192 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



sisting of pond mud, leached ashes, chip, yard manure, night 

 soil, coal dust and iron scales, well pulverized and worked over 

 under cover. I laid this compost in August, having first 

 removed the earth around the roots, carefully with hoe and 

 hook, for a space two to four feet in diameter, according to the 

 size of the tree. I next applied to each tree a half bushel or 

 more of the manure, spread evenly around, drew back the 

 earth and covered the manure to keep it from drying. 



This has been my practice or treatment until the present 

 season, when I put all the land under cultivation, top-dressed it 

 with two hundred and fifty pounds of guano to the acre, well 

 spread, and planted with broomcorn. I think that tlie guano 

 acted favorably upon the trees, as might be seen in their dark 

 colored leaves, and in their new, large and healthy shoots from 

 two to three feet in length. 



Leverett, October, 1857. 



. HOUS ATONIC. 



From the Report of the Committee. 



Your committee recommend that a premium be offered for 

 fruit trees planted and properly protected along highways. An 

 apple tree is as easily planted as a maple, and a row of good, bear- 

 ing trees would afford a better protection for a fruit orchard, 

 than the highest fence. The fence is exclusive, aristocratic, — 

 Young America cannot abide it, — whilst the row of fruit trees 

 along the road compromises the matter, and hence strikes the 

 American mind as perfectly philosophical and satisfactory. 



We should not neglect to notice that nothing which we have 

 seen in all our examination has more excited our admiration, 

 than a hedge of buckthorn, cultivated on the grounds of Mrs. 

 David Ives, of Great Barrington. It is, as it were, a strain of 

 harmony in two parts, executed by art and nature. 



The lateness of the season, and the delay and carelessness of 

 competitors in entering their crops, have made the committee 

 many miles of useless travel, attended with no little embarrass- 

 ment ; yet we have met every where with a cordial kindness 

 and hospitality, — roses that have hidden all the thorns, — and if 



