FARMING, NO. 1.-REVIEW OF THE AGRICULTURIST 
83 
FACTS IN 
pin£ are slightly tapering, so as to bind down upon 
the braces, and permit the panneis to shear a few j 
inches in overcoming uneven ground. The bat¬ 
tens are let into the sills through mortices, slightly 
dove-tailing at the bottom, and secured by the 
wedge or key d; or they may be furnished with 
knees made of strap iron one and a half inches 
wide, one eighth of an inch thick, and fastened 
with staples and nails. 
This fence is designed chiefly as a hurdle, com¬ 
bining the advantages of great strength, lightness 
and durability. Twenty rods in length, make one 
common load, which is so easily taken down and set 
up again, that two hands, with a suitable team, can 
remove a quarter of a mile of it from one side to the 
other of a large plantation, and set it up again in 
a day. J. L. Hardeman. 
Arrow RocJc , Mo., Dec. 3d, 1847. 
FACTS IN FARMING.—No. 1. 
There is a remark we often hear, when urging 
farmers to take an agricultural paper, which is 
this : “ Why, sir, there is nothing practical in them, 
or so little, that we will not pay our money for 
one.” Now there is no truth in the remark; and in 
proof of my assertion, I ask of any candid reader if 
he ever knew a farmer who has attentively read an 
agricultural paper for two years, without improving 
his farming more than ten times the value of the 
paper % A neighbor of mine, an old man, has taken 
one for two years; and a few days since, he re¬ 
marked to me, that he had made an improvement 
which was fifty dollars profit to him last year. 
After reading your articles on draining and irriga¬ 
tion, he drained a cold, wet field, and turned the 
water from it so as to run over a dry, adjoining 
meadow, thus “ killing two birds with one stone,” 
by draining the one and irrigating the other. 
In 1840, I had six acres of land entirely worth¬ 
less, being covered with bogs and bushes, upon 
which the water stood most of the year. I drained 
it, cut up the bogs and bushes, plowed and sowed 
it with buckwheat, for two years, and then seeded 
it down with Timothy. The result of my labors 
was as follows :— 
160 bushels of buckwheat, valued at . $80 
8 tons of hay, in two years, .... 80 
Increased value of the land, .... 150 
$310 
From this deduct— 
For expense of draining, bogging, &c., $100.00 
For seeds, plowing, harvesting, &c., . 118.50 
$218.50 
Net profit, $91.50 
I would ask every farmer who has such land to 
“go and do likewise.” It would be a better in¬ 
vestment than to put out money on bond and mort¬ 
gage ; for in four years, and often the first crops 
will repay all expenses attending the improvement, 
it will be permanent^ valuable; besides the 
gratification of beholding that which was worthless 
and unsightly, converted into a productive and 
smiling field. I have for ten years made experi¬ 
ments in raising various farm crops, and in 
feeding them. I have experimented also, with a 
variety of manures. If this communication is of 
any value, and if you want more. I will furnish an 
article monthly, recording actual experiments and 
the results. D. 
Orange County, N. Y., Jan. 8th, 1848. 
The above is a valuable article, and we are much 
indebted to the writer for it. We trust he will give 
us others for publication. Here are the details of 
an improvement which any farmer can make, how¬ 
ever limited his means. We wish to impress upon 
our readers that it is for the benefit of the small far¬ 
mers, and those of limited means, as well as those of 
extensive domains that we write, and we hope in re-i- 
turn that they will favor us with the details of their 
operations. Make no apologies, but give us the facts, 
and we will see that the printer puts the matter in 
such a shape as to read properly and correctly. 
There is no class of people with whom we so 
deeply sympathize, nor for whom we are so ready 
to toil, as the farmers. We care not how few 
their acres or how humble their improvements. It 
is the men and their occupation that interest us. 
REVIEW OF THE AGRICULTURIST. 
Having been called away from home during the 
autumn and part of the winter months, to visit my 
new lands in Maine, and oversee some improve¬ 
ments making in them, I have been obliged to neg¬ 
lect the Agriculturist for some time. I shall now 
give a brief review of the remaining numbers of the 
last volume, and endeavor not to be quite so much 
behind hand for the future. 
August Number. — The best season for cutting 
bushes , is not the month of August, and although it 
is a stereotyped saying, nevertheless, I think differ¬ 
ently. I have known many persons put off cutting 
bushes when they had leisure to do it, waiting for 
the “ right time in the moon,” or some other right 
time , till at length the time never came right. I 
say, therefore, cut the bushes whenever your other 
avocations will permit. But what would be far 
better than the implement figured with the article 
now under review, would be to procure a grubber , 
and with it hitched to a good yoke of oxen, pull out 
the bushes by the roots. [For such a bush puller, 
see cut and description inVol. v., page 139, of the 
Agriculturist]. 
Cisterns for Farm Buildings .—I wish to inform 
those who are hesitating about building a cistern 
on account of its expense, that I have known seve¬ 
ral of them made of the capacity of one hundred 
barrels, since I wrote upon this subject, with two bar¬ 
rels of cement, and but little mechanical labor, as 
the plaster was laid upon the sides of the pit, without 
any brick work, which any active farmer can do in 
part of a day. 
Culture of the Sugar Cane. —If all of the readers 
of the Agriculturist have read this article with the 
same satisfaction that I have, they have already 
thanked R. L. A. for a fund of pleasure and useful 
information. I was not aware, till I read this arti¬ 
cle* that sugar cane was ever planted so wide apart 
as eight feet between the rows. If planters can 
only be induced to get into the habit of using the 
best of improved plows, cultivators, and other im- 
