From the many communications received we select the following, and leave the sub- 

 ject for the present : 



"Interesting instances of the growth of Trees, Grain, and Vegetable?, contrary to 'Terra or 

 bKiN-JjEEP Culture. —1st. A peach tree standing near where I wished to dio- a cellar a bank of 

 rich dirt eighteen inches or two feet high was tlii'own around it, and the result was, not the death 

 o; the tree, Mr. Comstock, [he asked me if it did not kill the tree,] but an abundance of fruit which 

 ripened nearly a month earlier than the year before, and so much better that you would not suu- 



and^ruitful ^''''^ "'' '''"''*' ^''''^' ^^'^ ^""^ "''"'^ "''' ^^''''' "''"''''' ''''^ ^^^ ^'"'^ '^ ^^'^^ flourishing 



" 2-. A" oljl, favorite cherry tree, at my father's, twenty years since, treated in precisely the same 

 way, IS still living and thrifty. f j 



"S. A little east of the culvert where the Irondequoit passes under the great embankment an 

 orchard was buried in some places quite to the limbs of the trees, by a break in the canal some 

 twenty years since. I believe that not a solitary tree has died in consequence, and the whole 

 appear as thrifty as other orchards in the vicinity. 



"4. A tamarack tree, around which the ground was raised some eighteen inches, in dio-o-inff mv 

 tish pond, has grown rapidly ever since— five or six years. ' »& b j 



"5. Two fine asparagus roots were accidentally covered, I do not know how deep, with rich 

 mold scraped out ot a ditch. This was in the fall. A year from the next spring, rathln- late some 

 stalks ot asparagus, nearly as large as hoe handles, came up near the bank of the ditch • while mv 

 other asparagus that happened to be terra-cultured, bore little sjnndling stalks. The shoots from 

 the other louud their way out of the bottom of a liole which I dug to set a barrel in, as a reservoir 

 lor a water ram. , ^^^.y un 



"Before the invention of gang-plows and drills, we used to ]ilow in our wheat by gua-^in^ the 

 plow so as to cut a furrow four or five inches deep. The result was not spindling stalks alid a 

 poor yield, but wheat as stout and thick aa it could grow, often yielding forty or fiftV bushels per 

 acre on good land. o ^ j ^^ » 



"Now, Messrs. Editors, it will probably be obvious to you, and others who have been admitted 



to tlie mysteries of Mr. Comstock's system of terra culture, that what took place in relation to those 



trees and garden plants which I have mentioned, would have proved fatal to them bv removin.. 



he seat oi vitality from -I am not permitted to tell where. So of grain : he says that by covering 



■ \l!^'?' P/V^^''"*-;; l^^""' ^'^'fy ^^ '^"* ^^^" '""^ ""^'' y^'^ "^^y ^^^P on mv toes,J the point of vitaf 

 ity, o seat of life, will be injured, and long-jointed stalks and a light crop will be the consequence. 



Mr. C. says that liis system is according to nature, if I understand him. Well, after all, dame 

 JNature is not so difnciilt and capricious as some people imagine. We will suppose two or three 

 rf,r''f i ■'"''"'', >"/e?'''?S oft" his land, leaves here a nice hickory, there a butternut, and a 

 little further a maple, for fruit or shade. These are in a state of nature, or something like 'terra 

 culture. Fretty soon three or four yoke of oxen are tearing the plow among the roots of these 



u f PIt"^!', ""'i^ y.""^^' '''/*'*'■ y^''^^ *^^^ V^o<^^^& of cultivating and scarifying goes on. What is the 

 result i Not the death or decay of the saplings ; but instead, the large, thrifty, symmetrical ornaments 

 whic-h adorn our fields, with grains nearly an inch thick, as we find when we cut them for timber 



ihe asparagus is said to have been originally a sea-plant, but accommodates itself on terra- 

 nrma, and with plenty of its original seasoning furnishes us with one of the best dishes which our 

 gardens proauce In fact she seems to smile approviti-ly on all right efforts which we make to 

 improve her productions. By thorough culture (not "terra culture") she gives us beautiful flowers 

 and truits in place of those which were ordinary and worthless. Ever recuperative and vigorous, 

 11 in cultivating among our trees, we break a root, she immediately sends out numberless smaller 

 nores and the growing process goes on as well, and perhaps better, than before, Mr. C.'s little dry 

 sticks to the contrary notwithstanding. "^ 



'' But there is one thing she does not like, and that is to be robbed of the food which she needs to 

 Dring her productions to perfection ; and what the Genesee i^armer has been urging for years in 

 .legard to this robbery, we shall find to be true by and by. 



''Mr. C. says bis system will do away with the potato disease. Was his system followed thirty 



or loriy years ago when this disease was unknown. His substitute of , instead of deep and 



tnorough cultivation among corn and potatoes, might answer in a four foot bed in the garden, but 

 m a twen.y or htty acre lot it would be impracticable and wasteful. Manure on the surface of the 

 gtound loses one-half or two-thirds its value by evaporation. 



'Wg\\ Mr. Editor, perhaps I have said enough ; I don't know as I have made out much, but have 

 ine vanicy to t iink that the reason is, there was not much against which to work ; and I have 

 iroin my own observation and experience, come to the conclusion that "terra culture" is a humbuc/ 

 that 13 not worth the dollar. P. Parks.— Victor, iV. Y." 



Mr. P. will not be understood as recommending deep planting, but thorough culture, 

 which CoMSTocK says is labor worse than wasted. Mr. C. stated that any tree covered 

 above the ''seat of life" would certainly die, this being a natural laiv, and to it there 

 was no exception. 



