RECLAIMED MEADOWS. 65 



the holes "with blackberry roots, small stumps, and hassocks 

 within eighteen inches of the top, then covering it over with 

 mud from the next hole and planting potatoes upon it. The 

 clearing and planting were both done at once. The piece 

 managed in this way was not less than two acres. A man 

 would clear and plant from four to six square rods per day. 

 Wages at that time were a dollar a day. Cost of clearing 

 and planting, thirty-two dollars per acre ; cost of ditch, ten 

 dollars per acre — making in all forty-two dollars per acre. 

 The crop of potatoes was not less than two hundred bushels 

 per acre. 



Grass seed was sown on the ground when the potatoes were 

 dug, and the ground raked over. In 1845-6-7-8 and 9, mak- 

 ing five years, it produced as good a crop of English hay as I 

 ever raised upon any ground, without any manure except what 

 was put on the first crop of potatoes. In 1850 the crop of 

 grass began to fail, and some wild grass came in. In Septem- 

 ber, 1850, I ploughed it by hitching the plough behind a pair 

 of wheels, so that the oxen could walk on the grass. In the 

 winter, when it was frozen, I teamed on manure, all kinds being 

 mixed, about four cords to the acre. I planted it in 1851 with 

 potatoes ; the crop was from three to five hundred bushels to 

 the acre. Finding this much more profitable than hay, I have 

 managed it in the same way until the present time. When the 

 potatoes have been dug early, before they got their full growth, 

 I have not obtained so large a crop. When they have been 

 allowed to remain in the ground they have never failed of 

 yielding three times as much as the upland. 



The present season I invited the town clerk, with a number 

 of other gentlemen, to witness the measurement of the ground 

 and the digging and measurement of the potatoes. From this, 

 which I enclose, you will sec that the crop cannot be valued at 

 less than three hundred dollars per acre — many having now 

 been sold for more than one dollar and fifty cents per bushel. 



Wilmington, October 2, 1854. 

 9* 



