196 COTTON PLANTER'S MANUAL. 



All these constituents being derived directly from the soil, 

 plainly indicate the reasons why our lands in the South are so 

 easily exhausted. The crops extensively cultivated here all 

 require, in a great measure, the same food from the soil ; and 

 hence soils which will not produce cotton, are alike incapable 

 of producing the cereal crops. The great benefit derived from 

 the application of cotton seed as a manure to these crops, is 

 accounted for from the same causes ; an abundance of phos- 

 phates being given in their application to the soil. 



FALLOWING. A system of tillage which carries away an- 

 nually so large a proportion of these natural essentials to 

 vegetation, and which provides no means of returning them, 

 must necessarily impoverish any soil. A fixed principle in the 

 agriculture of all countries where the prosperity of the future 

 has at all been regarded, has been the gradual but certain 

 improvement of the soil. This is necessary for the support of 

 increased population ; and in the Slave States, where there has 

 been such an extraordinary and rapid increase of the laboring 

 population, it should never be lost sight of. The intensity of 

 our southern sunshine prevents, in a great measure, the annual 

 coat of grass which supplies vegetable matter to the soil in 

 northern climates; and the never-ending occupation of the 

 soils, by our system of culture, prevents the natural improve- 

 ment which in other countries is carried out by fallowing. We 

 are well aware that fallowing is generally objected to in the 

 South ; and we think where fallow is converted into pasture 

 land, and taxed during the whole season for the production of 

 herbage to sustain greedy herds, the system might well come 

 into disrepute. Planters, too, object to fallowing, and say they 

 have not land enough to allow one-half to lie idle, &c. ; but 

 reason, and justice to the noble occupation of agriculture, al- 

 lows this objection to pass unheeded ; and its fallacy is proven 

 by the desert wastes of " old fields? an agricultural feature 



