&l)c jfarmer'jg ittontljlij bisitor. 



117 



upon this field will probably pay lis double nil 

 llie expense we have made in n year upon the 

 land. For I lie next year tlie same land will lie 

 in a better condition tlian ever for another crop. 

 The method of manuring, with a very little la- 

 bor, leaves few weeds: a single hoeing here was 



i 'e effective than three hoeings upon the old 



intervale fallow ground. 



Another part of our business for August has 

 been the addition of about fifteen acres of culti- 

 vation to the pine plain field near the potato 

 ground. This preparation was the land from 

 which the pine growth was cut and cleared off 

 twenty months ago. Temporarily furnishing 

 ourselves with two additional yokes of oxen 

 from Mr. Norcross' river team about the first of 

 July, we have gone into the ploughing of this 

 field among the stumps. Furnished by each of 

 the gentleman plough-makers (Messrs. Doe and 

 Robinson) of this town for the purpose, we are 

 enabled to say that the town of Concord can 

 make ploughs belter than any instrument of that 

 kind we have ever yet seen operating in rough 

 ground. Our team of three yokes of oxen and 

 two horses cut every thing except stumps of the 

 larger growth as it went along: firm rooted 

 young oaks and pines, seemingly impervious 

 fern and brake loots, large stumps where the 

 fibres of the roots were not yet green and sound 

 — all gave way before these ploughs, which went 

 into the ground eight, ten and upon the side bill 

 twelve inches. The subsoil plough could not upon 

 this land be used. The surface ploughs were 

 pre-eminent for their strength as well as for 

 their near perforation to the larger stumps, leav- 

 ing none or very rarely the least naked balk 

 around them, and hugging the deep turned fur- 

 row all around the protruding wood. Harrowed 

 and sowed down to rye, ten of the fifteen acres 

 on the first of September show much of the 

 mellowness of a levelled rich old field : it is land 

 that now for the first time receives the plough. 

 We thought the operation of Mr. Doe's plough, 

 used at first several days, to be very fine indeed ; 

 and when our friend Robinson came into the 

 field with his larger plough No. 10, we much 

 feared that the holder among the stumps could 

 not give its due credit from the more severe 

 lifting necessary. The first round showed that 

 the Robinson plough was the true plough for 

 that ground: it stood in the ground better among 

 the stumps and roots, because it was larger and 

 went down deeper, liolh the Doe and the Rob- 

 inson ploughs, constructed much upon the same 

 principles, must have been of nearly equal merit. 

 Doe's larger plough would have been about 

 equal to Robinson's No. 10. These plough- 

 makers, we cannot doubt, if they might he per- 

 muted to furnish for the wants of the towns 

 will, in twenty miles of Concord, would add to 

 the value of their agriculture ten times the 

 whole amount of the cost of the manufactured 

 article. In the two specimens we have tried we 

 are gratified to he convinced that good cast iron 

 will be sufficient for the roughest treatment of 

 stumps; and we can see no good reason to be- 

 lieve that the same ploughs may not successfully 

 encounter the hard rocky grounds where the pan 

 moved deeper and deeper in the ground is capa- 

 ble of making the most certain and most pro- 

 ductive cultivation in all seasons. 



Our anticipation of the finish of early haying in 

 August was frustrated by no very agreeable matter 

 on the one hand, and yet quite a gratifying event 

 on the other. All signs of rain having failed up to 



the end of the first week in August, we were not 

 deterred on Thursday from the hope of driving 

 to the close of haying on Saturday by a south 

 wind, curving tin? light scuds directly up the 

 river towards the mountains. Never had we 

 known the river before so low as to take all the 

 waters from the frog ponds except in two places: 

 every thing was mowed and saved in these to 

 the low bottoms which hr.ve been tilling in from 

 year to year. As the ponds receded, the fishes 

 grouped at the lowest points had perished for 

 want of their accustomed element : these bottoms 

 were dried hard as the upper intervales. A heavy 

 day's work in getting in did not prevent the 

 mowing down of nearly half the remaining thick 

 grass to the extent of one hundred and twenty 

 cocks. All the hay was got in from the mowing 

 of! the previous day: that of this day being near- 

 ly fit, the prospect of change of weather promp- 

 ted to the further getting into the barn half of 

 the last mowed ground. Sixty cocks of the 

 reenest were left standing in the field. During 

 the greater part of this fine hay-day here fifty 

 lod a hundred miles above towards the sources of 

 our river (he clouds had broken and the rain was 

 pouring down in the mountains. Coining down 

 from Plymouth on Friday morning a gentleman 

 informed us that the Merrimack had already 

 risen six feet, when arriving at Concord in 

 the latter part of the day he found the water 

 had not risen as many inches. We awaited the 

 rain of Saturday morning over Sunday without 

 moving the sixty remaining hay cocks. On Mon- 

 day morning, not only the ponds, from the backing 

 in of the river were filled, but the overflowing 

 reached some eight or ten feet higher to cover 

 nearly over the lower intervales. The standing 

 grass left was all under water, and the comple- 

 tion of haying was delayed a full fortnight. Our 

 cocks of hay were all afloat, and while the water 

 was on the rapid rise were considered as good 

 as lost in the sea. A sudden check of this rise 

 however left it all upon the ground, so that after 

 the recession of the waters, the hay was saved 

 in not much worse condition than that which 

 encounters a single soaking of wet. 



