32 ESSEX SOCIETY. 



So the specimen of Indian corn, produced by Isaac Babson, of 

 Beverly, accompanied by a statement of Rev. E. M. Stone, is 

 exceedingly fine. Whatever may be the facilities for obtaining 

 corn further south, every effort should be made to produce it in 

 our own fields, and the idea of ripening it before the early frosts 

 is most important ; this is, perhaps, of more consequence than 

 the mere abundance of the crop, attended with the usual uncer- 

 tainty of ripening before the frosts of early autumn. 



For the Committee, 



D. CHOATE. 



Edwin M. Stone's Statement. 



The accompanying twelve ears of corn, of the twelve and 

 eight rowed kind, I gathered from the field on Tuesday of last 

 week (16th September). They are a fair sample of an acre 

 and two thirds, cultivated by a neighbor, Mr. Isaac Babson, 

 which was in proper condition to harvest last week. The corn 

 was in silk on the 28th of June, and the stalks were fit to cut 18th 

 of August, and were cut 25th of that month. Mr. Babson has 

 planted this variety several years, and has uniformly obtained 

 fifty bushels to the acre. He thinks his field will yield at that 

 rate the present season. He plants four feet apart each way, 

 and manures in the hill. The weight of this corn, when in or- 

 der for grinding, has been found, upon trial, to be sixty -pounds 

 to the bushel, or three thousand pounds to the acre. 



My principal object in procuring and presenting these sam- 

 ples, is to afford a practical demonstration of what farmers, with 

 a little pains, may do, to bring their corn to early maturity. Mr. 

 Babson' s practice has been, for a number of years, to select his seed, 

 in the field, from the fairest and most forward ears ; and the re- 

 sult is, that his corn ripens a fortnight earlier than it did when 

 he commenced planting this kind. This, it seems to me, is an 

 important fact, and, if duly heeded by farmers generally, will 

 place their corn crops beyond the reach of our earliest frosts, as 

 well as the storms of October, which often beat down and soil 

 the butt stalks. 



Beverly i September 24, 1845. 



