138 
SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
Finish cutting Asparagus by the middle of this month, 
or the first of June, at farthest. 
Continue to plant Okra^ Squashes and Melons, of the 
dilFerent varieties, Lima (or Butter) Beans, Sweet Corn. 
Transplant the Tomato, Pepper, Cabbage, Cauliflower, 
Celery, &c. Plant Carrots, Beets, Salsify, Parsnips, &c,, 
for a succession. 
Now is also the proper time to feed your plants with 
liquid manure, [say one pound of Peruvian Guano or two 
pounds of hen manure dissolved in 10 gallons of water]. 
Once a week is enough, and give plenty of pure water 
after the application of the manure. 
The Strawberry patch should receive a good working 
with pronged hoes, to avoid injuring the roots. After 
thus loosening up the soil, replace the mulching, and there 
will be little trouble with the weeds for the remainder of 
the season. If cultivating solely for fruit, the runners 
must be scrupulously kept down. 
Weeds will now begin to infest your gardens, and must 
be ruthlessly destroyed at their first appearance. 
THE ORCHARD AND FRUIT GARDEN. 
Destroy Catterpillar's nests wherever found on your 
fruit trees. If the branches are crowded or over-laden 
with thickly-set fruit, thin out one-half of it, and the re- 
mainder will be enough better to pay for the trouble. 
Dust over the Plum and Nectanne trees with a mixture 
of quick-lime, ashes and sulphur, while the dew is on the 
leaves, to destray the curculio. 
THE FLOWER GARDEN. 
Shade, water, weed, cultivate and mulch your flowers 
and notice the general directions for last month in this de- 
partment. 
DIVEKSIFIED AGRICl LTUltE, 
Undoubtedly more money may be realized from a 
plantation by devoting it mainly to the production of one 
staple, concentrating thereon all the energies, thought and 
muscle at the command of the proprietor, than by divid- 
ing his attention, labor and capital among a variety of 
crops. He is, however, far moi'e likely to impoverish the 
land which he cultivates, when thus actively pushing it 
to the extreme point of its natural fruitfulness in the growth 
of a single plant, like cotton, corn, or wheat, than when 
he studies and follows Nature in her admirable system 
of diversifying her vegetable offspring. Nature is the 
cultivator’s best teacher. Her great lessons are full of wis- 
dom. The barrenness which follows over-cropping and 
bad tillage, is an admonition, warning man of his folly and 
the certainty of the punishment that ensues from such 
practice. The positive waste of labor in the prolonged 
cultivation of poor land is itself an evil of fearful magni- 
tude, and one that grows much faster than population. In 
a word, a State, or community that sells its soil to pur- 
chase gold, ever makes a bad bargain; for a State cannot 
emigrate with its gold, nor can its inhabitants subsist with- 
out the perennial fruits of agriculture. From this con- 
dition of things there is no escape, provided we assume 
that the chief end of man is to make money by wearing 
out the soil. This unsound philosophy, this corrupted 
morality, must beprobed to the bottom, and removed from 
the popular mind, before it will receive and cherish abet- 
ter system of tillage and husbandry. 
A man may innocently chase dollars as children chase 
butterflies, and derive much pleasure from the employ- 
ment ; but he is prone to overstep the line of innocent 
labor, or amusement, in his too eager pursuit of riches and 
pleasure. Educated to want, or believe he wants, ail that 
any virgin earth can possibly produce, lie is not content to 
restore to the land a full and fair equivalent for the wealtn 
it yields him. If he would honestly do this, no arated 
field would ever dishonor his draft. But to check on a 
bank where one has never deposited funds, and expect 
such checks to be paid, and never dishonored, betrays a 
lamentable want of common-sense. We are forever 
drawing on the soil for food, raiment, and every species of 
wealth, and think it a great hardship if required to deposit 
in return one-tenth the amount we receive. Nay. we 
complain of losing money, when v/e .Minply cultivate a 
variety of crops, that every element of lertility may do its 
share in production, and that we may delay the final e;:- 
haustion of the particular ingredients winch form corn and 
cotton plants. We find it convenieiu to forget that the 
next generation will need good crops uf these important 
staples quite as much as we do, and that posterity can 
only have fertile land by the care and foresight of those 
who have cultivated it before them. All work for the 
highest immediate returns in cash — not for the greatest re- 
sults in the course of the lifetime of a community. Thie 
short-sighted, narrow-mindedness, which approximates 
man to tne beasts that perish, this blind worship of the 
Present with its gewgaws and its filth, regardless of the 
Future, alone forbids agricultural improvement. If mar. 
would consent to look ahead, to consider effects in con- 
nection with their causes, he would discover that wealth 
obtained by over-taxing the powers of Nature, whether in 
man himself, in working animals on the farm, in cultivated 
plants, or in tilled earth, cost more than it is worth ; and 
more than it possibly can be worth in the economy of In- 
finite Wisdom. God requires that all extremes shall be 
avoided; else we might be happiest when surrounded by 
extreme heat, or by extreme cold : by extremes in eatieg 
and drinking, or extremes in hunger and thirst ; by ex- 
treme mental or bodily effort, or extreme laziness and. 
stupidity. Our greatest sin is in carrying our p-f 
money to an extreme; so that it is now, as of old, “the. 
root of all evil.” This undue love of money prevents alike 
the improvement of man, and of his defective agriculturc- 
Progress in planting and husbandry depends entirely on 
progress in knowledge and sound morality. Without the 
latter, man ever refuses to do his duty. He exaggerates 
his rights, and denies his obligations to others when tcld 
that he is bound to leave every acre of land as fruitful ar- 
he found it, for the public good. While Nature and Sci- 
ence suggest a diversified agriculture, the public good de- 
mands it. 
This alone will give the community a plenty of wheat, 
meat, wool, vegetables, and oiher necessaries, as well as 
of the great staples, corn and cotton. A mixed system of 
tillage and husbandry, of gardening and fruit-culture, is 
indispensable to meet all the varied wants of civilized so- 
ciety. Let these wants be mainly supplied fi’om the son 
near the consumers, and each comsumer can easily furnish 
the essential fertilizers to maintain the normal productiv- 
ness of the land that feeds and clothes him. The fact can 
hardly be too often repeated that of all the animals on tiiis 
nlanet, man is the only one who impoverishes the soil- 
and that is done by this bad system of tillage and hus- 
bandry. Nature and science do not countenance any 
conduct of this kind; it is founded in ignorance and fol- 
ly, like most other popular errors. Long established 
habits, and customs, extending to all nations, appear 
to demand a continuance of the practice of taking 
