1848. 
THE CULTIVATOR. 
185 
hills. A few experiments convinced me that spreading 
a larger quantity of long manure and plowing it in 
was the better method; yet still I found it needful to 
add a little fine manure to each hill at the time of plant¬ 
ing, in order to give the plant an early and vigorous 
start. This last process, however, was attended with 
considerable labor at a busy season, as I found it re¬ 
quired full five days, man’s work, to haul and distri¬ 
bute the manure, drop and cover an acre, if done pro¬ 
perly. 
I tried drilling corn in rows, but then to scatter the 
manure nicely in the drills, was a tedious business which 
I could with difficulty get common farm hands to do. 
Therefore, I set about contriving a Manure Barrow and 
Seed Dropper combined, and put in my principal crop 
with it in 1838, and continued to do so for the seven 
following seasons that I remained on that farm. My 
first attempts were not quite satisfactory, but I studied 
to obviate the difficulties as they occurred and to make 
improvements ; the machine in its present state is the 
result thus far, and I shall be glad to see it further im¬ 
proved. 
The accompanying drawing was made several years 
ago; since then the pulley M has been made larger, 
and a tightening pulley added to band d, both of which 
are improvements. 
I have used only riddled manures in the machine, 
such as poudrette, lime, ashes, charcoal and bone dust. 
In my last planting of corn in 1845. I put eight bush¬ 
els of bone dust, mixed with twice the quantity of char¬ 
coal dust to the acre, it being the first planting upon 
land recently underdrained. The yield was a good 
one. 
With this machine and a steady going mule, a man 
has put in five acres per day; that is, plant, cover and 
manure it in drills. My practice was to plant twice 
as many kernels as I wished to stand, and where birds, 
moles and insects did not thin out sufficiently, it 
was done with a common hoe, cutting through the 
row r s, leaving the strongest plants to average a distance 
of about eight inches apart. The drills being 4£ to 5 
feet apart. 
Once plowing the corn only, and then as soon as the 
plants were fairly up, so as to be plainly seen in the 
row r s, going as near as possible and turning the furrows 
from them, afterwards keeping the ground loose and 
clean by the cultivator and harrow, I found to be the 
better practice. I am satisfied that hilling up corn is 
useless, and destroying the root by the plow worse than 
useless, both for the corn and the stalks. 
The kind of corn of all the various sorts that I tried 
which in that section produced the greatest yield, is 
rather a large growing stalk, producing ears of four¬ 
teen to twenty row’s mostly, red cob, the kernel a red¬ 
dish yellow, or flesh color, something of a gourd seed 
or horse tooth shape, and a little indented on the top. 
Robt. White, Jr 
New-York, 4 mo., 1848. 
THIS FARMERS NOTE HOOK. 
The Norman Horse. 
Editors of Cultivator —In the course of my re¬ 
marks on breeding horses, recently published in the 
Cultivator, I have more, than once intimated my 
intention to notice the Normans. This design 
would have been executed earlier had I been able 
to commana my time. I nave even now to regret that 
other calls press upon me so closely that I am com¬ 
pelled to give you but a hasty sketch. 
The Norman horses now most used in France, are a 
cross of the old French or Norman draught horse with 
the Andalusian, or Spanish barb. The original breed 
was too clumsy and slow. The cross with the Anda¬ 
lusian has rendered them more shapely and active. I 
have examined the improved breed with a good deal of 
scrutiny. During my visit to France in 1846, I rode 
many hundred miles behind them, and saw many sta¬ 
bles filled with them. The postmen and stage propri¬ 
etors use them exclusively. I found them in daily ser¬ 
vice from four to twenty-four years old. Some had 
been driven fifteen or sixteen years. I found no lame 
or sickly horses in their stables—all appeared fat and 
hardy. They are driven before the mail coaches over 
routes of many hundred miles in extent, at the rate of 
eight miles per hour including stops; and I have many 
times seen one or more horses in a team trotting 
squarely and handsomely when the coach was moving 
at the rate of thirteen or fourteen miles per hour. 
They are of very uniform size and appearance—gene¬ 
rally about fifteen hands or fifteen hands and an inch 
high, and weighing 1100 lbs. 
The Norman horse lately purchased by Mr. How- 
land, of Union Springs, Cayuga County, is a very cor¬ 
rect representative of the breed as it now appears in 
France. His sire “ Diligence,” is a better horse than 
any one I saw in France; and I have no doubt the 
stock of Mr. Howland’s horse will prove a valuable 
acquisition to>this section of the State. On good com¬ 
mon mares of large size, he will get decidedly the best 
farm and draught horses that we can raise. I think the 
Norman horses and their crosses are better adapted to 
stage coaches and peddler’s wagons also, and all places 
where quick and heavy draught is required, than any 
breed of horses of my acquaintance. I have no doubt 
that a pair of them, with a ton cr more behind them, 
will perform a greater journey in a day or a week, than 
any other horses that can be produced. 
Again, they are so hardy that there is'but little 
trouble or risk in raising them. They mature so early 
too, that they may be sold at three and* four years old 
for as much as they will bring when eight or nine. In 
short I consider them a very useful and valuable stock 
of horses. Respectfully, &c., J. B. B. 
Syracuse, April 13, 1848. 
P. S. In my last article on breeding horses, your 
compositor has made me say that I have never known 
a successful cross of a Morgan horse on a highly bred 
mare. I wrote, or intended to write, that I have never 
known a successful cross of a Norman horse on a highly 
bred mare. ______ 
l arge Corn Crops in Indiana. 
I noticed in the January number of the Cultivator, 
1848, page 29, an inquiry respecting the method of 
raising large crops of corn in the w T est. In 1843 I 
plowed up a piece of grass-land which had been pas¬ 
tured two or three years. Before plowing I spread over 
one-third of the ground about ten cords of common 
barn-yard manure per acre; turned the sod as even as 
I could four inches deep. Planted Northern Yellow 
corn from Western New-York. Harrowed each way 
twice, and cut the weeds thrice—no hills made. Yield, 
80 bushels per acre. Next season, 1844, spread on 
about seven cords of manure per acre on a little more 
than half the field, beginning on the same side as be¬ 
fore, plowed once—laid off each way with a small plow 
—planted four feet apart each way, with Baden , and 
