AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
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AGRICULTURE 18 TEE MOST REAL THY. THE MOST USEFUL . AND THE MOST NOBLE EMPLOYMENT OF MAN. — Wash«G*oh. 
PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY ALLEN & CO., 189 WATER ST, 
YOL. XIII.—NO. 1.] 
NEW-YORK, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 1854. 
[NEW SERIES.—NO. 53. 
S^FOR PROSPECTUS, TERMS, $c., 
SEE LAST PAGE. 
PEAT FOR POTATOES. 
We hare just finished an experiment, sug¬ 
gested by a friend, which shows pretty conclu¬ 
sively, the value of peat as a dressing for pota¬ 
toes. From the fact that potatoes have almost 
uniformly done well in reclaimed peat swamps, 
even when the rot was extensive in other 
places, we inferred that it would be a good 
dressing for potatoes. The part of the garden 
selected for the experiment, had been trenched, 
and manured in the bottom of the trenches 
with the contents of the pig-sty. On the 24th 
of May, we planted three drills, about twenty 
feet in length, with large, sound potatoes. In 
drill No. 1, nothing was put. In No. 2, several 
bushels of peat, that had been thrown up for 
the action of the winter frosts upon it, were 
spread over the potatoes. In No. 3, one quart 
of guano was carefully sprinkled. 
The potatoes were dug and weighed on the 
31st of August. No. 1 gave 13 lbs.; No. 2, 
21 lbs.; No. 3, 9 lbs. Those in the peat were 
much larger and fairer than the others, and 
lacked but a pound of equalling the weight of 
the other two rows. The season being exceed¬ 
ingly dry, has been unusually favorable to the 
success of the peat. It has retained the mois¬ 
ture, so that they have suffered less from drouth 
than the adjoining rows. It has been quite as 
unfavorable for the guano, that manure requir¬ 
ing to be plowed in the preceeding fall, or a 
wet season, to bring out all its virtues. It 
would not be safe to infer that peat was a better 
fertilizer than guano, though the product in 
this case was more than twice that of the guano. 
But the experiment justifies the conclusion that 
peat, decomposed by the frost, is an excellent 
application for potatoes. Let the farmers im¬ 
prove this drouth, to throw out large quantities, 
and expose it to the weather until spring, and 
then apply, in the hill, twenty-five cords to an 
acre of potatoes. We think it will be a safe¬ 
guard against the rot, and most likely will se¬ 
cure a good yield. 
We noticed that in another part of our gar¬ 
den, where potatoes were planted upon re¬ 
claimed salt marsh, they were remarkably 
smooth, free from rot, and of excellent quality. 
Our field potatoes are just harvested, and we 
have not discovered a rotten one among them. 
We have heard of little rot in this region, and 
the indication now is, that there will be five 
bushels of potatoes this fall in many places 
where there was only one bushel last fall. 
SHEEP AND WOOL. 
Wool at this time is twenty-five to thirty per 
cent, lower than it was last year in market, al¬ 
though it now sells as high as the average price 
for the last ten years preceding the clip of 1852, 
when wool raising was considered by our farm¬ 
ers as a paying business. The year 1853 was 
an inflated 3 'ear. Almost all commodities of 
American product had for years been approach¬ 
ing a culminating point. Railroads, real estate, 
especially in our growing cities and towns, farm¬ 
ing lands at large—all increased in a ratio of 
value too rapid to be maintained. A foreign 
demand raised our grain to enormous prices, 
equal to the very highest of war-time and scar¬ 
city; and wool, unfortunately for the dealers 
and manufacturers, had the same tendency, 
though not to so great an extent. For the first 
time, in years, large quantities of wool were 
contracted for, all over the country, months in 
advance of the clipping season, at prices which 
resulted in heavy losses to the buyers. The 
market, of course, reacted, and now wool is 
down. Sales are dull, or if effected, they are at 
such low rates as to dissatisfy the producers. 
