AND HORTICULTURAL REGISTER. 



^ 



\ (lb. XV11.3 



PUnLISHED BY JOSEPH BRECK & CO., NO. 52 NORTH MARKET STREET, (Agbicultdral Warehouse.) 

 BOSTON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, APRIL 24. 1839. 



[NO. 43. 



N. E. FARMER 



H^ subjoined address was delivered at the Show 

 ' Berkshire Agricultural Society, in 1836, by 

 ;'r \V. Bishop, Esi;., of Lenox. A copy was 



-led by the society, but the request was de- 

 1, from a reluctance to tax the funds of the 

 i\-, There are few ways in which a portion 



111 could be better used. We feel ourselves 

 ■iilarly indebted to the kindness of tlie author, 



iiiiitting us, by our request, to enrich our col- 



" ith it. It will be read with great pleasure. 



(JiXTLEMEN OF THK SociF.TT: — The seasons 

 i\e .li.-ipensed their blessings : the fruits, to which 

 lesliowers of spring gave life, and summer's warmth 

 ave substance, autumnal suns have ripened. The 

 bors of the present year are closed : the fruit germs 

 " the next are wrapped in winter clothing : 

 le forest leaves are sending back again the vi- 

 il fluids to tlie roots : soon will the chilling night- 

 dl impel the patient ox to seek his stall, and win- 

 y winds, revisiting the highlands, drive down to 

 leir folds the warm-clad flocks. In this, the even- 

 ig of the year, their labors over, and nature, all 

 round them, falling to repose, 'tis rational, 'tis 

 ise, for the cultivators of the earth, to come in 

 oni the fields around, lay aside the instruments 

 nd habiliments of husbandry, and 'conclude the 

 ;ene by appropriate festivities. With usy in Berk- 

 lire, this is an occasion of high and animating in- 

 >rest, — an occasion, which annually brings to this, 

 le queen of her villages, and convenes within these 

 icred walls, the active, the intelligent and the re- 

 ned of her population. Why does the interest, 

 jlt in our society, in this anniversary, grow stron- 

 er and stronger, and extend itself farther and far- 

 ler, each successive year ? Is it because it gives 

 3laxation from toil, — a season of recreation — a 

 ocial pastime ? For other objects was this asso 

 iatiou formed ; for higher and nobler purposes 

 ave its inlUiences been excited. Its relations, and 

 leir vital importance to the prominent pursuits and 

 ccupations of this county, convene us, not merely 

 3 extend the greeting hand, regale upon the rich 

 lands of our hosts, and disperse ; but to commune 

 reely and fully, upon the varied interests of agri- 

 ulture and its kindred occupations, — to cast back 

 3 determine what has been, and forward to ascer- 

 lin what can be done, to advance them. 



The other occupations of life know and acknowl- 

 dge no such state as quiescence. Their march is 

 nward. Intellectual activity is the element of 

 leir success, and they move forward with the rap- 

 iity of thought. Every new principle — every new 

 ombination of matter, and every new application 

 fits laws, is seized and husbanded by themechan- 

 ;. " He makes the air his servant, and the waters 

 is workmen." By accelerated movement, he has 

 iven to days the value of years and reduced degrees 

 minutes. He has shot beyond the limits set by 

 tie boldest anticipations, and He only, who has limit- 

 d the powers of the human intellect at conception, 

 nd prescribed all the possible forms and appliances 

 f matter, can determine what the future may unfold. 



