218 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



is producing grass "with us where the meadows and swamp- 

 land are cultivated. We are producing remarkable effects on 

 such lands with the cranberry. The sand w^hich is carried on 

 our low, swampy meadow-lands is producing wonderful ef- 

 fects, without any manure at all. Hundreds of acres in my 

 own section of the State have been brought into cultivation 

 within a few years by means of the sand tiiat is carried on 

 the land to the depth of three or four inches. So great has 

 been the improvement, that, in one or two cases where we 

 have been cultivating the cranberry instead of grass' upon 

 this low land, we have taken one hundred bushels of cranber- 

 ries, worth $1,200, from an acre. That is what sand is doing 

 in that section of the State. 



We have also tried sand upon our meadows, and it has 

 produced wonderful effects even there. I have been for some 

 years cultivating a low jDiece of meadow, where I could not, 

 for a long time, except by draining, get on with a team at all. 

 Finally, after draining, I was enabled, in the month of Sep- 

 tember, to get a plough in there, and I liave cultivated that 

 piece now for two or three years or more with crops. I was 

 enabled to turn over a piece of low meadow, after draining it ; 

 then I put upon it my sand, and sowed what compost I had; 

 and then I put upon that, in the month of September, my 

 seed, and it took root during the fall. And, mind you, this 

 was land that was filled with roots ; it was a swampy, marshy 

 meadow, filled with swamp-roots. I covered this so deep 

 that the grass took in the autumn, and the next season I had 

 as fine a crop of grass as could be produced in almost any 

 portion of the State. That continued for several years. By 

 and by, as good luck would have it (as they tell us that " it 

 is an ill- wind that blows nobody any good ") , a cargo of Pe- 

 ruvian guano was wrecked upon our shores, and I got several 

 tons of it. I put one ton on this land, after I had sown it 

 down for five years, and it has never been turned up to this 

 day. It is more than ten years since I put this Peruvian gu- 

 ano upon it. Some of the herdsgrass which was grown 

 upon this swamp-meadow, which had produced little or noth- 

 ing before, stood higher than my head. This is my experi- 

 ence in cultivating grass. While my neighbors have been 

 producing cranberries on their low lands, I have tried grass 