Let us, however, look into it. Wool is still 
worth as much as it was in any one year from 
1845 up to 1851, and more, by several cents per 
pound than during some of the intervening 
years. We know this experimentally, for we 
have grown and sold wool every year for the 
past ten years. Almost every winter of those 
years, up to 1850, millions of sheep in the ag¬ 
gregate, throughout the country, were slaught¬ 
ered for their pelts and tallow alone. This was 
no great loss to the country, to be sure, for the 
most of them were miserable animals, yielding 
light fleeces of the lowest-priced wools, and 
they scarce worth feeding for mutton. Since 
then, beef has advanced largely in price, and 
mutton has followed it. Sheep have conse¬ 
quently increased in number; and for three 
years past, comparatively few have been so reck¬ 
lessly slaughtered for their pelts and tallow. 
Now, the low price of wool begins to suggest 
the question to many, whether great numbers 
of sheep will not be taken to the shambles next 
winter for like objects? If our farmers, as in 
former days, chance to be discouraged by the 
present price of wool, and therefore set it down 
as a rule that sheep won’t pay, of course mil¬ 
lions of sheep will again be sacrificed. But we 
hope no such acts of folly will be committed. 
We American farmers, as well as others, are a 
very spasmodic class of people. When a thing 
is high in price, we rush into it—when a thing 
is low, we sell out. That is the rule. We have 
inos n farmers run from wool-growing, when 
wool was low, into dairying, when butter and 
cheese were high, selling their sheep for a song, 
and buying cows at nearly double price. In 
three years time the tables turned upon them, 
butter and cheese fell, while wool came up 
again ; and they, foolish enough to follow in the 
wake, just coming after in time so as to sell 
low and buy high at every turn of the scale! 
We do not believe in such a system as this. 
Wool is a permanent staple of our agriculture, 
and as imperatively demanded by the population 
of the country as cotton, sugar, rice, beef, pork, 
or any other commodity. The tables of supply 
and demand will not always tally with each 
other. These will, at times, overbalance each 
other, and the intermediate parties who make 
the interchanges between the wool-grower and 
the manufacturer—that is, the wool-dealers— 
gain and loose, as the case may be, in the fluc¬ 
tuations of price. In the long run they make, 
at least they ought to make, a profit, for the 
use of their capital, and for the time and know¬ 
ledge they devote to it. These men are a bene¬ 
fit to the wool-grower and the manufacturer 
both, taking his production from the door of the 
one, and delivering it at the warehouse of the 
other. It is his interest to pay all he can afford 
to the farmer, to secure his successive clips. It 
is also his interest to sell at fair prices to the 
manufacturer to maintain his custom. Occa¬ 
sionally there may be combinations among man¬ 
ufacturers and dealers to compel the grower to 
sell his wool at a low price; but these combina¬ 
tions are seldom got up, and they are always 
very hazardous ; for after, all the consumption of 
the manufactured cloth regulates the price of 
the raw material. Thus the farmer stands on 
an equal footing with the dealer and manufac¬ 
turer. 
Last year the farmer had the advantage, deci¬ 
dedly. The wool-dealers and the manufacturers 
lost money. This year they intend not to re¬ 
peat the operation, but to make a profit if pos¬ 
sible. This they are entitled to, and the farmer 
should be willing. It is not for the farming in¬ 
terest that the purchasers of agricultural sta¬ 
ples should become poor. They are, in reality, 
the brokers between the producer and consu¬ 
mer; and without the existence of such a class 
as this to bring the producer and consumer to¬ 
gether, agricultural products would instantly 
fall twenty per cent, in value. Therefore, un¬ 
satisfactory as the present price of wool may be, 
it is probably all that it is worth to the pur¬ 
chaser. 
We do not thus write to influence the judg¬ 
ment of any man in the sale of his wool. 
Wool-dealing is not our business; on the other 
hand, we have our last clip of a thousand 
pounds, safely stored away, for which we intend 
to take the first favorable offer we can get, be- 
