingly productive ; there is 

 a portion of every kind of soil existing in the sur- 

 rounding country, annually carried on with the 

 vegetable substances. Intervals are composed of 

 every sort of earth the water can reach and re- 

 move. This circumstance may properly encour- 

 age the mixture of many kinds of earth, even when 

 there is no particular evidence that each kind is 

 especially adapted to remedy any deficiency in the 

 soil, which we would improve. There is less 

 hazard in administering medicines in great profu- 

 sion to cure the diseases in the soil, than in the 

 human body. What is always disgraceful in the 

 physician, viz. to boast tlie number of his applica- 

 tions and the judgment with which they have 

 been made, as it is impossible for them to do any 

 harm, if they do no good, may in the farmer, often 

 be a course worthy of praise. In stepping out of 

 the beaten ])ath of habitual practice, and calling 

 attention to experiments, which to some may look 

 very simple and to others very absurd, we may 

 become instrumental in the discovery of highly 

 important truths. 



Accidental occurrences often produce results, 

 which show us that much useful knowledge might 

 be obtained in a course of new experiments. A 



load of coarse sand, removed merely for the pur- 

 pose of clearing away an incumbrance and placed 

 in some hollow on the farm, will often show how 

 much that kind of soil can be improved by the 

 application of materials, which seem to be wholly 

 inactve and destitute of the food of plants. Many 

 other applications of accidental origin, may Icail 

 attentive observers into new discoveries in the true 

 philosophy, in relation to the mixtui-e of soils. 



But we should not think the knowledge that has 

 been acquired through accidental occurrences, or 

 the speculations of theorists, which we have peru- 

 sed, can ever justify our neglect of other means 

 of increasing and ai)plying knowledge. New trials 

 and experiments are necessary, to carry forward 

 every important branch of agricultural knowledge 

 with the most speedy and certain success. Theory 

 may satisfy the speculatist, but practical men want 

 ocular evidence; they are not easily persuaded to 

 desert an old for a new path, till the obstacles are 

 manifestly well cleared away. By attention to 

 the constituent parts of soils through which 

 streams of water pass, and the kinds of ])lants 

 which grow most luxuriantly on the banks of them, 

 we can discover the causes of the extraordinary 

 richness of intervals and learn to imitate the oj)- 

 erations of nature. In the removal of alluvion, to 

 mix with other soils, the most important thing to 

 be observed is, always to place it where the soil 

 is somewhat different in texture from the soils 

 through which the stream of water had passed. 



Tliis is a rule easy to understand and apply, 

 and the obst.rvance of it will insure success to this 

 sort of labor. The maxim of Kligogg, a famous 

 philosophical farmer of Switzerland, will j)rove 

 true in every region and climate : that ' every 

 species of earth may be instrumental to the im- 

 provement of another of opposite qualities.' 



When alluvion is placed on a soil, different in 

 qualhy from that through which the stream jsass- 

 es, as far as composed of earth, it fomis a proper 

 and useful addition to the soil, and as much of it 

 as consists of vegetable matters acts with as much 

 energy in that situation, as it could in any other. 

 The same rule is important to be observed in the 

 application of materials taken from hollows and 

 the bottoms of temporary ponds. We should 

 consider what sort of earth has been washed into 

 them, and endeavor to incorporate it with that of 

 different texture. In this course, permanent im- 

 provements are constantly made in the soil, while 

 every possible advantage is derived Ironi the veg- 

 etable matters applied and acting as manures. 



When soils are mixed, with a view both to per- 

 manent improvement and immediate influence on 

 crops, it is also important to attend to the natural 

 growth in the vicinity where our materials are 

 collected, and apply them where our purpose is to 

 cultivate i)lants, bearing some affinity to those 

 which nature had planted in the soil removed. — 

 If wo examine,' says the Farmers' Magazine, 

 ' tracts of land, which have not been cultivated, we 

 find nature has adapted different kinds of plants 

 to most of the distinguishable varieties of soils; 

 and although some belonging to one, may from 

 some cause or other, be found on lauds of a difter- 

 ent quality, they seldom thrive or perfect their 

 seed so as to become general. 



