1872 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
835 
this does not prevent me from seeing and feeling 
that there is no real profit in working land un¬ 
less we raise good crops. Many of us must 
turn over a new leaf. We must make our land 
cleaner, drier, and richer. Wc must get rid of 
stagnant water, kill the weeds, and mellow the 
soil. We must keep better stock, and feed it 
more liberally, and thus make more and better 
manure. We must grow-more and better grass. 
Now, because I say all this, and have said it 
over and over again, do not imagine that I live 
in a section where good farmers are unknown. 
O. M. Richards, of Wisconsin, writes that his 
farm contains 360 acres, 160 of which is in pas¬ 
ture and 200 under the plow. “I propose,” he 
says, “to raise 140 acres of corn, 10 acres of 
wheat, 20 acres of oats, and 30 acres of clover, 
so that I shall have 30 acres of clover to plow 
under in July. I have for some years sowed 
ten pounds of clover-seed to the acre in all of 
my small grain, and usually plowed it under the 
following October. It generally makes a fine 
growth. By this process, and feeding all I grow, 
my land is constantly increasing in fertility. 
Now, the point I wish to be clear on is this: I 
want to feed off my corn on the ground with¬ 
out gathering it, so as to save that job, and also 
drawing so much manure. My plan is to first 
snap off the corn on 40 acres; then put a fence 
between that and the ungathered corn; turn 
my cattle into the ungathered corn once a day 
in the morning, and let them stay just long 
enough to get all the corn they will cat. Then 
turn them back into the field where the corn is 
gathered, where also will be my hogs, and so 
on until the crop is consumed. You will bear 
in mind that labor is dear and produce com- 
paratiyelv cheap, and that corn is the cheapest 
food that we can raise. With our improved 
tools, the labor of one man and team will plow, 
plant, and cultivate an acre of corn in one day’s 
time or its equivalent. I will say that my corn 
crop seldom falls as low as 50 bushels per acre, 
thanks to manure, clover, and ‘Walks and 
Talks.’ ” 
I do not know that I fully understand the 
point. And at any rate I have had no experi¬ 
ence in this kind of farming. So far as making 
manure is concerned, the manure'dropped on 
the land will be just as valuable as if it was 
dropped in a yard and afterwards drawn out. 
But still I am inclined to think that it would 
pay far better to feed in yards or sheds where 
the cattle could be kept warm and comfortable. 
Mr. Richards, as I understand him, now adopts 
the latter plan, and proposes to change to the 
rougher and more primitive system. This is 
going back instead of forward. I am well 
aware that labor is high. But it is no higher 
with him than with us. I should aim to raise 
good grade Shorthorns, feed liberally, and crowd 
them forward rapidly to maturity. I think I 
should adopt a modification of Mr. Richards’s 
plan: feed on the land as long as the weather 
was favorable, and then finish off in the yards. 
It can not be long before we have a good 
machine for cutting up and husking corn. 
Sowing clover in the spring and plowing it 
under the same fall does not commend itself to 
my judgment. It seems to me that it would be 
better to let it grow until the following May, 
and then plow it under for corn. But I have 
had no experience. It is merely a theoretical 
opinion. I should aim to grow more clover 
and less corn. But how this can best be done 
will depend on the character of the land and 
on the kind of stock kept, and the mode of 
feeding. I should want to keep more or less 
sheep. It seems to me if I raised such a large 
proportion of corn I should see if it could not 
be seeded down with clover after the last culti¬ 
vating in July. I have seen a capital crop of 
cloyer obtained in this way. 
“ I have made up my mind on one point,” 
says the Deacon; “ it does not pay to sow wheat 
unless the ground is in good order, and rich 
enough to produce a good crop.” Good for the 
Deacon! I think thousands of fanners have 
had this truth brought home to them by the 
results of the present wheat harvest. The dif¬ 
ference in the crops on good and poor land was 
never more striking. I saw wheat to-day (July 
24th) in a field planted with apple-trees. Some 
manure had been spread for two or three feet 
round each tree. Here the wheat was four or 
five feet high, the straw stiff and bright, and 
the heads well filled. On the rest of the field 
the wheat was not over eighteen inches high. 
It was thin on the ground, the straw flimsy, 
and the heads empty. It avould not yield five 
bushels per acre, and the wheat would be good 
for nothing but chicken feed. 
I have made up my mind to sow my wheat 
early this fall—say the first week in September 
—two bushels to the acre, and drilled in pretty 
deep. Then as soon as it is well out of the 
ground, I will harrow it with Thomas’s harrow 
every three or four days, to see if I can not kill 
red-root and other weeds. Harrowing in the 
spring will not kill the red-root plants. But in 
the fall, just as the weed-seeds germinate, I see 
no reason why the harrow will not kill them. 
