1854. 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



313 



ricultural Bcienco or improvements in practical ag- 

 riculture. 



The first kw years 'vvero spent in extending the 

 settlement, exploring the country, and seeking for 

 new and better lands. In the space of thirty 

 years, no less than forty small towns were incor- 

 porated, of which Springfield was the most wes- 

 tern. An attentive observer is struck l)y the rest- 

 less disposition to move from place to phice, even 

 in the early days of tl;e settlement. Land new 

 and rich iu mould, the accumulation of ages, did not 

 require very careful cultivation, to secure an abun- 

 dant return. But a few years of constant crop- 

 ping exliausted its productiveness. The prdprie- 

 tor could easily obtain otiier lands, to bo subjected 

 to the same process. lie raised wheat until the 

 land become too poor, and then he raised corn ; 

 and when it Avould no longer produce corn, he 

 sowed barley or rye, and so on to beans. 



The number of intelligent cultivators was few, 

 and for the most part agriculture was in a state 

 of extreme depression. This staie of things con- 

 tinued with little change, down to the period of 

 the Revolution. That it was so, will appear 

 strange, wlien we consider that even in England, 

 where land was high, comparatively', and the de- 

 mands for produce much greater than here, there 

 was, during the same period, none of the interest 

 and enterprised which have since changed the 

 whole face of the kingdom. 



It should be mentioned, however, that iu 17-47, 

 the Rev. Jared Eliot, of Connecticut, began the 

 publication of a series of essixys on farming, full 

 of valuable suggestions, and marked throughout, 

 by a degree of intelligence and good sense far in 

 advance of his time. His experiments in draining, 

 and in the improvement of .salt marsh, are among 

 the earliest attempts at real progress in the coun- 

 try. 



But, with very few exceptions, there was no 

 spirit of inquiry to give a charm to agricultural 

 labor, and it was performed l)y the farmer as an 

 evil which must be endured, from stern necessity. 

 Having no love for his occupation, he paid no at- 

 tention to the selection of the best stock, and the 

 best seeds. Owing to the imperfect provision for 

 schools for the great body of the people, the boy 

 was trained up to a narrow routine of labor, as 

 his fathers had been for a century before. He 

 often affected to despise all intelligent cultivation 

 of the soil, and not only scrupulously followed 

 the example of his fathers, but also advised others 

 to do the same ; thus transmitting to us in the 

 line of succession, the very practices which had 

 originally been derived from the uncivilized Indian. 

 The manner of settling new lands being such as 

 has already been described, it will be seen that 

 the population must have been scattered over a 

 large extent of territory by the middle of the last 

 century. Ten counties had been incorporated, and 

 one hundred and forty towns. The proportion of 

 the population collected in the great centres at 

 that time, was comparatively small. Boston con- 

 tained less than fifteen thousand inhaljitants, and 

 next to tliat stood Marblchead ; but it miglit al- 

 most be said, that in neither of these did the 

 liouses quite shut out the woods and the fields; 

 for in the former, — by far the largest town in the 

 State, — the space now occupied by the Common 

 and the western slope of Beacon Hill, including all 

 the western part of the city, was used as a pasture 



for cattle. The spots where some of -our most 

 flourishing towns and villages now stand , were 

 then covered with a dense forest. 



Few of the rural population of that day saw a 

 newspaper or a journal of any kind. At the com- 

 mencement of the last century there was not one 

 published in the State, and in 1750 there were but 

 four. The circulation of these Avas confined, for 

 the most part, to the metropolis ; a few copies 

 being sent to clergymen in the country. There 

 were but six in 1770, and one of these was discon- 

 tinued in June of that year, for want of support, 

 Tlie facilities of travel were so limited that few of 

 the farmers ever went beyond the borders of their 

 own towns, unless it were to market. It will be 

 seen, therefore, that there was no opportunity of 

 cultivating i^hose larger and more generous senti- 

 ments which now mark the progress of civilization, 

 and the spread of knowledge and intelligence 

 among the people. Obstinate adherence to pre- 

 judice of any kiad, is now generally rcgai-ded as a 

 mark of ignorance or stupidity. A centiiry ago, 

 the reverse was the case. In many a small coun- 

 try town, a greater degree of intelligence than was 

 possessed by his neigld^ors, brouglit down upon 

 the farmer the ridicule of the whole community. 

 If he ventured to make experiments, to strike out 

 new paths of practice, and adopt new modes of 

 culture; or if he did not plant just as many acres 

 of corn as his fathers did, and that too in "the 

 old of the moon ;" if he did not sow just as much 

 rye to the acre, use the same number of oxen to 

 plow, and get in his crops on the same day; or hoe 

 as many times as his father and gi-andflither did ; 

 if, in fine, he did not wear the sauvi homespun 

 dress, and adopt the same religious views and pre- 

 judices, he was shunned in company by the old and 

 young, and looked upon as a mere visionary. He 

 kuQw nothing of a rotation of crops. "With fire- 

 places adapted to make the largest quantity of 

 ashes, he had no idea of their uso, and would have 

 sold them for the smallest pittance in money. The 

 use and value of manures were little regarded. 

 Even so late as within the memory of men still liv- 

 ing, the barn was sometimes moved away to get 

 it out of the way of heaps of manure, by which it 

 was surrounded, because the owner would not go 

 to the expense of removing these accumulations, 

 and put them upon his fields. 



The swine were generally allowed to run at 

 large, the cattle were seldom housed or enclosed 

 at night, during the summer months, the potato 

 patch often came up to the very door, and the lit- 

 ter of the yard seldom left much to admire in the 

 looks of the barn or the house. Men who suf- 

 fered their cattle to run loose in the summer nighta, 

 thought it necessary to let them run at large very 

 late in the fall, and to stand out exposed to the 

 severest colds of winter "to toughen." Orchards 

 had been planted in many parts of the State, but 

 tlie fruit was mostly of an inferior quality, and 

 used mainly for the purpose of making cider. 



In the latter part of the last century many left 

 the seaboard and removed to the interior, to avoid 

 the inconveniences arising from tlie difficulties be- 

 tween this country and Great Britain, and other 

 causes. More attention seems, then, to have been 

 paid to agriculture. The population liad now be- 

 come scattered over tlic whole Stat(>, and the 

 whole territory had, in 17'iO, been incorporated 

 into towns or districts. Men had begun to cmi- 



