A FLIGHT THROUGH CONNECTICUT. 
321 
A FLIGHT THROUGH CONNECTICUT. 
Immediately after leaving the noise and con¬ 
fusion of that great “ Babel,” known as New York, 
and even before I was fairly out of the purlieus, 
I saw large tracts of land, that, notwithstanding its 
iron-bound, rocky nature, if cultivated, even with a 
tithe of the care that John Chinaman bestows upon 
his soil, it might be made to yield a good support 
to thousands of the poor creatures that are dragging 
out a miserable existence in the filthy courts and 
alleys of the city ; while here, within an hour’s 
walk, lie thousands of acres of productive soil, 
where the healthy atmosphere is such as God gives 
to the mountaineer, instead of that made for human 
lungs by the inhuman folly of man in the dark, 
damp, city cellars, where the spirit of cholera finds 
the seeds already sown that will produce him an 
abundant crop. 
Much of the land above referred to is covered 
with bushes, or miserable little half-starved patches 
of cultivation, or with shanties that are a degree, at 
least, below the western log cabin. And this is 
within the sound of the City-Hall bell. And this is 
“ the age of agricultural improvement, is it % The 
country where we give thousands of dollars annu¬ 
ally in premiums for the exhibition of the fattest 
bulls and boars, and daily proclaim to the world 
what a great improving agricultural country this is! 
But let us proceed. What do we see along the 
line of railroad towards New Haven I Why the 
same old stone walls and rickety rail fences, bush 
pastures, bog meadows, alder swamps, stony fields, 
and scanty, because unmanured, crops, that were to 
be seen in the same places fifty years ago. Have 
these people ever heard of the fact that they might 
purchase an article called “ guano,” which has a simi¬ 
lar effect upon land that is attributed to manure'? 
Beyond New Haven, the road passes through 
several miles of a poor sandy plain, which looks as 
though it belonged to the “ piney-woods” region of 
South Carolina, rather than to Connecticut. This 
is perhaps too sterile to be improved with profit; 
yet, it is a question with me, whether more profit, 
if we count long life and good health anything, 
might not be made from this sandy waste, than 
from some of the rich prairies and bottoms of the 
great west, California included. In fact, notwith¬ 
standing that agriculture, in general, seems to have 
been conducted in Connecticut for a century or 
two, upon the same identical “American system” 
of skin, shave, and waste the soil, and “ do as 
father did,” yet every now and then we pass a spot 
where everything around shows that the light of 
science, yea, agricultural science, has penetrated 
far enough to show that, if men would, they might 
make all of these old, sterile, fields not only pro¬ 
ductive, but actually more surely profitable than 
any other employment. But the truth is, and can¬ 
not or should not be disguised, the farmers of Con¬ 
necticut, as a body, have not, do not, and I fear 
will not, even read anything that is calculated to 
inform their minds upon the subject of improving 
And renovating their old worn-out soil. 
I left the cars at Meriden, and took a tour through 
the state eastward, making many stops during a 
week, and in all the time I never saw nor heard of 
but one subscriber to an agricultural paper, and he 
was a gunsmith instead of a farmer. I saw many 
men mowing many acres that would not produce 
500 lbs. of hay to the acre 5 and at the same time, 
it was self-evident to me, that a moderate expendi¬ 
ture of labor in under draining, grubbing up bushes 
and bogs, straightening channels of streams, car¬ 
rying muck from swamps to gravelly knolls, and 
a little outlay for manure, lime, guano, &c., 
would make the same land produce two tons to the 
acre j and that of a far better quality—-though the 
blackberry crop might be lessened. My attention 
was particularly drawn to one “meadow,” (swamp,) 
which I have known for more than thirty years, 
that annually produces about half or three quarters 
of a ton of “bog-meadow hay” per acre, which 
has been carried out upon poles every one of those 
years; for no animal can travel over it. I wish I 
could recount the number of cattle that have been 
mired and lost, while trying to get in, to crop the 
early spring grass upon that little green spot. It 
contains about seven acres, in an oval shape, sur¬ 
rounded by rocky hills, and was undoubtedly once 
a shallow pond ; for the muck is from one foot to 
four feet deep, lying upon a hard bottom. It is not 
apparently fed by springs, but in a wet time is filled 
with water from the surrounding hills, which, when 
it rises above the surface, runs off into a little brook 
at the lower end. Now this is the only level, 
smooth piece of mowing land upon the farm, and 
it has been mowed and “ poled” probably more than 
half a century. Let us put the account into figures, 
in the shape of debit and credit. 
The Old Pond Meadow, Dr. 
For the care and cultivation, ditching, 
improving, manuring, nothing. 
That’s cheap. “ Two times naught 
is nothing” (vide Daboll). “ Set 
that down.” “Yes, sir.” . . 0.00 
To seven cows, heavy with calf, got 
mired and lost seven different 
springs, worth $20 each, . . 140.00 
To seven other cattle and horses that 
got mired at different times and 
were got out—damage and labor of 
getting them out, “ dod rot ’em,” 
$3 each, ..... 21.00 
To extra labor of poling out hay for 
50 years, ..... 125.00 
To sundry half pair of boots and 
shoes, mired down and lost, say 
one every year, .... 25.00 
To going to the cedar swamp ten 
times, (twelve miles,) to cut new 
hay poles, (240 miles travel,) 4 cts. 
a mile, . . ... 9.60 
$320.60 
Contra , 
50 crops of hay, 5 tons a year, at 
$5 per ton, .... $250.00 
50 crops of early spring grass, when 
feed is scarce, for pasture, very 
valuable, but good for nothing, 
because cattle can’t get at it, . 0.00 
Fall feed, a little nipping around the 
