BIO 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
AGRICULTURE and HUSBANDRY of the SOUTH. 
We are furnished by the last number of the Southern 
Agriculturist, with a most excellent Address on the Ag¬ 
riculture and Husbandry of the South, delivered by Gen. 
James Hamilton, at the formation of an Ag. Society at 
Fort Mitchell, Russell Co. Alabama, on the 4th July last. 
The author evinces a thorough acquaintance with agri¬ 
culture in general, and particularly with that of the re¬ 
gion of country for which his remarks are especially de¬ 
signed. We cannot doubt that such addresses as this, in 
connexion with the spirited and praiseworthy exertions 
of many enterprising citizens of the South, will exert a 
most salutary influence in the improvement of agricul¬ 
ture. 
We present our readers below with several extracts 
from Gen. Hamilton's Address. The handsome tribute 
therein paid to our friend Dr. N. B. Cloud, we have no 
doubt is well deserved, and we heartily rejoice that his 
labors in endeavoring to introduce anew and vastly more 
profitable mode of cultivating the great staple of our 
southern neighbors, are beginning to be properly appre¬ 
ciated : 
“ I think it may be assumed as a postulate, that about 
as much cotton is produced now as can be gathered, but 
I am equally certain by the improved mode of manured 
and checked culture, that half the land now in cultiva¬ 
tion will give the same return. In other words, I be¬ 
lieve five hundred acres of cotton in the new mode of its 
cultivation, will produce as much as a thousand in the 
old. In order to embark in this recently recommended 
culture, it is admitted that a large and accumulating stock 
of manure is necessary. It is however to be remember¬ 
ed, the seed of one crop will nearly manure one-half of 
the succeeding one, by resorting to the check culture, 
and by carefully littering and stabling our working ani¬ 
mals and stock the whole year round, an amount of com¬ 
post to manure the other half may be made. But after 
all, the great magazine for restoration and improvement 
of our soils, is at our own doors, through the region of 
country we occupy. Marl constitutes a never failing 
source of renovation. It renders porous soils more com¬ 
pact, and clay soils more friable, and is the most power¬ 
ful agent yet discovered for decomposing vegetable mat¬ 
ter, and converting it at once into manure. It is in this 
last particular it performs its most beneficial office. It 
has been found equally as fertilizing to cotton as to any 
of the cereal or root crops. Virginia has been renova¬ 
ted by its use. It has checked emigration in that State, 
doubled the product of the counties in which it has been 
used, and very nearly increased the price of farms in the 
same ratio. Yet the marl in Virginia does not average 
more than 60 per cent of the carbonate of lime, its con¬ 
stituent element of usefulness, whilst the marl of Georgia 
and Alabama reaches nearly 90 per cent—a vast differ¬ 
ence in our favor. Let every farmer commence at once 
a search for that valuable mine on his farm. It is easily 
detected by its brown and greenish incrustation, in which 
are imbedded small fragments of sea-shells.” 
“ In many parts of South Carolina where marl has been 
applied, the cotton crops have been nearly if not entirely 
duplicated, and although our soils are less worn than 
hers, it behooves us at once to commence a resort to this 
great mine of agricultural wealth. It ought at once to 
constitute an object of our Society, to obtain detailed in¬ 
structions for its use and application. It is not, howev¬ 
er, alone by the use of manures, that our cotton crops are 
to be increased—the great elements of solar light and 
heat are no less essential. Hence our cotton rows ought 
invariably to run south and north, that not only the least 
amount of shade should be cast on the plant, but that as 
our winds prevail in the summer months, the highest 
amount of atmospherical nourishment may be given to 
the plant. The necessity of this will be manifest, when 
it is recollected how much atmospherical nutrition the 
cotton derives from absorbents of its redundant foliage. 
