288 CULTIVATION OF HOPS. 



be perfectly immersed in still water : a vat is a better mode than a natural pit, into which the 

 water may flow, and when ready be drawn off. The time which it is to remain varies with the 

 state of the weather ; if warm, the process may be completed in five or six days or a week ; if 

 cool, or cold, it may require a month. The same method is employed for determining the 

 time when it is to be removed from the water as when it is rotted on the ground, viz. by trial ; 

 if the fibre separates from the stem readily, it is ready to be removed, when it is spread out to 

 dry upon the meadow. It is evident that where the time is uncertain for the process to be 

 completed, that trials of its state and condition should be made ^aily, after the first week, or 

 first five days. 



After the preceding was written, I observed that there was appended to the article of Mr. 

 Newcomb an analysis of the flax and seed, by .Johnston. By reference to page 303, volume 

 two of the Agriculture of New-York, it will be observed that flax is, as has been remarked al- 

 ready, an exhausting crop. My results may be relied upon, as care was bestowed upon the 

 process pursued in the analysis. It grew in Pittstown, upon slaty soil, and one which is natu- 

 rally fertile : lime, in combination with organic and phosphoric acids, exists in large proportions ; 

 potash exists also in large percentage ; sulphuric acid and soda are also in large proportions 

 for these elements. In flax seed, cliloride of sodium is an important substance, so that salt, as 

 a fertilizer, is adapted to and suitable to the flax plant. There can be no better rule, in pre- 

 paring fertilizers, than to be governed by analysis ; and analysis shows that the fertilizers which 

 I have given meet the wants of tlie plant better than ordinary barn-yard manure. It is stated 

 that grass seed takes remarkably well after flax, and for this fact it is supposed that flax does 

 not exhaust the soil materially. This is not, however, a sufficient reason ; the shading of the 

 soil, the extraction of the flax by the roots, which opens the soil so freely and evenly, favors 

 the germination and rooting of the seed. For the germination of seed, and its rooting, it is not 

 so essential that the soil should be very rich ; and soil which has been well prepared for this 

 crop, it is not expected that a single season will exhaust it. But I would never discourage the 

 culture of a crop because it is exhausting, when its value is in proportion to its expense. We 

 have such an abundance of fertilizers that crops of this kind may be cultivated far more exten- 

 sively than they are, and indeed should be. 



CULTIVATION OF HOPS. 

 Tlie cultivation of hops is attended with considerable expense. In the first place, the ground 

 requires deep and substantial ploughing : in the second place, the field must be heavily manured, 

 with the best the barn-yard affords, which must be harrowed in. The plants must be set from 

 six to eight feet apart, and these must be sustained with poles from fourteen to sixteen feet 

 long, set firmly in the ground. The gathering of the crop or picking the hop is troublesome 

 and expensive. The drying of the gathered hop requires a separate building, and experience 

 to perform the drying properly. Notwithstanding the expense and trouble of cultivating the 

 hop, it has been a profitable pursuit, a productive husbandry. The hop, as it requires a rich, 

 mellow soil, and is supplied with extensive roots, which penetrate deeply, may be regarded as 



