THE CULTIVATOR. 
63 
tempting, the clover, the turnip and the draining system; and that this 
improvement has taken place under burthens, in the shape of tithes, 
poor rates and rents, to which the American farmer is in a measure a 
stranger, and which here would he deemed highly oppressive. 
And why cannot we adopt the same improvements , with certainty of 
success, that have proved so highly salutary in our father land ? We 
have strong arms, and as stout hearts, as our ancestors. But we lack 
the necessity which there prompts to industry and economy, and we 
fear the intelligence—the lights of science, that there guide and direct 
the labors of husbandry. Yet we are on the high road of improvement. 
Agricultural publications are multiplying—they are improving in cha¬ 
racter and in patronage—and it is our firm conviction, that they are 
adding ten per cent every year to the amount of our agricultural pro¬ 
ducts. The establishment of Schools of practical and scientific agricul¬ 
ture, which even those advanced in life may yet hope to see established 
among us, which shall concentrate and teach all that is most useful in 
theory, and most perfect in practice, will accelerate our improvements 
in progressive rat o. Well does the agricultural press deserve public 
countenance and support. It excites none of the bad propensities of our 
nature; but it tends to lessen the wants and the vices of the human 
family, and to diffuse useful knowledge, increase iudustry,and promote 
virtue and happiness. It is scattering the good seed, pure and unmix¬ 
ed, free from cockle, chess or tares—the seed has germinated, and un¬ 
der the fostering care of the husbandman it must continue to grow, and 
to yield an abundant harvest. 
PLANTING.—No. I. 
Trees give to a farm half its intrinsic value. Without trees about 
it, a farm house looks naked, cheerless and uncomfortable; and with 
out trees man enjoys but a modicum of the blessings which providence 
has destined for his use. Trees are the farmer’s resource, in most 
cases, for building, for fencing, and for fuel. About farm buildings, 
they afford shelter, and are conductive alike to health and beauty. In 
the orchard and garden, they are sources of interest, of luxury and sub¬ 
stantial profit. It is announced in a late Northampton paper, that 
Captain Hale, of that vicinity, had sold thirteen locust trees for $153, 
and a red oak for $30; and that a white ash, which grew in that neigh¬ 
borhood, when converted into plank, brought in market the round sum 
of $70. Besides their intrinsic value for timber, and fruit, the judicious 
planting of trees, in open and exposed situations, “ improve the gene¬ 
ral climate of the neighborhood, the staple of the soil, as regards the 
gradual accumulation of vegetable matters, affords shelter to live stock, 
promotes the growth of pasture and corn crops, beautifies the landscape, 
and thus greatly and permanently increases the value of the fee simple 
of the estate and adjoining lands.” 
“ What is your age?” was the interrogatory which an eastern prince 
caused to be put, by one of his attendants, to a very old man, seated by 
the way side. “ I am four years old,” was the reply. “Do you intend to 
insult his majesty?” was therejoinder. “ No, may it please your majes¬ 
ty—it is but four years since I began to live, as I ought, for posterity— 
since I first planted a tree.” According to this definition of living for 
posterity, but comparatively few of our countrymen have began yet to 
live; for instead of planting , their study and occupation have been to 
destroy trees. But every consideration of interest and comfort admo¬ 
nish us, to change our habits in this respect, and to provide in time for 
the wants of posterity. The old settled states are already experiencing 
a scarcity of wood, and they contain vast tracts of land, now in a great 
measure unproductive, which, if planted, would in a few years yield a 
profitable return in wood, and the great Prairie West is rapidly fillinr 
with a population which will soon exhaust its spare woods. 
Planting woodland may be regarded as a new business with us, though 
the Massachusetts agricultural society have endeavored to encourage 
it by liberal premiums, and individuals, in different parts of the Union 
have directed some attention to it. It is related of a farmer in Long 
Island, that he planted a hundred locust trees on the birth of each child 
and that the proceeds of the hundred trees, when the child beeame of age 
afforded to it a handsome outfit. It is a branch of rural economy which 
we must begin at some time, and the sooner we begin the better. Many 
districts on the old continent have become desolate, and almost uninha 
bitable, in consequence of the total destruction of the wood. This is 
the condition of many tracts in Asia, in Spain, and in the environs of its 
capital, and even in Russia. In speaking of the maize and vine dis¬ 
trict of that empire, lying upon the Black sea and the confines of Tur¬ 
key, a late writer, said to be a Russian statesman, mentions as a great 
defect of this region, the almost total absence of forests; and he recom¬ 
mends, the planting of larch and other quick growing trees in spots 
where the soil is suitable, and sheltered from the strong blasts which 
sweep the plain; to rear other plantations under shelter of the first 
and the planting of trees near farm houses, and villages, round the 
fields, along the roads, and especially in the ravines, as means of ameli 
orating the climate, and increasing the productiveness of the soil. 
