72 



hereditary custom, than by any well matured plan having in view 

 the gradual and permanent improvement of the whole farm. We 

 know instances in which Indian Corn has been planted in the same 

 spot upwards of ten years in succession and potatoes nesjily as long. 

 The consequences are the gradual inpoverishmentof the soil, dimin- 

 ished crops, and the neglect of other and valuable parts of the farm, 

 which are doomed to the product of a sour or scanty herbage or to 

 perpetual barrenness and neglect. It does not now remain to be 

 proved that good husbandry requires a change and alternation of ^^^j 

 crops ;* that crops of the same kind on the same land should not 

 immediately succeed each other ; that it is a wasteful husbandry, 

 which year after year spends the manure of the farm on the same 

 pieces of land to the neglect of other parts of the farm ; and that a 

 skilful farmer will aim by a regular course and in succession to go 

 over the whole of his farm, which is capable of being subjected to 

 the plough, and bring it all both arable and pasture into as good a 

 condition as he can. The intelligent husbandman should look at 

 his whole farm to decide what should be done ; determine the quan*- 

 tity to be cultivated by the amount of labor and manure, which he 

 can apply to it ; and then arrange his rotation of crops so as to 

 take up one part after another in succession, that in the end the 

 whole shall be brought under a regular and systematic course of im 

 provement. 



We shall speak next of our improvident or unskilful management 

 of manure. Manure is essential to successful husbandry ; yet in 

 few instances is halt the amount made, which with little trouble 

 might be made. Of what is made a large portion is wasted by ex- 

 posure to the sun and rains. — We shall say nothing of the advan- 

 tages of barn cellars and vaults because they are deemed expensive. 

 But we will suggest a few simple rules, which every farmer may ob* 

 serve. Litter your stock with whatever of coarse fodder or refuse 

 hay or leaves you can procure, for their comfort and your interest. 

 The best farmer that Switzerland ever produced (Kliyogg) took 

 care that his cattle should stand knee deep in litter. — Fill your pig 

 styes and barn yards with litter, or mud, or loam drawn from the 

 sides of the roads, or wherever it can be taken without injury to the 



* " For more than half a century the rotation s^^stem has formed the true 

 test of agricultural improveraont in overy variety of soil and climate. When- 

 ever it has been adopted the art is found in a state of prosperous progression ; 

 whenever neglected or rejected it is cither stationary or retrograde." Trea- 

 tise on Agriculture, p. 81. 



