74 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



picturesque scene of land and water, we could but admire the 

 taste which led that gay adventurer to select this spot as his 

 residence. 



The soil of tlie farm is mostly warm, and readily produces 

 fine crops of Indian corn and rye, and in moist seasons, heavy 

 crops of clover and grass. At the time of our visit, a second 

 crop of clover was being cut from a field of twenty acres. 

 Several of the committee expressed the opinion that they had 

 never seen a better second crop of clover — the yield being esti- 

 mated at a ton to the acre. The first crop had been much 

 heavier. Both crops, as well as most of the hay crop of the 

 farm, had been cut with the Buckeye mowing machine, the 

 operation of which gave much satisfaction. 



The live stock of the farm consists of about fifty head, most 

 of which are cows, the milk from them being sent to Boston. 

 The cows have generally been selected from the common stock 

 •of the country, but a few Ayrshires have latterly been kept, the 

 products of which have been such as to induce Mr. Adams to 

 ti*y the blood more extensively. He purchased in 1859 the 

 Ayrshire bull Troon, imported the previous year by the Massa- 

 chusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture, and is rearing 

 several heifers, the progeny of this bull from selected cows of 

 the herd. 



The barns on the farm are commodious and convenient. 

 The stock is not kept at the barns, except in the winter season, 

 being pastured in summer. Much of the fodder is cut for the 

 stock — a two-horse endless chain power, by which threshing 

 and other work may be performed, operating the cutter. 



At another part of the town, near Braintree, the committee 

 called at another of ^\v. Adams's farms — one on which stands 

 the ancient mansion (ancient for our country) in which the 

 two Presidents, John and John Quincy Adams, were born. Its 

 style of architecture by no means agrees with the fashion of this 

 generation, but it is still in good condition, and under the man- 

 agement of a neat New England housewife, its interior presents 

 an appearance of comfort which may often be sought in vain in 

 more modcrii and pretentious dwellings. 



This farm, consisting of about two hundred acres, has been 

 leased for several years to ]\[r. Charles A. Spear, whose man- 

 agement presents such au example of the profits of farming as 



