SECRETARY'S REPORT. 91 



will give a pretty good growth of rye, and will cause grass seed 

 to spring up and live. One piece of four or five acres that I 

 ploughed up a few years ago, has produced more feed than any 

 ten or twenty acres of the same piece. 



Mr. Anderson. — I still contend that I can kill the high laurel. 

 It is a good deal more difficult to kill than sweet fern, but I 

 have succeeded, on pastures where I have attempted it, in the 

 course of six or seven years. It requires a good deal of time 

 and attention, but if you cut it down smooth to the ground in 

 the first place, and are assiduous in your labors as soon as 

 it comes up, you will be sure to kill it. It can no more live 

 without its leaves, than a man can live without lungs. 



I would like to inquire about ditching. I have, by expending 

 perhaps twenty-five dollars on four or five acres, in digging 

 ditches and filling them with stone, made land which was 

 formerly useless, the very best land I have. A great deal of 

 our pasture land is too moist. Pasture and mowing land should 

 be dry enough to raise corn. The best corn land is the best 

 land for grass, and I think we should derive as great benefit 

 from ditcliing our pastures as we should from ditching our 

 mowing land. 



Dr. Hartwell. — Is there any plant that will not die if you 

 cut it below the leaves ? 



Mr. Anderson. — No, sir. I remember that, formerly, our best 

 mowers were considered those who mowed close to the surface ; 

 and I have known them mow so close on our best lands, where 

 we had been accustomed to have a second crop, that we could 

 not get a second crop ; whereas, on other parts of the field, that 

 were mowed so as to leave something of the herbage, it would 

 start right up and grow. The other would not start that year, 

 and would be injured for years after. 



Mr. Perkins. — One word in regard to cutting down trees and 

 vegetation. I maintain that if you cut hard wood from this 

 season until the first of May or June, it will not kill it. You 

 may cut any kind of vegetation from the latter part of August 

 to the first of October, and effectually kill it. If I am cutting 

 in the forest, and wish it to sprout up again, I cut only in the 

 spring ; if I don't want it to sprout, I cut from the latter part 

 of August until the first of October. I have cleared thirty-five 

 acres of meadow, that was just one mass of underbrush. I cut 



