SOUTHERN CROPS AND CULTURE. 
85 
er and shorter we can grow grain cheaper; and the 
cow-pea will grow among our com without mate¬ 
rial injury. I have repeatedly referred to these 
facts, hut they are in my estimation of so much 
value and of so easy application, that I must con¬ 
tinue to allude to them even if I repeat “ line upon! 
line, and precept upon precept.” The policy is, to 
protect land from the sun, from washing, and from 
the exhausting effects of cropping. Whether this 
can be done, and good crops gathered for 50 or 100 
years, I will not dare affirm; but this I will do— 
much of our lands lying near to the water courses, 
and the flat lands in the western part of Mississippi, 
can be kept near their present state of product for 
many years. 
We never remove corn-stalks from our land, as is 
done in many portions of the United States; many 
have burnt them off, as they do cotton stalks— 
these are therefore generally returned to the land. 
If the pea be sown among corn about the 1st of 
June, the vine will cover the land entire before the 
hottest of our summer be past, and if not fed off, 
will give a vast quantity of vegetable matter to the 
earth ; these, with the corn-stalk, will nearly coun¬ 
terbalance the deterioration eaused by taking off the 
com and the fodder—and if we were to sow down 
in October, Egyptian oats or rye, on corn and cotton 
land, to be left on the ground until planting time, I 
feel certain that the washing rains of winter would 
do but little injury, and that the return to the earth 
would be ample. There can be no doubt as to the 
vegetable matter, and I presume there is a suffi¬ 
ciency of inorganic matter in our soils to last many 
years without any material injury ; for we only ex¬ 
port the cotton wool, having, you may say, all the 
balance to return to the land. What the intrinsic 
value of cotton seed is, taking stable manure as a 
.-standard, I cannot say; but I am fully convinced 
they ought t© be used only as manure. I am satis¬ 
fied as to feeding hogs with them, having tried them 
effectually. The experience of all men can never 
induce me to use them again. 1 have lost in twelve 
months full 6 0 hogs, that should now have netted 
me 12,000 lbs. of pork, and which I could now sell 
for about $500. I say not that my loss is entirely 
attributable to the seed; but I know that I lost some 
very choice mixed hogs, which were killed by the 
seed. As to feeding cattle with them, I am so 
doubtful, that I exclude my stock entirely. I would 
then only use them for manure. A brother planter 
of mine, who is devoted to planting, informs me 
that he has manured in the drill, and that the yield 
was about one-third gain, which, if only 300 lbs., 
would be $4 or $5 per acre ; this for the first 
year; $2 to .2,50 for the second year; and $1 to 
1,25 for the third, would be' some 10 dollars per 
acre in three years. I would use enough to do per¬ 
manent good, say about 100 bushels per acre, thus 
manuring about one-third of cotton land yearly, at a 
trifling cost Thus far, the labor and cost is trivia], 
and all com land and one-third of the cotton land 
has been manured. There should be enough rye, 
oats, and peas saved, to plant the succeeding crop. 
You have no conception of the quantity of grass 
that follows an oat or a rye crop, in this country, on 
fair land. I have no doubt but I could have cut a 
ton per acre, and then left a heavy aftermath to 
turn under. I know some theorists deny this—hut 
that matters not. 
To the above I would recommend at least half an 
acre be planted per hand of sweet potatoes, one- 
third to one-half of an acre with artichokes. 1 know 
that ordinary land, producing say 8 to 10 hundred 
lbs. of cotton per acre, will produce 1,000 to 1,200 
lbs. sweet potatoes. My experience with arti¬ 
chokes is too limited to speak positively; but when 
we reflect that the leaves are large and hairy, that 
the product is from £00 to 1,000 bushels per acre, 
and that no portion of the crop is fed off from the 
land, the improvement must be certain. The stalk 
and leaves contain more alkali than most any other 
plant yields, and very largely of ashes. I have un¬ 
derstood that some writer lias determined—for him¬ 
self—that sweet potatoes exhaust the land very 
much; all I can say to this is, I have assisted in 
planting them for 25 to 30 years, and have made up 
my mind that a good crop of sweet potatoes, leav¬ 
ing the vines on the ground, is equal to a good 
manuring. 
There is yet all the manure from lots, stable, and 
hog pen to use, which, though small, yet will add 
somewhat to the general result. This can be vastly 
increased by hauling in leaves and corn-stalks. In 
addition to the improvement from manures, I would 
urge as equally important—rotation. A friend who 
dined with me this day, who was bred to farming, 
and who is no theorist, made confession of his con¬ 
version to the soundness of the doctrine. He was 
incredulous, and changed this year mostly through 
necessity. He «ays, though he was injured by 
worms and a bad stand, that he has made a better 
crop than he ever had before. If we will examine 
into the material taken up by some crops from the 
earth, we can see that there is sound reason in the 
matter. Let us take wheat and oats. Wheat takes 
up 2.9 percent, of potash,and 204 of soda; whereas 
oats require only 6 of the one and 5 of the other. 
If wheat be persisted in for several years, these 
alkalies must become scarce on farm lands; where¬ 
as, if a crop that would probably take less or 
restore a portion were planted, and the land allowed 
to grow up in grass or weeds, there would he some 
certainty of making other good crops. I have seen 
an improved crop of .cotton grown on land after it 
had grown one crop of oats, which were fed off to 
hogs on the land. 
Draining is another important addition. Many 
are prepared to pounce on this—“ what! drain our 
lands here when we need so much moisture !” The 
advantage of draining much of our upland would 
be sure, in getting a stand of corn or cotton earlier; 
of its growing off earlier; of its ripening earlier; and 
in course of its needing moisture in midsummer, 
much less. But if the land be drained, so as to 
draw off the water that the earth cannot absorb, it 
cannot prevent the earth from retaining as much 
moisture; and from being less liable to being im¬ 
pacted by water, will really retain moisture longer 
—besides, the early shading of the land will retain 
it. By getting com up earlier, and it growing off 
earlier, it can be laid by earlier, and thus we shall 
have more time to attend to cotton. 
We lose too much time in fencing, and if we 
would adopt hedging with the nondescript rose, or 
