FARMERS' REGISTER— .MR. JEFFERSON'S FARMING. 



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ceedino;!}' anxious 1o see them in o-eneral use by I harmless little dittlies, (pretty much upon the plan 



every farming; individual of the tommunity, I in 

 stantly turned to tiie communication, to see tlic 

 wonderful success tliey must have met willi, though 

 I quickly saw that I should lie disappointed ; for I 

 observed that the si^inature of my particular friend 

 Wardsfork, of Charlotte, was appended to the es- 

 say, whose sentiments I knew to be very adverse 

 to this new plan of improvement, long previous to 

 the appearance of his piece. 



Believing Wardsfork to be mistaken in his 

 views upon the subject, and thinking his ideas more 

 tlieoretical than he himself is disposed to imagine, 

 I have thought it necessary to say a word or two in 

 favor of these ditches, for fear that his arguments 

 may induce many to pass over this valuable im- 

 provement, unnoticed and untried. 



To show and to prove that tiie views of my 

 friend are fallacious, and in a high degree theore- 

 tical, but little is necessary for me to say ; for, as 

 much might be gathered from his own communi- 

 cation as would be all sufficient. But lest it may 

 he considered that I assume more to myself than 

 what properly belongs to me, I will leave Wards- 

 fork and his essay for tlie present, and proceed to 

 state of these ditches, wiiat I believe to be true and 

 useful in speculation, and I know to be sound and 

 efficacious in practice. Owning, as I do, three ol 

 as broken, hilly, and in many places, as gullied 

 farms as any in middle Virginia, I think I have 

 had ample opportunity to test, in the most conclu- 

 sive manner, every i)Ossible expedient that could 

 be devised to stop gullies and prevent the lands 

 washing. It is sufficient to say, that 1 have tried 

 almost every plan that I iiave yet seen published — 

 and all to no purpose. It has been my hal)it for 

 several years, for the purpose of stopping gullies, 

 to throw brusli, cornstalks, &c. into them — tomake 

 wattle and stone dams across them, plough over 

 them in various ways, then haul all the manure 

 that could be spared and spread it over the land — 

 but all was of no account: for frequently, in less 

 than a week, they were washed deeper than ever, 

 anci the fruits of all my labor swept down into the 

 adjoining bottom. 



Meeting then with such repeated disappoint- 

 ments, I v/as forced to abandon every plan, and to 

 determine to throw away no more time nor labor 

 upon the subject, but to suffer the gullies and the 

 land through which they ran, to lie waste, till 

 time should effect an improvement They were 

 permitted to remain in tliis condition for about 

 two years; when some one, (I do not now recol- 

 lect who) informed me that hill side ditches would 

 effectually stop every gully upon my firms. Think- 

 ing ti)e plan a good one, from the idea I had taken 

 of it, and being very desirous to effect this end, 

 and restore my land to its original fertility, I re- 

 solved upon giving the experiment a fair trial: 

 and upon occurrence of the first leisure moment, 

 I repaired to the different places, and laid off some 

 ditches according to tiie instructions 1 had re- 

 ceived: and to my entire satisfaction, they an- 

 swered every end for which they had been sug- 

 gested. Nay, they exceeded my most sanguine 

 expectations ; for instead of gullies and barren 

 land, are now to be seen some of as fine clover as 

 grow upon any part of my farm. 



Thus, to borrow in some degree my friend's 

 phraseology, I would say, if you wish to stop ten, 

 fifteen, or more gullies, construct two or three 



that Wardsfork would lay off his beds) inclining 

 to the horizon about two inches in every ten feet, 

 until you meet with the adjacent bottom, branch, 

 or stream.* Experience tells me that the course 

 of these ditches should be as short and as straight 

 as tlie nature of the ground will permit: so that 

 they may empty themselves quickly, in heavy 

 showers of rain, and thus prevent Ihe banks (which 

 should be low) from breaking over. 



Construct your ditches as is here directed, and I 

 will V, arrant that they will not, and cannot wash ; 

 and I will insure that ihey will answer every end 

 for which they are proposed, in the most convinc- 

 ing manner. 



Before condemning the use of these ditches so 

 prematurely, and in such round terms, Wardsfork 

 should have shown that the evils of which he com- 

 plains are the necessary and unavoidable conse- 

 quences of their construction, under all circum- 

 stances. Then he would have made manifest that 

 the prin.ciple upon which they are founded, was 

 false — then he would have shown that the use of 

 them was " temporizing with dangerous tamper- 

 ings," — then he would have !)roved that the agri- 

 cultural interest speeddy required an abandonment 

 of a plan so pernicious, and an experiirient so high- 

 ly injurious. But this he did not, and could not 

 do : and such an attempt would evidently have 

 demolished the foundation upon which his own 

 plan rested: for the mathematical axiom which 

 declares that " things which are equal to the same 

 thing, are equal to one another," is not more evi- 

 dent to my senses, than the identity of the two 

 principles which govern the hill side ditches, and 

 Wardsfbrk's bedding plan of improvement. 



February 22fZ, 1834. 



MR. JEFFERSON S FARMING. 



[The following extract from the travels of the Duke 

 de la Rochefoucault Liancourt may be interesting to 

 many readers, both on account of the subject, and as pro- 

 ceeding from a distinguished foreigner. We suspect, how- 

 ever, that the author mistook, in some respects, the sys- 

 tem which Mr. Jefferson intended to introduce, for that 

 which was actually in operation.] 



Mr. Jefferson has divided all his land under cul- 

 ture into four fiarms, and every farm into seven 

 fields of forty acres. Each farm consists, there- 

 tore, of two hundred and eighty acres. His sys- 

 tem of rotation emliraces seven years; and this is 

 the reason why each farm has been divided into seven 

 fields. In the first of these seven years, wheat is 

 cultivated ; in the second, Indian corn ; in the third, 

 peas or potatoes; in the fourth, fetches ; in the 

 filth, wheat; and, in the sixth and seventh, clo- 

 ver. Thus, each of his fields yields some produce 

 every year; and his rotation of successive culture, 

 while it prepares the soil for the following crop, 

 increases its produce. The ai)undance of clover, 

 potatoes, peas, &c. will enable him to keep suffi- 

 cient cattle for manuring his land, which at pre- 

 sent receives hardly any dung at all, indej)endent- 



* I have not yet had it in my power to see Mr. 

 Bruce's communication, and therefore cannot avail my- 

 self of his views upon this subject. 



