Proceedings of the Farmers' Club. 439 



abstracted from the soil, by each successive crop, must be replaced 

 in an available condition, or else the average yield, instead of 

 increasing, lessens every year. The question naturally arises, how 

 can the farmer produce the largest crops, at the least expense, and 

 at the same time improve the quality of his land. 



It is self-evident that the present average yield per acre is but a 

 fraction of what could be produced under a thorough system of 

 tillage. The ruinous system of owning large tracts of land, scratch- 

 ing over the surface, and scantily manuring, has long been, and is 

 still a national evil. It is my firm belief, founded on experience, 

 that if all the manure and labor, now ineffectually squandered in 

 this way, wa^ applied to one-quarter of the present cultivated area, 

 the aggregate yield would be double, while the expense of pro- 

 ducing would be lessened at least one-third. Who can say that he 

 really knows the capacity of an acre of ground. On our farm I 

 have grown on a single acre eight bushels of oats, and in less than 

 four years the same acre produced eight hundred bushels of carrots. 

 Another field, that had never yielded more than twenty-five bushels 

 of shelled corn to the acre, has by a similar mode of treatment fre- 

 quently produced eight thousand marketable cabbages, and this 

 too, at a very moderate expense, and a handsome profit. 



The market gardener, with thorough culture and heav}- manuring 

 year after year, annually produces three crops of vegetables from 

 the same piece of ground, either one of the three abstracting from 

 the soil more nutriment and relatorily of more value than any of 

 the cereals. Nor is it unusual for the gross receipts for an acre, 

 cultivated in this way, to range from $600 to $700 each year. I 

 don't mean by this that every former should turn gardener, but I 

 do mean that the average yield of our staples could be doubled, 

 yes, quadrupled in many cases, by adopting the gardener's thor- 

 oughness of culture. Cultivate fewer acres, and cultivate them 

 well. Let your motto be " How much manure can I use with profit," 

 and not ''With how little can I get on." I believe it was Ralph 

 Waldo Emerson who said that a basement story belonged to every 

 farm in Massachusetts which the owners know little about, and the 

 sooner the acquaintance was made the better for the individual and 

 commonwealth. The same remark is more or less applicable to 

 every acre of arable land in the country. 



If the mass of farmers would fully realize this fact and act upon 

 it, our agricultural resources would be incalculably increased. As 



