THE SOUTHERN CULTIVATOR. 
115 
then follows and drops peas in said furrow; a 
plow then turns back and with one furrow cov- 
ers the peas. If the ground is too dry for peas 
to come up, I have the rows left without the 
middle furrow being plowed out till rain, then 
one plow will run the last furrow in those rows 
as fast as a hand can drop the peas, and another 
plow will keep up with the covering. In fifteen 
or twenty days after the corn should have the 
last plowing, which is called laying by. This 
plowing may be done either with a shovel or 
sweep. My land being so broken, I generally 
give the last plowing with the shovel. After 
this much is done, when it is convenient, the 
hoe hands go over and chop round the peas and 
corn, cutting all weeds and large grass, if any. 
I am well aw’are that this mode differs but 
very little from the general custom of cultiva- 
ting corn. The difierence is most in that of 
siding with colters, and many corn makers may 
side their corn with colters for aught I know,bu*' 
I can say to those who never have tried siding 
young corn with colters, that if they will have 
colters made of a proper shape and try them, I 
am sure they will never repent it, especially 
those that have stiff land to cultivate. 
It may seem to some at first thought, that se- 
ven teet wide for corn rows is giving too much 
distance; but a slight calculation will prove to 
them that 7 by 2 feet will give a good many 
more stalks on an acre than will be by 4 teet 
each way. By having corn rows less than sev- 
en feet wide does not do well for a pea row in 
the middle. 
I am careful never to have my plows at work 
in my corn, or in any part of my crop, when the 
land is the least mirery. It is an inj ury to the 
crop as well as to the land to plow while it is 
too wet, especially land that has little or no 
sand in it 
It is well known to planters, that corn planted 
in the summer is of a more rapid growth than 
that planted early in the Spring. Perhaps there 
are but few that have taken any account how 
long it will take corn to come to resting ears, 
planted at any season ol the year. I have taken 
some account of this matter and am willing to 
give it to the public. Year before last I plant- 
ed a lot that cows had been penned on, the 15th 
day of July, with the common gourd seed corn 
dry from the crib, and had roasting^ears the 53d 
day after putting the seed in the ground. Last 
year I planted the same lot with the same kind 
of com, and did not have roasting ears till the 
64th day after planting— (last year it was plant- 
ed the 4th day of July.) You will see there was 
a difference of 11 days. The difference was 
owing to the season — year before last it rained 
perhaps half the days in August, and the lot be- 
ing on a hill side and very stony, could bear a 
shower every day or two. The ears were hea- 
vier and better matured last year than they were 
year before last. In both years, as the ears 
were pulled off for eating, (all hands had free 
access, both black and white,) the stalks were 
cut off at the ground and fed to the horses and 
hogs — every part was consumed by them to pro- 
fit no doubt. The same lot was sown in barley 
each fall for the benefit of my poor calves, sheep, 
&c. I have planted the same lot in corn again 
this year, the 24th of June, and expect to contin- 
ue it in producing two crops a year. I leave 
you to judge of its profitableness. 
■ I beg leave to enqtiire, through your paper, 
if there are any of your subscribers who have 
the Kentucky Blue Grass in cultivation: if so, 
they will do me a favor by giving some account 
of it. I wish to get some of its seed, and would 
be glad to know how it thrives in this climate. 
I also wish to know if any planter in this 
Stale has a com and cob crusher; if there is 
one, I should be glad to know if such a mill is 
durable, and if they will crush the cobs small 
enough to be ground to meal in a grist min'? I 
have no doubt of the great saving planters 
could make by having such a mill, if they can 
be made to be durable and crush cobs small 
enough to be made with grain to meal in a grist 
mill. Horses or cows will eat every particle of 
com cobs if soaked in salted water till they be- 
come soft. I have seen statements made, going 
to prove tha t there is one third as much nutri- 
ment contained in the cob as there is in the 
grain of corn that covers the cob. Whether 
this be a fact or not, I am not able to decide, 
but I have no doubt but there is considerable 
nutriment in cobs. 
I am, sirs, yours respectfully, 
John Farrar. 
Houston County, Ga., ) 
June 29, 1843. j 
Iviportance of Hogs. — Hoio the People of Georgia 
are imposed on by Spurious Breed, tf-c. 
