RULES AND SUGGESTIONS IN FARMING. 197 



the nucleus of greater improvement. But when the crop 

 is carried off, and nothing returned, deterioration must 

 take place — the food for the vegetables must undergo a 

 continual diminution. This is a plain exposition of the 

 cause of hnds^ lo earing out ; and at the same time of the 

 means of preventing their wearing out. 



9. All the elements of a good soil being present, its 

 fertility, and consequent profit, will in a measure depend 

 upon its exemption from an excess of water, which, like 

 fire, is a good servant, but a bad master. This excess 

 may arise from spouts and springs bursting up from below, 

 — from surface-waters, where the ground is level, or near- 

 ly so, settling and reposing upon a tenacious soil or sub- 

 soil, or from waters flowing from higher grounds. Hence 

 the importance of draining. We do not know of any 

 farm-crop which thrives upon a soil habitually wet, either 

 upon the surface, or within the natural range of the roots. 

 Water meadows and rice grounds profit by periodical 

 floodings, but they are injured by habitual wetness. 



10. Fertility depends much, also, upon the quality and 

 properties of the subsoil. If this is bad, or comes too 

 near the surface, its faults may be corrected by furrow- 

 draining, and the trench or subsoil plough, or by bringing 

 it up, in small portions at a time, or during a course of 

 crops, to the ameliorating influence of the atmosphere, 

 and incorporating it with the upper stratum, or proper 

 soil. 



11. If a soil, under good management, does not return 

 good crops, or if the crops are found annually to diminish, 

 it is a sure indication that there is a deficiency in some 

 of the primary elements of a good soil, that the subsoil 

 has a malign influence, or that there is an excess of water. 

 It is the province of the manager to seek out the cause 

 of the evil, and to apply the proper remedy, be it lime, 

 manure, drainage, or deeper tilth. In doing this, a knowl- 

 edge of natural science will be found of great advantage. 



12. The small-grain crops are the greatest exhausters 

 of the fertility of the soil, on account of their narrow system 

 of leaves, which draw sparingly from the atmosphere, 

 and the large portion of nutriment they extract from it to 



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