150 Eulogium on William West. 



scantily made. Successive crops of grain exhausted 

 the ground : the slovenly practice of sowing wheat or 

 rye among the standing Indian corn was universal, and 

 the cultivation of artificial grasses especially of that great 

 fertilizer red clover^ which has done so much for Penn- 

 sylvania, was unknown. The cattle were therefore per- 

 mitted to wander over the fields to pick up the slender 

 provision afforded by nature, or to browse upon young 

 twigs in the woods, to the certain destruction of the 

 gro^ving timber : grazing at that time was solely con- 

 fined to the rich natural meadows on the peninsula, 

 between the rivers Delaware and Schuylkill, and many 

 farmers depended entirely upon them for the supply 

 of their winter beef, and even for part of the hay 

 for their live stock. In short, he found that the whole 

 management of a farm was pursued not upon fixed 

 principles, but in a random manner ; the object appear- 

 ing to be, to obtain as much from the land as possible, 

 without regard to the preservation or improvement of 

 the powers of the soil. With those facts before him, the 

 prospect was extremely discouraging. He did not 

 pretend to any knowledge in farming; but what he saAv 

 and learnt were sufncient to convince him that practices 

 which neither enriched the farmer nor the land, could 

 not be the most eligible, and he therefore determined 

 not to adopt them, and as he could derive no informa^ 

 tion from his neighbours, he read what books he could 

 procure on farming, and for the rest he depended upon 

 his own judgment. At the day alluded to, the science 

 of agriculture was at a low ebb in every part of the 

 European and American world : the useful spirit for 

 diffusing information by means of books, was not ex- 