sold under titles merely imaginative: the conse- 

 quence was, that the good and valuable timber 

 lands with, a bona fide title were brought into 

 discredit with the rest ; and thus things have re- 

 mained while men who are not owners of the 

 land have been taking and carrying off the most 

 valuable timber. The pine and spruce are so 

 valuable that as well those who do own as 

 those who do not own the laud are engaged in 

 getting it down where it will float on Connecti- 

 cut river, where under all the disadvantage of 

 enormous taxation for tolls through canals and 

 other extras sufficient to cover a large part of the 

 value, it is carried down to Hartford, supplying 

 and making a great business all the way dowa 

 the river. An increased demand for this timber 

 will be given in the construction of the new city 

 at the South HadJey Falls. So well are the tim-i 

 her lands on the Connecticut river waters appre- 

 ciated, that a gentleman made a sale recently of 

 a single tract in the south-west section of Car- 

 roll to a company in Manchester for the sum of 

 forty thousand dollars, covering the loss which 

 he made of a had trade in the speculating times 

 twelve years ago. The railroads from the Mer- 

 rimack tapping the waters of the Connecticut 

 have sensibly affected the value of the timber 

 lands all along the upper region of New Hamp- 

 shire. The last account we have had of tree3 

 worth sixty and seventy-five dollars each upon 

 the stump was, that after being hauled on wheels 

 twenty and thirty miles, they have been carried 

 from Wells river oy.er the Passumpsic railroad 

 to Lebanon— thence over the Northern, Concord, 

 Nashua and Lowell railroads to Boston — thence 

 over the. Eastern railroad to Portsmouth, there 

 to be used as spars to the noble merchant ships 

 which have this year been constructed at thai 

 place. 



We understand that a Mr. French of Chester- 

 ville has recently hauled to this market two ship 

 masts which he sold for the snug linle sum of 

 five hundred dollars. They were beauties, such 

 as .Maine only can furnish. Success to the "pine 

 tree Slate."— Hallowell Gazette. 



There are tall pines near the White Moun- 

 tains, far up in the Granite State, that are said to 

 be worth fifty and a hundred dollars each where 

 they now stand : they are upon land that before 

 limber times of speculation was not counted as 

 fit for any thing. We visited (he town of Car- 

 roll, (then an unincorporated place by the name 

 of Bretton woods) in 1622, when there was 

 scarcely a single hundred acres of laud consid- 

 ered practicable fur any useful purpose within 

 the limits of a large township ; and these acres 

 were one or two cleared spots of intervale along 

 the bank of the Ammonoosuck. Sixteen years 

 afterwards, we passed by a new road over the 

 same town, portions of which had been cleared 

 and converted into farms ; and our way was 

 through the original white pine grounds grow- 

 ing up straight without a limb fifty and seventy- 

 five feet, and full an additional height taller than 

 the common forest trees. The lands in Carroll, 

 Whitefield, Dalton and Bethlehem that were 

 open were speculated up to a high price in the 

 great timber humbug of 183li— some lands were 

 then sold that really had no timber — some were 



According to a letter, first published in. a news- 

 paper at Cincinnati, Ohio, the great constitution- 

 al lawyer and statesman, Daniel Webster, has 

 been engaged this sumjner since he left Wash- 

 ington, in improving land, beautifying his very 

 extensive farm in Marslifield, Massachusetts, 

 personally directing the numerous hands em- 

 ployed. It will require much money to carry 

 out a great New England farm of more than u 

 thousand acres in the manner of his cultivation, 

 where much, is done fpr fancy as well as for pro- 

 ducts under improvement. The profit of a varies 

 ty of vegetable crops cannot be expected where 

 there is no personal attendance for the sale in 

 market. Turnips, ruta baga,- beets and carrots 

 may be raised to an extent for the consumption 

 of stock upon a farm: the profits only can be 

 realized in the sale of stock. If consumed upon 

 the farm, the cost will not always be met. Mo- 

 ney is sometimes well expended in permanent 

 improvements : it is frequently thrown away in, 

 objects of mere fancy. One crop llie writer 

 from Mr. Webster's farm mentions which may 

 pay all the cost : twelve acres of potatoes in one 

 field it is supposed will produce two thousand 

 bushels, and if these sell as they did last winter, 

 will give two thousand dollars. Our field of 

 nearly twice twelve acres will do well for us if 

 it produce three thousand bushels — it will pay 

 all our farm expenses if that quantity shall net 

 us fifty cents a bushel. 



(U 13 There are several interesting topics on 

 which we would have written for this number of 

 the Visitor, if our time had not been covered 

 with other labors than those of the farm. 



