130 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



June 



phate of' iron) was considerably used in the city of 

 AugUHta, Georgia, last summer and autumn, on the 

 recommendation of the writer, as a disinfecting agent, 

 and with tlje most satisfactory results. There was 

 no cholera, and scarcely a case of fever in the city, 

 during all the warm season of the year. The cop- 

 peras used was an inferior article, which cost only a 

 dollar per 100 lbs. 



A GENERAL VIEW OF AMERICAN AGRICULTURE. 

 THE POSITION OF AMERICAN FARMERS. 



Every one tliat eats bread, or wears cloth made of 

 wool, cotton, or flax, has a direct personal interest 

 in the results of Tillage and Farm Economy. — 

 Hunger and nakedness are wants of the most press- 

 ing character ; and Providence has placed them alike 

 in every human being. In civilized communities, all 

 arc equally dependent on successful agriculture for 

 the means of subsistence. Let the soil be perma- 

 nently exhausted, or fail but for a year to reward the 

 labor of the husbandman, and no language can ade- 

 quately describe the intensity of the universal suffer- 

 ing that must ensue. Hence, this branch of national 

 industry has peculiar and paramount claims to the 

 earnest attention and the fostering care of all gov- 

 ernments which are regardful of the public safety, 

 and sustained by common sense. 



American Agriculture ofTers for consideration sev- 

 eral interesting ana striking features. Prominent 

 among these is the fact, that nearly three-fourths of 

 the labor and capital of the country are employed in 

 this single pursuit. Agriculturists are themselves 

 a large majority of the voters, tax-payers, and con- 

 sumers of all domestic and foreign goods. 



Under their republican system, they arc mainly 

 responsible for the good government of each State, 

 and of the Union. If their public servants, whether 

 in Congress or State Legislatures, fail to promote 

 improvements in agriculture, as recommended by 

 President Washington, the fault is not in their rep- 

 resentative>i, but in those who neglect to ask for such 

 aid as government may properly grant. 



American farmers enjoy advantages superior to 

 those of all other nations, for improving both them- 

 selves as a class, and their landed estates, up to the 

 highest capabilities of man and of the earth which he 

 cultivates. This republic proffers to rural art and 

 rural science, more than one thousand millions of 

 acres of available farming lands, of which as little or 

 as much may bo subdued and improved as wisdom 

 shall dictate. There is neither compulsion nor re- 

 straint in either direction. With this entire freedom 

 of action, is associated a degree of security for life, 

 liberty, property, toleration of religion, and exemption 

 from onerous taxes, without a parallel in the history 

 of the worid. 



In extent of sea coast, facilities for river, lake, and 

 canal navigation — for variety of climate, soil, vege- 

 table and animal products — for indefinite and almost 

 imlimiled commercial, manufacturing, mineral, and 

 hydraulic resources, no other country equals this. 

 There is some danger, however, that we shall prove 

 unworthy of so great blessings — that we may forget 

 the so\n'ce whence they come — abuse the peculiar 

 advantages and the exalted privileges which we pos- 

 sess, and blindly cling to the barbarous practice of 

 impoverishing the soil, to the incalculable injury of 

 coming generations. Instead of exhausting millions 

 of acres without any adequate recompense, instead of 



looking longingly to the wilderness of forest and 

 prairie at the west, we should search closely into the 

 lands already under the plow, ami learn what can be 

 done to add two, three, and four-fold to their present 

 productiveness. The time has at last arrived, when 

 it is indispensable to the continued prosperity of all 

 the older States, that the principles both of renovating 

 and exhausting cultivated fields, be thoroughly and 

 universally understO'>d. 



A FEW FACTS ABOUT SOILS, PLANTS, AND ANIMALS. 



Soils contain, as a general thing, not more than 

 one part in a thousand of the atoms, in an available 

 condition, which nature consumes in forming a crop 

 of any kind. This statement expresses a fact of 

 great practical importance ; for the husbanding of 

 these fertilizing atoms is the first step toward arrest- 

 ing the impoverishment of the earth. It is the mat- 

 ter in the soil which makes crops in one arrangement 

 of its atoms, and forms manure in another condition 

 of the same atoms, that the farmer should learn to 

 preserve from waste and loss. 



Soils of different degrees of productiveness, where 

 their mechanical texture and physical properties are 

 alike, always contain unlike quantities of the food of 

 crops. It teems to make little difference how small 

 is the amount of the lacking ingredient in the com- 

 position of cultivated plants. Its absence is fatal to 

 the farther growth, of the crop, after its appropriate 

 aliment fails in the soil. It is easy to discover the 

 wisdom of this universal law. Suppose Nature 

 should organize grass, grain, and other plants w hich 

 serve as the daily food of all the higher orders of 

 animals, as well without bone earth (phosphate of 

 lime) as with that mineral. Would it be possible 

 for such grass and grain to yield to the blood of 

 domestic animals and to that of man himself, that 

 solid earthy matter which imparts strength to human 

 bone.s, and to those of oxen, horses, shee]i. and swine 1 

 Certainly not. Although iron is ulways present in 

 the food and blood of animals, no farmer ever killed 

 a calf, a pig, or an ox, which had iron for the frame 

 of its system. No anatomist ever saw a bone in the 

 body of a person, formed of other earthy atoms than 

 such as Providence had titled for this peculiar func- 

 tion in the animal economy. 



The brains and muscles of all animals contain both 

 sulphur and phosphorus as constituent elements. If 

 their daily food, derived as it is from the soil, lacked 

 either sulphur or phosphorus, must not this radical 

 defect in their nourishment soon induce weakness 

 and disease, and finally result in premature death ? 

 To prevent consequences so disastrous and so obvi- 

 ous. Nature refuses to organize plants without the 

 presence in the soil, in an available form, of those 

 peculiar atoms adapted alike to the wants of vegeta- 

 ble and animal vitality. This wise provision should ' 

 be studied by every one who desires to enjoy sound 

 health and a long and happy life. Most of the "ills 

 that flesh is heir to,'" as well as most of the maladies 

 of plants, have tlieir origin iu the violation of 

 Nature^s laws. 



The growth and constitutional vigor of all living 

 beings, not less than the revolution of the earth on 

 its axis, are governed by immutable laws. One of 

 these appears to be, that an atom of carbon (charcoal) 

 shall not perform the function of an atom of iron ; 

 nor can an atom of iron perform the office of an atom 

 of carbon, or that of any other element concerned in 

 the organism of planta and animals. There are only 



