I860.] 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



481 



An Address 



On the Opposite Results of Exhmisting and 

 leriilizing Si/ stems of Agriculture, Read 

 Before the South Carolina Institute, at 

 its Fourth Annual Fair^ November IS th, 

 1852. 



BY EDMUND RUFFIN, ESQ. 



Concluded from page 408 Sou, Planter. 



From this -digression to a particular branch, 

 I will now return to the general subject, of 

 the neglect of rest and manuring crops, for 

 land. 



The incessant cultivator does not the less 

 rest, and lose the use of his land, by refu- 

 sing any cessation of tillage so long as he 

 can avoid it. If such cultivators manure so 

 abundantly that there is no general decline 

 of production, then they do not come under 

 my past remarks and censure. If there be 

 any such, I will only say of their mode of 

 maintaining fertility, that it is less effectual 

 and more costly, than if aided and substitu- 

 ted in part by manuring crops and a judi- 

 cious rotation of crops. But as to many 

 other planters, who, whether slowly or rapid- 

 ly, are certainly impoverishing tbeir lands, 

 they will, at some future period, be compell- 

 ed to allow a greater proportion of time for 

 the land to rest, and to greater disadvantage, 

 and less profit, than if allowing regularly 

 either one year in three or two in five. Sup- 

 pose the land to yield cotton, (or sometimes 

 corn,) continuously for thirty, or even forty 

 years — or, with much manuring, sixty years. 

 In such cases, it is true, there were as many 

 crops obtained as the land was kept years 

 for tillage. But after the first few years, 

 the products were declining; and for the 

 last five or ten - years, on the general aver- 

 age, they scarcely paid more than the expen- 

 ses of cultivation. The crops also suffered 

 during the whole time the evils of a want 

 of rotation, and the land of want of change 

 of condition. At the close, the land must 

 be turned out to rest, because manifestly, not 

 worth longer cropping. This compelled 

 cessation and rest will continue for twenty, 

 thirty, or forty years, when the land will be 

 again cleared of its second (or perhaps its 

 third) growth of trees ; and with this and 

 other extra labors, will be again brought 

 under continued tillage, to be again, and 

 much more speedily, exhausted of its smaller 

 recovered amount of productive power. In 

 this manner, thouEch at long intervals, more 

 3X 



than the full proportion of rest, required by 

 an improving system of rotation, is given to 

 the land, and enforced by its exhaustion ; 

 and the manner is such as to make the least 

 return of *benefit for the greatest expense 

 incurred for the respite of the land from 

 cultivation. 



My former engagemenf in South Carolina, 

 and the then especial object of my investi- 

 gations and labours, served to make me bet- 

 ter acquainted with a large portion of your 

 territory than any other as extensive else- 

 where. From that acquaintance was derived 

 the opinion, which I have since asserted and 

 still maintain, that no other as extensive re- 

 gion, known to me, possesses half as great 

 advantages and resources for agricultural im- 

 provements, or more needs the employment of 

 these means. The proper and full use of 

 your wonderfully abundant, rich and easily 

 accessible marl, and the recent shells and 

 other marine remains, offer the best princi- 

 pal and indispensable means of fertilization, 

 and which are available for half your terri- 

 tory. Another great resource, and almost 

 as much neglected, is presented in your great 

 inland swamps, now only wide-spread seed- 

 beds of disease, pestilence and death ) and 

 which, by drainage, with certainty and great 

 profit, might be converted into dry fields of 

 exuberant fertility. It is true, that existing 

 legal obstacles oppose these extensive plans 

 for drainage ) but these difficulties might be 

 removed by wise legislation, with great ben- 

 efit to the interests of all concerned — and 

 improvements might be permitted and invi- 

 ted which would render these now worthless 

 and pestilential swamps as fruitful as the 

 celebrated borders of the Po. 



The draining of the inland swamps of 

 rich alluvial soil, together with the general 

 application of marl to these and also to the 

 now cultivated higher ground, would go 

 far to remove the long prevailing unhealthi- 

 ness to which Lower South-Carolina is sub- 

 ject, and which is the only important evil 

 which is not entirely in the power of the in- 

 habitants to remedy. I will not presume to 

 say how far this great evil may be lessened 

 by these works of industry and improve- 

 ment. But, when so much of your country 

 consists of low and wet swamp, and of par- 

 tially wet, higher lands, and all easy to be 

 drained, it does not seem over-sanguine to 

 suppose, that, with such drainage and the 

 general extension of the also sanitary ope- 

 ration of marling and liming, the country 



