^36 
SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
place as can be done conveniently without detaining too 
much time. After this working run around it, throwing 
Che dirt towards the cotton ; follow this with hoes and thin 
CO suit your fancy. After the second working the middles 
should be thrown to the cotton, and the plowing continued 
■thvovjhi^ dirt to the cotton ail time. Itshoidd be remem- 
bered that these remarks apply only to bottom land, I hav- 
ing no exoerience in any other kind. 
Willi. Sproll. 
Con-sJtoMc Chv.tc, Natchetoches, La., April, 185G. 
P s.— I have plowod up some land this year with a 
verv large plow and five yoke of oxen. In due lime I 
will give^you the result. Excuse this too hastily written 
document. .1 would like to hear from you upon this sub- 
— 
.LEVEL CTJLTURE-LETTEH FEOM COL. CAL’IfOIT. 
Editors SouTHBRN Cultivator— I have just read an 
larticle in the .Tune number of the OaUAcdGr, signed L , 
v/hich I suppose was written by the senior Editor, in \yhicli j 
you refer to my earnest advocacy oi the urgent necessity j 
which exists and should at once force the planters in this j 
section o'f the country to go to work to save their soil from ^ 
washing away from them by ‘'■icccluig their landL _ j 
This subject was very briefly, but, as you state, with j 
■earnestness” alluded to by me, in an address which I 
■aad the honor of pronouncing at the first x\nnual Fair held 
by the “Fayette County x\gricultural and Mechanical 
Society,” at Sommervilie, in October last. 
This “earnestness” was lieartfelt. and, I thought, fully 
■justified by thegreat exigency of the evil, and tlie absolute 
certainly I had experienced, of the entire success of the 
proposed remedy. 
After much anxious thought, as to how 1 could best 
■discharge the responsible task Iliad assumed, in consenting 
to deliver this address, so as most positively and prcsenlLy 
to promote the progress of the all-important and kindred 
pursuits, whose advocate I had reluctantly become, 1 de- 
termined — deslgncdlij — to endeavor, as much as possioie, 
■to exclude all d^-y details, and to abbreviate and condense 
OiOseiy every point I should present. 
In this, it would seem from your article, I did wrong, 
and that too in connection with the subject which 1 stated 
txs be and still think is the foundation-stone upon wdiich 
,rests all agricultural improvement in our section ot the 
•country. I was both surprised and pained to see m tiie 
'Cultivator, and especially by “L ,” so radiOal a niiscon- 
■ception of my meaning and misstatement of my plan ; and 
'■candor compels me to confess that there are some points 
in your article referred to, which I cannot but regard as 
■decidedly— though I cannot, for a moment, believe as de- 
r'signedly exceptionable. 
'Sut I have too near at heart the great cause ef Agricul- 
tural advancement, and, allow me to add, too, high an ap- 
{nreciation of your able and very efit3ctive labors in this 
tnoble and mighty world-work, to permit me to do more 
iihaii very briefly endeavor to place you right in this mis- 
take of yours, and to rob myself of the unpleasantpess of 
the very awkward and ridiculous position in which jiour 
guess at my plan places me. 
Had it been as you imagine and state it to be — to cut 
4own hills and transport the millions of tons of dirt that 
would have to be moved, even in a small field, to fill up 
■the vallies below, and at a cost of thousands of dollars per 
■ acre— your language is much too mild, when you say :— 
“The Planters who read this journal must have been a 
little surprised at the earnestness with which Col. Cannon 
urges the necessity of not allowing an inclination of sur- 
face 'in tilled land, equal ‘to a fraction of an inch ip a 
Yes ! instead of being a “little surprised,” their 
aastonishment should have been boundless, and, though 
you might, perchance, have felt warranted in the compli- 
ments you bestow upon my “enterprise,” I do not think 
they can find foothold in the clay of my “ intelli- 
gence,” with their strongest and most ravenous roots ; 
and this system, which you place at my door and force 
me to stand god-father for, instead of being regarded by 
you as“impracticable” simply, should have been, unhesitat- 
ingly characterized as absurdly nonsensical, and most ex- 
travagantly Quixotic. 
Just here, hovvever — “currentc calarnd ’'‘ — the thought oc- 
curs to me that the curious direction that this matter has 
taken, may result in good, and possibly prove the truth of 
the two trite old aphorisms — that “everything is for the 
best,” and that “good somtimes comes of evil.” At all 
events, 1 shall be perfectly satisfied, if the more than “Cal- 
iban” deformity, with which the subject has been tempor- 
arily clothed, should so arrest public attention and beget 
public investigation, as to cause two level rows to be run 
where only one ran before, or even one where there was 
none before. 
This it will certainly do, wherever it is fairly looked, 
into and tested. It courts scrutiny and is worthy of a trial. 
Above all, there is no hidden my.stery about it. It is easy 
of comprehension and accomplishment, even by the com- 
monest capacity. It stands the test of the severest practical 
demonstration, and is thus “a remedy, at once effective 
and easy in its application” (and which you truly say) 
“is the most urgent want of plantation economy, for this 
great evil of Southern agriculture — the washing of the 
soil.” 
But, as brevity is ray motto, let me hasten and facilitate 
the explanation by calling your attention to the first part 
of the paragraph in my address from which you quote. I 
there say : “But, at the foundation of all this, so far as the 
agriculturist is concerned, lies the absolute and urgent 
necessity of not only improving, but of keeping what soil 
you have from washing away from und-er and around your 
land, and subserving the miserable purpose of making 
more mud at the many mouths of the Mississippi.” 
“Do you ask me how this is to be done I I answer, 
without a moment’s hesitation, after a ten years positive 
experience and a convincing demonstration upon my own 
plantation “level your land.” Do it by all means and at 
once. Do it for your own sake— for the sake of your 
cliildren — for posterity, and the good ofyour country; and 
don’t do it with a little fall, as is too often practiced. No! 
noli not even with the fraciloii — the smallest fraction of 
an inch in a mile, or twenty, should your rows be so 
long.” Now, it really seems to me that this carries along 
with it its owp explanation. It is not the surface that is 
to be dug down or filled up, but the rows — most emphati- 
cally the rows — must be run upon a “dead level,” without 
the least fraction of a fall, no matter how great their 
length. 
The system of “circling land” and “hill side ditching” 
— all with “a fall” — to take oft the surplus water, as it is 
termed, is not new here, and I had supposed had been 
practiced to a greater or less extent in almost every State, 
with a rolling' surface, in the Union. 
The novelty of my plan, if indeed there is any about it, 
(outside of this section of country) consists in running the 
rows around and on the the side of the hills, upon a per- 
fect level, or as near as human agency can accomplish it, 
and thereby dispensing with “hill side ditches,” and sav- 
ing the time, labor, and land devoted to them ; and all 
this can be accomplished — easily accomplished too — at a 
cost of three to five cents per acre, instead of the thous- 
ands of dollars, alluded to by you. 
In using the expression — “level your land” — I but em- 
ployed the common language in which this idea is clothed 
by every class in this community; almost to such an ex- 
tent as to warrant me in calling it the ven-nacular of the 
country; and, while aware that it would be understood 
