1876 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
the farms are very large, but in the older settled 
parts of the country, where from forty to eighty 
acres is getting to be a profitable holding, from 
thirty to fifty families might live in such <n com¬ 
munity, and none of them be more than a mile from 
their farms. To have only the dwelling house in 
the village, leaving the bams and stables on the 
farms, would be in every way objectionable. It is 
an essential condition of successful farm life, that 
the “ chores ” be near at hand, and for this the sta¬ 
ble, and tool house, and all appurtenances must be 
close to the dwelling. But a single acre, or even 
much less than this, will furnish all the accommo¬ 
dation required, together with a vegetable garden. 
In the German villages the whole establishment 
is often, though by no means always, concentrated 
within the same four walls, covering less than two 
thousand square feet. Such crowding is disagree¬ 
able and undesirable, but if tbe space allotted to 
each family be as small as their comfort really de¬ 
mands, then the smaller the estates the better, as 
making a more concentrated community. Many of 
the French villages are simply long streets, with the 
houses standing very close together, but each with 
ample space at its rear. 
The objection to this system, which must strike 
any farmer, is the important one that he will have 
too far to go to his daily work in the fields, hut it is 
to be remembered that this affects him and his la¬ 
borers, and operates only during the season for 
field work. In my own neighborhood it would be 
pretty constant from the first of May to the middle 
of October, and intermittent for a few weeks be¬ 
fore and after these times. During the whole long 
winter it would only be necessary to make a trip as 
often as it was necessary to haul out manure, and 
to haul in barrack-stored or stacked hay or straw. 
So far as the farmer’s family is concerned, his 
wife and his daughters, and his younger boys, the 
relief would be absolute, and the saving would bo 
considerable. There would be no need of the “ best 
carriage ” for church and visiting, and the serious 
amount of time and horse labor now demanded for 
these purposes and for shopping, would be entirely 
saved. The economical advantages and disad¬ 
vantages of the system suggested, weigh differ¬ 
ently in different cases, and it is my purpose 
here only to suggest an idea that seems to me 
worthy of much consideration. The influences 
of this life on the plans and aspirations of the 
younger members of the family, seem to be very 
obvious, and they are clearly demonstrated by 
the immemorial experience of countries where the 
custom has always prevailed. It is useless to tell a 
boy that the occupation of farming is the noblest 
of all, that it is the one that will the most surely 
secure him a comfortable support for himself and 
his family, and the one in which he will effect the 
greatest good to his country—and all that—boys do 
not take this view of their coming lives, and their 
ambition leads to other directions than nobleness 
of living, the securing of daily bread, and the do¬ 
ing of good to the public. They look for the en¬ 
lightenment, sociability, intimate friendships, op¬ 
portunity for displaying their modest merits of 
person, clothing, and attainments, which they 
believe (and rightly) to belong more particularly 
to men who live among their kind. Their aspira¬ 
tions grow first of all out of the oft stated fact 
that man is a social animal, and they so often waste 
their lives seeking even meagre employment in 
towns and cities, beeanse of the imperative attrac¬ 
tions that towns and cities hold out to them, for 
other reasons than mere business ones. They want 
friends, they want evening entertainment, they 
want to know plenty of nice girls, and they want 
many other things that an isolated life withholds 
them from. 
I know that it is not usual in writing for Ameri¬ 
can farmers, to suggest any deficiency in intelli¬ 
gence, but if I may be permitted to speak plainly 
what we all know and feel, that broadening of the 
natural intelligence, that comes only of frequent 
intercourse with many people, is, as a rale, impos¬ 
sible to a tired hoy, who, after milking his cows 
and feeding his pigs, eats his supper and goes at 
once to bed, or who sits over a farm-house fire, re¬ 
pealing night after night the same sort of idle small 
talk with the same few boys and girls of his own 
neighborhood. American farm life is by no means 
altogether bad. It has very much to commend it 
to admiration, but it certainly does lack more than 
one element that is really necessary to a proper de¬ 
velopment of an intelligent boy. All who doubt 
this may, it seems to me, very readily satisfy them¬ 
selves on the point by a simple consideration of the 
fact, that my text indicates, that as an almost uni¬ 
versal rule, the sons of eastern farmers do not look 
forward to farm-life as one offering them the ad¬ 
vantages that they most desire. The simple ques¬ 
tion of education alone is. very vitally connected 
with the change here suggested. We are accus¬ 
tomed to regard our system of country common 
schools as something that marks our superiority 
over the rest of the world, but I have had sufficient 
intercourse with American farm children, and with 
the children of German farm villages, to be obliged 
to confess that the instructions that ours receive is 
in no way comparable with that. The village is 
more attractive to the teacher, and secures a more 
competent person, and that brightening of the witS 
that children get in communication with each other 
adds immensely to the efficiency of the system. 
Let me insert as a saving clause that I am not the 
originator nor the champion of the plan herein set 
forth, I merely submit for the consideration of my 
readers a possible means for a much needed 
relief that has been forced on my own attention by 
the marked difference that I have observed between 
our own system and the European one, in its effect 
on native character, aud especially in the degree to 
which it attaches the younger members of our pro¬ 
fession to the work and life of their fathers. Some 
will suggest that the character of our German im¬ 
migrants does not seem to sustain the theory, but 
as a rule our immigrants are not from the best class 
of German villages, and such as do come are not 
always rightly understood. Our ignorance of their 
language prevents our recognizing their real acquire¬ 
ments, while their civilization and education are bas¬ 
ed on a standard quite different from our own. The 
farmer in Germany does not aspire to be a gentle¬ 
man. The American farmer does—always. Then, 
too, the local influences, the character of the evening 
entertainment, and the relations between the indi¬ 
vidual and the church and state, arc all factors that- 
must be considered in solving the problem. But if 
due allowance is made for the circumstances under 
which the development of each class has taken 
place, 1 believe that ail must come to the conclu¬ 
sion that the interests of the individual, and above 
all, the very important question of a supply of 
farmers of the best class for the future feeding of 
the American people, would be greatly subserved 
by any change that would relieve the life of the 
farmer’s family from its dullness and its isolation. 
