20 



Ornamental Planting. — Rotation of Crops. 



Vol. VI. 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 Ornamental Planting. 



The pfforts of atjriculturists in America 

 have been hitherto almost entirely utilitarian. 

 Their principal aim has been to secure 

 good crops, and to keep their lands in the 

 best possible condition, while too little atten- 

 tion has been paid to ornament and taste, in 

 the arrangement of their grounds and build- 

 ings. In many parts of the country the tra- 

 veller may pass tlirongh large and fertile 

 tracts, and his eye will meet buildings of 

 every class, from the cottage of the daily la- 

 bourer to tiie house of the independent farm- 

 er or the spacious mansion of the wealthy, 

 yet find no relief from the glare of a sum- 

 mer's sun. Often, not a tree or shrub can be 

 seen in their vicinity, or if there should be any, 

 they are scattered with so little care or taste, 

 that they would at once stamp the owner as 

 devoid of all perception of the beautiful. The 

 very forest trees — whose noble size would 

 more than grace the park of an English no- 

 bleman — are mercilessly cut down, and many 

 a pleasant residence stripped of its finest or- 

 naments ; and this, too, in a country where 

 nature has scattered with a lavish hand all 

 that is beautiful in vegetation. Nowhere in 

 Europe or the tropics, can be found our noble 

 forests with their fresh greenness of spring 

 and gorgeous hues of autumn, or our rolling 

 prairies, where the most beautiful flowers 

 flourish in the wildest luxuriance. Yet with 

 all this around us, we remain insensible to 

 its beauty, and casting from us all those plea- 

 sures that address themselves to the eye or 

 the mind, spend our days in obtaining that 

 wherewith to eat, drink, and be clothed. I 

 would not say that this is universally the 

 case, fijr there are instances to the contrary, 

 and the environs of our principal cities can 

 boast of many a beautiful country-seat with 

 its well-planted lawn and ornamental shrub- 

 bery, yet it is with the practical farmer that 

 this taste should increasingly prevail. At a 

 very trifling expense, and by the employment 

 of his leisure hours, he could surround his 

 house with forest trees and shrubbery ; and 

 with the exercise of that inirenuily — which 

 is said to be native with every American — 

 impart to the whole place an air of rural 

 beauty. 



Nor would the cultivation of such a taste 

 render his other employments more irksome, 

 his home less pleasant, or his domestic circle 

 less cheerful : on the contrary, it would lend 

 a double charm to all, and enhance tenfold 

 his enjoyment of things around him. 



It would increase his love of nature; and, 

 giving him a deep appreciation of her charms, 

 would insensibly refine his feelings and make 

 him a happier man. We should then seel 



none of that want of taste which strikes the 

 traveller so unpleasantly at every step, and 

 which is almost a characteristic of us money- 

 getting Americans; and our country — than 

 which none can be found possessing superior 

 natural advantages — would appear as one 

 garden, replete with everything for the en- 

 joyment as well as support of life. May we 

 not, then, venture to hope that our agricul- 

 tural papers will devote more attention to 

 this branch of their subject; that they will 

 obtain and circulate information respecting 

 it, and encourage the practical farmer not 

 only to attend to the means of sustenance, 

 but to cultivate a taste for those beautiful 

 things which have been so bountifully show- 

 ered upon us. P. 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 Rotation of Crops. 



I HAVE been amused, while reading in diP 

 ferent agricultural publications, the various 

 and very dissimilar propositions for the forma- 

 tion of a course of crops. It is admitted to 

 be a subject of paramount importance, and 

 has called forth the consideration of almost 

 every one who is practically engaged in the 

 science of agriculture, as well as of many 

 who have scarcely ever held an acre of land 

 in their lives. It is a fertile subject for specu- 

 lation, while upon it depends much of the 

 weal or woe of the husbandman; at the same 

 time, it must be confessed that many of the 

 most egregiously false systems that are pro- 

 pagated, have emanated from really practical 

 men — a proof that practice is not always in 

 alliance with sound theory. It is readily ad- 

 mitted, that different soils require different 

 management; but the rule, that no two grain 

 crops follow in succession on any soil and 

 under any circumstances, ought always reli- 

 giously to be observed. 



In a late work, entitled "The complete 

 Practical Farmer, by an American," I find 

 the following instructions for a rotation of 

 crops, and am constrained to ask, can mere 

 theory be more wide of the mark than mere 

 ■practice ; or rather, is it possible that the 

 writer could be a " practical farmer," exon- 

 erating him from the charge of being " com- [ 

 plete" in his profession"! He says: "If the i 

 soil be a stiff dry clay, the first crop may be 

 oats, well harrowed in the sward ; turn the j 

 stubble under, and in the fall of the year '■ 

 throw up the ground into high narrow ridges; 

 cleave these down in the spring, and prepare r 

 the ground for barley, after manuring with 

 suitable compost: plough up immediately af- 

 ter harvest, and put in wheat in the fall, and 

 in the spring harrow in clover and timothy." 

 Now here are three grain crops in succes- 