At any rate, I mean to give it a thorough trial, 
aud I wish others would test the matter. 
We must do something to destroy the weeds 
on our farms, and we should try every method 
that commends itself to our judgment. The 
great aim should be to kill them before they get 
to the surface, or as soon after as possible. - 
- - « - -««•>-► «- 
Utire Water. 
A correspondent writes us that he has a well 
thirty feet deep, situated twenty feet from a 
cesspool, into which the refuse of a family is 
discharged. He asks us if there is any danger 
that the water in the well will become defiled 
when the well is cemented from top to bottom. 
This is an important question, as these circum¬ 
stances are very common, and in very few cases 
is there even the partial protection of the ce¬ 
ment coating given to the well to prevent the 
influx of drainage. It is quite common to see 
wells surrounded with slops from the kitchen, 
or drainings from barn-yards. Sometimes the 
immediate vicinity of the well is constantly 
visited by farm stock of all descriptions, and its 
condition in the spring when the winter’s accu¬ 
mulations become thawed is disagreeable and 
unwholesome in the extreme. It is too com¬ 
monly supposed that earth will defecate and 
render pure all liquids which may pass through 
it. While this is true to some extent, it is just 
as true that there is a point of saturation which 
is easily reached when the earth no longer ex¬ 
erts this purifying property. It has been found 
that when soil has been abundantly manured, 
although heavily cropped, liquid manure spread 
on the field causes the water passing off in 
the drains four feet beneath the surface to be 
colored with if. This shows how easily the point 
of saturation of the soil can be reached. Now, 
what must be the condition of the soil beneath 
an old barn-yard and that adjacent to it, or to a 
long-used cesspool! The large quantity of 
liquid passing into these places, and that from 
the rains constantly falling upon and percolat¬ 
ing through the soil around the well, have com¬ 
pletely charged it with offensive matter which 
must eventually pass into the well; and al¬ 
though it may not color the water, nor give it 
a disagreeable taste or smell, it will exert a 
most injurious effect upon the health of per¬ 
sons using it. It is well known that many dis¬ 
eases have been traced to a cause similar to the 
one referred to, and that its removal has imme¬ 
diately restored the locality to a healthy state. 
The peculiar poison generated by decomposing 
animal refuse when taken into the system pro¬ 
duces a class of fevers known as typhoid, which 
are often fatal, and always dangerous. As a 
matter of course, this poison affects all animal 
life more or less acutely, aud it is worth while 
for those who have written us from several lo¬ 
calities about the suffering of their stock from 
diseases of a typhoid character, to consider if 
they have not originated in some manner sim¬ 
ilar to this. Pure water is imperatively neces¬ 
sary to human health, and it is equally necessary 
to that of our animals, and the farmer who vio¬ 
lates this law can not escape the consequences. 
It is only a matter of time how soon the un¬ 
wholesome matter will reach the well; and even 
though it be protected by a cemented lining, 
a passage will sooner or later be found for it. 
Irrigation—Storage of Water. 
The two past summers have been so dry as 
to cause heavy losses in various crops through¬ 
out great portions of the United States. If the 
excess of rains not wanted for the spring crops 
could have been stored in ponds, and then care¬ 
fully used for irrigation as required through 
July and August, millions upon millions would 
have been added to the wealth of the country. 
There are few farms on which suitable spots 
may not be found for ponds, into which tie 
waste water may be conducted, to be stored up 
against a drouth. Where springs or rivulets 
prevail, across which dams can be constructed 
for the same purpose, artificial ponds may be 
dispensed with. These ponds would also be 
very convenient for watering the live-stock of 
the farm; in fact, in many places where springs 
or rivulets do not abound, they are essential. 
A Mr. Brown, of Edinburgh, Scotland, has 
recently invented an apparatus by which a fine 
shower of water, like fine natural rain, may be 
applied to the surface of the land as required. 
This is found far superior to the usual method 
of irrigating by ditches, and it has the further 
advantage of dispensing with the digging of 
these and leveling the surface of the ground 
through which they conduct the water, thus 
saving a large outlay to begin with. It is of no 
consequence how rough or uneven the land is 
where Mr. Brown’s apparatus is used. It .is 
affirmed that two men with it can shower a 
thousand acres in a single night. The best man¬ 
ner 1o use the water is to apply about as much 
at night as is evaporated by day. This gives 
the largest and best quality of crop that it is 
possible to grow. Will some of our wealthy 
and enterprising farmers import a set of Mr. 
Brown’s apparatus, and show what can be done 
with it on American soil ? A. 
[The above comes from an esteemed corre¬ 
spondent, but we think there must be an error 
in stating the number of acres that can be 
watered by the apparatus referred to.— Ed.] 
