f, THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
rRE.MIU.MS FOR TUB BEST MAN.VGBD FARMR. 
To the Editor of the Marlborough Gazette. 
Having already received notice fiom two gen- 
tlemen, competitors, addressed to me as first 
named of a committee to award the premium 
oflered for the best managed farm in the county, 
it seems proper that I should state, in this the 
most convenient form to all parties, that it will 
not be in my power to undertake the trust with 
which the Agricultural Society ol Prince 
'ieorge’s has honored me. I am not the less 
gratelul for the compliment which such an ap- 
pointment conveys, for it assuredly impiiesa be- 
lief that the persons so delegated have not only 
taken a deep interest in the general subject of ag- 
riculture, but that their fondness for it and con- 
viction of its paramount importance, has led 
them toin'iUire into and reflect upon what con- 
sti.tutes good managemoi', both as to principles 
and practical details. 
It is not easy to imagine any duty that re- 
quires better judgment or more unyielding im- 
partiality than that of awarding suck a premium. 
How many things are to be considered! The 
extent of the farm to be compared, not only with 
others, but with the resources at the command of 
the proprietor — such as capital in money, in la- 
bor, in natural fertilizers, and in elements requi- 
site for compounding manures, &c. The time 
the farm has been in possession of its present 
proprietor, with its original and present condi- 
tion, and in that connection what hav'e been his 
extraneous aids and facilities, and how far iiu 
provements have resulted from his own sagacity 
and forethought, or from the knowledge and ex- 
perience of his manager — for the manager some- 
times makes heavy crops under an improving 
system of husbandry, not by the directions, but 
in spite of the owner. 
All these and many other things are to be taken 
into the account, and, after all, there will be lia- 
bility to error, as well from overlooking import- 
ant facts, as from giving undue weight to minor 
considerations; still, with such colleagues as 
were on that committee, I would, if my duties 
here would permit, most gladly have joined in 
the inspection of the farms to which they are in- 
vited, expecting to derive, not only peculiar 
pleasure in visiting their proprietors, but much 
inlorraation from observing their practice, and 
fi'om being associated with gentlemen of so much 
experience and judgment. Indeed, it is difficult 
to conceive any thing more agreeable and recre- 
ating to a passionate amateur of the country, and 
all that belongs to country life, than would be a 
comparison of the claims of competitors for such 
premiums. The thorough sifting that should be 
given to the candidate would be a caution to all 
indolent and tmthinkhig planters ! The cate- 
chism should he begun by a close examination 
of his personal agency in the concern, to know 
how much of the results were the fruits of his 
owu thoughts and directions. But that agency is 
not always to be measured by the time of a man’s 
rising, or the constancy of hi.s presence on the 
farm. There are some men who have things so 
systematized, that they can manage better when 
3ick,.or occasionally from home, than others who 
rise before day and are “fretting and fuming” 
from morning to night. The gentleman, Col. 
N. Bosley, of Hayfields, w’ho took the premium 
“presented by the hands of General Lafayette,” 
for the best managed farm of that year, was half 
his time bed-ridden, and had no overseer; but he 
knew every day what was doing, w here it was 
doing, how it was doing, and why— yes, and 
that’s the great ipoint— why that particular thing 
was being done at that particular time. He 
made an independent fortune with hay as his 
•Staple, on a very hilly, stony farm, sixteen miles 
from Baltimore. 
I had lately, by special invitation, and by the 
kind permission of my Boss, the satisfaction to 
dine at Indian Hill, the premium farm of Mas- 
sachusetts, to the proprietor of which the pre- 
mium was awarded, not only for the best managed 
farm, but for the best specimen of under draining, 
and the best system of keeping farm accounts. 
Who might not be prouder of such premiums 
) than of military achievements, and sometimes 
negative service without achievements,for which 
our wise, thoughtful, republican Government, 
representing two-thirds farmers, awards the high- 
est honors, the largest life salaries, hospitals, pen- 
sions, (f‘C. 
The proprietor of that farm, where I met some 
of the most accomplished agriculturists of Mas- 
sachusetts, is half the year absent in the South. 
But he has things so set down and systematized, 
that he is constantly and exactly informed of 
what is going on. Every man is numbered, and 
every job of work to be done is numbered, and 
he knows that on a given day number so and so 
was at work on job No. 7, or 3, or 2, as the case 
maybe. His people all rise at five, A. M., by 
the ringing of a bell, as in a ship or a factory; 
and breaklast by candle light, he taking his seat, 
when at home, at the head of their breakfast table, 
just to see that all are there, and that rill is right. 
Alter all is fairly under way, he is ready lor his 
own family breakfast table, where, as well as 
throughout the house, you find a neatness, good 
order, and abundance, corresponding with if not 
even excelling the out-door management. In 
fact, the neighbors do hint that “tv.'o heads are 
better than one !” Certain it is, that I never saw 
a more unique, antique, venerable looking man- 
sion outside, nor one in which reigns a more 
charming air of quiet order, good management, 
and domestic taste and harmony. 
To economize time, even the kindling is in 
the kitchen “the overnight.” The hash is ready 
only to be “warmed up,” and breakfast with 
coffee is all ready fer the laborers in the “twink- 
ling ol an eye” alter the bell rings at five. 
The laborers — willing, steady, and constant — 
are all white men, generally Scotch, sometimes 
Irish, hired by the month. On that point 1 refer 
to his answers to questions propounded by the 
Society. When all is going on, as it goes every 
day, as smooth as clockwork, Mr. Poore, rich 
“in all the qualities that give assurance of a 
man,” is then ready to take his family or his 
guest, as he did me, in his coach and “four in 
hand,” and that in his own nand of preference, 
■ ny where over delightful roads and a magnifi- 
cent country at the rate of eight miles an hour! 