The planting of forests and ornamental grounds, has long been prac¬ 
tised in Europe particularly in Great Britain, where it is sedulously en¬ 
couraged by statesmen as well as landholders. It has contributed much 
to beautify the country, as well as to improve the productiveness and 
profits of the soil. Some idea of the extent to which it is carried may 
be formed from the fact, that in the twenty-seven years between 1802 
and 1809, the Duke of Bedford alone, had planted upon his estate, 1,540 
acres of ground, with five million seven hundred and thirty-five thou¬ 
sand trees, exclusive of 680 bushels of acorns and other seeds put in 
with the dibble. 
The business of planting, like the culture of turnips, or any other new 
branch of rural economy, seems much more formidable and expensive 
in prospect, than it turns out to be in practice. It may be managed up¬ 
on every farm, with but trifling expense, by the ordinary laborers.— 
Seeds of our forest, ornamental and fruit trees may be readily gathered 
at the proper seasons ; and under the plain directions which we intend 
to give, they may be sown, and trees reared and planted and grown 
without difficulty. 
It is not our intention, in these remarks, to say any thing of trees ex¬ 
clusively ornamental, or particularly belonging to the orchard or gar¬ 
den, except to express a hope, that at least orchards already existing 
may be spared from the axe, if not for the liquor they afford, or the im¬ 
portant material of diet they furnish in the kitchen and in the desert, 
at least for the profit of the proprietor, in feeding and fattening his hogs 
and other farm stock. Ample and indisputable testimony has been re¬ 
cently afforded, that the same area of land is far more profitable, for 
feeding farm stock, in an apple orchard, than it can be made in grow¬ 
ing for them grain or roots. Our present object is to make some brief 
suggestions on planting forest timber, particularly for the benefit of 
our subscribers in the Prairie West, where, if we understand the con¬ 
dition of the country, this ought to be one of the first subjects that 
should engage the attention of the settler. 
BEET SUGAR. 
We have received a communication from a friend, soliciting our co¬ 
operation with the friends of improvement in Pennsylvania, in further¬ 
ing the culture of the beet, and the manufacture of sugar from this 
root. Some gentlemen in Philadelphia, impressed with the importance 
of the subject, have patriotically sent Mr. James Pedda to France to 
acquire the knowledge requisite to the culture and manufacture. Our 
correspondent says, “I have samples of the sugar made from the beet 
root, equal to the finest loaf I ever saw, and which only cost nine cents 
per pound in France. When I return I will furnish you with the sam¬ 
ple. France last year manufactured eighty millions pounds.” 
Had our correspondent examined our last volume, he would have seen 
that we had anticipated his request. At the suggestion of a corres¬ 
pondent in the far west, we gave a summary of the mode of culture 
and manufacture, from M. Chaptal, than whom no one was more com¬ 
petent to instruct, as he conducted the business on a large scale for 
twelve years, and was withal, one of the best chemists of the age. 
This summary will be found in pages 80, 81 and 104. The whole pro¬ 
cess is minutely detailed in Chaptal’s “ Chemistry applied to Agricul- 
ture.” We stated that beet sugar could be successfully cultivated in 
France when foreign sugar did not compete with it in the market at a 
less price than ten cents per pound. We did not then consider, nor did 
our readers probably understand, that the remark then had reference 
to refined sugar. The fact now seems to be this, that beet sugar, equal 
to our double refined loaf, which now sells in the New-York market at 
eighteen and twenty cents per pound, can be profitably sold in France, 
by the producer, at nine cents per pound, or at half the price of cane 
sugar. It follows as a matter of course, for bating the difference in 
labor, we can produce it here as cheap as they can in France, that the 
culture of the beet, and the manufacture of beet stigar, can be ren¬ 
dered a profitable business in this country. Our soil and climate are 
well adapted to the beet; and in the interior, in particular, where the 
price of foreign sugar is enhanced by the charges of transportation, 
beet sugar must ere long be among the staple products. As an offset 
to the difference in labor, we have an advantage in the cheapness of 
land. Chaptal’s estimates are predicated on a rent of 40 francs ($7.60) 
per acre. 
Chaptal states his average product in beet roots at 40,000 pounds the 
hectare (which is 2 acres 1 rood 35 perches English;) that in his es¬ 
tablishment he operated upon 10,000 pounds in a day; that this quan¬ 
tity (10,000 lbs. roots) produced, of 
1 Refined sugar, 187 lbs. worth,. 210 francs. 
2 Middling do. 67 lbs. worth,. 67 “ 50 c. 
3 Trimmings, 1,000 kilograms, (fed) worth, ... 2 “ 50 c. 
4 Mash, (fed to stock) 1,250, worth,. 30 “ 
5 Molasses, 130, worth, .’. 12 “ 
322 francs. 
equal to about $61 on the products of one-fourth of a hectare, or some¬ 
thing more than half an acre of land. The expense of cultivating an 
acre is stated at 133 francs, about $25, which includes 40 fr. for rent, 
and 10 for taxes, and leaves about $15.75 for cultivating, digging, trans- 
