212 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
CULTURE OF MADDER. 
Mr. Russel Bronson, of Birmingham, Hu¬ 
ron County, Ohio, a successful cultivator of 
madder, has published a communication 
upon this subject, which contains the fol¬ 
lowing information: 
“ A location facing the south or south-east, 
is to be preferred. A sandy loam, not over 
stiff and heavy or light and sandy, or a good 
brown, deep, rich upland loam, free from foul 
grass, weeds, stones, or stumps of trees. 
Where a crop of potatoes, peas, corn, or 
wheat has been cultivated the past season, 
plow deep twice, once in September, and 
once in October, and if rather stiff, let it lie 
after the plow until spring. When the 
spring opens, and the ground has become 
dry and warm—say in Tennessee 1st of April, 
Ohio, 15th, and New-York, 25th, to the 1st 
of May, (I speak of the spring of 1836,)— 
plow again deep, the deeper the better; then 
harrow well and strike it into ridges with a 
one-horse plow, 3 feet wide and 4 feet va¬ 
cant, or making a ridge once in 7 feet, rais¬ 
ing it, if on rather moist ground, 8 or 10 
inches, and dry land 6 or 8 from the natural 
level; then, with a light harrow, level and 
shape the ridges like a well-formed bed of 
beets, &c. 
We will suppose you intend to plant one 
acre of ground, and that you have purchased 
eight bushels of tap roots in the fall, and 
buried them like potatoes on your premises; 
count the ridges on your acre, and take out 
of the ground one bushel of roots and plant 
it on one eighth of your ridges ; you will then 
be able to ascertain how to proportion your 
roots for the remainder. 
The following is the manner of planting , 
cultivating , &c., when the quantities of 
ground do not exceed three or four acres. 
One person on each side of the ridge to 
make the holes, (plant four inches below the 
surface of the bed, or thereabouts, when 
covered,) one on each side to drop the roots, 
and one on each side to cover, pressing the 
hill in the manner of planting corn ; or three 
persons may be placed on one side, as the 
case may be, whether you have one or more 
acres to plant. Let the owner be the drop¬ 
per of roots, and his most thorough assist¬ 
ant behind him. Make the holes from 12 to 
10 inches apart, and about six inches from 
the edge of the ridge. As the plants are 
supposed to have been purchased in the fall, 
the roots, may have thrown out sprouts, and 
possibly have leaved. In this case, in drop¬ 
ping and covering, you will leave the most 
prominent sprouts a little out of the ground, 
as where a plant has leaved, it ought not to 
be smothered. 
When the plant gets up three or four inch¬ 
es, weed with the hoe, and plow with one 
horse between the ridges or beds, but not on 
them; this will take place two or three 
weeks after planting. When up 12 or 15 
inches, many of the tops will fall; assist: 
them with ten feet poles crossing the beds, 
covering with a shovel or garden-rake, 
throwing the soil from between the ridges. 
After loosening with the one-horse plow, 
you will, with a shovel, scatter the earth be¬ 
tween the stalks, rather than throw it into 
heaps ; of course we wish to keep the stalks 
separate, as they are to form new and im¬ 
portant roots in the center of the beds. 
About the 20th of June you may plow between 
the beds, and scatter more earth on the fresh 
tops, (all but the ends,) and when you get 
through, you may plant potatoes between 
the beds, if you please. 1 do not recom¬ 
mend it if you have plenty of land, although 
I raised 1,070 bushels of pink-eyes on eight 
acres the first year, and sixty bushels of 
corn. If your land is perfectly clear of 
weeds, you are through with your labor on 
the madder crop for this year, except in lati¬ 
tudes where there is not much snow and 
considerable frost; in this case, cover in 
October, two inches or thereabouts. Second 
year, some operations in weeding, but no 
crop between; cover once in June. Third 
year, weed only. Fourth year, weed in the 
spring, if a weedy piece of ground. 
Begin to plow out the roots in Tennessee 
(3 years old) 1st of September; Ohio (4 
years) same time; New-York 15th or 20th, 
after cutting off the tops with a sharp hoe. 
In plowing out the roots, use a heavy span 
of horses and a large plow. We ought to 
choose a soil neither too wet nor too dry, 
too stiff or light. Shake the dirt from the 
roots, and rinse or wash, as the soil may be 
stiff or light; dry in a common hop-kiln; 
grind them in a mill similar to Wilson’s pa¬ 
tent coffee-mill; this mill weighs from one 
to two pounds. The madder mill may be 
from sixty to 80 pounds weight. Grind 
coarse, and fan in a fanning mill; then grind 
again for market. The profit of this crop is 
immense ; the exhaustion of soil trifling, and 
glutting the market out of the question. 
Madder is used in whole, or part, for the 
following colors on wool, both in England, 
France, and America, viz.; blue, black, red, 
buff, olive-brown, olive, navy-blue, and many 
others ; finally, it produces one of the most 
beautiful, durable, and healthy colors that is 
at this time dyed ; as for calico printers, it 
enters greatly into their dyes. 
As the tops of the plants spread very 
much, some advise placing them in hills, 
som what like Indian corn, four and even 
six feet apart each way, and two plants in 
each hill.”— New-England Farmer. 
