FARMERS' REGISTER— BACON— SONG OF THE BEES— RAKES. 



203 



feeding crop was to be corn — -and therefore we 

 could not borrow a term from England, for a 

 practice and cultivation not known there. 



The laborious and expensive English summer 

 fallow has been seldom if ever tried in this coun- 

 try, because our cheaj) land and dear labor would 

 have made the practice too costly, even if our com- 

 mon cleansing crops did not render it unnecessary. 

 But thougii we have no like operation to call sum- 

 mer fallowing, we have applied the term to ano- 

 ther preparation for wheat, which is quite differ- 

 ent, and which is never called by that name in 

 England : I mean wheat on clover lay. This is, it 

 is true, a summer, or early autumnal ploughing, 

 and intended to prepare the land for wheat : but 

 its object is entirely diffei'ent from the process 

 from which we have borrovved its name. The 

 English fallow is intended to extirpate weeds, by 

 repeated ploughing, harrowing, rolling, rakuig, 

 &c. so as to leave the land as clean as possible. 

 By our (miscalled) fallow, we intend to turn in a 

 coat of vegetable matter by a single deep plough- 

 ing, to enrich the land, while a seed bed is imper- 

 fectly made above, by a later shallow ploughing 

 or harrowing. Yet, deceived by the same name 

 being given, we do not enough keep in mind that 

 the processes are totally different. We have even 

 taken sides for and against fallowing for wheat, 

 and each party has borrowed the arguments of 

 English writers, to sustain or oppose practices, 

 which those writers either knew nothing of, or 

 at least did not know under our names. In thus 

 disputing about English terms doubly misapplied, 

 we have neglected to ascertain by discussion and 

 experiment the comparative and absolute value of 

 our own practices. It is yet entirely unsettled 

 what is the comparative labor and production, and 

 improvement or exhaustion of fertility, caused by 

 our wheat on clover, and wheat after corn, on the 

 different soils suitable to all three of those crops. 



In Lower Virginia, though we have denied the 

 name of fallow crops to corn and tobacco, fallow- 

 ing is a common term used for ploughing the land 

 to prepare for those crops. This is the only sense 

 in which we use the word, which has no special 

 relation to preparing land for wheat. 



The last and most strange appropriation of the 

 term fallow is in the western part of New York 

 to the charing (or " chopping") of woodland for 

 cultivation : not its subsequent breaking up for til- 

 lage, but merely removing the trees. As this use 

 of the word fallow may be as strange to my read- 

 ers as it was until very lately to myself, I iv ill re- 

 fer to niy authority, which is an article in the Ge- 

 nesee Farmer of July 13, 1833, " On Clearing 

 New Lands," in which this application of the term 

 fallow is several times repeated. r. iv. 



SKIPPERS IN BACON. 



Mr. Editor, — There is a very general disposi- 

 tion in mankind, and in womankind too, to do 

 things in any other way than the most direct. — 

 With many, a simple method of accomplishing an 

 object has no charms ; something of mummery 

 and mystiiication is absolutely necessary to recom- 

 mend a scheme to their favorable notice. 



We see often in ncAvspapers, and every year in 

 almanacs, sage recipes for blockading smoke houses 

 against the inroads of those destructive little ani- 

 mals called skippers ; — and how much red pepper, 

 trash tobacco, pennyroyal, &c. have been vainly 



wasted for this purj)Ose in Virginia, nobody can 

 calculate. 



For the benefit of your readers, I give you my 

 method of prevention. It has two recommenda- 

 tions — simplicity and efficiency. 



Smoke the meat every day, until it is smoked 

 enough ; and on the very day that the smoking is 

 discontinued, pack it in hogsheads, barrels, or 

 boxes : they need not be air-tight, but it is necessary 

 to have no holes or cracks in them large enough 

 to admit the small fly,^that is the mother of skip- 

 pers. A lady to whom I communicated this plan 

 in conversation, for the sake of convenience, used 

 bags to keep her bacon in. Skippers were found 

 in but one of them ; and in that there was a hole. 



This system has succeeded perfectly with me 

 for several years. So far as I know, it is original ; 

 but I cannot suppose that any thing so simple 

 and so reasonable was never tried by others. 



D. 



To the Editor of the Farmers'' Register. 



It is without the permission of the fair and ac- 

 complished authoress of the " Song of the Bees," 

 tiiat I offer it to be placed in the " poet's corner" 

 of your publication. This little effusion of poetic 

 fancv, written in an hour of sorrow, may serve to 

 cheer the weary swain, who while he imitates the 

 industry of the bee, may not always possess its 

 patience. 



The circumstances under which these lines were 

 written would, if known to your readers, serve to 

 throw a charm around them, even greater than 

 is given them by a mind that adorns whatever it 

 touches. C. 



SONG OF THE BEES. 



We watch for the light of the morn to break, 



And color the Eastern slcy 

 "With its blended hues of saffron and lake, 

 Then say to each other, "Awake ! Awake! 

 For our winter's lioney is all to make, 



And our bread for a long supply." 



And off we hie to the hill and the dell, 



To the field, to the meadow and bower, 

 We love in the Columbine's horn to dwell, 

 To (lip in the Illy with snow white bell, 

 To search the balm in its odorous cell, 



The mint, and the rosemary flower. 



We seek the bloom of the eglantine, 



Of the painted thistle and brier. 



And follow the steps of the wandering vine, 



Whether it trail on the earth supine, 



Or round the aspiring tree top twine 



And reach for a state still liigher. 



While each on the good of her sisters bent 



Is busy, and cares for all, 

 We hope for an evening with heart's content, 

 For the winter cf life ; without lament 

 That smnmer is gone, its hours misspent. 



And the harvest is past recall. 



RAKE USED IN THE VALLEY. 



To the Editor of the Farmers' Register. 



I herewith send, agreeably to promise, a de- 

 scription of the rake used in the Valley, for 

 gleaning wheat fields. It is extracted from the 

 familiar letter of a friend, and was not designed for 

 publication : it will not, however, be the less valu- 

 able on that account. Rakes are occasionally used 



