AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
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AGRICULTURE IS THE MOST HEALTHFUL, THE MOST USEFUL, AND THE MOST NOBLE EMPLOYMENT OF MAN.— Washington. 
CONDUCTING EDITOR, 
ORANGE JUDD, A. M.' 
PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 
ALLEN & CO., 189 Water-st., New-York 
VOL. XIV.—NO. 23.] 
NEW-YORK, THURSDAY, AUGUST 16, 1855. 
[NEW SERIES.—NO. 101. 
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8VISIT TO NORFOLK COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS. 
Farm of B. V. French , Esq .—We enjoyed 
both the pleasure and advantage, a few days 
since, of looking over this admirably man¬ 
aged farm, in company with its intelligent 
propriet or. It is situated near the Railroad 
den''. ,n Braintree, and is made up of several 
detached portions, the high price of land in 
the vicinity of Boston, and the comparative¬ 
ly great number of its proprietors, rendering 
it a difficult matter to buy large masses of 
land together. The aggregate area of his 
farm is not so much to be reckoned as its 
products. These are large, and in the high¬ 
est degree satisfactory and remunerative. 
Whatever the proprietor undertakes to do, 
is done thoroughly, and therefore profitably, 
as a general rule. 
His orchards of apple and most other fruit 
trees, all of which are the most approved 
varieties, are extensive and peculiarly thrifty 
and productive. In his early planting, he 
committed the fault of not unfrequent occur¬ 
rence with the inexperienced, placing the 
trees too thickly ; and as a necessary conse¬ 
quence their luxuriant branches already inter¬ 
lock and entirely shade the ground, although 
not over three-fourths the dimensions they 
would otherwise attain from his fertile soil 
and careful attention. His later orchards 
will never be subject to similar inconven¬ 
ience. Next to apples, pears occupy the 
principal place among his fruits, and of these 
there are a large variety of the choicest 
kinds. The prices he quoted which some of 
this fine fruit brought in the Boston market, 
was quite surprising. Three to four dollars 
per dozen, and for some particularly choice 
winter pears, 50 and 75 cents each have been 
obtained. Horticulturists ought not to do a 
losing business at such prices ; though these 
must be taken as outside retail prices, and 
not often to be attained. 
The crops on the ground, and especially 
the corn and roots, were of the most prom¬ 
ising appearance. We have nowhere seen 
better ; and at the large prices all these arti¬ 
cles command in the Boston market, we 
think Mr. French can have no cause of com¬ 
plaint with the result of his investments in 
his farming and labor. 
One field of rye to which he called our at¬ 
tention, afforded unmistakable evidence of 
the value of guano—an article not hitherto 
used to much extent in this Commonwealth, 
except among the most intelligent cultivat¬ 
ors. On a gravelly knoll, which without 
manure would not produce grain enough to 
pay for cultivation, Mr. F. obtained a crop 
estimated at about 20 bushels per acre, with 
straw enough to pay all the costs of labor 
and use of land. This was the result of ap¬ 
plying about 300 lbs. per acre of guano, at a 
cost of about eight dollars per acre. Such 
facts as this, of which there are a great 
many even in this State, ought to satify the 
farmers that they can use this fertilizer 
there, as well as elsewhere, to advantage, 
after first having exhausted all their home¬ 
made manures. 
Mr. F. has had the enterprise to adopt a 
mowing machine, though from its being one 
of the earlier kinds, it has not proved so suc¬ 
cessful, owing to its heavy draught. Light¬ 
ness or ease of draught we have found in¬ 
dispensable to the general use of the mow¬ 
ing and reaping machines ; and this is fully 
secured in some of those of more recent in¬ 
vention. All the tools on the farm are of 
the best description and in abundance for 
every occasion. Of carts and wagons we 
should think there were not less than 12 to 
20 ; an equal number of shovels ; also of 
plows, harrows, cultivators, &c., &c.; all of 
which, when not in use, were arranged in 
their appropriate places in the tool-house. 
The stock of cows, of which near 40 were 
brought into their stalls in the afternoon 
from their pasture, to receive their rations of 
cornstalks, and to be milked, we have sel¬ 
dom seen surpassed. There are six or eight 
very fine thoroughbred Devons among them; 
and the remainder are the best grades or 
natives, selected for their great milking 
properties. Mr. F. keeps up his stock of 
Devons by the use of a choice bull, and finds 
a ready sale for all his calves at largely re¬ 
munerative prices. 
The milk from these cows, which mostly 
goes to the Boston market, by admirable 
management is kept sweet for 48 hours, even 
during the hottest weather. That drawn in 
the morning and afternoon is kept in coolers 
till early the following morning, when it is 
sent to town in time for the breakfast table. 
The swine kept on the place are very 
choice, being mostly of the Suffolk breeds, 
with a few Neapolitans interspersed. We 
have seldom seen finer ones. 
The most prominent thing on the farm, 
however, is the barn, which is 100 by 57 
feet on the ground, and some 60 or 70 feet 
in hight to the top of the roof. The lowest 
room of the premises, which is under the 
stables, is 70 by 57 feet, and with its grouted, 
water-tight floor, and massive stone walls 
laid in cement, is devoted exclusively to the 
manure, both liquid and solid being dropped 
into it from the stables above. A sufficiency 
of windows admit of necessary ventilation, 
and ample doors on two sides allow carts 
to be backed in or driven through in all direc¬ 
tions, to remove the manure. A space on 
the first floor above, and of the same size, is 
devoted to the cows, oxen and young stock, 
which occupy four sides of a parallelogram. 
The hay, straw, meal, chaff, &c., is cut and 
prepared on the commodious floor above, 
and dropped through scuttles and conducting 
boxes to the central area of the stalls, where 
are large water-tight troughs for wetting up 
the feed. The roots are stored in an adjoin¬ 
ing room 30 by 57 feet, upon the ground 
floor, and on a level with the stables. These 
are wheeled into the area, and after cutting 
are mixed with the other feed, or fed alone 
as required. Water is led from a distant 
spring into the stable, and distributed, at 
will to every animal. The room is suffi¬ 
ciently warm to prevent freezing during the 
coldest winter. 
The floor above, which it will be perceived 
is the third story in ascending, is really 
the commencement of the barn. A large 
open floor, one end of which is nearly on a 
le\el with the road, receives the hay and 
grain, which are driven into it with only a 
slight ascent, and discharged into either side, 
where capacious mows receive it; the whole 
range of the barn, 42 feet in width, after 
taking off a portion of the end for store¬ 
rooms, being subdivided into different mows 
for the purpose of storing the various kinds 
of forage. The remaining 15 feet of the 
width, is cut off for a tool-room, where all 
the implements and some of the superfluous 
vehicles, sleds, &c., of the farm are stored, 
each in their appropriate and labeled divis¬ 
ion. A large platform scale, set into the main 
floor, admits of weighing every cart-load of 
hay, grain or roots, going in b or out, ijOne 
