1875.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
15 
summer-fallow consists in cleaning the land, and in 
giving us as much or nearly as much produce from 
one seeding and oue harvesting, as from two seed- 
iugs and two harvestings. I contend that if the 
natural yield of wheat—from a given soil, is 15 
bushels of wheat—per acre every year, as is the ease 
with Mr. Lawes’ experimental wheat field without 
manure, then it is better, if we can do it, to raise 
30 bushels every other year, or 45 bushels every 
third year—especially if we can manage to raise a 
crop of clover into the bargain. I have not time 
to discuss this matter now. But it will be found 
that this idea is the keystone of good agriculture. 
So far as practical agriculture is concerned, the 
great storehouse of fertility is in the soil, and not 
in the atmosphere. We must plow better, and 
perhaps deeper and more frequently. Very few of 
us work our land enough. Mr. Geddes says he 
plowed up this old pasture because it “ did not 
produce one-quarter as much feed, as when newly 
seeded.” And yet many people think that grass 
and clover “ enrich ” land. 
Mr. “ G. B.,” of Nebraska, who asked me some¬ 
time ago whether I would plow land when it was 
dry in August, wrote me again just before winter 
set in, that if he had waited he should not have 
needed to ask the question, for, says he, “ I could 
not help noticing that the land plowed in August 
is in by far the best condition now,” and also that 
“ land plowed a year ago, when very dry, now 
plows up again in much better condition than that 
plowed when the land was wetter.” This is pre¬ 
cisely in accordance with my own experience. 
A few hours ago a man called on me to ask if I 
had any insects, worms, or blight, on vegetables, 
fruits, flowers, or ornamental trees. He had been 
a gardener for 40 years, and had learned how to 
drive away the cureulio from the plum, to cure 
blight on pear trees, to prevent the black fly from 
touching cabbage and turnip plants, and lastly to 
“innoculate” seed-potatoes, so that the Colorado 
beetle would give the plants a wide berth. He 
talked very fluently, and offered either to do the 
work, or to give me the recipe for a consideration. 
He had been to Ohio, and was traveling slowly to 
New York, ridding the country of aH insect-pests 
and diseases as he went along. “Perhaps you 
have never seen the city of New York,” he said. 
“I was born there, on Division street, and have 
studied botany, and know all about animals and 
plants. Plants are porous, and I have two minerals 
that I boil on the stove for two hours, and apply 
the solution to the roots, trunks and branches of 
trees, and all insects, being porous also, know by 
instinct that the trees have been innoculated and 
will not touch them, as they have the fear of death 
before their eyes. ’ ’ He got this off, and much more 
to the same purpose, very rapidly. He had learned 
his lesson perfectly. I told him I had been in the 
city of New York—in fact was there yesterday 
morning, and that there were many orchards and 
gardens between here and there that needed his 
treatment, but that I had been away from home for 
some days, and had not time to avail myself of his 
skill and knowledge. “ But,” said I, “ there is my 
friend, the Deacon, a very intelligent farmer and 
fruitgrower, living in the next house. You had 
better call on him and tell him I sent you.” He 
left, and I hope he will find the Deacon at home. 
There are people who will give such a smoothed 
tongued pretender five dollars for his secret, who 
could not possibly, during these hard times, find 
$1.60 to subscribe for the Agriculturist , post-paid. 
Hugh T. Brooks, of Wyoming Co., N. Y., writes 
me that he can get lime, fresh and unslaked, for 15 
cents per bushel. “ Will you kindly inform me,” 
he asks, “ whether we can profitably use it in large 
quantities in Western New York as a fertilizer, and 
on what soils and crops? ”—I have long wanted to 
use lime on my farm, but hitherto the price has 
been too high. We h?.ve had to pay 25 to 30 cents 
per bushel. We can how get it for 20 cents. 
“ Yes,” said the Deacon, “ and you can get refuse 
slacked lime for 10 cents. Mr. Blank bought 800 
bushels to put on his wheat last fall.”—“Can you 
tell me, Deacon,” I asked, “how much slacked 
lime we get from a bushel of lump lime ?.” I have 
thought at times of slacking a bushel to find out. 
I have asked a dozen people, and never found one 
that could answer the question. The Deacon 
thought it would “ swell up considerable.” Bous- 
singault, who is usually accurate, says one bushel 
will make two bushels of slacked lime. Stephens, 
in his Book of the Farm, says, a heap will swell up 
to “ three times ” the size. 
Even if this refuse lime is as fresh and as good 
as the lump lime, the latter at 20 cents is probably 
cheaper than the slacked lime at 10 cents. And 
the latter is not only about one-third heavier, but 
you can not get more than half as much into your 
wagon-box, and consequently the item of “car¬ 
riage ” is more than double. 
There is one well established fact in regard to 
lime. It does no good on wet land. You should 
drain first and then lime. We have much rich, 
low, mucky land, which, if drained and limed, 
would be immensely productive. Our heavy clay 
uplands, if drained and limed, would become 
lighter and much more productive. Light, sandy 
or gravelly land, when limed, becomes firmer and 
much better adapted for wheat. The lime, too, 
has often a decided effect in stimulating the growth 
of dlover, and when we can grow good crops of 
clover, we can make our farms richer for all crops. 
The Rev. Dr. John Hall, of New York, has writ¬ 
ten a sensible letter in regard to the best methods 
of relieving the distress of unemployed people in 
that city. He would give work in preference to 
charity. “ Happily,” he says, “ there is little or no 
special pressure in the country districts. Take, for 
example, Western New York. It would be a great 
surprise to me to find any inability among well-to- 
do farmers of that rich and rising region, to employ 
labor, if it could be had on reasonable terms. The 
same remark applies to much of Pennsylvania, 
Ohio, and Hlinois. But we had ample evidence last 
winter that ‘ hands ’ were scarce in the farming 
counties of this State ; not that they could not 
be sometimes obtained, but that they would not ac¬ 
cept work at the prices farmers can afford to pay.” 
