AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 259 



digger. A second patent of 1857 was granted for a digger, but it did not 

 pulverize over one and a half acres a day. As to the necessity of the 

 pulverization of the soil, Voelker says that is of the utmost importance. 

 The Canadian digger was further improved and steam applied the present 

 year; and so was Croskill's digger also improved, and several other dig- 

 ging machines were brought out, one of which costs $3,500, and works 

 well, but only six inches deep. 



CRANBERRY CULTURE. 



The Secretary read a paper touching the cultivation of cranberries vipon 

 Long Island. The average crop is sixty bushels per acre. There is not 

 the least difficulty in producing this crop, and making it a very profita- 

 ble one. 



DRAINING THE HACKENSACK (NEW JERSEY) MARSHES. 



John D. Ward. — The work of draining and improving the Hackensack 

 marshes, in New Jersey, may, perhaps, at first sight, be thought out of the 

 range of subjects which properly come under discussion at the meetings of 

 the " Farmers' Club" in the city of New York ; but when it is recollected 

 that some portion of the tract proposed to be improved, is situated within 

 five miles of the city, and that the average distance to be traveled from all 

 |)arts of it, to reach Washington market, is less than eight miles ; and that, 

 if properly drained and cultivated, the whole of that now useless and re- 

 pulsive region may be made more productive than any other equal extent 

 of cultivated land, from which Nev York can receive milk and vegetables, 

 it will be perceived that the citizens of the great metropolis have at least 

 as deep an interest in the matter as those in its more immediate neighbor- 

 hood. The means of supplying the markets of the city with the more per- 

 ishable articles of food, so largely consumed, would be much increased ; the 

 supplies would be more regular, and the prices less variable, than when 

 brought from greater distances, by those less intimately acquainted with 

 the state of the market ; and the cost to consumei'S would rather be di- 

 minished than increased. 



The following paper was originally drawn up for the purpose of showing 

 to some persons whom the writer wished to engage in the undertaking, the 

 probable cost of the work, and the advantages which might be realized from 

 it, if properly executed. Having failed to interest a sufficient number in 

 the project, to render it expedient to undertake it at the present, the plan 

 is presented to the " Farmers' Club," with the hope that it may not be 

 forgotten; but that, at some not very distant day, it may be executed, and 

 a miniature Holland grow up on the banks of the Hackensack. 



The large amount of low meadow land, or marsh, in New Jersey, lying 

 west of Hackensack river, in Hudson and Bergen counties, has frequently 

 attracted the attention of capitalists and cultivators, who have supposed 

 that it would, if embanked, drained and properly cleaned, furnish the finest 

 situations within reach of New York and adjacent cities, for producing 

 milk, vegetables, and other articles required for daily consumption by the 



