AGRICULTURAL SURVEYS. 229 



AGRICULTURAL SURVEYS. 



NOTE FROM THE SECRETARY OP THE N. Y. STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



It was not until since the New- York State Fair, that the following reached 

 our hands. We beg the writer, unaffectedly, to believe that every sentiment of 

 kindness and every disposition for the interchange of kind offices expressed in it, 

 are cordially and fully reciprocated on our part. 



We are delighted to hear of the proposed Agricultural Survey of Washington 

 and other Counties, and that it has been committed to such competent hands. — 

 We heard, too, with pleasure, some indistinct intimation that, as connected with 

 the particular Survey designated, we are likely to have a thorough analysis of 

 Indian Corn, in all its parts and periods of growth, to be made by one so ade- 

 quate to the work and so zealous in the general cause as is the learned Doctor 

 Emmons. When such really useful investigations are thus entered upon, the 

 public will have confidence in the results, and will chcerfally support the Insti- 

 tutions by which they are directed, since they cannot fail to result in (what alone 

 constitutes usefulness in almost everything) valuable additions to the existing 

 stock of knowledge. AVe have no hesitation in believing that an Agricultuzal 

 Survey of a single County, well conducted — as we are sure this will be — and 

 embracing everything connected with that branch of industry, will be of more 

 real and lasting benefit than all the State Exhibitions which have been held since 

 the foundation of the Society. We could wish the Society had taken measures 

 to have ascertained the proportion which the fodder of corn bears to the grain. 

 We are aware that much depends on the kind of corn and something on the sea- 

 son, but still approximations might be had, highly useful as a matter of agricul- 

 tural economics. 



In regard to the extraordinary and, doubtless, well authenticated crops men- 

 tioned in this note, we may be allowed to say that if, along with these accounts, 

 the Society had possessed the means to have analyzed the soils on which they 

 greiv, and of giving, along with that analysis, the chemical composition of each 

 of the crops (which has been ascertained as to Avheat and oats, at least), show- 

 ing how much of their nourishment they derived from the soil — how much from 

 the manure applied to it, and how much from the atmosphere — presenting the 

 whole sum of information at one view — it would have contributed more toward 

 the general production, or approximation to the production, of such crops through- 

 out the State, than all the premiums they distributed for animals at the last Fair. 

 It is by such investigations, and such diffusion of a knowledge of the elements 

 of crops, and the principles on which their successful culture depends, that Agri- 

 culture has made such vast strides of late years in Europe, and especially in Eng- 

 land, where the average increase in the last quarter of a century has been nearly 

 equal to the total average product per acre in New- York — where there is reason 

 to doubt whether the average increase has been one grain ! 



In relation to the " Transactions of the INew-York State Agricultural 

 Society," we have to acknowledge the receipt of the copy referred to, and will 

 take the first leisure moment to examine and review it, with the candor and free- 



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