86 MIDDLESEX SOCIETY. 



for us to incorporate a portion of it with this report. We 

 must therefore speak in general terms of his cornfield, exceed- 

 ing twenty acres, of his broad reclaimed meadows, of his 

 ploughed bogs, with their immensely broad furrows, seemingly 

 the work of a team of elephants ; of his almost interminable 

 lines of drains, open and covered ; of his stone walls, his 

 beautiful orchard ; his barns and barn cellars, all betokening a 

 head to plan and a hand to execute, the most bold and intri- 

 cate agricultural works. In the manner of carrying on his 

 farm, Mr. Brown wovild be, in most respects, a safe model. 

 Systematically, thoroughly, quietly ; these seem to be the 

 talismanic words. In one particular, however, we must take 

 the liberty to advise an improvement, and that is, the keeping 

 of an exact written account of the expenditures and proceeds of 

 the farm. To Mr. Brown it may be attended with no special 

 danger to neglect this ; but to most men it would be a fatal 

 oversight. Much as we reverence the human intellect, we 

 doubt whether " one small head " should be required to " car- 

 ry" all the complicate accounts of a large farm. 



In regard to reclaimed meadows, your committee would 

 remark, that what has passed under their observation, author- 

 izes them to say, that with the experiments in reclaiming 

 swamps, began a new era in agriculture. Lands, regarded as 

 comparatively worthless ever since the settlement of the coun- 

 try, are now found to be of the very highest value. Though 

 the labor and expense of reclaiming these tracts may at first 

 appear formidable and discouraging, still it has invariably been 

 found, that no outlay has proved a better investment, and no 

 labor been better rewarded. When we consider what has 

 already been accomplished in this way, and what immense 

 tracts of unreclaimed meadow still invite the efforts of the 

 farmer, we feel that there are among us unwrought mines, 

 which will by and by prove more productive than those, of 

 California. 



The Middlesex Agricultural Society, in offering a premium 

 for the best conducted experiment on swamp meadow land, 

 annexed the condition that the experiment should extend over 

 a period of three years. This condition excludes, for the pre- 

 sent, several applicants whose lands we have visited. Of them, 

 as well as the others, we can speak in terms of approbation. 



