54 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[February, 
casionally given to them. A large glass win¬ 
dow in the house gave them light and sunshine, 
in which they basked in cold weather. For all 
this care we were repaid by a constant supply 
of eggs all through the winter, and by February 
or early in March some of the hens would set, 
and bring out early broods which would take 
their places the next season. 
Walks and Talks on the Farm.—No. 122. 
Last winter I found that there was great 
danger of my cellar freezing during a cold, 
windy night. It occurred to me that a little 
boiling water poured upon the cellar floor 
would be of some service. I said nothing about 
it, for I thought I should get laughed at; but 
after every one else had gone to bed I got a 
pailful of boiling water and sprinkled it about 
the floor and shut up all the doors and win¬ 
dows tight. It saved the cellar; and no one in 
the house ever knew what risk we ran of hav¬ 
ing frozen potatoes. I don’t want to tell tales 
out of school, but it so happened that I wrote 
the next month’s calendar for the Agriculturist, 
and in one of the “ Hints about Work” I sug¬ 
gested this plan. I can recollect that I thought 
it hardly worth mentioning, but that at any 
rate it could do no harm. 
One of my German neighbors said to me the 
other day: “ That paper you and the Deacon 
write for is first-rate. I signed for it last year. 
I did not think I could afford it, but I wanted 
t© see what the Deacon said about you. I wish 
I had taken it before. It saved me ten dollars.” 
“ How was that, John ? ” I asked. 
“Well, you see,” he said, “I have got an 
awful cold cellar. When the stove goes out at 
night and the wind blows it’s most sure to freeze. 
I had a lot of potatoes in the cellar, and thought 
they would all be spoiled. I read what was 
said in the paper about pouring boiling water 
on the cellar floor. I tell you it saved the 
potatoes. That editor is a smart man. I-guess 
he is a German.” 
The incident pleased and amused me. It 
shows that one never knows what will or will 
not do good, and that those of us who “ write 
for the papers ” should not be afraid to men¬ 
tion a matter because it seems a simple thing. 
John Johnston sends me an ear of his corn. 
“I think,” he writes, “it is a very good kind, 
and if you have none of it I will send you a 
bushel for seed if I live until next planting 
time. It is called the White Flint. I had 158 
bushels of ears per acre of 40 lbs. to the bushel. 
A man who buys a good deal of corn in the 
ear said he would rather buy this corn at 75 
lbs. per bushel in the ear than have it shelled 
at 66 lbs. per bushel. He said he never saw 
any so well filled out.” 
The ear sent me contains eight rows, and 
there are 64 kernels to the row, or 512 kernels 
in the ear. My own corn is the common eight- 
rowed yellow. I got it from Mr. Dewey, who 
has taken great pains for many years to select 
the best ears for planting. I have just counted 
the kernels on one of the best ears, and found,, 
57 in the row or 456 in the ear. 
Mr. J. continues: “ I drilled my corn at the 
rate of about five seeds to three feet in the row ; 
rows 3 ft. 4 in. apart, I cultivated it thoroughly, 
but gave no hoeing except the two outside rows 
and about six feet at each end of the rows. So 
many suckers came up no weeds or grass could 
grow. It was as clean as it could have been 
made if I had hoed it all the time. I got some 
stalks with two ears that gave from 740 to 950 
kernels from one planted.” 
The Washington Co. Agricultural Society 
appointed a committee to examine a crop of 
corn raised last year by Mr. James W. Dickey, 
of West Alexander. The committee report 
that they selected three average shocks in dif¬ 
ferent parts of the field and husked the corn. 
They got 19 half bushels of ears from the three 
shocks, or 3 ! / 6 bushels of ears to each shock. 
There were 1,104 shocks on the 15 acres. This 
would give 3,499 bushels of ears, or 233 bushels 
of ears of corn per acre. 
The field had been in grass eighteen years. 
Last spring, as soon as the frost was out, it was 
plowed up at an average depth of 2i to 3 inches. 
The sod was well turned over and harrowed 
six times before planting. The land was marked 
out in rows 3 ft. 1 in. one way and 2 ft. 5 in. 
the other way. It was planted April 20th, and 
I judge from the report about four kernels 
were planted in each hill. This is very thick 
planting. When the corn was partly up it w T as 
harrowed with a common harrow. It was 
then cultivated twice in a row five times in all. 
At the last working the corn was up to the 
horse’s back. 
I have an idea that the report is designed to 
show the advantage of shallow plowing for 
corn. To me it shows the advantage of thor¬ 
oughly working the land and keeping the 
manure or sod near the surface. Mr. Dickey 
keeps 950 sheep, and I suppose this field had 
been pastured for many years. A sod turned 
over only 2-J- to 3 inches deep and harrowed six 
times w r ould be pretty well pulled all to pieces 
before the corn was planted. It would in fact 
be equivalent to a top-dressing of manure 
thoroughly worked into the soil. The frequent 
cultivating afterwards in warm weather would 
favor its decomposition and the corn roots 
would get a liberal supply of plant-food. 
