124 



N E W ENGLAND FARMER, 



OCT. 20, IS41. 



or straw ; by this means the grass is kept green, 

 and fit for mowinfr all this long period. 



Whether this ynuni; growth from the Joints, be 

 owing to the liorizontal position of the straw, or 

 whether it is a confirmation of that doctrine, that 

 the joints of plants are seed-vessels, I leave to natu- 

 ralists to determine. 



I find by experience, that the best time to mow 

 this grass, is when these new branches or succors 

 have obtained to their full growth — Ihiil. 



RECLALMING BOGS AND SWAMPS. 



1 would comnrtGnd and encourage the clearing 

 and draining of Rwamps and bogs, as there is a 

 depth of rich soil for the nourishment of the rankest 

 vegetables, and they cai not fail of being the best 

 of every man's estate who is possessed of them : I 

 think they will prove like the drained bogs in Ire- 

 land. 



This branch of husbandry is improved and ad- 

 vancing yearly, and in many places makes a fine 

 show. Take a view of ft swamp in its original 

 state; full of bogs, overgrown with flags, brakes, 

 poisonous woods and vines, with other i;seless pro- 

 ducts, the genuine -Oitspring of stagnant waters. 



Its miry bottom, a harbor to turtles, toads, efts, 

 snakes, and other c^e(.^i^g vermin. The baleful 

 thickets of brambles,' n;,d the dreary shades of lar- 

 ger growth; the d«clling-place of the owl aud 

 the bittern ; a portion of fo.\es, and a cage of eve- 

 ry unclean ajid hateful bird. Now take another 

 survey of the same place, after the labor of clear- 

 ing, ditching, draining, burning, and other needful 

 culture has passed upon it. 



Behold it iiow, clothed with sweet verdant grass, 

 adorned witii the lofty wide-spreading well-set In- 

 di.iii coiii ; llic yollo.v b;irloy ; the iilver-coloicU 

 finx ; the ramping hemp, beautified with fine ranges 

 of cabbage; the delicious melon, and the best of 

 tuniips — all ple.isiiig to the eye, and many agreea- 

 ble to the taste ; a wonderful cliaoge this! and all 

 brought about in a short time; a • resemblance of 

 creation, as much as we; impotent beings can at- 

 tain to — the liappy prodcct of skill and industry. 



Suinptudus buildings and fine gardens, afford a 

 pleasing prospect, and strike the eye agreeably ; 

 what are the gaudy shows, the fleeting joys (^f Ra- 

 nelagh ; the glittering scenes, the chanting music, 

 the splendid banquets of Vauxhall, compared with 

 the more than rural pleasures to be enjoyed in 

 these new sprung fields, considered as a rich source 

 of supply for man and beast ? but more especially 

 considered as a compendious lasting fund of chari- 

 ty .' it being a more extensive charity to prevent 

 beggary than to relieve it These views serve to 

 waft away the soul upon the wings of exulting ele- 

 vated thoughts and warm desires, towards the 

 Great Creaturand Beneficent Ruler of the Universe. 

 —Ibid. 



SALT AND LIME. 

 It would be, perhaps, difficult to name any other 

 Bubslance in the catiilogue of modern fertilizers, 

 whoso powers have been so often disputed as com- 

 mon tall. For tills controversy many reasons may 

 be assigned. It has been generally employed with 

 little scientific accuracy, has been tried in a man- 

 ner far too careless fiir any reliance to be placed 

 upon the majority of the reports which have been 

 furnished to us, and for many years a prohibitory 

 duty rendered it inaccessible to the farmer, an im- 

 post whicii has not very long been removed, and 

 which yet was the occasion of a great variety of 



blundering trials, miscalled experiments. The du- 

 ty on salt was indeed one of long continuance. It 

 originated as a »ar tax, in the ninth year of the 

 reign of W'illiam the Third, and was not removed 

 until after an arduous debate at the end of that of 

 George the Third. The price of salt thus raised 

 to more than aOs. a bushel, was, in consequence, 

 too expensive a fertilizer to be employed by the 

 English farmers. During that long period it was 

 known only in their traditions. Through these 

 they were told that it was formerly used to kill 

 worms and to destroy weeds ; that it cleansed fal- 

 lows, increased the produce of light arable soils, 

 and sweetened grass. These reported advantages 

 were rendered more probable by certain facts that 

 had been forced as it were upon their attention. 

 Every gardener was aware tliat the brine of the 

 pickling tubs when poured over his heaps of weeds, 

 not only killed those weeds and their attendant 

 seeds and grubs, but that these heaps were then 

 converted into so many parcels of the most fertili- 

 zing manure, whose good efiects, especially upon 

 potatoes and carrots, were very decided. It was 

 well known too, that a single grain of salt, placed 

 upon an earth-worm, speedily destroyed it ; that if 

 brine was poured upon a lawn, that from that spot 

 all the earth worms were immediately ejected ; and 

 that if it was sprinkled over a portion of the grass, 

 on this salted portion all the deer, or sheep, or 

 horses of the park constantly repaired, in prefe- 

 rence to any other part of the field. Salt, evicfent- 

 ly, .therefore, destroyed weeds and worms, and ren- 

 dered grass more palatable to live stock ; and, up- 

 on consulting the old agricultural ivriters, it was 

 found that the notices of salt as a manure were 

 many and important, and that salt had been cm- 

 ployed in various agricultural operations from a 

 very early period. Thus it is referred to by St. 

