1862, 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



379 



be richer than the farmer. He would be honest, 

 and admit that fanners were better off than the 

 mechanic. Farmers might make more money if 

 they farmed better. His friend Fish had grown 

 rich by the application of scientific principles to 

 the culture and manuring of the soil. Keeps 

 good cows, and makes G50 lbs. of cheese per cow. 

 One year, he (Fish) had made some 700 lbs. It 

 was just as cheap to keep a good cow as a poor 

 one. 



E. Cornell, of Ithaca, gave some very inter- 

 esting statistics of Tompkins county, showing that 

 the land, buildings, &c., were worth $13,000,000. 

 The crops raised were worth $2,713,011. Allow- 

 ing half of this sum for labor, seed and taxes, and 

 we have over 10 per cent, interest on the capital. 

 Farmers are getting rich. Better buildings, finer 

 bouses, etc. The land is not deteriorating — it is 

 annually becoming more productive. 



For the New England Farmer. 



HABRIET MABTIWEAU ON AMERICAN 

 AGBICUIiTUKE. 



In the year 1835, Miss Martineau made a tour 

 of observation in this country, and on her return 

 home published a couple of very interesting vol- 

 umes, embodying her views upon American socie- 

 ty, and commenting with a good deal of sagacity 

 upon our agriculture. Upon the subject of the 

 thorough tillage of England, and the slovenly of 

 America — a subject lately much discussed — she 

 makes the folloAving sensible remarks : 



"English farmers settling in the United States 

 used to be a joke to their native neighbors. The 

 Englishman began with laughing, or being 

 shocked, at the slovenly methods of cultivation 

 employed by the American settlers ; he was next 

 seen to look grave on his own account, and ended 

 by following the American plan. 



"The American plows round the stumps of the 

 trees he has felled, and is not very careful to 

 measure the area he plows and the seed he sows. 

 The Englishman clears half the quantity of land — 

 clears it very thoroughly — plows deep, sows thick, 

 raises twice the quantity of grain on half the area 

 of land, and points proudly to his crop. But the 

 American has, meantime, fenced, cleared and sown 

 more land, improved his house and stock, and 

 kept his money in his pocket. The Englishman 

 has paid for the labor bestowed on his beautiful 

 fields more than his fine crop repays him. When 

 he has done thus for a few seasons, till his money 

 has gone, he learns that he has got to a place 

 where it answers to spend land to save labor ; the 

 reverse of his experience in England ; and he soon 

 becomes as slovenly a farmer as the American, 

 and begins immediately to gi'ow rich." 



This is all very natural to expect, as the Eng- 

 lishman and the American are as near alike as two 

 eggs, (as Shakspeare would say,) their different 

 positions in their different countries or tlie shadow 

 of their institutions only making the apparent dis- 

 similarit)'. But while Miss Martineau knows the 

 American farmer recognizes the high comparative 

 price of labor in this country, she cannot account 

 for his opposing immigration so strenuously as he 

 does, when the tendency of this is to make labor 

 cheaper. But perhaps this is the result of mis- 

 taken political considerations. Respecting the 



close cultivation of the soil, this is a subject which 

 no theorizing or lecturing will influence, but will 

 come as a necessity with the increase of popula- 

 tion and the dearness of land. The American 

 farmer, where land is cheap and rising, always 

 wants more than he can cultivate, as a reserve for 

 speculation. Hence Miss M. observes : 



"The pride and delight of Americans is their 

 quantity of land. I do not remember meeting 

 with one to whom it had occurred that they had 

 too much. I saw a gentleman strike his fist on 

 the table in agony at the country's being so ^con- 

 foundedly prosperous!^ * * * Land was 

 spoken of as the unfailing resource against over- 

 manufacture ; the great wealth of the nation ; 

 the grand security of every man in it." 



If what she observes in another paragraph is 

 true, (and it undoubtedly is,) we need have no 

 fears that agriculture will run down ; in fact, it ap- 

 pears to be a kind of safety-valve to all other to- 

 cations. 



"The possession of land," she observes, "is the 

 aim of all action, generally speaking, and the cure 

 for all social evils among men in the United States. 

 If a man is disappointed in politics or love, he 

 goes and buys land. If he disgraces himself, he 

 betakes himself to a lot in the West. If the de- 

 mand for any article in manufacture slackens, the 

 operatives drop into the unsettled lands. If a 

 citizen's neighbors rise above him in the towns, he 

 betakes himself where he can be monarch of all 

 he surveys. An artisan works that he may die on 

 land of his own. He is frugal, that he may enable 

 his son to be a landowner. Farmers' daughters 

 go into factories that they may clear off the mort- 

 gage from their fathers' farms ; that they may be 

 independent landowners again." 



]\Iiss M. speaks fovorably of this, and remarks 

 that "it falls out well fen* the old world in prospect 

 of the time when the new world must be its gran- 

 ary." 



Both of the great political parties, she observes, 

 are proud of their lands, but the democratic party 

 were wont to say that the United States were in- 

 tended to be an agricultural country. "It seems 

 to me they are intended to be everything." 



In Massachusetts, and, in fact, in most, if not 

 all the New England States, the authoress sup- 

 posed agriculture to be on the decline — or in other 

 words supplanted by manufactures, for which she 

 thinks it best fitted ; and in this connection she 

 alludes to many farmers dividing their time with 

 other pursuits — fishing and shoemaking, for in- 

 stance. 



Miss Martineau's volumes are written Avith re- 

 markable vigor and freshness, abounding in a 

 good recognition of general principles, sagacious 

 observations, democratic tendencies and wise 

 prophecies — all covered with her hearty good 

 wishes. But, at present, I will make no further 

 extracts. d. w. l. 



West Medford, July, 1862. 



Thinning Pears. — One great error in the man- 

 agement of dwarf pear trees, is allowing the trees, 

 especially young trees, to bear too much fruit. It 

 is absolutely necessary for the health of the trees 

 and to secure good sized fruit, that the young fruit 

 be thinned ihorouglihj at this season. Don't be 

 afraid of thinning too much. — Genesee Farmer. 



