172 PECULIAR BENEFIT TO CLOVER. 



the recommendations of writers on this grass, or by the success 

 witnessed on better constituted soils elsewhere. The utmost that 

 has been gained, by any of these numerous efforts, has been some- 

 times to obtain one, or at most two mowings, of middling clover, 

 on some very rich lot, which had been prepared in the most perfect 

 manner by the previous cultivation of tobacco. Even in such 

 situations, this degree of success could only be obtained by the 

 concurrence of the most favourable seasons. Severe cold, and 

 sudden alternations of temperature in winter and spring, and the 

 spells of hot and dry weather which we usually have in summer, 

 were alike fatal to the growth of clover, on so unfriendly a soil. 

 The few examples of partial success never served to pay for the 

 more frequent failures and losses ; and a few years' trial would 

 convince the most ardent, or the most obstinate advocate for tjie 

 clover husbandry, that its introduction on the ordinary poor soils 

 of lower Virginia was absolutely impossible ; and scarcely practi- 

 cable, even partially, on such lands when very highly manured. 

 Still the general failure was, by common consent, attributed to any- 

 thing but the true cause. There was always some reason offered 

 for each particular failure, sufficient to cause it, and but for which 

 (it was supposed) a crop might have been raised. Either the 

 young plants were killed by freezing soon after first springing from 

 the seed or a drought occurred when the crop was most exposed 

 to the sun, by reaping the sheltering crop of wheat or native and 

 hardy weeds, aided by very favourable weather, overran the crop ; 

 and all such disasters were supposed to be increased in force, and 

 rendered generally fatal, by our sandy soil, and hot and d*y sum- 

 mers. But after the true evil, the acid nature of the soil, is re- 

 moved by marling, clover ceases to be a feeble exotic. If with- 

 standing the early dangers of frost on the newly sprouted plants, 

 and of drought soon after, clover is then naturalized on our soil, 

 and is able to contend with rival plants, and to undergo every 

 severity and change of season, as safely as our crops of corn and 

 wheat and offers to our acceptance the fruition of those hopes of 

 profit and improvement from this grass, with which previously we 

 had only been deluded. 



After much waste of seed and labour, and years of disappointed 

 efforts, I had abandoned clover as utterly hopeless. But after 

 marling the fields on which the raising of clover had been vainly 

 attempted, there arose from its scattered and feeble remains, a 

 growth which served to prove that its cultivation would then be 

 safe and profitable. It has since been gradually extended over all 

 the fields. It will stand well, and maintain a healthy growth on 

 the poorest marled land; but the crop is too scanty for mowing, or 

 perhaps for profit of any kind, on most poor sandy soils, unless 

 aided by gypsum. Newly cleared lands yield better clover than 