To the Editors of the Southern Cultivator: 
It is no longer a question in Georgia, should 
the cotton planter of the South raise his bacon? 
By long and sad experience the Georgia cotton 
planter has found it to be to his advantage to 
raise his own bacon; nay more, it is with him 
now a matter of the first magnitude, for without 
the article he cannot raise cotton. Bacon, from 
long experience, is known to be the most healthy 
meat diet in the world, particularly for negroes, 
who do most of the labor on cotton plantations; 
and as long as the negro children are fed boun- 
tifully upon bacon and bacon grease, &c., they 
are not attacked with worms; and it is a fact 
well known to physicians, that near one third of 
the deaths of negro children, from two to seven 
years old, are from worms. Good old fat bacon 
is (not a remedy, but) a preventive of that for- 
midable disease. Being raised in the South, 
near the Atlantic, amid large and extensive 
plantations of negroes, my experience (not much 
circumscribed,) can testify to the truth of the 
above remark. In that region of country I ob- 
served, early in life, that the fatality of the ne- 
gro children, caused by worms, was in equal 
ratio with the amount of bacon diet furnished 
them. The above remark is founded in truth, 
and will be made more evident by experience 
in future, and 1 consider the subject of great 
moment in subserving the ends of religion and 
humanity. 
In order for the cotton planter to produce this 
article, so indispensible to his welfare, it is plain 
that the first step after making an abundance of 
all kinds of grain, is to procure the best breed 
or stock. 
, The very laudable and prai.«eworthy spirit 
manifested (only a year or two past) among our 
planters, to procure and raise a genuine stock, 
has exposed them to unpardonable impositions, 
equally as disgracelul as that one of wooden nut- 
meg memory. 
Since this noble spirit has manifested itself 
among the planters of Georgia, from whence 
have they obtained blooded hogs? Answer, 
from the Western States principally, and they 
have in like manner obtained their breed from 
the Northern States, and these have, in like 
manner, been supplied from the fountain head. 
Old England. Now soon as any one of us ob- 
tains one of these genuine animals, the next 
thing done is to cross Jthe breed with our scrubs, 
and the same thing is done in all parts of the 
country. This spurious and mixed breed, pam- 
pered from the start, is, by our more enterprising 
bretheren of the West, hurried across the Cum- 
berland Mountain, down into the beautiful and 
fertile plains of Georgia, with the name and 
character of the genuine stock. The credulous 
and unsuspecting Georgian, (with the milk of 
human kindness overflowing,) becomes the dupe 
of his more keen and sagacious neighbor ol the 
west, and instead of getting the genuine blood - 
he has only the half, and perhaps the quarter 
breed. For the slock, nine times in ten, was 
first mixed in the Northern States, secondly in 
the Western States, and hence we see a spuri- 
ous and wretched breed of hogs, after much ex- 
pense, swarming about almost every plantation 
in Georgia, to the great disappointment and in- 
jury of all. A continuation of such disappoint- 
ments will humble that zeal and emulation 
which has just taken such favorable hold among 
our planters, and in disgust they will return 
again to their old station. Whoever will take 
the trouble to read the “Sketches of Travel,” 
by Captain Barkley, an English agricultu- 
rist, through several of the United States, will 
become more acquainted with the humbuggery 
practised on us in the articles Grazier and Berk- 
shire hogs, Saxon and Merino sheep, Durham 
cows, &c. The want of direct importation has 
made the Southern States “hewers of wood and 
carriers of water” for a long series of years. — 
Why have the people of Georgia been depen- 
dent on States 600 miles distant, for hogs of a 
spurious breed? Where is our much neglected 
but much beloved Savannah? as fine a sea port 
as any on the borders of the Atlantic, within 
the boundry of our State, to which we can, if 
we wished, have the genuine stock ol every 
kind imported direct from any part of the Eng= 
lish Islands, in from thirty to forty days. Why 
not avail ourselves of these signal advantages, 
which the Western States do not and cannot 
enjoy? But rather than import the genuine 
breed ourselves, we have preferred, heretofore^ 
to pay extravagant prices for the half and quarm 
ter breeds, and hence we hear the remark almost 
in every company we approach, that “it is all a 
multicaulus speculation.” But I am glad to 
know there is yet intelligence enough left among 
some of us to estimate these matters properly. 