It is evident that Mr. Dickey does not believe 
in shallow plowing, for the committee speak 
of another 15-acre field of his that had been in 
corn two years that they thought would yield 
nearly as much as the other. This field was 
plowed shallow when in sod and planted to 
corn, and then plowed “ very deep ” and planted 
to corn again. 
“It was those 950 sheep,” remarks the 
Deacon, “ that did the business. There is 
nothing like sheep for enriching land.” 
“ I believe in sheep, Deacon,” 1 replied, “ but 
that remark is only true in part. It is not the 
sheep that enrich the land. A sheep can create 
nothing. A sheep returns to the land nothing 
more than it takes from it. ” 
“Don’t you think,” said the Deacon, “that 
the sheep enrich your Northern Spy orchard? ” 
“ In one sense yes and in another sense no. 
If I run a lawn mower over the field every few 
days and left the grass to rot on the surface I 
think the land would sooner or later be en¬ 
riched by the mown grass as much as by the 
droppings of the sheep.” 
“ The sheep kill the weeds,” said the Deacon, 
“ and bring in better grasses and clover.” 
“ Mr. Lawes did the same thing,” I replied, 
“ by the use of artificial manures. It is not the 
sheep.” 
“I don’t see what you are driving at,” re¬ 
marked the Deacon as he got up to go. 
“ Hold on, Deacon,” I cried, “ the weather is 
stormy, and you have nothing to do. What I 
want to say is that it is the growth of the grass 
that enriches the land, and not the sheep. Or, 
to go back to the real root of the matter, it is 
the gradual decomposition of the organic mat¬ 
ter and the disintegration of the inorganic 
matter in the soil itself that furnishes food for 
plants. If we carry off all these plants the land 
becomes poorer. If we feed them out on the 
land the soil becomes richer. There is no more 
actual plant-food in the soil, but what there is 
is in a more available shape. This 15-acre 
field of Mr. Dickey’s that had been pastured for 
eighteen years furnished a certain amount of 
plant-food every year from the inert matter in 
the soil. The air decomposed it, the rain dis¬ 
solved it, and the roots of the grass took it up 
and the leaves organized it into food. The 
sheep ate the grass, converted the food into 
wool and mutton, and their droppings returned 
to the land some 90 to 95 per cent of all the 
nitrogen, phosphoric acid, and potash that the 
grass contained, and a still larger proportion of 
lime, soda, magnesia, and other mineral ele¬ 
ments of plant-food. This plant-food was 
again taken up by the grass, together with the 
; amount gradually rendered available by the 
decomposition of the soil. If the latter amounts 
to more than the small quantity removed in 
the wool, bones, and flesh of the sheep, the land 
gets richer and richer every year.” 
“You mean,” says the Deacon, “richer in 
available plant-food; not that there is abso¬ 
lutely any larger amount in the soil. Now, 
what I want to know is what becomes of this 
extra amount of available plant-food. If it is 
soluble, why is it not washed out by the rains 
and lost ? ” 
“ That question opens too big a subject for 
us to discuss this evening. I may remark, 
however, that if you pour a solution of ammo¬ 
nia, potash, or phosphoric acid upon a soil it 
unites with certain ingredients in the soil and 
becomes comparatively insoluble. Again, in 
an old pasture the roots of the grasses contain 
a large amount of the plant-food which has 
gradually accumulated. An old sod contains 
several tons of organic matter per acre. And 
so it is not at all a difficult matter to see what 
becomes of the plant-food which is gradually 
developed from the soil. It is stored up in the 
soil and in the sod; and when you plow up the 
land the sod is decomposed and furnishes 
plant-food for the next crop. That great corn 
crop of Mr. Dickey’s got more or less of the 
plant-food which had been gradually devel¬ 
oped from the soil and stored up during the 
last eighteen years. The sheep did not create 
this fertilizing matter; they merely helped to 
preserve it and turn it to good account. The 
piant-food comes from the soil.” 
The Deacon was silent a few minutes, and 
then said: “I don’t see, according to your 
theory, why our lands should not become 
richer instead of poorer.” 
“ It is because so few farmers take pains to 
save the plant-food which is gradually devel¬ 
oped from the soil. Instead of keeping sheep 
they sell the hay. Instead of draining the land 
they let the surface water run away with the 
soluble plant-food. Instead of cultivating the 
land and developing the plant-food they let the 
weeds rob the growing crops. Instead of care¬ 
fully saving the manure they let the best por¬ 
tion of it run into the nearest ditch.” 
Farmers do not differ essentially in these 
matters from other people. The man that 
knows how to make money and to save it is 
the exception. It seems, an easy matter to get 
rich, and it seems equally easy to make the 
land rich—on paper. 
