274 BOAED OF AGRICULTUEE. 



from which it was brought. That is exactly what happened 

 to me the present season. 



For several years I have raised a variety of improved 

 "Canada Cap" corn, which has always been ready to har- 

 vest in September. The ears are small, but numerous and 

 closely packed, and the yield has been equal to seventy or 

 seventy-five bushels of shelled corn to the acre. Last fall, 

 at one of the fairs which I attended, I saw some seed-corn 

 that attracted my attention, and upon inquiry it appeared 

 to be an improvement upon what I bad, so I procured and 

 planted it. It came up and grew beautifully, and my field 

 was often spoken of as a fine piece of corn ; but at the time of 

 harvest I was disgusted with the result. The ears and ker- 

 nels were large, and the number of basketfuls quite satis- 

 factory ; but the corn was not matured, even as late as the 

 first of November. And where I had, with the small kind 

 of corn, not more than one basket of pig corn in a hundred, 

 this year the pig has more than he can eat. I had better 

 have " let well enough alone," 



In preparing ground for corn, I prefer to have rows both 

 ways, because the after cultivation can be better and more 

 easily done than when the rows are only one way. I use a 

 marker adjusted to make five rows to the rod, which gives 

 4,000 hills per acre. Four or five stalks to each hill, ac- 

 cording to the variety, are enough. 



In my own operations upon a small farm I do not use the 

 corn-planter nor the Thomas harrow, both of which imple- 

 ments may be advantageous where large areas are to be 

 planted and cultivated. Neither have I anything to say in 

 regard to growing corn for ensilage, as I have no knowledge 

 of my own in regard to those matters. 



The preparation of the ground for corn, as we have seen, 

 is of primary importance, both as regards the mechanical 

 manipulation of the soil, and supplying it with an abundance 

 of the most suitable fertilizing elements. Indeed, without 

 proper attention to these matters we have no right to expect 

 a satisfactory result. 



But all important as these matters are, they are not more 

 so than the after cultivation. No farmer can afibrd to put 

 manure upon his fields to be absorbed by a growth of weeds, 