I believe moreover, after the full moon in July, the per¬ 
pendicular stem of all cotton over four feet and a half 
high, should be topped, and the two or three of the long 
lateral branches on the full moon in August. I am sat¬ 
isfied that in rank and wet seasons, we should make at 
least one-third more to the acre by adopting this pro¬ 
cess.” 
ce By this improved mode of culture, through the instru¬ 
mentality of a system of manuring, I believe, we may 
make one acre produce as much as two by the old denu¬ 
ded process, by which we take every thing from the soil 
and return nothing to it. The consequences to our ope¬ 
ratives from this mode of cultivation, by which we give 
to one acre the productive energies of two, are of inesti¬ 
mable consideration. First, one half of the horses and 
mules which we now use to go over an immense space 
of imperfectly cultivated soil, may be dispensed with, or 
used for the garden cultivation of a diminished number 
of acres. Secondly, to our slaves how greatly will the 
burthen be lightened, by tilling one-half of the quantity 
of land, yet in the end having a harvest equally or per¬ 
haps even more abundant to gather ? To say nothing of 
the increased facility of the harvest itself, by pulling two 
thousand pounds of seed cotton on one acre, instead of 
one.” 
“ At the Bend, I have this year planted in the check, 
twelve hundred acres of cotton, six hundred I have ma¬ 
nured, the other six are planted in the first rise of the 
swamp, in a rich alluvium of untouched fertility requi¬ 
ring at present no manure. Two hundred acres of the 
former, on the second level of the swamp, are on a stiff 
clay flat. The cotton was planted in this field on the 1st 
of May. It did not receive a drop of rain until the first 
week in June. The consequence has been, that I have 
encountered incredible difficulty in obtaining a stand; 
some of the land was re-planted five times, and none less 
than three. It was not until the 10th of June, by unre- 
mitled efforts, I at last succeeded in setting the crop in 
this field. I advert to this miscarriage for the purpose 
of indicating its remedy, to wit:—of giving a deep win¬ 
ter close furrow plowing, to all the lands you design for 
the check culture, and harrowing them early in the spring 
before you check off, after they have been rendered fria¬ 
ble by the winter rains and frost, and another spring plow¬ 
ing. I believe I might have thrown up and abandoned 
these two hundred acres, and still that at the firstdevel of 
the Bend, I will make more cotton, from present appear¬ 
ances, than my whole force can gather between the 15th 
of August and 15th of January, from manuring and adopt¬ 
ing the check, and discai’ding the drill culture. On my 
first level, I have checked five feet by four, and on the 
second level four feet square. I believe, however, five 
feet by three in the most fertile soils, and four by three 
in those of less richness, will be the right distance.” 
• “ My corn on Cantey’s fraction, which I think the 
richest piece of high river bottom I have seen this side 
of the Brasos and Colorado, I have planted in squares of 
three feet, and thinned to a single stalk. It is the best 
eared corn on my place, and will average, if no disaster 
occurs, nearly two ears to the stalk.” 
“ In noticing the check culture, I should be singularly 
unmindful of the claims of an individual who has most 
successfully directed the public attention to it, if I did 
not pay a willing- tribute to the intelligence and ability 
with which he has illustrated the philosophy on which it 
rests. You will understand, gentlemen, that I can allude 
to no one but Dr. Cloud, of Macon county, who by his 
careful analysis and induction of facts, has done much I 
believe to diminish the labor and augment the product 
of the cotton crop of the United States. That his theory 
rests on the true philosophy of the plant, I entertain as 
little doubt, as I do that its introduction will mark a new 
era in the culture of our beneficent staple. You will per¬ 
mit me to remark, that this system of manuring and plant¬ 
ing in the check, takes off’half the tax on our lands, by 
allowing us to fallow half, or enables us to double our 
product in provisions and stock, if desirable. Indeed, a 
system of steady and efficient manuring, combined with 
an alternation of our crops, and of fallowing the most ex¬ 
hausted of our soils, constitute the best recipe for renova¬ 
ting an old country and preventing a new one from 
growing old.” 
Pick carefully all winter apples for sale and for use, 
and save all other apples for pigs and other farm stock, 
for which they will be found very valuable in winter. 
