40 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[February, 
adopted, we advise every person to construct 
some kind of apparatus, or at least to use pure 
rain water, and discard spring, well, brook, river, 
or pond water, unless filtered. 
Valuable Experience with Clover in Re¬ 
newing Worn Out Land. 
To the Editor of the American Agriculturist 
Is the Winter of 1848 I purchased six acres of 
land which lay adjoining my farm, and which the 
former owner had pronounced almost worthless, 
from the fact that it was, as we farmers term it, 
“runout.” It lay at the extreme end of his 
farm, and a piece of woodland lying between 
that and the rest of the farm, with a steep hill to 
ascend, made it impossible to get manure to it, at 
least so he thought. He had cropped it with rye 
for several years, until it would not produce 
enough to pay for the labor bestowed, his last 
crop being but five bushels per acre. This so dis¬ 
couraged him, that he offered to take ten dollars 
per acre for the piece. I bought it, thinking that 
I could bring it to its former fertility, which was 
sufficient to raise 40 bushels of corn per acre. In 
the Spring I sowed six quarts of the large 
kind of clover seed to the acre, and let it lie that 
Summer, turning nothing on it. The clover took 
as well as could be expected on such land. The 
next Summer it came on a little better, and would 
have been perhaps a third of a crop had it been 
mowed ; but as soon as it was well in the blos¬ 
som, I plowed it under, and about the first of 
September sowed it to rye, seeding to clover again 
in the Spring. The result was nine bushels of 
rye per acre, which was so much better than I 
expected, that I resolved to continue the process. 
In 1853 the clover was considerably better than 
before, and in July I turned it under again, sowed 
and seeded as before :—produce 12^ bushels to 
the acre. Performed the same operation in ’55 
and '57, with the following results : in’55, 15 bush¬ 
el.-, and in ’57, 22 bushels to the acrej when I 
considered the land strong enough to bear corn. 
Accordingly I let the clover grow, and in Octo¬ 
ber turned it under to plant to corn next season. 
The rye was always threshed in the field, and the 
straw stacked and left until the next crop was 
sown, then spread on lop just before the ground 
froze, which, in a measure, prevented the rye 
from heaving out. 
It is true that I have not derived any benefit 
from it except what rye it produced over and 
above the cost of cultivation, but the increase in 
the value of the land will more than pay all ex¬ 
pense, for the former owner has offered me ^30 
per acre for the piece. I have never pastured it 
one week since I have owned it, so it is an easy 
matter to come at the profit or loss in the specu¬ 
lation. “ Farmer Bor.” 
Oak Util, N, Y. 
Remarks. —The experiment of “ Farmer Boy,” 
and its results, like that of “ Squire ” Bunker giv- 
an in the January Agriculturist, should be care¬ 
fully studied by the owners of “ worn out ” lands. 
J o make it as clear as possible we have re-ar¬ 
ranged the figures sent by our correspondent, 
placing them in tabular form. 
Dr. 
Cost of cultivating and harvesting C acres rye 
4 years. ®$6 per acre, per year....SHI 
Clover seed and sowing. 44 
Inti rest and taxes on land 10 years. 50 
Total cost. $238 
Cr. 
350 bushels Rye at average of 70c.$215 
increase i.i value of land. 120—$355 
Clear Profit...$127 
This would be $12.70 per year, or about $2 per 
acre, which is a profit of 20 per cent on the in¬ 
vestment, over the regular rate of interest. 
Perhaps some skeptical anti-book farmer may 
say “All very well, and easily done, when you 
can buy land at such a bargain, but you could get 
no such figures from land at $30 per acre. Let 
us see what may be done. “ Farmer Boy ” ob¬ 
tained for the first crop, 9 bushels per acre; 2d, 12£ 
bushels ; 3d, 15 bushels ; 4t.h, 22 bushels—an aver¬ 
age increase of over 4 bushels per year. Should 
the same course be followed, it would be safe to 
calculate upon an increase of 4 bushels per acre 
for the next crop, making the yield 26 bushels 
per acre. The account would then stand 
Dr. 
Cost of cultivation (1 acre)...$6 
Clover seed and sowing. 5 
Interest and taxes two years... 5 
Total cost....$16 
Gr. 
26 bushels Rye worth at least 75c, per bush.$19 50 
Profit.$3 50 
near 12 per cent on the investment after paying 
for legal interest, labor, etc. A result that can, 
and ought to be obtained, by a rational system of 
farming.—E d.] 
How Tobacco is Grown and Prepared for 
Market_I. 
Tobacco stands next to cotton, among the ex¬ 
ports from the Southern States. It very early 
attracted the attention of planters,’ and in colo¬ 
nial days, before the development of cotton man¬ 
ufactures, it was a main reliance for export, and 
indeed, to some extent, served the purpose of 
currency. The price of a month’s work, a bushel 
of corn, a cow, or a horse, was so many pounds 
of tobacco. As it is reckoned among the luxu¬ 
ries of mankind, there has been no such rapid in¬ 
crease in its production as in the case of cotton. 