CULTURE OF BROOM CORN. 
Some inquiries received relative to the cul¬ 
tivation of broom corn, induce us to give a 
few items of information on that subject. 
Broom corn will thrive on any land where 
Indian corn grows well. The preparation of 
the soil, the manures required, and the after 
cultivation are very much alike for each crop. 
One grower says that it always succeeds 
best on the inverted sod of an old meadow 
or pasture, and is a very sure crop, having 
never failed with him except from late frosts. 
In the Mohawk valley broom corn is raised 
on the flats very successfully. Stiff clay, 
such as one correspondent mentions, would 
not be the best soil which could be chosen— 
unless well drained and manured. 
As early as the season will admit, the 
ground selected should be prepared and 
planted. The latter operation is performed 
with a seed planter, or drill, in rows about 
three and one-half feet apart. Some sea¬ 
sons it is delayed by unfavorable weather as 
late as the first week in June. As soon as 
the corn is fairly up, it is hoed, and soon 
after thinned so as to leave the stalks two or 
three inches apart in the row. If only hoed 
r along the rows, the remaining surface is kept 
clean by the frequent use of the cultivator, 
and the working finished by running a shov¬ 
el or double mold-board plow rather shallow 
between the rows. 
It was formerly the practice to let broom 
corn stand until quite ripe, and also to break 
down the tops and let them hang for some 
weeks, so that the brush might straighten 
evenly. Now the tops are lopped while the 
brush is quite green and the seed yet in the 
milk, and then cut down by a second set of 
hands, while a third loads them into wagons 
and takes them to the factory, one of which 
is generally carried on by those who grow 
much broom corn. There they are parcel-d 
into sorts of equal length and the seeds taken 
off by a hatcheling machine, carried by wat¬ 
er, steam or horse power. It is then spread 
thin on racks under shelter, and will dry in 
about a week, so that it may be packed in 
bulk. 
An average yield is stated to be about one 
hundred brooms per acre—one hundred 
pounds of cleaned brush making about sev¬ 
enty brooms of the average size. The 
stocks are five or six feet high after the 
brush is cut off, and are generally left on the 
field to be plowed in the succeeding spring. 
It is said that the stocks are full of leaves 
which are very nutritive, and in case of need, 
would furnish a large amount of good food 
for cattle. They can be cut and dried for 
winter, or eaten green by stock on the 
ground. The seed is used as food for fowls, 
and sometimes as food for stock.— Credit 
unknown. 
PATIENCE IN WHEAT GROWING. 
The Mark Lane Express, of May 21st, in 
a review of the Corn Trade, makes the fol¬ 
lowing observations which we extract: 
We are glad to find that our theory of pa¬ 
tience towards the wheat plant has been vin¬ 
dicated by a recent examination of some 
growing on the light lands of Surrey. It 
seems that “ on the last days of April hardly 
a green blade was to be seen on a farm there 
to the rod, and that in a fortnight afterwards 
the plants, after being rolled, were reappear¬ 
ing.” The whole is explained by an exhibi¬ 
tion of the temperature of the surface, as 
compared with that of the soil to the depth 
of 18 inches ; the mean temperature of the 
surface for the first fourteen days in May 
was 3l!j 0 , that of the soil 41|°, which is 10-^° 
warmer. On the 3d when the superficial 
temperature was only 21°, the soil was as 
high as 41°, or 20° warmer, and never went 
lower than 40° in the fourteen days. It 
must also be remembered that the roots 
were not only kept in heart by the higher 
temperature, but by the unusual dryness of 
the soil; and that the circumstance of the 
plant only showing a small head to the se¬ 
vere east winds was still more in favor of its 
recovery, for there was no less exhaustion 
of sap. This modern observations bring to 
light the soundness of old adages; for in 
some parts farmers were wont to say, in re¬ 
spect of great beneficial changes in the crop, 
“ I visited my wheat in May, 
And then went sorrowing away ; 
I visited my fields in June, 
And went away whistling a tune.” 
Let us, therefore, hope that, with finer 
weather over head, some of our patient agri¬ 
cultural friends will reap a better recom- 
pence than they once expected. 
The Female Mind. —The influence of the 
female mind over the mind of man, is great 
er, perhaps, than many are willing to ac¬ 
knowledge. Its operations are various, and 
some men struggle fearfully to disengage 
themselves from it. But this we believe, 
that more or less, all men have felt its pow¬ 
er; and those perhaps have experienced it 
to the greatest extent who would have it 
supposed they despised it most. A woman 
loses many of her charms, and consequent¬ 
ly, much of her power in the opinion of 
many, when she ranges herself on the side 
of that which is wrong ; while it is impossi 
ble to calculate the influence of virtuous 
women, when that influence is exercised with 
tenderness and modesty. The ruin produced 
by a bad woman may be sudden and violent, 
and compared to the bursting of a volcano, 
or the overflowings of the ocean ; but the 
influence of a virtuous woman are like the 
gentle dewand morning showers, which de¬ 
scend silently and softly, and are known only 
by their effects in the smiling aspect of the 
valleys and the weight of the autumnal 
branches. 
