TH E 



Devoted to Agriculture^ Horticulture^ and the Household Arts. 



Agriculture is the nursing mother of the Arts. I Tillage and Pasturage are the two breasts of 



[Xenophon. I the State. — Sully. 



J. E. WILLIAMS, Editor. 



AUGUST & WILLIAMS, Prop'rs. 



Vol. XX. 



RICHMOND, VA., AUGUST, 1860. 



No. 8. 



For the Sow her -a Planter. 



Ifotes on the Cane-Brake Lands— or the 

 Cretaceous Calcareous Eegion of Ala- 

 bama. 



BY EDMUND RUFEIN, OF VIRGINIA. 



The calcareous lands of southern Alaba- 

 ma offer, in their agricultural and obvious 

 characteristics, a remarkable contrast to all 

 the lands of the Atlantic slope of the United 

 States. The contrast will appear still strong- 

 er, when the comparison is extended to the 

 chemical qualities of the soils, and to other 

 peculiarities not generally noticed, or open 

 to the cursory observation of strangers and 

 visitors, or even known to old residents and 

 practical cultivators. More than twenty 

 y(.ars ago, when this w^as a new settlement, 

 buc little known except to the residents, 

 ar " when neither this nor any other new or 

 we^ftern state had been visited by me, I was 

 so much interested in the reports of this 

 region, that I endeavored to investigate its 

 peculiarities and their causes, and .presumed 

 then to publish my views of the remarkable 

 soils and other peculiarities of the country, 

 and to account for their existence, in an 

 " Inquiry into the causes of the Formation 

 of Prairies, &c.'' (Farmers' Eegister, vol. 

 29 



iii.)* It was not until very lateiy, (in May, 

 1858,) when making a first and short visit 

 to Alabama, that, (induced by the kind in- 

 vitations and attentions of sundry planters 

 to whom I had until then" been personally a 

 stranger,) I used the offered facilities to- 

 examine some of these lands — and to test, 

 my previous views by personal observation,, 

 and also by the best information to be ob^ 

 tained from residents. Whatever has beea 

 thus learned, whether in confirmation of my 

 early views and reasoning, or in correctioiL 

 of former mistakes of myself or of others, 

 will now be submitted, as a sequel to, and' 

 commentary on my several former publica- 

 tions on this general subject.^ 



* Two later and enlarged editions of tliis^ 

 article have been published since — the latest in 

 my ''Essays and Notes on Agricnlture," (pub- 

 lished by J. W. Randolph. Richmond, 1855.) 



•fT had much cause for regret that this sudden 

 and hurried visit to the cane-brake lands had not- 

 been tbreseen, and prepared for by me, by pre- 

 vious reference to and noting of sundry publica- 

 tions on this subject in the "Farmers' Register," 

 by residents or proprietors, and founded on ac- 

 tual observation, as well as my own extensive- 

 comments on and deductions from such writings 

 of others. Much as this subject had formerly 

 engaged my attention, and labor of investiga- 

 tion, more than twenty y^irs had afterwards- 

 passed, when the fir.?t cmd; unexpected opportu- - 