—This is quite true. For several years past men 
have been leaving the farm for the city. If they 
are tired of the city, let them return and welcome. 
We want them. It does us all good to have a man 
come back and tell us that if we knew when we are 
well off, we should stay at home on the farm. It 
makes us more content. 
But the farmers of Western New York need not 
go to New York, to find men out of employ. We 
can find just as many, in proportion to population, 
in our own cities and villages. We farmers have 
had hard times for three or four years past. My 
city friends turned a deaf ear, when I told them 
their turn would come next. “We have not got 
over the effects of the panic,” remarked a business 
man a few days ago in New York. “ I presume 
not,” I replied. “ But it is not the panic that is af¬ 
fecting you. The panic wiped out some hundreds 
of millions of fictitious values. But there is as 
much real property in the country, as there ever 
was—and more. The distress in the city comes 
from the past distress in the country. When far¬ 
mers suffer, all classes, sooner or later, suffer also. 
We need more labor in the country. There is 
plenty of work. 1 was going to say we needed 
cheaper labor. But that is not quite what I mean. 
The cheapest labor is often the dearest labor. We 
want trained and skillful men. I am underdraining 
more or less this winter, and should do much more, 
if I could get the right kind of men. If the cities 
have got any bright, active, industrious, sober men 
to spare, let them come to the country. 
And now I want to say a word to the Deacon and 
to the Squire. The Deacon complains that he can 
not get labor when he wants it. “ You give steady 
work,” he said, “ and when I want a man for a few 
days, I can not get him, because he is engaged to 
you, or he will not come, unless I give him 25 to 50 
cents more a day, than you are paying.”—“ That is 
so,” said the Squire, “you do us all great injury by 
keeping up the price of labor.”—Now the truth is 
that it is precisely the Deacon and the Squire, and 
other farmers who adopt the same system, that not 
only keep up the wages higher, than we can afford 
to pay, but make all our men restless and dissatis¬ 
fied during the busy season. During the winter 
and spring months they do not employ half the men 
they need in summer and harvest. And yet I am 
sure, both the Deacon and the Squire could profit¬ 
ably employ more men in winter and spring, than 
they now employ during the very busiest days of 
haying and harvest.—Do not tell me the men are not 
to be had. The cities and villages are full of them. 
I have not time to go into this matter. It is one I 
have often talked about. The real point is to en¬ 
courage good men to come and settle in the coun¬ 
try, either by building and renting houses, or better 
still, by cutting up some part of our farms, and 
selling lots at reasonable rates and easy terms to 
any sober, industrious, married men, w r ho want to 
get a home for themselves and families. 
If this or some similar plan were adopted, many of 
the inconveniences, which we now experience, 
would disappear in a few years. The boys and 
girls soon grow to be men and women, and we 
should get, what we now so much need, a denser 
population in the agricultural districts. 
Southern Agriculture. 
A most interesting report is that of the Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture of the State of Georgia. It is 
a comparative statement of the number of acres 
planted to different crops in 1873 and 1874. From 
this it appears that the acreage of cotton has con¬ 
siderably decreased; 1,860,559 acres were planted 
in 1873, and only 1,603,005 acres in 1874, a difference 
of 257,554 acres. This is precisely what the Agri¬ 
culturist has long urged upon Southern farmers, to 
reduce the cotton crop and give more attention to 
raising food and fodder crops. It is a fact that of 
late years much cotton has been grown, which has 
not paid its cost, leaving the planter in debt and 
under the necessity of buying his food. This is 
directly contrary to the usual course amongst 
good farmers, which is to raise all the supplies 
for the farm at home, to have nothing to buy, and 
raise a surplus to sell. Under this system there 
may be less money passing through the farmer’s 
hands, and fewer accounts to keep and settle, and 
a less show of business ; but more of the money 
which comes into the farmer’s hands remains there. 
It js gratifying to learn that in Georgia this 
system has been inaugurated, and the increase in 
the Acreage of corn in 1874 is equal to the decrease 
in that of cotton. Besides this there is an increase 
of over 58,000 acres in wheat; over 89,000 in oats, 
and more than 10,000 in sweet potatoes. There is 
also a large increase in stock of all kinds. But one 
thing is yet needful. There is no report of the 
acreage of grass and clover. Without these crops 
agriculture has no satisfactory basis. No complete 
system of home supply can exist without these. 
There can be no dairy ; cheese and butter must be 
brought from elsewhere, and beef and mutton 
purchased. Clover and orchard grass, the best 
of the standard forage crops for the South, will 
thrive excellently in Georgia, while lucerne or 
alfalfa will produce abundantly, and in the moun¬ 
tains timothy will yield abundantly. The cultiva¬ 
tion of these crops should be encouraged. It is to 
the credit of the Georgia Granges that the reform 
here noticed has been instituted and consummated. 
The resolution introduced a year ago at Macon has 
thus borne fruit. It is to be hoped that this judi¬ 
cious policy will be persevered in, and that fodder 
crops and stock breeding be added to the list of 
new industries. An increase of manufacturing can 
not occur until food is plentiful and cheap, and 
a dense agricultural population is available for 
help. Capitalists are tempted to invest, where a sup¬ 
ply of labor is certain and steady. It is this diversi¬ 
fied industry that makes a locality wealthy, and each 
industry helps the other. Where there are many arti¬ 
sans, there are good markets for farm produce, and 
