RECLAIMED MEADOWS. GT 



of herds grass and two pecks of red top. Late in tlie fall 

 I sowed four quarts of northern clover, not meaning to have 

 this vegetate before spring. Since the first sowing I have put 

 on another dressing of compost equal to the first, and my crops 

 continue good. I have mown this for the last three summers. 



The old pine swamp with a peat bottom, one arid a 

 miles off, was cleared in a different manner. The brush was 

 cut, dried, and burned, and the pine stumps were dug out 

 by the roots. This I find to be the only sure mode of subdu- 

 ing this swamp. The pine roots, extending far from the stump3 

 just under the surface, are poisonous to the good grasses, and 

 the low blackberry vine soon gets possession of the soil. I 

 have now about four acres which I have thoroughly subdued in 

 this way, and have taken from them three harvests of hay in 

 the last three summers. The cost of subduing in this thorough 

 manner, and sowing down, is full fifty dollars per acre, includ- 

 ing the draining. I have here two hundred rods of ditching; 

 and I have laid out the whole in plats of four rods in width. 

 The whole meadow has a deep peat bottom. 



The cost of covering the cranberry meadow with gravel was 

 less. Some acres I can cover with earth for thirty dollars per 

 acre. Mine cost me between thirty and forty. 



Framixgiiam, September, 1854. 



HAMPSHIRE. 

 Report of the Committee. 



It is peculiarly fortunate when the performance of a particu- 

 lar duty harmonizes with the tastes of those who have to fulfil 

 it; for then the mind, instead of dragging the slow length of 

 its ideas along, moves with alacrity, and imparts to others a 

 portion at least of the satisfaction which itself enjoys. 



Such is the happy position of the committee. Merc swamps 

 had been cold, wet, and dreary ; but that word reclaimed not 

 merely made our duty less irksome, but rendered it positively 

 delightful. The idea of reclaiming any thing quickens the pul- 

 sation of every generous heart, because it presupposes a down- 

 ward career and a tendency to the region of hopelessness ; and 



