peas. 439 



ed of before. Without them, on the one hand we must descend to 

 meager harvests, perishing stock, fast approaching sterility, hard times 

 and general discontent. On the other, by their powerful aid we ascend 

 up to plentiful harvests, fat stock with the multiplied advantages result- 

 ing therefrom, good living, money in the purse, prosperity and content- 

 ment. Can the pea and clover accomplish all this ? Worked in proper 

 rotation with other crops they most assuredly can. In the heathen, but 

 appreciative past, when gratitude was manifested by the erection of 

 temples, and by solemn worship to those deities from whom temporal 

 blessings were thought to flow, the pea and clover of the present day 

 have been entwined with the wheat and fruit — crowning the brow of 

 beneficent Ceres. Now, these mainsprings of successful agriculture in 

 our favored land are but half appreciated, and are thrust aside by the 

 impatient tiller of the soil for some other crop supposed to bring in 

 more immediate money profits; but which in its continued drafts upom 

 the fertility of the soil, must end in the bankruptcy, as well as the ruin 

 of its possessor. 



In a previous letter to you I stated some of the advantages which the 

 field pea possessed even over its great fellow laborer, red clover, as a 

 fertilizer. 



1st. The pea will thrive upon land too poor to grow clover. 



2d, That it will produce a heavy and rich crop to be returned to the 

 soil in a shorter period than any vegetable fertilizer known. 



3d. That two crops can be produced on the same ground in one year; 

 whereas it requires two years for clover to give a hay crop, and good 

 aftermath for turning under. In this time four crops of peas can be 

 made. 



4th. That the pea feeds but lightly upon, and hence leaves largely in 

 the soil, those particular elements necetsary to a succeeding grain crop, 

 and the pea lay, in its decay, puts back largely into the soil those very 

 elements required for a vigorous growth of the cereals. 



5th. There is no crop which is its equal for leaving the soil in the 

 very best condition for a succeeding wheat crop. 



6th. It is the only crop raised in the South so rapid in its growth and 

 perfection as to be made an intervening manurial crop between grain 

 cut in the spring, and grain sowed in the fall, upon the same ground. 

 And this alone makes the pea invaluable to Southern agriculture. 



7th. In our particular latitude it flourishes equally with clover : and 

 with two such renovators of the soil (aside from their value as food 

 crops), no portion of the earth is equally blessed. North Of us the pea 

 does not succeed ; south, the clover fails. 



Sth. Its adaptability to other crops, producing in the space between 



