THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



101 



effects of marl, I published sundry queries, and 

 also directed copies of them specially to many 

 known marling farmers. The usual and culpable 

 remissness, in this respect, which marks the agri- 

 cultural class, and the general unwillingness to 

 write facts for publication, prevented my obtaining 

 answers in regard to more than twenty-two farms, 

 including the one on which my marling labors were 

 commenced. There could have been no better 

 vouchers for the facts known, than the persons who 

 gave the answers. But there were many other 

 farmers who could have stated larger or older ex- 

 perienced results than most of these witnesses — 

 and there are many more who have made later im- 

 provements with the aid of better lights, and who, 

 by more judicious practice, have had a greater 

 measure of success and of profit. Further: my 

 friends and former neighbors of Prince George 

 county, who will be here cited, I am sure will not 

 consider me as doing them injustice, when stating 

 that there is not one truly good farmer among 

 them — though all were industrious, economical, 

 and thriving cultivators and proprietors. 



The original queries referred to were so extended, 

 that full answers thereto covered (as had been de- 

 signed) the whole subject of the effects and bene- 

 fits of marl, in the personal experience of each 

 answer. The answers, with the queries, were pub- 

 lished at length in the "Farmers' Register," (Vol. 

 VII.) and subsequently (in 1843) a digest of them, 

 in tabular form, in my " Report of the Agricultural 

 Survey of South Carolina." 



Among the many queries, some required and ob- 

 tained from each individual, the report of the rate 

 of production of his farm, both in corn and wheat, 

 (the general and almost only crops,) before marling; 

 and, by estimate, the then average productive power 

 of the respective farms in 1840. At'that time, no 

 one concerned could have supposed that he would 

 ever be again called upon to report the production 

 at any later period. Each one then answering, 

 (naturally and properly, and with good reason,) 

 proud of the success of his labors of improvement, 

 and sanguine as to the actual benefits already 

 achieved, must have stated the supposed and then 

 latest productive power of his farm, full as high as 

 his belief and the truth warranted. To have esti- 

 mated and stated below tins rate, would have been 

 contrary to human nature. 



In 1852, when the fifth edition of the " Essay on 

 Calcareous Manures " was in the course of prepa- 

 ration for the press, it occurred to me that abstracts 

 of these former answers, showing so far the in- 

 crease of production, with the addition of the then 

 latest rate, would present more striking and im- 

 pressive proofs of the effects of marling than I 

 could offer to the public in my own opinions and 

 experience. For this purpose, letters were again 

 addressed to all of the former answerers whose cases 

 were deemed applicable, inquiring as to the a mounts 

 of actual crops of the then last two years, 1850 and 

 1851. The taking of all the crops of two consecutive 

 years, it was supposed, would offer a fair average 

 of seasons and of productive power, and especially 

 as to farms whose length of rotation embraced 

 three years only. Deaths which had occurred, ab- 

 sence, changesand divisions of property, with other 

 circumstances, prevented my obtaining answers but 

 from seven of the farms on which miocene marl 

 had been used mainly or exclusively. And these 

 answers arrived so slowly that they were too late 

 to be used for the work for which they had been 

 designed. But they will serve to show that the 



benefits of marling are much greater than supposed 

 by Mr. Newton, and all the better because these 

 cases were not sought or chosen for their present 

 use. 



All the seven farms cited are in one neighbor- 

 borhood, in Prince George county. One of them 

 only, No. 7, (Coggin's Point farm,) is touching the 

 river; and also, that one only has had any marl 

 other than miocene, or had any originally rich land 

 or very good soil. Not one of them had any good 

 flat land worth consideration; or any "low-grounds" 

 except the narrow and crooked alluvial bottoms, of 

 sandy soil, bordering small and rapid streams. 

 These bottoms, even when rich naturally, are so 

 difficult to keep drained, and to cultivate, and so 

 liable to injury from rain-floods and the barren 

 sand they bring down and deposit, that the narrow 

 bottoms, with their enclosing slopes, or steeper hill- 

 sides, are of less value than the other poorest level 

 up-land of the farm, after the latter has been marled. 

 With the unimportant exceptions named, all the 

 seven farms were naturally poor, and, before marl- 

 ing was begun, greatly exhausted — mostly of sandy 

 soil, and, being all high and hilly, were deprived 

 of much of the surface-soil, and even sub-soil, by 

 the washing of rains, forming barren galls and gul- 

 lies on numerous slopes. The comparatively richest 

 portions of the first six of these farms, when new, 

 (and of all such land,) were the sandy slopes, (of 

 " free, light la^nd,") which wear out rapidly, and are 

 the slowest and least to be improved by subsequent 

 marling. The highest ridge or table land only offers 

 any extensive level. This was naturally the poorest, 

 (and extremely poor,) but is the best of the land 

 after being marled. The farm No. 7, (formerly 

 mine, and since 1838 under the sole direction of 

 my son,) was, for much the greater part, in natural 

 soil and surface, and in judicious culture, like the 

 others. But out of more than 700 acres of arable 

 (now perhaps 800) there were about 100 only (nearly 

 all high) of very good and originally rich soil. 

 Eocene marl (though containing no " green sand,") 

 had been used for about 60 acres of this farm — all 

 the other land having had ordinary miocene marl 

 only. Gypsum has been used there to some partial 

 extent — and the " gypseous earth," dug on the farm, 

 much more largely and generally. But these ex- 

 ceptions, limited and ve*ry partial as to this farm, 

 do not, in the least, apply to either of the other six. 

 Neither guano, nor any other bought manure, (ex- 

 cept the little gypsum stated as to No. 7,) had been 

 applied to either, to any appreciable effect, if at 

 all, in all the time included in the table. There- 

 fore, all these farms, (allowing for the partial ex- 

 ceptions as to No. 7,) present cases agreeing with 

 the requisitions of Mr. Newton's proposition, in 

 being naturally poor, and having had no foreign 

 or purchased manure ; and for nearly all the ag- 

 gregate surface, of all except No. 7, they have not 

 been benefited by the aids which his proposition 

 would admit, that is, the use of gypsum, of any 

 rotation better than of three shifts, and of either 

 -clover or pea fallow to precede wheat. Added to 

 these deficiencies, the loss of soil, from all, by 

 washing, had been very great, and over much ex- 

 tent of surface; and land so damaged, and even 

 so barren a subsoil, can never be brought to equal 

 value with ground retaining its soil. Yet, under 

 all the unfavorable conditions, the general average 

 products of all these farms, botli in corn and wheat, 

 for 1850 and 1851, rise above the maximum limits 

 of improvement asserted; and also the separate 

 average products of each farm except one — and 