Will the agriculturist consent to fold his arms in 

 stationary attitude, while all around him are hurry- 

 ing on to the attainment of greater excellence and 

 higher eminence ? Will he bo patient to have his 

 occupation regarded as a mere trade, requiring 

 nothing but muscular strength and manual dexter- 

 ity, while tlie other departments of business, less 

 uaeful and less intimately blended with social well- 

 being, are acquiring all the respectability which 

 art, and all the dignity which science can impart 

 to them ? If it do nut move on abreast with them, 

 the fault is entirely his own. If it be true, that 

 science has done less for agriculture than for other 

 occupations, it is also true that there is nothing for 

 which it can do more ; indeed, there is nothing for 

 which it can do so much, for nothing else requires 

 learning so various. Is it of less moment that the 

 husbandman should understand the composition of 

 his soils, than that the clothier should know that of 

 his dyes? Is it of more practical importance that 

 the leather manufacturer should know the proper- 

 ties and action of heat, than that he who cultivates 

 the earth, should know its power and influence up- 

 on vegetation ?• If, after years of minute and accu* 

 rate observation, and. by the collection of facts 

 innumerable, and leading truths illustrated in prac- 

 tice, and confirmed by experience, important and 

 interesting relations are disclosed between the vital 

 air and animal organization, enabling the learned 

 physician to detect and obviate the causes of dis- 

 ease, who will venture to predict, that relations, if 

 not equally important, quite as curious, may not be 

 discovered between the same fluid and vegetable 

 organization, which, by tlie aid of facts and expe- 

 rience, will enable the scientific husbandman to 

 detect and obviate the causes of the failure of an- 

 ticipated harvests ? The discovery that caustic 

 lime-stone would absorb and retain the noxious ex- 

 halations of putrefaction, was justly accounted an 

 important achievement by physical science— a sig- 

 nal victory over the subtle agents of death. The 

 relations of the discovered truth to human health 

 and life, were quickly discerned and applied. But 

 discovery did not stop here. It has been as clearly 

 disclosed, that the noxious substance exhaled, is- 

 the chief aliment of plants, and though destructive 

 to animal, sustains vegetable vitality, and that, in 

 combination with lime, it can be long preserved, 

 conveniently used, and parts, except as required 

 for the purposes of vegetation, with few, if any, of 

 its fertilizing properties. Wliy may not the double 

 application of this single truth, double the benefits 

 of its discovery to mankind ? Were the effects of 

 the laws of vitality, which govern the functions of 

 plants, as closely watched and as accurately record- 

 ed by the farmer, as those which govern animal 

 functions are by the physician, a new characterand 

 a new impulse might bo given to agriculture, and 

 the toils of labor be regarded as the recreations of 

 learning. 



Until the recent companionship of chemistry with 

 ao-riculture, it was hardly considered as having any- 

 thing to do with uniform physical laws, or if it were, 

 the n-eneral ignorance of those laws precluded the 



possibility of a practical conformity to their opera- 

 tions. The influence of heat, moisture, and the at- 

 mosphere, upoQ vegetation, was more or less known, 

 but their nature and modes of actinn were subjects 

 of superstitious conjecture ; and the thermometer, 

 barometer, and other cheap and simple contrivances 

 by which their changes may be foretold, and which 

 have shorn the moon of half its glory, were un- 

 known. There are certain natural phenomena, the 

 study of which is of conceded importance. Those 

 connected with climate are most obviously bucIi. 

 To climate, all the processes of husbandry, whether 

 tillage or grazing, must be adjusted, and its influ- 

 ence extends not only to the kind of plants and an- 

 imals to be reared, but to the mode of rearing. A 

 few plants and but few, are universal. Of those 

 belonging to agriculture, may be enumerated most 

 of the annual pasture and hay grasses, -and of the 

 cereal grasses, wheat, rye and barley. The pea, 

 bean, turnip, potato and perennial pasture grasses, 

 will not thrive either in very high or low tempera- 

 ture ; cotto;/ and rice can be grown in warm coun- 

 tries only, and the oat in temperate regions. Soma 

 animals, are universal, as the swine and horse ; oth- 

 ers are limited in their range, as the sheep when 

 domesticated. It will, to be sure, live in Lapland 

 or Congo, but in either country deteriorates, and 

 loses its useful qualities. In very high latitudes, 

 it requires a protection, the expenses of which are 

 widely disproportionate to its value ; and in low, its 

 soft, fine dotting is converted to a loose coarse 

 garment of b^ir. No one can be found so fool- 

 hardy as to attempt to raise the fruits of the tropics 

 in open sky, '.t fifty degrees above the equator, or 

 to substitute the reindeer for the camel upon tlie 

 sands of Africa, or the camel for the reindeer among 

 the snowdrifts of Siberian It wonld be a defiance 

 of the operations .if well-known, unyielding natural 

 laws, — an act of. stupid folly ; and little else than 

 such, is the atterapt to transfer any of the vegeta- 

 ble species from its own to unwelcome localities. 

 Efforts at acclimation have, with very few excep- 

 tions, been unavailing. The eflfects of climate 

 have destroyed the favorite exotics, long before 

 they could adapt themselves to the circumstances 

 of their new situation. 



By climate, as connected with agriculture, some- 

 thing more is intended than those alternations of 

 temperature, occasioned by the seasons in the dif- 

 ferent geographical parallels of latitude : there are 

 local, which modify, strengthen or counteract the 

 influences of these ^g-cnera/ causes, and which merit 

 the special notice of the practical husbandman, 

 who, when he may, would make nature his auxilia- 

 ry. Little can be inferred of the climate of any 

 section within the temperate parallels, by the mere 

 knowledge of its distance from the tropic. While 

 the English farmer in Northumberland, is busily 

 preparing his well dried field for the barley crop, 

 the farmer of Berkshire, .500 miles below him, may 

 be riding on snowdrifts over the fences wliich en- 

 close his stalk-grounds. Within our own local 

 limits, we notice the effects of local climate. The 

 ploughman, while, in early spring, subverting the 