 Luke, ch. xiv. v. 34 ; Virgil reprobates a salt soil ; 

 Cato recommends it for cattle, hay, straw, &c., as 

 does Virgil (lib. iii. v. 394.) The early German 

 farmers knew of its value for sheep, and for the 

 same purpose, in Spain, it has been employed from 

 ihe earliest ages. In i7.")0, Conrad llercbaschius 

 commends it as a certain prevention of the " mur- 

 rain or rotte." In Ki.")'), Sir Hugh Piatt speaks of 

 salt as a fertilizer, in his usual visionary manner, 

 and details the result of a very successful experi- 

 ment on a "jialch of c;round" at Clapham, from 

 which some late writers upon the uses of salt, have 

 led their readers into great blunders, by stating 

 this experiment to have been performetl upon an 

 acre of land. 



The use of salt by th« cultivator, since the re- 

 peal of the duties in Iri^.'}, has been considerable, 

 however, in many districts of England, in spite of 

 these blundering instructions, ill-contrived experi- 

 ments, and Ignorant conclusions. If to this be ad- 

 ded the natural difficulty of obt,iining correct re- 

 sults in any experiments in which vegetable life is 

 concerned, we need no longer be surprised Uiat 

 many contradictory statemenla have been made 

 with regard not only to salt, but to all other fer- 

 tilizers. 



These dillicnlties, with regard to vegetable 

 chemistry, and the phenomena wjih which it 

 abounds, are, in fact, not fow in number; they 

 meet us in every investigation, from the period 

 when a seed first begins to germinate, through its 

 growth, its ripening, its decay; and, finally, when 

 the putrefactive ferir.entation, by reducing the 

 whole mass of vegetable matter to its constituent 

 earths and gases, puts an end to every trace of a 



vegetable substance, we are still obliged often t 

 content ourselves with examining and noting tli 

 phenomena we cannot chemically explain. The^ 

 mysteries were observed at the very dawn of nioi 

 ern chemistry, that the same moss of earth, th 

 same water, the same atmosphere, could, at th 

 same time, produce the flour of the wheat, the op 

 uin of the puppy, the oxalic acid of the sorrel, th 

 vegetable poisons of the hemlock and the nigh 

 shade, the sugar of the beet-rout, and tlie timber < 

 the forest — none of which are contained in eitht 

 the soil, the water, or the atmosphere — were ma 

 ters of serious and undivided attention ; and a 

 though the ablest chemical philosophers have ii 

 vestigated these vegetable mysteries, the harvet 

 they have reaped, though highly important, ha 

 hardly been worthy of the laborers. 



A mixture of salt and lime was recommended a 

 a manure by the celebrated German chemist, Glai 

 her, in his Hints for the Prosperity of Agricultun 

 more than two centuries since. Ho at some lengt 

 described the mode of preparing it, and charactei 

 ized the compound of soda and muriate of lini 

 produced, as " most fit for dunging lands, and to b 

 used instead of the common beasts' dung." Chris 

 lopher Packe, \.ho in 10^8, published a huge foli 

 translation of Glauber's works, enforces the valu 

 of this fertilizing compound, with much earnest 

 ness, in his preface, describing it as " thecheopefc 

 of all mixtures for the enriching of poor and barre 

 land." The want of scientific knowledge amongS" 

 farnters, and the hindrance to tlie use of sal' 

 through the duties, which were so long impose 

 upon it, naturally prevented any extensive use c 

 this fertilizer ; yet there have been many acciden 

 tal or occasional notices o.'" its valnc. Thus, for 

 great many years, it has been the practice of th 

 farmers of Essex, and other English maritime coun 

 ties, to steep their seed wheat in sea-water, strength 

 ened with salt, until it is of a sufficient gravity t 

 float an egg, and then roll the brined seed in limt 

 This, they Consider, not only prevents smut in th 

 corn, but promotes the general health and vigor c 

 the [ilanl. The Essex farmers have a traditio 

 that this plan was discovered by the accident of 

 farmer's laborer dropping a sack of seed whea 

 from the boat in which he was crossing the nioutJ 

 of the river Crouch. It was long, however, thi 

 superstitious belief of the district, that the salt 

 water wetting must be the result of accident, ti 

 produce a good result. The Cornish farmers havi 

 for centuries used the valine, calcareous sand o 

 the coasts of Devon, whicli contains IJ4 per cent 

 of carbonate of lime, fetching it for some milei 

 from the shore, in preference, says Dr Paris, to the 

 unsalted sand, which they can procure at theij 

 own doors. The very mixture of salt and lime 

 wiis successfully employed in Ayrshire many yean 

 since. And George Sinclair, in 181b, very nearly 

 demonstrated at Woburn, the value of this appli- 

 cation. He unfortunately, however, applied the 

 salt and the lime separately ; yet still with con. 

 siderable benefit The use of salt and lime wa* 

 noticed in Ihe year 1800, by Mr llollingshead, of 

 (;;horley, in Lancashire, who observes — "Lime 

 prepared for manure, should be slacked with salt 

 springs or salt water ; lime so slacked, will have a 

 double effect." In 1H04, in the experiments of the 

 late Rev. Edmund Curtwright, upon potatoes, with 

 twentyfivc manures, or mixtures of manures, salt 

 and lime were found superior, in their product of 

 potatoes, to nineteen others. And in 181ij, Mr 

 James Manley, of Anderton, in Clicshirc, when 



