316 Management of the Thorn — Farmers^ Cabinet, ^^c. Vol. III. 



For the Farmers' Cabinpt. 



M:ini&gcas)4;sat of 13sc TBioraa. 

 I some time since noticed an article in the 

 Cabinet on the Enolish Thorn or Hawthorn, 

 (pag-e 92, vol. 3.) With this variety 1 am not 

 acquainted, and of course can say nothing re- 

 specting it. But I have had considerable ex- 

 perience for thirty years, and have paid espe- 

 cial attention for the last twenty years to tlie 

 black or New Caslle, the white, and the Vir- 

 ginia thorn. The New Castle thorn has 

 been in use from my earliest recollection. — 

 The Virginia, was introduced into this neigh- 

 borhood about twenty years since. I gave 

 this species a fair trial, but it did not an- 

 swer my purpose, and I abandoned its culti- 

 vation. I prefer the New Castle, which is 

 now very scarce. I have generally obtained 

 my supply from the neighborhood of Salem, 

 N. J., for which I have been charged eleven 

 dollars per thousand. My method is to let 

 them remain in the nursery for two or three 

 years, or until they are fifteen or twenty 

 inches high. I generally plant in the line of 

 a fence, as affording security to the plants. I 

 dig a trench as wide and deep as -the width 

 and depth of our common spades ; and if the 

 soil is thin I put a little manure in the trench, 

 after which I plant the quick fifteen inches 

 apart, which 1 find close enough. When they 

 require a dressing, instead of hoeing I throw 

 some fresh earth around them, and continue 

 this practice whenever a dressing appears 

 necessary, until I have a bank two or three 

 feet high from the top of the trench. I never 

 cut them off as some recommend, but let them 

 grow as tall as possible. It is a great fault 

 with many to lay them too young, and trim 

 them too much. Tlioy ought not to be laid 

 until they are two inches in diameter, and 

 then cut as close to the ground as possible, or 

 sufficient to bend them. I lay them two or 

 three feet high, or rather, trim them off to 

 that height. I prefer dead stakes, and lay 

 them fair over the butts of the others ; the 

 young shoots will sprout from the butts, and 

 all along the bodies, so that in two or three 

 years I have a fence which no bullock or other 

 animal can possibly pass. In the inontii of 

 August (it will answer later but not so well) 

 I take what we call a stock knife, affix ittoa 

 handle, and trim the long shoots. This must 

 be done once a year, or the hedge will be ru- 

 ined. I know not how long the large wood 

 of the thorn will live — I have some now va- 

 rying from ten to fifteen years which look as 

 well as at first, and so well set that the hea- 

 viest ox cannot penetrate, and so compact that 

 a rabbit can scarcely make its way through. 

 A Nemt Castle Co. Faumer. 



For Ihp Farmers 

 Farnjcrs' Cabinet— Mr 



Science has no enemy but ignorance. 



Cabinet. 



n u rc«"-Improve" 

 nitiits— Lime, &c. 



Mr. Editor, — Being solicited last summer, 

 by our worthy post master, to become a sub- 

 scriber to your valuable publication, I at once 

 assented, and being at our post office (North 

 I East) some time after on the arrival of the 

 mail, I was surprised at the large number of 

 your Cabinet sent to our small di.'^trict ; I have 

 not a doubt but all your subscribers have a 

 desire to improve, as far as practicable, in 

 i their mode of farming. Indeed I do not think 

 I there can be one among us who is not ready 

 land willing to acknowledge that there is 

 great room for improvement. I fully believe 

 that had such a publication the same circula- 

 I tion for the last 10 or 1.5 years in our coun- 

 try, as the Cabinet now has, that there would 

 not be so many of us now farming worn out 

 fields, that barely produce enough to pay for 

 qalhering the crops. Now, as the Cabinet 

 is continually enforcing upon us the value 

 and importance of saving, making, and apply- 

 ing MANURE, a thing that appears only to be 

 a secondary object amongst the best of our 

 farmers, and indeed no object at all with too 

 many of us, to give you a detail of the plan 

 generally adopted here, would be useless, as 

 the old Maryland system of cropping and 

 cropping, one crop after the other, as long as 

 a sprout will grow, to our shame be it said, 

 is still much in practice with us, as may be 

 seen at any time by passing through some 

 parts of our country. Now, Mr. Editor, as 

 we generally farm more ground in proportion 

 to the stock we keep, than your Pennsylva- 

 nia farmers, and then make much less ma- 

 nure, with the same proportions, it is a mat- 

 tor of course that we must do something more 

 for our land than apply our small proportions 

 of manure, if we expect to be repaid for our 

 labor, as from cur mode of fanning of course 

 our means must be limited, therefore the ob- 

 ject is to get, at once, at the best and cheap- 

 est plan of improving our long neglected and 

 abused fields. It seems to me as if [ can 

 hear you and your host of readers all cry out 

 at once, Z/??/p, lime! Well, some of us, at 

 least, have limed, and the result is, that either 

 the lime is so poor, or the manner it is ap- 

 plied so bad, that the improvement will not 

 warrant the labor and expense. For my part, 

 1 attribute it to the almost entire worthless- 

 ness of tlie article called lime that is put on 

 us ignorant, easy, good-natured sort of people, 

 as I tliink we are generally supposed to be. 

 There are men who make it a business (and 

 a profitable one too, I judge,) in bringing lime 

 into this part of the country, — it is what they 

 jcall fallen lime. 



I I begin to suspect that the greater part of 

 it is nothing more nor less than the refuse 



