178 



Cultivation of the Soil. 



Vol. V. 



— I cannot call it farmed — by a man who had 

 regularly sowed it every year with grain of 

 some sort, but he never manured it, as he 

 conceited he should remove to the west next 

 year, and then some one else would reap the 

 fruit of his labour — he never weeded his 

 crops for the same reason — addinsf, " where 

 is the fun of working for other folks'!" For 

 a small consideration, he gave me possession 

 of the land immediately after he had carried 

 his crop of wheat, which yielded but eight 

 bushels per acre — not quite the quantity, per- 

 haps, of the seeds of the weeds which he left 

 behind him, two feet in height, and covering 

 the land like a carpet; but amongst these 

 was buried the stubble of the wheat-crop, 

 which had been cut so high, because of the 

 weeds. By the time I had completed the 

 fence, which was in many places flat with 

 the ground, the season for sowing rye having 

 arrived, I dragged both weeds and stubble, 

 and, with one of Prouty's long ploughs, going 

 the way which the harrows had passed, the 

 whole was turned down with a clean furrow 

 to the depth nearly of the beam ; the land 

 was then broken down with the harrows, and 

 sown with three bushels of rye to the acre, 

 covering it with four harrowings in a place, 

 and finishing by a slight rolling. The crop 

 came up strong, owing to the great depth of 

 fresh soil which had been turned up, but not 

 half the quantity of weeds that had been ex- 

 pected, for the same reason. The spring 

 •was early, and in May I cut the crop of rye, 

 while green, feeding a part to my cattle and 

 selling the remainder to the cow-keepers, my 

 object being to clear the land for immediate 

 cultivation, and which was done, by turning 

 it exactly to the depth to which it had been 

 broken up for the rye, thus the old surface 

 •was returned to the top; harrowed it four 

 times in a place, and awaited the result — a 

 crop of weeds inconceivable — but as I had 

 no intention of " going to the west," I was 

 down upon them so soon as I found that they 

 had all fairly vegetated, turned them to the 

 depth of the new-formed staple of the soil, 

 and harrowed again for weeds, which grew 

 by tens of thousands, paying me most hand- 

 somely for my labour, for, as Colonel Smith 

 observes, "they were the only crop on the 

 land," and indeed it was a thundering one ! 

 but they soon found themselves consigned to 

 an untimely grave, and four more harrowings 

 was all the labour which I had to bestow for 

 another crop of weeds, which, however, was 

 most strangely diminished, both in quantity 

 and quality — indeed, not half a crop, weak 

 and sickly ; I therefore commenced carrying 

 abroad upon them a large quantity of dung 

 and compost, which I had prepared during 

 the winter, taking it from the yard as occa- 

 sion served, and placing it in a corner of the 



field, convenient for carrying out ; and when 

 it had been very carefully spread, it was 

 turned in by the same plough — which I take 

 the opportunity of recommending for this pur- 

 pose, as it left not a particle of the manure 

 remaining on the surface — the land was then 

 spread with 50 bushels of lime to the acre, 

 well and carefully slaked, and evenly distri- 

 buted, and, after a good harrowing, one-half 

 the piece was drilled with the common large 

 turnip, the other with rutabaga, the whole 

 being finished by a light rolling. The crop 

 was kept clean, and proved astonishingly 

 great; the common turnips were first fed to 

 my stock of cattle and sheep, the rutabagas 

 being carefully housed for the winter; and 

 the moment they were removed from the 

 land, it was sown, after one very careful 

 ploughing to a good depth, with wheat — a 

 late seed-season, but the crop proved most 

 abundant, with the straw clean and free from 

 rust. Grass seeds were sown upon the wheat 

 in the spring, the object being to get the land 

 into meadowy and I have never in my life — 

 now a pretty long one — seen any manage- 

 ment that succeeded so well, or paid so libe- 

 rally for the expenses incurred. 



Now, this success was owing entirely to 

 the perfect cultivation which the land had re- 

 ceived ; by over-cropping, the soil had become 

 as poor as Job, and a rank wilderness of 

 weeds; the coat of manure was by no means 

 a heavy one — not half sufficient for the de- 

 cent maintenance of the crop of weeds that 

 had been so long the tenants of the soil — and 

 the lime had no other matter to operate upon, 

 for no man on earth had ever less cause to 

 tax himself with the iniquity of having poi- 

 soned his soil with manure, than he, the 

 former occupier; but then, every particle of 

 it Vv'as taken up by a profitable plant, and ap- 

 propriated to a right purpose. 



And now, I must be indulged with a little 

 theory of my own, by way of reward for the 

 labour which I have bestowed on putting pen 

 to paper — a task far more irksome than 

 ploughing an acre of land, and requiring 

 more dexterity in guiding the instrument; 

 but if you will close up the furrows a bit, and 

 fill up the hollows, harrowing four times in a 

 place and picking out the weeds, a crop may 

 come — who knows ? — that might, after all, be 

 worth the reaping, chaffy although it might 

 be. 



Well then, I believe that the clean and 

 beautiful appearance of my wheat crop, at a 

 time when all my neighbours were complain- 

 ing of mildew, blight, smut, rust, and about a 

 dozen other evils, arose entirely from my ma- 

 nuring and liming for a preceding crop, and 

 not for the wheat. And another little idea I 

 have, which is, that by spreading my lime on 

 the surface of the land, from which a coat of 