There has, however, been a steady gain in its use, 
and notwithstanding its well known injurious ef¬ 
fects, and the war made upon it by the medical 
faculty, it is chewed, smoked, and snuffed in ever 
increasing quantities. The exports which in 
1855 were put down at fourteen millions of dol¬ 
lars, have reached this year twenty one millions, 
and this is but a part of the product of the coun¬ 
try. The principal tobacco growing States are 
Maryland and Virginia, and the States lying im¬ 
mediately west But it is grown in considerable 
quantities in all the other States, and forms an 
important crop in the valley of Connecticut river. 
It has been cultivated to a considerable extent in 
that region from the earliest days, and the varie¬ 
ty known as Connecticut seed leaf, used chiefly 
for wrappers, commands a high price iu the mark¬ 
et. Indeed, we suspect that a large part of the 
Havanna cigars consumed in our city, are grown 
on the soil of the nutmeg State. 
SEED AND SEED BEDS. 
The practice of transplanting is universal in the 
cultivation of this crop. Much therefore depends 
upon an abundant supply of good, strong, healthy 
plants. To make sure of success, every planter 
should grow his own seed, saving the strongest 
early plants for this purpose. The seed, if not 
“the least among herbs,” is exceedingly minute. 
It is said that twenty-five hundred, furnishing 
plants enough for a half acre, will lie upon a half¬ 
dime. It is of the utmost importance to have 
good seed, as the loss of a few days at the criti¬ 
cal time of sowing, will make the plants too late 
for a well matured crop. The vitality of the seed 
may he tested by putting a few from the lot into 
a lock of moist cotton, to see if they will germi¬ 
nate. It is said that seed kept five or six years, 
will sprout sooner than fresh seed ; hut this we 
regard as one of the old wives’ fables with which 
our agriculture is still encumbered. Well dried 
seed of the last year’s growth is quite certain to 
germinate. It is the practice of some of our best 
cultivators to sprout the seed designed for sow¬ 
ing, before putting them into the bed. This is 
done by taking two or three quarts of wood 
mold, or any other very fine soft soil, and mixing 
the seed very thoroughly with the whole mass. 
It should then be moderately moistened, and kept 
in a warm room four or five days previous to the 
time of sowing. This course enables the sower 
to distribute the seed more evenly over the. bed, 
and as they are already sprouted, they come up 
before the weeds, and keep the start of them. 
It requires but a small quantity of seed to sup¬ 
ply a large plantation. The more sparsely and 
equally the seeds are distributed, the stronger the 
young plants will grow. The rule is about a 
thimble full, or a pipe bowl full, to a square rod, 
and this quantity of ground ought to furnish plants 
enough for an acre. 
The seed bed should be prepared in a very 
thorough manner. It may he either with or with¬ 
out glass, according to the circumstances of the 
cultivator. Where the season is rather short for 
this crop, as in places nonh of this city, it is an 
advantage to start them under glass, in the same 
way as cabbage plants. If without glass, a spot 
should be selected upon the south slope of a hill, 
or in some sheltered spot where it will have the 
full benefit of the sun. The bed is prepared early 
in the Spring, by cutting up the brush, grubbing 
up the roots, and burning a large pile of brush 
upon the spot. This furnishes a large supply of 
wood ashes, which is one of the best fertilizers 
for this plant. If a fresh virgin soil is not at hand, 
the want may be supplied by working in a heavy 
dressing of compost, or yard manure, into any 
piece of land that is convenient.. In this case it 
will be a good plan to burn brush on top, as it 
kills the seeds of weeds, makes the soil fine, and 
fertilizes it. If brush is not convenient, wood 
ashes will be a good substitute. The plot should 
be laid off into beds about four feet wide, for con¬ 
venience in weeding and drawing the young 
plants as they are wanted. The surface should 
be raked with a fine toothed garden rake, until 
all the small lumps are broken. The beds should 
next be rolled or gently pressed smooth with a 
board or shovel, to prevent the seed- from sinking 
too deep into the soil. After sowing the seed, 
the bed should be again smoothed over with the 
back of the rake, and gently patted down with the 
shovel or board. All this care is necessary, that 
the seeds may not be buried beyond the reach of 
the sun's rays. Unless the seeds have been pre¬ 
viously sprouted, they come forward very slowly, 
and it will be six or eight weeks before they be¬ 
come large enough for transplanting. It is a good 
plan to wet the beds occasionally with a weak so¬ 
lution of guano, about a pound of guano to a bar¬ 
rel of water applied at evening after the liquid 
has stood all day in the sun. 
After the young plants show themselves, the 
beds should be closely watched for weeds. Where 
the plants are too thick, they should be thinned 
out, and the soil should be stirred as often as 
once a week. The strength of the plants will 
depend a good deal upon the cultivation they re¬ 
ceive while in the seed bed. 
SUITABI.E SOIL, AND TRANSPLANTING. 
It is not all good land that is suitable for this 
crop. The famous tobacco of Cuba is grown only 
in a very limited district in the southwest partol 
the island, and this district is growing smaller 
from the wretched system of tillage. Formerly 
the tobacco lands were about eighteen miles from 
Havanna, now they are one hundred and fifty. 
In Virginia, and the other States, tobacco of the 
