380 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



the low wet land began to feel the salutary influ- 

 ences of summer heat, and vegetation started up 

 wiih renewed vigor. Grass was well grown and 

 of a good quality, rather more forward than field 

 and garden vegetables; the haying, however, com- 

 menced in good season, and the weather was very 

 lavorable for drying and securing the crop. 



The different kinds of grain and vegetables yield- 

 ed fair crops of a good quality. There was a me- 

 dium crop of the different varieties of fruit, except 

 cranberries, which were proljably injured by the 

 frost in June. The crop, 1 believe, is generally 

 light; ours had the appearance of growing upon 

 shoots which sprung from the old vine after the 

 June frosts. They were uncommonly late in blos- 

 soming, and had not time to arrive at the usual size, 

 and like "small potatoes," it took a great many to 

 make a bushel. The natural cranberry is such a 

 capricious character that our efforts to improve the 

 crops are all in vain; mowing and burning old 

 vines which are past the bearing state, is labor, 

 with me, thrown away. Manuring will extermi- 

 nate them instead of increasing their disposition to 

 yield fruit; the meanest gravel and sand appears to 

 be most congenial to their natures; finally, they 

 delight in growing where nothing else will, and 

 precisely to do their own business in their own 

 way. It has been said that a variety had been dis- 

 covered which will grow and produce upon up- 

 land, if that should prove practically true, and the 

 cranberry should become subject to cultivation, it 

 would open a field of enterprise very encouraging 

 to the fruit-grower; but as yet, for more than 30 

 years, I have never gathered a bushel except on 

 land which has been inundated during the winter. 

 Of all fruit, apples claim the pre-eminence. There 

 is no other fruit which can be kept the year round, 

 unless preserved in some antiseptic preparation, and 

 they are a universal favorite wherever they are 

 known. Whether the first apple tree was a pro- 

 duction of the garden of Eden, is a question I leave 

 to the decision of theologians, not having a definite 

 knowledge of its natural history. Within five 

 years all my old apple trees which had the signs 

 of life have been grafted with scions from various 

 sources, many of them furnished by the editor of 

 the New England Farmer. The present fall, our 

 apple trees have begun to reward us for the la- 

 bor bestowed upon old trees, partially winter- 

 killed 20 years ago, which have produced but little or 

 no fruit since till the present year; some of them 

 have produced remarkably fine apples, which I con- 

 sider d in a hopeless condition, supposing resusci- 

 tation out of the question. It is remarkable how 

 old apple trees may be revived by pruning, scrap- 

 ing, plowing, mulching and manuring, when ap- 

 parently in a dying slate. I have no doubt, but a 

 ureal proj)orlii) I of out old apple trees, which, to 

 .'.ppearante, have arrived to a period of fruitless 

 old age, might be restored to a producing state, and 

 be in advance of those lately transplanted some 10 

 or 15 years; the advantage of renovating old trees 

 is readily seen. Waiting for young trees to grow 

 and bear has been a discouraging circumstance to 

 many a man, and has been the cause of the almost 

 unpa'-donable neglect, in past time, of planting or- 

 chards. Our ancestors set out orchards for the 

 purpose, mainly, of making cider, which, at a cer- 

 tain time, was a profitable branch of farming. But 

 since cider-drinking has been on the decline, many 

 arineis have treated their orchards with total ne- 



glect, or made fuel of the trees, not thinking that 

 they might have been used for a better purpose 

 than furnishing an article, to say the least, which 

 was liable to abuse. With a little labor, those ne- 

 glected trees might have been grafted with scions 

 taken fiom good varieties, and now afford a better 

 income from the sale of their fruit, and with less 

 labor than it required to make cider for the mar- 

 ket. I believe all our refuse apples, not fit for the 

 market, might be converted into vinegar of the best 

 quality, and the business w-ould well compensate 

 the farmer, and furnish a profitable article of trade. 



On the 15th, IGih and 17th of April, the most 

 destructive gale came upon us that has happened 

 since 1815; many of the old forest trees were pros- 

 trated in this and the adjoining towns, making quite 

 3 stir among lumber-men. In other places the 

 lightning has been destructive to life and property 

 to an unusual degree; and, a full share of earth- 

 quakes, tornadoes, railroad collisions, car smash- 

 ings and other desolating irregularities in "divers 

 places" have reminded us of the instability of some 

 of our buildings, the carelessnessof conductors and 

 engineers on railroads, as well as all sublunary 

 projects of man here below. s. b. 



Wilmi7iglon, Nov. 4, 1851. 



For the New England Farmer. 



charcoaij and the potato. 



BY M. H. 



Gentlemen: — In the last number of the Farmer 

 I noticed an article in relation to the potato plat 

 of Mr. Lane, of Chester, N. H. It was stated 

 that a portion of his potatoes — those grown on the 

 beds of charcoal kilns, and those manured by the 

 bottoms of those beds — were more or less affected 

 by the rot according to the quantity of charcoal 

 in the soil, &c. This result accords, somewhat, 

 with my own experience, the present year. Last 

 spring I cleared a hedge of about two rods by forty, 

 on the side of a field, and burned the brush upon the 

 ground. The dense mass of combustible materials 

 made an intensely hot fire, and left a large quantity 

 of coal and ashes upon the ground. After a 

 thorough plowing and harrowing, I planted three 

 different varieties of potatoes on this land. No 

 manure was used. The land had never been ma- 

 nured, or plowed, before. The potatoes grew very 

 large, and very rotten. By the side of the hedge, 

 on the grass sward plowed at the same time, ma- 

 nured by spreading and harrowing in green stable 

 manure, with little plaster in the hill, as good 

 sound potatoes grew as I ever saw. The soil of 

 the whole is a sandy loam, rather dry. 



I might add that striped, speckled, green, gray 

 and "small black bugs," of which there were any 

 desirable number, evinced no particular partiality 

 for either portion of the field for their operations. 



Pclham, N. H. m. h. 



Remarks. — Such clear and concise statements of 

 facts as the above, may lead to valuable informa- 

 tion. The writer states in a note that he has usu- 

 ally found plaster the best preventive of the 

 plague; thinks the disease atmospheric, that the 

 malaria gathers with the dew*, and adhering to the 

 vine, descends through it to the tuber. The plaster, 

 being an absorbent, and having a greater affinity 

 ibi the poison than the potato has, receives and re- 



