THE CULTIVATOR. 
build their houses with the timber they grow. If our 
road-sides were adorned with a tree once in five rods, 
the rows alternating with each other, as far as conve¬ 
nient, the roads, with the exception of here and there 
a wet place, which might be intermitted if thought de¬ 
sirable, would not be a whit worse, and in many soils 
would be far better. If one-fourth of these trees were 
rock maples, they would furnish sugar for the popula¬ 
tion, whenever it should be cheaper to manufacture 
than to buy ; and no one knows what future times will 
be. Rural dwellings should be adorned by shade trees. 
An American farm-house, under a sun shining intense¬ 
ly at least two hundred and fifty whole days in a year, 
is a vei;y different thing from an English country resi¬ 
dence, where the sun scarcely shines as many hours, 
and that mainly morning and evening. Yet the Eng¬ 
lishman takes care to provide his residence with trees ; 
the breezes that outer his windows come purified by a 
pre\ ious passage through dense foliage; while too often 
the American neglects to surround himself with these 
conservators of health and comfort; so that he and his 
family breathe air, not only scorching hot, but often 
surcharged with carbon and ammonia. An American 
farm-house, without trees at a little distance, (not so 
near as to produce injurious dampness,) is out of all 
taste, is unfavorable to health and comfort, and in utter 
disregard of the great law of adaptation to circum¬ 
stances of situation and climate. 
APPROPRIATION OF LANDS TO THE PURPOSES FOR 
WHICH THEY ARE BEST SUITED. 
L. Tucker, Esq. —An important means by which 
the results of British agriculture are obtained, is the 
wise appropriation -of lands to the purposes for which 
they are best suited. 
It would save something In transportation and much 
time in traffic, if each farmer eould produce bread- 
stuffs, horse-feed, beef, pork, butter, cheese and eggs 
enough for home consumption, and then sell the surplus. 
This would be the best way, provided that all lands 
were equally well adapted to all purposes. It requires 
sound discretion to determine when this rule shall be 
departed from. The wants of the family and the 
adaptations of the land are to be studied conjointly. 
English farmers seek a better reason for raising a 
particular crop or series of crops, than that their fa¬ 
thers did. They require a better reason than that their 
families will need the produce. As their country is 
small, and the means of transportation ample, they 
find it better to exchange produce with each other, 
than to appropriate lands disadvantageously. What 
kind of husbandry—what crops and in what rotation, 
is best adapted to different soils, is a matter which they 
have studied thoroughly, and which is pretty generally 
settled. 
But as a general rule, their practice is founded on 
sound principles. They can show a reason. Especial¬ 
ly is this the case in their appropriation of lands for 
particular purposes. In the Isle of Wight, and in the 
south of England, on the main coast, are extensive 
chalk hills. These, so far as I have seen them, are 
generally broad, continuous elevations, extending many- 
miles in length, and seldom steep or abrupt, except 
where the action of the sea is undermining and break¬ 
ing them down; as in the Isle of Wight. They are 
ealled “ downs and, as you are probably aware, have 
given name to a favorite breed of sheep extensively 
grown in the southern counties, of which the name 
“black fades” would be more characteristic than that 
of “ South Downs.” The soil in these hills is generally 
thin, often not more than two or three inches in thick¬ 
ness ; and it lies in a subsoil of chalk and flint stones. 
Consequently it is unfit for the plow, and is appropri¬ 
ated to the grazing of sheep. The soil is of a quick, 
active nature, producing a fine sweet grass, of which 
sheep are exceedingly fond, and'on which they fatten 
admirably in the summer, and will live pretty well 
during the whole winter by being “ helped out,” as the 
people here say, by a little hay or a few turneps. In 
making a pedestrien tour, with an American friend, in 
the Isle of Wight, I passed along one of these downs 
from Brading to Arreton, some six miles. The vallies 
on each side exhibited the most beautiful cultivation I 
ever saw. The reform of which I spoke in my last, 
had here done its work thoroughly. Clusters of trees 
here and there adorned the landscape; but nope in¬ 
fested the wheat-fields. The hedges, except enough to 
divide the land into lots of forty, fifty, or sixty acres, 
had disappeared. The distance from the cultivated 
fiields on the north to those on the south might have 
been two miles. On the rising ground between, were 
feeding thousands upon thousands of sheep and lambs, 
all South Downs, or a cross in which the features of the 
South Down were dominant, and so far as I could 
learn, ail in the care of a single shepherd, whose cot¬ 
tage was central between Brading and Arreton, and 
was the only dwelling-house on a territory five or six 
miles in length and two or three in width. I then 
believed, what I had heard before, that the Isle of 
Wight sends immense quantities of the finest mutton 
to London. I do not mean to imply that sheep farm¬ 
ing is confined to such downs. Almost all farmers in 
this country have sheep, more or less. In grain-grow¬ 
ing districts sheep arc employed to feed off the turnep 
crop, and thus prepare the ground for the crop that is 
to follow. But the downs are devoted almost entirely 
to the growing of mutton and wool; and it is undoubt¬ 
edly the wisest disposition that could be made of them. 
On the other hand, certain interval lands, as the 
valley of Aylesbury, are appropriated to the grazing 
of cattle. John Lee, LL. D., of Doctor’s Commons, 
London, but the owner, and a part of the year the resi¬ 
dent, of Hartwell House, in Buckinghamshire, invited 
me to visit him on his estate, in that county—said he 
knew something of farming, and that his men, some of 
them, knew more; and he would put me in the way of 
seeing some of the most sensible farmers in that part 
of the country. 
The bailiff told me that Dr. Lee’s estate extended 
thirteen miles in one direction and about two in the 
other—said he was a good master, probably the best 
in England, and was beloved by all the tenants. He 
introduced me to four large farmers on the Doctor’s es- 
