86 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



Colored and woollen clothes must not 

 be boiled as above, but may be washed 

 in the suds weakened in water. The 

 clothes will last longer by the use of this 

 soap, and much labor will be saved. 



Six pounds of sal. soda, six pounds of 

 bar soap, and thirty quarts of water, will 

 make about fifty pounds of the soap. — 

 The soda costs about eight cents a pound, 

 and the bar soap eight cents per pound. 



A pint measure will hold a pound of 

 the labor-saving soap. This will save the 

 trouble of weighing every time. — Emi- 

 grant's Hand Book. 



For the Southern Planter. 

 COMMUNICATIONS. 



Mr. Editor, — Your editorial on the sub- 

 ject of communications I am fearful will 

 exclude many from your columns.. The 

 theories of young men fresh from college 

 are rejected ; the communications of those 

 who make but " one barrel of corn, whose 

 land is deteriroating, whose stock is starv- 

 ing, whilst his crop is growing small by 

 degrees and beautifully less," are also re- 

 jected. Now, I fear if such be your rule, 

 that you will have but very few commu- 

 nications, from Old Virginia at least. — 

 How few are the farmers in Virginia 

 whose lands are either deteriorating, or 

 whose cattle are not in a starving condi- 

 tion at least half the year. But my 

 greatest fear is that the communications 

 of those who will be acceptable to you 

 must be few and far between ; not because 

 still there are not enough such men in 

 Virginia, but because it is very difficult 

 to induce them to write, and because they 

 have less egotism than the bragging theo- 

 rists with empty corn cribs. They are 

 afraid that what they have to say is no- 

 thing new nor worth knowing; if so, 

 they certainly ought to be willing for the 

 Editor to put them into the fire ; or they 

 fear that their language may not be fit 

 for the press. This is the great bugbear. 

 They should be encouraged to believe 

 what all writers know, that the more they 

 write the better they will write, and that 

 their brother farmers are plain people and 



value the matter and not the manner of 

 their communications. Now I would ad- 

 vise not to discourage our young brothers 

 with their new theories, nor the old far- 

 mers who have heretofore worked wrong, 

 but are at last willing to work right, (for 

 they have had a fair opportunity to profit 

 by past experience,) but to receive all, 

 (post paid,) allowing to the Editor the 

 privilege, without giving offence, of throw- 

 ing all unprofitable communications in the 

 fire. The Editor must be our judge as 

 to what will make his paper useful. An 

 agricultural paper must be poor if not 

 well filled with useful practical informa- 

 tion for the farming community. I for 

 one shall be willing cheerfully to abide by 

 the Editor's decisions. 



-Sir, your motto, 11 Tillage and pastur- 

 age are the two breasts of the State," 

 pleases me well. But tillage and pastur- 

 age as practised in lower Virginia seems 

 to me to be incompatible; for what kind 

 of pasturage can we have in lower Vir- 

 ginia, where the whole of the arable 

 land is under tillage once in two or three 

 years. It requires a hundred acres of such 

 land to sustain twenty cattle during the 

 summer months. 



My main object . in writing now is to 

 give some notions of mine, in my own 

 way, part theory and part practice on the 

 subject of neat cattle. I found some two 

 years since, that my farm as also my to- 

 bacco lots were becoming poorer and that 

 it required a considerable addition of new 

 land to fill the cribs and barns ; and that 

 the number of my cattle was diminishing, 

 that I did not raise calves through the 

 winter to supply the loss to my number 

 from beef killed and poverty, from old age, 

 &c, I had to purchase a yoke of oxen 

 occasionally, and now and then a few 

 cows to afford milk for the use of my 

 family. My determination was to pur- 

 chase a few more cattle, and by care to 

 endeavor to increase my stock. My calves 

 were permitted to run with -their dams 

 during the day throughout the summer 

 and separated from them at night and 

 they were deprived of the whole of the 

 milk in the morning, which afforded a 

 sufficiency for family use. In the fall 



