REVIEW OF THE MARCH NUMBER OF THE AGRICULTURIST. 
181 
REVIEW OF THE MARCH NUMBER OF THE 
AGRICULTURIST. 
" Maple Sugar should now be made by all who 
have trees suitable for it." Doubted. " No tree 
should be tapped" — slop there ; that part is a fact 
—and I will add the remainder of the sentence by- 
saying, until it is fully ascertained that it will be 
profitable to you to make maple sugar, while cane 
sugar is so very low as it is now. Because I 
doubt the economy of " all who have trees suita- 
ble," undertaking to make sugar at all. If there 
are several persons on the farm, either old or young, 
male or female, who would not do much else to 
any advantage at that season of the year, they 
might engage in this pleasant kind of labor, for it 
is labor, just as some families can make a few 
pounds of silk a year, and have it all clear profit. 
But hire a man and set him to make maple sugar, 
and ten chances to one that his wages would not 
buy more cane sugar than he would make. So 
all should not make maple sugar. 
Fruit Garden and Orchard. — This is a valuable 
direction and is suited to all places. Not so are 
all the directions for " Work South," but as that is 
to the niggers, and they can't read, I will let it pass. 
Rotation of Crops. — As the author of this arti- 
cle has neglected to construct a table suited to the 
customs of the south, I will make one that is right, 
as I can prove, " What everybody says is true ;" 
hence, what everybody does is ri?ht. Of course it 
follows that the following rotation upon a light- 
soil hilly cotton farm in certain sections, is right. 
ROTATION OF A COTTON FARM'ACCORDING TO 
CUSTOM. 
1st year — Cotton — cleaning, log-rolling, grubbing, 
burning new land, stumps, rich soil, plow up hill 
and down — good crop. 
2d year — Cotton — stumps, old logs — good crop. 
3d year — Cotton — land pretty clean, timber mostly 
burnt up, roots rotten, some small gullies com- 
menced — crop so-so. 
4th year — Cotton — grass, gullies, worms, shallow 
plowing, and deuce take the land, I havn't made 
half a crop. 
5th year — Cotton — more grass, more gullies, 
more worms, more cursing, and next to no crop. 
6th year — Cotton on the best spots, irreclaimable 
gullies, and broom sedge on the balance — mighty 
sorry crop, I shall have corn to buy on credit. 
7th year — Dogs take that old field, I wont try to 
make a crop on it. 
Sth year — The soil gone down the river, and the 
owner gone to Texas. 
9th year — That old abandoned plantation. 
10th year — The last remains, sold at sheriffs 
sale. 
I say, John, them 'ere cotton planters down south 
are all getting rich, aint they ? 
Well, I can't say. If they are, the land is not. 
Grasses, Meadows, and Pastures, No. 2. — This is 
an extract from Allen's American Farm Book : and 
if it is a fair representation of the whole book, it 
indicates that the work is a most valuable one. 
Such an article as this, is just such a one as ought 
to form reading lessons in every school where far- 
mers' children are educated. How many of the 
scholars of such schools know the names of the 
grasses they daily walk over, and upon which the 
whole income of the farm, pejhaps, depends % In 
this article, the common and botanical name is 
given, with a plain description, and a cut showing the 
appearance of each kind in such a manner that any 
child might soon learn. 
While upon the subject of grass, I wish to in- 
quire if the mosquito grass of the great western 
prairies has ever been introduced into our domestic 
cultivation ? It strikes me that this would be a 
very valuable grass for the south, where the com- 
plaint is that they cannot grow cultivated grasses. 
It is a remarkably nutritious grass. The buffalo 
and wild horses could hardly live, if it were not for 
this kind of grass. It appears a very hardy as 
well as a constantly green grass, and I have no doubt 
but it may be introduced into cultivation. 
Hybridization and Cross Fecundation of Plants. 
— This is a valuable and interesting article, and I 
hope the writer will continue and give short prac- 
tical directions, so that any common person can 
learn the trade, for eveiything of this kind, no mat- 
ter how simple and easy to the master workman, is 
a trade that must be learned by the apprentices, 
before they can set up business for themselves. 
Let them commence on some very common plant at 
first; Indian corn, for instance, and watch the re- 
sult. How few there are that even believe in hy- 
bridizing much more know how to practice it. 
They plant cucumbers, squashes, melons, and 
gourds, in close proximity to each other, year after 
year, and then wonder at the fact of their "seed 
running out." It is a common thing in these 
days, to hear men arguing that " peach pits from 
good peaches will produce the same good peaches." 
But these are men that argue without knowledge. 
They don't take your paper, neither do they believe 
that agriculture is a science that should be taught 
in schools. 
American Prodigality. — True, every word of it, 
and yet who believes it? But the fact is, we are 
a nation of gormandizers. As Mr. Colman has 
given, in his European tour, some of the bills of 
fare of European laborers, let me give one of many 
American farm houses that I wot of. 
For Breakfast — Coffee or tea, with cream and su- 
gar, just as much as is desired. Fried bacon, and 
in the season, eggs always. Cold beef or hash, or 
perhaps fish, and often fresh meat. Irish or sweet 
potatoes, good butter, and plenty of it ; cheese, 
ditto ; pickles, stewed dried fruit, light and white 
flour bread, corn bread, or hot cakes, hot biscuit, 
often pies or cakes. 
For Dinner — Coffee, sweet milk or sour, or but- 
termilk, as may be preferred. Boiled pork, beef, 
potatoes, turnips, cabbages, beets, &c. White loaf 
bread and butter, cheese, pickles, stewed fruit, and 
almost always pie or pastry. 
Supper — The cold meats and vegetables from 
dinner, or perhaps a hot dish of meats or fish, or 
some broiled chickens, and coffee or tea, of course, 
with bread as before, to which add a little " tea 
cake." At each meal, all the condiments, and pro- 
vocatives of appetite, such as mustard, catchup 
vinegar, pepper, salt, pickles, &c., are usually on 
the table. 
During harvest time, a lunch in the forenoon and 
afternoon, of cold meats or fowls, with fresh 
wheaten loaves or biscuits, cakes or pies, and often 
