Office removed to i\o. §7 I¥ortIi Second street. 



THE FARMERS' CABINET, 



DEVOTED TO AGRICULTURE, HORTICULTURE, AND RURAL ECONOMY. 



Vol. III.— No. 9.] 



April 15, 1839. 



L"Whole JTo. 51. 



More about Lime-Angwer to Q,uerles. 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Cabinet. 



In your Cabinet, Vol. 3, p. 253, there are 

 some inquiries put to me by J. S. S., of Bal- 

 timore,, and Calcium, of Middletown, in re- 

 gard to my paper on the use of lime, publish- 

 ed by you in February last, which I feel it 

 incumbent on me to answer. 



J. S. S., like myself, wrote in haste, conse- 

 quently he overlooked my express statement, 

 that the lime used was stone lime. 



The communication, " going to show that 

 shell lime, as a manure, is valueless," I have 

 not seen. My own e.xperience with this kind 

 of lime is very limited. I put five hundred 

 bushels, fresh from the kiln, on five acres of 

 pretty good light land, a few years ago, and 

 was favorably impressed with its effects. The 

 stone lime, however, is more easily obtained 

 here, and this is the only reason wliy I have 

 ever since used it to the exclusion of the 

 other. 



I erred considerably when I stated that the 

 field was manured the fall previous to liming; 

 I should have said that 20 acres of the field 

 were manured for wheat, in the fall of 1836, 

 (not 1837, being two falls previous to limino-,) 

 with compost and barn-yard manure, a con- 

 siderable proportion of which was very indif- 

 ferent, and was spread over the 20 acres nei- 

 ther very heavy nor very light; the whole 

 25 acres was sown with wheat, and the fol- 

 lowing spring with clover; the wheat crop 

 was a failure, and from the appearance of the 

 clover I thought it not worth keeping for the 

 scythe. 



Let me here observe that there was but a 



trifling diflference, either as to the wheat or 



clover on the land that had been manured and 



that that had not, and, with confidence, must 



Cab.— Vol. III.— No. 9. 2G5 ' 



I have expected that there would have been 

 about as much corn per acre on the 5 acres, 

 as per acre on the 20; but, allowing it to be 

 otherwise— allowing three bushels per acre 

 more on the manured land than on the other, 

 (a greater relative difference than could be 

 justified by the previous wheat crop and the 

 clover, on the land,) still the calculation be- 

 fore given will not be overrated ; there will be 

 363 bushels of corn given whereof to pay me 

 for the 800 bushels of lime, &c. 



To recapitulate, there would have been 16 

 bushels to the acre on the 20 acres as well 

 as on the 5, had the manure for the wheat 

 not been applied ; and had no lime been sub- 

 sequently used, there would have been (al- 

 lowing 3 bushels per acre for the improve- 

 ment before made) 19 bushels per acre on the 

 20 acres; owing, however, to the lime there 

 was a fraction over 37 bushels per acre, in- 

 «l*Wa of 19, making an increase of 363 bush- 

 els on the 20 acres. I do not say, nor do I 

 at all believe that, without a considerable 

 quantity of organic matter, 800 bushels of 

 lime would, of itself, have procured such a 

 striking increase of crop; but at the same 

 time I do say, and I do believe, that had no 

 'ime been applied, there would not have been 

 as much corn raised on the 20 acres by 363 

 bushels, contradictory as it may seem. It is 

 not expected that I should inquire how much 

 of this good effect is attributable to the vege- 

 table, and how much to the mineral manure. 

 Were a farmer to spread lime on a neglected 

 field, covered with white grass, &c., and which 

 : perhaps had not for a longtime produced over 

 ten or twelve bu.shels of corn to the acre, and 

 were to obtain thirty or forty bushels to the 

 acre, instead of ten or twelve, surely he would 

 be justified in attributing this increase to the 

 lime, without ascertaining whether the prin- 



