Proceedings of tee Farmers' Club. , 409 



roads, and wliether you plow deep or shallow, your crops will not be 

 worth the planting till you make another soil. In the best portions 

 of New Jersey and Pennsylvania through which we traveled, the 

 natural soil of the uplands (and we are not considering alluvial forma- 

 tion in this connection) was generally from three to four inches in 

 depth, as shown by the banks along the roads ; in some concave spots, 

 where leaves had accumulated during the ages of forests, we may 

 sometimes see a depth of five or six inches. 



This is the primitive or virgin soil. It is dark colored ; the line of 

 demarcation between it and the subsoil is usually distinct. It is the 

 decayed vegetable matter it contains that in a great measure makes 

 it productive. Now suppose you use a plow running a foot deep, 

 your three or four inches of soil will be covered with eight or nine 

 inches of subsoil. The farmer who can prove that such plowing is 

 best, must prove also that the feeding roots of plants prefer to burrow 

 down to such a depth. Dr. Thompson, of Salem, told us he wished 

 to make his garden more productive, and had one-half of it trenched! 

 That portion, for the time being, he considers ruined. Sweet corn 

 produced little, spindling stalks, and absolutely no ears. He says 

 there is nothing to be done now, except to manure, and manure until 

 he makes all the worthless ground he has brought to the surface as 

 rich as that he buried. If you have a superabundance of manure do 

 as George Abbott does, plow deeper, so as to make room for it. If 

 you want great crops of corn, do as they do in Salem, have nothing 

 grow upon the ground but corn at the same time ; no weeds, no grass ; 

 cultivate, and cultivate the surface, whether the season is wet or dry, 

 but more often when dry. As to the hospitality with which we were 

 treated, and the proofs of high civilization that we saw during the 

 trip, we have only to remark, that whenever it shall become neces- 

 sary to send another committee to Salem each one of us wishes to be 

 considered as a candidate for appointment. 



I. P. TRIMBLE. 



A. B. CRANDALL. 



J. C. Y. SMITH. 



T. C. PETERS. 



J. B. LYMAK 



J. B. Lyman. — Mr. Chairman : Although I sign this report, and 

 approve it as a statement of what I saw, I wish to express a dissent 

 from some of the conclusions drawn by Dr. Trimble. He has omit- 

 ted to tell the club the character of the subsoil, and the whole ques- 



