GO 



on which the experiment hnd been made, they found the growing 

 crop of corn thereon was in a much more promising and flourishing 

 state, and much better sustained the severity of the drought, to which 

 all lands in that vicinity were then exposed, than the crops of corn 

 which were then growing on the contiguous ground of a similar soil; 

 and which had been cultivated and manured in the ordinary manner." 

 Besides the ploughing in of the green crop, the field was manured 

 in the same manner as the other lands with which it is here com- 

 pared. 



The price of manure in Essex County, is extraordinary. Three 

 dollars and a half a cord for stable manure have been paid at 

 the stables in Methuen ; 55§4.50 in Andover ; and I have known $6 

 paid in Salem for compost of night soil and muscle bed. A farmer 

 in Middlesex, told me he was content to pay $5.50, for unmixed 

 cow manure in Lowell, and cart it a distance of 4 miles. The ex- 

 penses and trouble of transportation are often fully equal to half the 

 cost of manure. It is surprising to find farmers willing to pay such 

 prices ; and it would be well to inquire whether it would not be ex- 

 pedient to keep one man whose sole business it should be, whenever 

 the team could be spared, to collect the materials for a compost 

 heap, w^hich are to be found in abundance in almost every vicinity 

 for the labor of going afier them. At the prices above named, 

 manure may well be called the gold dust of the farmer. 



I am unwilling to quit this homely subject without remarking, 

 what always strikes me with great force, that beautiful and sublime 

 miracle of the divine Providence, by which the very refuse, which 

 man casts out and loathes, returns to bless him in the verdant fields, 

 and the teeming harvests, in the most fragrant flowers, the most deli- 

 cious fruits, and the most substantial products. 



The use of clover sowed among grain and even among corn for 

 ploughing in as the means of renovating the soil, has not prevailed 

 within my knowledge in Essex County ; but is commended to 

 their attention as likely to be eminently beneficial. For this pur- 

 pose we recommend most strongly the June, southern, or early 

 clover so called. 



No considerable experiments in the use of lime have come under 

 my notice. A farmer in Haverhill, who has applied lime as a top 



