INDUSTRY OF COUNTIES. 
405 
lands are more liable to become foul with, we ds than tlie apparently less 
rich soils of the oak-openings, and plaster produces no perceptible increase 
in the amount of the crops raised. Nature has everywhere held compen¬ 
sations for the apparent advantages of the prairie, which is easily brought 
into a state of cultivation and very rich in elements of vegetable product¬ 
ion, but is generally less bountifully watered, more bleak in winter, less 
pleasant to plow because the rich loam does not clear the mould board or 
the hoe, and is more muddy. It is also generally devoid of natural slielt< r 
and of material for fencing and fuel, which the prairie fanner must buy of 
his apparently, but not really, less fortunate neighbor of the timber or 
openings. The prairie is, moreover, not so well adapted to the production 
of fine orchards, on account of the bleak winds of winter, which sweep 
with unchecked violence, and also because a large portion is underlaid by 
a stiff clay subsoil, which resists the full and rapid development of the 
roots of fruit trees. The finest orchards in the county are found in the 
timbered districts or in the oak-openings. Fruit trees are still trees; they 
thrive best on the lands on which the finest timber grows in the natural 
state. « 
Upon the whole, it is our opinion that, every thing considered, the oak- 
openings are the best lands for a farmer of moderate means. These lands 
seem to be less rich in vegetable producing elements than the other two 
(timber or prairie), but such is not the fact as demonstrated by that most 
unanswerable theorist—experience. The soil of the oak-openings is of a 
lighter color, but it produces the finest crops of cereals, including corn and 
also esculent roots. It plows very kindly, is never miry like the prairie 
where the reapers have sometimes become useless in wet seasons because 
they could not be worked in deep mud; the openings produce as much to 
the acre, and of plumper, heavier grain; manure works a more permanent 
benefit; they raise heavier crops of clover and other grasses, and the use of 
plaster is attended with wonderful effect, frequently doubling the crop of 
hay; orchards thrive better; they supply sufficient fuel and fencing mate¬ 
rial, and also in • sufficient, though not in excessive quantities, that almost 
indispensable article—stones for cellars, wells, underpinnings and imperish¬ 
able, handsome fences. 
All the advantages mentioned in connection with the oak openings, also 
belong to the timbered sections, and the latter have the further advantage 
that, once cleared, they do not, like the openings, send forth a crop of use¬ 
less and tangled grubs, which are very expensive to eradicate. 
Beside the three kinds of lands which we have described, this county 
also includes a proportion, perhaps amounting to one-fifteentli of the whole, 
of marshes; but these have, in almost every instance, been ditched and re¬ 
claimed, and now make very fine mowing or pasture land, and are as highly 
valued as any other portion of the farm. A narrow belt of valuable cedar 
runs through the towns of Marshfield, Forest and Osceola. It supplies the 
