264 



NEW ENGLAND FARIVIER. 



June 



cess of enriching, and furnish food for the 

 plants. 



Lands treated in this manner stand the 

 drought much more successfully than untrench- 

 ed grounds, and are always found to be more 

 productive, with the same amount of manure, 

 than the deepest soils in their natural and un- 

 worked state. 



On gardens we have seen it tried repeatedly. 

 It is well known that the sand and coarse 

 gravel ex«avated from wells and cellars, will, 

 when exposed to atmospheric influences, im- 

 bibe principles of fertility rapidly, where no 

 manure is used, and become in a short time 

 covered with verdure. We have knotvn the 

 common yellow, sandy loam, taken from the 

 pit and spread upon upland mowing fields, with 

 the happiest results. This loam is full of fer- 

 tilizing salts, which, upon being brought to the 

 influence of the air and rains, impart them to 

 the roots of the grass with surprising effect. 



Plaster and charcoal, each have a powerful 

 tendency to absorb enriching principles from 

 the air, and in all experiments like the one we 

 have suggested, they can be profitably em- 

 ployed. The second year after digging, a very 

 marked improvement will be apparent, and a 

 single operation will have a decided influence 

 for many years. 



Those who have but little land should attend 

 to this suggestion if they wish to make a gar- 

 den highly productive. We have tried it on 

 garden lands, accomjianied with thorough 

 draining, and think we have doubled the crop, 

 using no more manure than we did before the 



trenching. 



The Soil Breathes. 



When a soil is brought into the genial and 

 healthful condition which we have attempted 

 to describe, it has a vital action energizing 

 every portion of it, and it really breathes, as 

 truly as animals do. An ingenious and philo- 

 sophical writer says: "A few years since, if 

 one asserted that trees had lungs and breathed, 

 he would have been held to an argument to 

 prove it ; just as a few years earlier nobody 

 would have believed that a fish's gills, and the 

 leaves of a tree, and the lungs of a beast, all 

 performed the same office, that of aerating, or 

 airing the blood or sap. 



"The soil breathes. IIow does it breathe P 

 Its circulating fluid, the blood of the soil, is 

 water ; this comes to it from the air, and is 



already aerated, (that is, filled with air. ) This 

 soon loses its gases by contact with the soil, 

 just as the arterial blood fresh from the lungs, 

 loses its oxygen when passing its circuit in all 

 parts of the body. The blood comes back to 

 the lungs for more oxygen, but the blood of 

 the soil cannot do this, so ice must let the air 

 in, to come in contact with it." 



From this interesting exposition of nature's 

 workings, the gardener will see the necessity 

 for "stirring the soU as deeply as practicable 

 during droughts, but not to interfere with the 

 roots of growing plants, — so that a deep and 

 light soil shall invite a free circulation of air 

 beneath the surface. Hot air, the moment it 

 passes beneath the surface becomes very 

 moist, from the water which it originally con- 

 tained, and it deposits it ; thus not only airing 

 the soil, but adding to its moisture. Cold air 

 can hold but little moisture, but hot air dis- 

 solves an immense quantity, which it deposits 

 when it cools, or on cool surfaces. Who has 

 not noticed, of a winter's day, a locomotive 

 leaving behind it a snowy cloud of vapor, like 

 a comet's tail, often floating for a minute after 

 the train has passed? Think of this, and 

 watch the steam car on days when the hot 

 breath, just as full of water as in winter, is 

 puffed out into the eye of the sun, and not 

 steam enough shows to make a shadow, it is 

 so quickly absoi-bed by the air." 



These general remarks are sufficient to sug- 

 gest to any observing and reflecting person, 

 how he may secure at small cost, a garden 

 plot that will give him scope enough to raise 

 all the fruits and vegetables that a family needs 

 for its own use. It will require some labor, 

 and thought, and care, and so it will if he plow 

 his fields, builds his house, or sells his mer- 

 chandise. But the soil, once brought into con- 

 dition, and followed by generous dressings and 

 clean culture, it may be heavily cropt for gen- 

 erations without impairing its fertility. 



More Profitable Farmi>'g. — A Framing- 

 ham, Mass., correspondent notices another in- 

 stance of profitable farming in that town. 

 Three years ago Mr. M. M. Fisk bought six 

 acres of rather light land, on which he has ex- 

 pended for purchase money and labor $402. 

 The value of the three crops — potatoes, corn, 

 and rye seeded, with grass — has amounted to 



