604 SELECTIONS FROM ADDRESSES. 



upon it cannot but be warmer than the supernatant soil. 

 Properly underdrained fields are also early. The absence of 

 an excess of water prevents the accumulation of ice through 

 the soil and leaves it ready for the plough and in a less com- 

 pacted form than soils not so treated. 



The underdraining of Enghsh farms, and the action of the 

 British government in relation to the profit consequent upon 

 underdrains, settles all doubt on this question. Long practice 

 has shown that most farms, when properly underdrained, give 

 an excess of produce, as compared with their previous produc- 

 tion, which enables the farmer to pay ten per cent, of the cost 

 of underdraining each year from the increased products, and 

 therefore, at the end of a few years he finds his farm increased 

 ten per cent, in value, or more, with the cost of improvement 

 paid for, by the excess of crops during those few years. In- 

 deed, some of the English statesmen have advanced the doc- 

 trine that although but a portion of the farms are as yet under- 

 drained, still the whole agricultural product has been increased 

 ten per cent, by this improvement alone. From these causes 

 the government have each year set apart a large fund to be 

 loaned for draining mortgages, and these mortgages are only 

 active beyond a valuation previously made of the farm. The 

 owner is required to pay five per cent, of the principal an- 

 nually, until all the mortgage is discharged by such paynjents ; 

 and should he fail to make these payments, and the mortgage 

 should be foreclosed, the government can only appeal to the 

 increased value, beyond the value fixed before the underdrains, 

 for their payment; and still no case has yet occurred where 

 this increased value was not entirely sufficient to discharge 

 the debt. 



I should like to dwell more specially on underdraining and 

 subsoil ploughing, as applied to this country, and particularly 

 to this district, if my time would admit. 



To recur to the importance of fairs. Perhaps no set of citi- 

 zens are less migratory than farmers. They remain at home, 

 their vocations seldom permitting them to leave their business, 

 and hence we find modes of operating pursued in one town- 

 ship scarcely known to any other. Many farmers in different 

 parts of the country raise one hundred bushels shelled corn per 

 acre, and still thousands of farmers, occupying land of similar 

 quality, continue to be satisfied with a product of one-third that 