1 only mention it to show that “best manage- 
ment” does not imply eternal drudgery, and the 
absence of all social enjoyment. At Indian Hill 
farm, as on every farm in New England, there is 
a place for everything and everything is in its 
place. You don’t see a bridle on the ground here 
and a swingletree in another place ; sheep skins 
and sometimes the sheep themselves eaten up 
by dogs, and harness lying out in the weather; 
axes scattered here and hoes every where ; carts 
broken and doors and gates off the hinges ; ne- 
groes hunting here and there for the spade, or 
for him that had it last, to know where he lelt it; 
galled horses with clogs on (heir feet and yokes 
on their necks; and oxen, as I this morning ac- 
tually saw a yoke in Washington, one palling 
one way and the other the other way with all his 
might, with a negro on each side armed with 
sticks to drive them from one side to the other. 
There (in New England) one yoke does at least 
as much as three do here. They are all fat 
enough for beef the year round, and are driven 
rather by signs and with very light whips than 
by violence. One must go to New England to 
have an idea of the power, the docility, and the 
great usefulness ol a single yoke of oxen. 
At Poughkeepsie, in the plowing match, 
there were seven single span of oxen and two of 
horses started for the premium, each managed 
by a plowman without a driver; thenrize was 
taken by a span of oxen I The whip of the 
plowman was lighter than the beach noitches, 
which 1 remember well, and to my great terror 
were kept standing in the corner of a log-cabin 
school-house in Calvert county, under the dread 
government of the never-to-be-forgotton Ptobert 
Spicknali. 
How much 1 should have been gratified could 
our committee, witli the estimable and efficient 
Secretary of the Society, have been with me to 
witness many things that I saw on an almost 
literally flying visit to Massachusetts and New 
York. I could “spin a yarn” worth hearing out 
ofit, if! had time; one that might make the 
woof and the web of an address, for which I see 
“by the papers” I have been “set down” for 
your next meeting; but close confinement here, 
and the disordered state of my health, will not 
allow me to comply with the wishes of the socie- 
ty in that respect. 
Among other places, I made a visit to Marsh- 
field, and there ate chowder, made chiefly of cod- 
fish, taken in the “deep wa'ers of the dark blue 
sea,” by the hand, hook and line ol the great 
American commoner himself. 
Arriving before dinner he took us first ihrougt 
his cornfield, by way ot an appetiser, and what 
with the thickness of the corn and the number of 
the pumpkins on the ground, you might as well 
have been dragged through a Mississippi cane- 
brake. I could not help thinking what glorious 
music a good pack of hounds would make in it, 
in pursuit of a gray fox or a wild cat. A large 
portion of the field would undoubtedly yield 
eighty bushels of corn to the acre, and yet corn 
of the same height with us would not produce 
twelve bushels. Mr. W. was proud and had 
reason to be of his large field of '■^swedes,” his 
twelve beautiful heifers, and ol his Southdown 
sheep, of the stock he selected in England, ot 
which he generously tendered as many as I 
would accept, which was a buck and two ewes, 
to go into Prince George’s county. But of all 
things he seemed to be fondestof and most fami- 
liar with hisnuble oxen! some six or eight yoke, 
that would average, in the shambles, at least 
twelve hundred. He seemed, loo, to felicitate 
himself particularly in the shade of a venerable 
SiOfi magnificent elm near his house, Rcligirme 
patrum vmltos servataper annos,” its graceful 
branches extending over a diameter of a hundred 
feet. 
You will receive in this hasty letter the an- 
swers of iMr. Poore, of Indian Hill, to the ques- 
tions propounded by the Society. It is probable 
that many of your readers will peruse them with 
as much benfit, if not interest, as they would do 
— some other things. Respectfully, 
J. S. Skinnee. 
EXTRACT 
From Mr. Whipple’s Address before the Merrimack Co. 
Agricultural .Society, at Warner, N. H. Oct. 14. 
“We are very much in the habit of cultiva- 
ting too much land. Certain it is that one acre 
well cultivated and richly manured, will pro- 
duce more than two acres indifferently cultiva- 
ted — and then you save about half the labor — a 
very important item. The farms in this coun- 
ty and in the Slate, now under cultivation, are 
capable ol producing, by proper and judicious 
managemennt, from 25 to50 per cent, more than 
the present yield. I think I do not exaggerate 
in my estimate. There is one store in Concord 
which sells annually twenty thousand barrels of 
flour. Suppose th t is one-filth part of the 
quantity sold in the State— then there would be 
one hundred thousand barrels of flour consumed 
yearly. Estimate this at the lowest price, say 
S5 per barrf»], and you have the sum of S500,000 
expended for the single article of flour, beside 
the other gram which is brought into the State. 
Could you believe this? Half a million of dol- 
lars is yearly paid from this State, for bread 
stuff raised western farmers. Certain I am 
from inquiry, that the estimate I have made is 
small. 
“You ought to raise your own bread stuffs; 
you might easily supply the wants of every con- 
sumer in the State. There is no reason, no 
excuse why we should be dependent upon our 
western farmers for such an immense amount 
of bread stuffs. We have soils well adapted for 
the growth of every kind of grain, and we as 
farmers, areas capable of producing large crops 
as the farmers of neighboring States. That 
there should be such a deficiency for our home 
consumption, is altogether unaccountable. We 
ought to encourage our sons and young men to 
remain here on the beautiful hills and vallies of 
our own native State and cultivate our lands, 
instead ol advising them to go W est. It is a 
