530 



THE SOUTHERN PLANTER. 



cost of less than fifty cents per bushel for the 

 mere cultivation, as my own and others' obser- 

 vation and experience abundantly attests. If 

 you mulch your beds with tan, the mulch will 

 keep down the growth of weeds near the plant. 

 I would let runners grow, and in the Fall take 

 a fine rake and pull up the weak plants of the 

 runners. This is cheaper than any plan of 

 cutting ofi" the runners, and does not injure 

 the plants. In setting plants, use the plants 

 from the first end of the runners, as the roots 

 are stronger than at the little end of the vine. 



S. G. Pardee. 



Progress of English Agriculture. 



In our August issue we published a very 

 interesting and lucid synopsis of an article 

 contained in the April number of the 

 London Quarterly Review, entitled " The 

 Progress of English Agriculture." Much 

 to our mortification, credit to the Boston 

 Journal — the source from which it wasi 

 derived — was omitted, and we were there- j 

 by placed in the unenviable position ofj 

 appropriating the labors of others without | 

 due acknovi'ledgement. It is true we had 

 endorsed it with the name of that paper, 

 but the printer being unused to that mode 

 which in our want of experience we had 

 thoughtlessly adopted, failed to observe it, 

 and we became aware of the omission 

 only when it was too late to remedy it. 

 We have read the article in the London 

 Quarterly with much satisfaction, and 

 would gladly lay it before our readers in 

 eoctenso did our limits permit ; but, on ac- 

 count of its length, we must content 

 ourselves with the presentation of the 



extracts which follow : 



* # * * # 



The first great epoch of modern agri- 

 cultural im.provement began with Lord 

 Townshend, who demonstrated the truth 

 embodied in the adage, 



' He who marls sand 

 May buy the land,' 



showed the value of the turnip, and, as 

 we presume, must have been a patron of 

 the four-course system, vi'hich had its rise 

 in Norfolk about the same time. The 

 second epoch was that of Bakewell, whose 

 principles of stock-breeding have ever 



since continued to raise, year by year, the 

 average value of our meat producing ani- 

 mals. The third epoch dates from the 

 exertions of such men as the Duke of 

 Bedford and Coke of Holkham, the latter 

 of whom, combining usages which had 

 been very partially acted upon, !)iought 

 into favour drilled turnip husbandry, car- 

 ried all the branches of farming as far as 

 was permitted by the knowledge of his 

 time, and did the inestimable sevice of 

 inoculating hundreds of landlords and 

 tenants with his own views. The fourth 

 epoch, if we were to take each advance 

 from its earliest dawn, would comprise the 

 various dates of the opening of the first 

 railroad, the importation of the first cargo 

 of guano, the publication of Liebig's first 

 edition of the ' Chemistry of Agriculture,' 

 and the deep draining of the Bonesetter's 

 field on Chat Moss ; but in general terms 

 it may be said to date from the first meet- 

 ing of the Royal Agricultural Society at 

 Oxford in 1839, when farmers began to 

 be familiarized w^ith men of science, and 

 men of science learned not to despise 

 agricultural experience. This last era is 

 almost the birth of yesterday, and already, 

 as compared with any former period, the 

 results read more like a page from the 

 Arabian Nights than like a cba])ter in the 

 history of agricultural progress. Deep 

 drainage, artificial manures, artificial food, 

 improved implements, and railroad com- 

 veyance, have been the leading means b}^ 

 which the change has been wrought. Deep 

 drainage has brought into ])lay the un- 

 exhausted fertility of our strong clays : 

 portable manures and purchased food have 

 increased Ihe crops on land of every de- 

 gree. Mangold and swedes have been 

 made to flourish on stiff soils, and cereals 

 on sieve- like sands. Downs have been 

 transformed from bare pastures to heavy 

 root and rich grain-bearing fields. The 

 visit©rs to Salisbury Plain at the agricultu- 

 ral show of 1857 were surprised to find a 

 large part of it converted into productive 

 corn-land — a change which has been al- 

 most entirely effected within the last 

 twenty years. The scientific mechanic 

 has provided the tools and machinery for 

 breaking up and pulveriz^ing the ground, 

 for sowing the seed,|br gatheringthe crops, 

 for preparing it for market, for crushing or 

 cutting the food for the stock, with an ease, 

 a quickness, and a perfection unknown 



