160 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



clover as a fertilizer. The professor brought it forward very 

 beautifully and happily. It is plain that it grows plentifully ; 

 but if I should tell you the length of some roots of clover that 

 I have seen, you would think I was drawing a long bow, so I 

 will only say that they were very long. It is a rapid growing 

 plant, and throws its roots down into the subsoil to take up the 

 mineral elements there, while the long, broad leaves are swept 

 across by every wind that blows. They are opening the soil 

 and making it just what it ought to be to supply the carbona- 

 ceous matter needed by the plants. That is why he recom- 

 mended clover — to supply the organic matter in the soil, which 

 is taken from the minerals below and from the gas of the air. 



It is true, one thing should be borne in mind, and the pro- 

 fessor brought it out pretty well, that this rotation of crops 

 actually robs the soil in a certain sense ; but while you are tak- 

 ing one material, nature is at work storing up another from the 

 decomposition of the rocks. I noticed one point which seemed 

 likely to create a wrong impression, when he spoke of mowing 

 meadows in the fall of the year. I confess I think it very likely 

 that the conditions here are such that that is the most profitable 

 thing you can do. I am not going to controvert that at all ; I 

 wish simply to call attention to a point which seemed likely to 

 lead to incorrect conclusions. It was said that in a certain field 

 a swath was mowed close in the fall of the year, and another 

 patch right by the side of it was left unmowed, and the next 

 year no perceptible difference was seen. I thought the infer- 

 ence likely to be drawn was, that therefore no harm was done 

 by taking off that grass at that time. Now my friend Dr. 

 Durfee was introduced as a man who not only holds the money- 

 bag of the Agricultural College, but has a pretty deep one of 

 his own. If he should send a check to the bank to-day for a 

 thousand dollars, it would be honored ; and if he should send 

 another to-morrow, it would be honored ; and if he should send 

 a third the next day, that, too, would be honored ; but, deep as 

 his money-bag is, he could send his checks so often, that by 

 and by they would not be honored. Now, sir, this grass that 

 comes up in the fall of the year has two purposes to perform. 

 The first is, to take the nutriment from the air and the earth 

 and store it up in the roots of the grass, laying it up in the form 

 of sugar and starch and other materials, to send up life in the 