I have many letters from farmers in remote parts 
of the country asking at what price they can get 
young Jersey bulls and bull calves. I am obliged 
in many cases to say that while the cost of such an¬ 
imals is not beyond the means of any ordinary 
farmer, the cost and difficulty of transportation 
over such long distances is very great, and is often 
sufficient to make it impossible that the purchase 
should be made. I keep the records of the Ameri¬ 
can Jersey Cattle Club, whose members are scat¬ 
tered over the whole country, in nearly every state, 
and while I cannot answer these specific questions 
by seeming to advertise breeders by publishing 
their names and addresses in these papers, I am 
always glad, on personal application, to give the 
address of some reliable breeder (whether a mem¬ 
ber of the club or not), sufficiently near to the ap¬ 
plicant’s locality. 
In this connection a word of caution seems advis¬ 
able. Some Jersey breeders under a notion, which 
I believe to be a mistaken one, are seeking to de¬ 
velop herds of animals of uniform color, and with 
black switches to their tails. Those who have 
sought this end here and abroad, have given at least 
a second place to the question of dairy production, 
so that either for this reason, or from the fact that 
the parti-colored animals are really the best repre¬ 
sentatives of the dairy branch of the race, I would 
advise any farmer seeking a bull for his own use, 
129 
to be cautious in buying from a breeder who makes 
it a point that the animals offered is of the “ fash¬ 
ionable color.” Mr. Charles Sharpless, of Phila¬ 
delphia, who has devoted much enthusiasm, and 
an abundant investment to securing a herd of the 
best Jerseys obtainable, recently imported an Eng¬ 
lish bred Jersey cow of the conventional solid 
color. With a frankness and honesty equal to his 
enthusiasm and investment, he reports that at her 
best, about a month after calving, when on the 
best grass, aud when receiving two quarts per day 
of ground oats in addition, she made but 11 ibs. 
3 oz. of butter per week, and he says: “ This com¬ 
paratively small product is not favorable for the 
solid colored cow, and I have tried to recall any 
case of large yield of butter except from parti-col¬ 
ored cows.” 
A school-teacher in Massachusetts has bought a 
run-down farm, where he hopes to recover the fer¬ 
tility of the soil, and the robustness of his own 
health by a combination of agricultural and sanitary 
development. As a means to this end, his land not 
being natural grass land, he proposes to raise corn- 
fodder instead of hay for his stock, and asks what 
I have to say of the objection to this fodder raised 
by Dr. Loring and Mr. Harris Lewis. I answer 
that so far as I have been able to learn, the differ¬ 
ence between good and bad com fodder is, to a large 
degree, due to difference of soil, manure, and vari¬ 
ety, but much more largely to a difference of sun¬ 
light and ventilation. Sowed corn-fodder is trash, 
no matter what the variety, nor what the quality or 
richness of the soil; but any variety planted 
thickly in drills, at least three feet apart, if grown 
on suitable land, is sure to make a large crop, and 
the free circulation of air among its leaves, and the 
full penetration of the light and heat of the sun, 
will be quite sure to give a quality generally equal 
to, and often, I believe, decidedly superior to that 
of good meadow hay. The sweet corns are richer in 
saccharine matter, and they make a better fodder 
than do the other sorts, but in my own practice I 
prefer the ordinary tall growing western corn, 
for the great difference in its yield. Give it plenty 
of sun, and it will give back plenty of nourishment. 
--— 
Science Applied to Farming.—XVI. 
Bx Prof. W. O. Atwater, Director of Connecticut 
Agricultural Experiment Station, Wesleyan 
University, Middletown, Conn. 
Exhaustion ansi Enrichment of Soils—More 
about Commercial Fertilizers—What to 
Select, and How to Buy—Experience and 
Experiment—Inquiries Answered. 
I very much regret that limited space forbids full 
replies'to the many inquiries from correspondents, 
concerning soils and manures. I will, however, 
attempt a brief and general answer to some of the 
more important ones. First, then, what are we to 
understand by the 
Exhaustion of Soils? 
Crops take from the soil certain materials needful 
for their growth, and which are called, and rightly 
so, “plant-food.” Some soils yield large crops, 
many years in succession, without manuring. They 
do this because they contain large stores of the 
ingredients of plant-food, as potash, lime, nitrogen, 
etc., and because these are furnished in available 
forms, so that the plant can readily use them. 
Most of the plant-food in our soils is, so to speak, 
locked up in rocks, sand, or partly decayed vegeta¬ 
ble matter. In what is commonly called “weather¬ 
ing,” these mineral and vegetable substances un¬ 
dergo certain chemical changes, which set free the 
lime, phosphoric acid, nitrogen, and other ingre¬ 
dients of plant-food, and change them to such 
forms that they may he dissolved in the water of 
the soil, and absorbed by the roots of the plants. 
There are some soils that have a very great natural 
strength. That is, they not only contain very 
large stores of plant-food, but by weathering, or 
otherwise, new portions are made available as 
rapidly as the older ones are removed in cropping. ' 
The famous 1! black-earth ” soils of Southern Rus- 
