79 



The next inquiry, which the Essox farmer should make, is what 

 can he raise to sell? 



Hay is one of the first articles, and will yield ordinarily a fair pro- 

 fit. We have this advantage, that there is not a town in the county, 

 which may not find a market for its hay. The Ipswich farmers 

 have for years found a profit in transporting vast quantities to Bos- 

 ton market by land in spite of the competition of the neighboring 

 tov\ns, and the screwed hay from Maine. 



J'ruit is another article for which a ready market is generally 

 found. The produce of the orchard of one farm in West Newbury" 

 has been equal for several years, before the two last, when the owner 

 is suffering from the canker worm, to six or eight hundred dollars 

 per year. 



Indian Corn is the next crop which should claim the farmer's at- 

 tention. This crop is the greatest blessing that ever was bestowed 

 upon any country. It is not a more exhausting crop than potatoes 

 or any other crop, as may be ascertained from the result on those 

 places where it has been raised for years in succession on the same 

 ground, with tolerable success. The cost of the seed is a mere 

 trifle. The labor of cultivation will be greatly lessened when we 

 learn to use the horse plough and the drill harrow more and the 

 hoc less, and renounce the old and useless systems of hilling and 

 half hilling — The best product has been obtained by planting it in 

 drills from north to south, that it may have the full benefit of the 

 sun. A successful trial, we are told, has been made the last year 

 at the Alms House, in Haverhill, of cultivating it on a level surface 

 without hilling at all, with a horse harrow, and not putting a hoe to 

 it after the planting, the children of the establishment having been 

 employed to weed among the plants. The produce of corn fodder 

 from an acre for the feed of any neat stock, if well cured and chop- 

 ped, is nearly equal to a ton of English hay. There is no crop 

 which returns so much to the ground ; potatoes return nothing 

 where the crop is sold. The fodder from an acre of corn when the 

 crop is good, in the opinion of Chanceller Livingston of New- York, 

 will pay the labor of cultivation ; and if the manure is furnished by 

 the iann the grain may be considered as clear profit. 



The Dairy should be the next object of an Essex farmer. All the 

 butter and spare poultry wliich the County can produce may be 

 sold as fast as it is made and reared in the several towns and villaijea 



o 



'^ Statement of Willium Tlmrlow— Estcx Reports for l&2d— p. 21>, 



