Various

“ Twice in every year our otherwise quiet village is thrown into a ferment, which agitates its little community like an earthquake, and unsettles all the habits of order and industry for which we are usually remarkable. The cause of this great tumult is the militia training—that system which supposes every citizen to be a soldier, and undertakes to instruct him in the art and mystery of holding a musket and putting the right foot foremost. ”

“ After providing a due proportion of apples for the table, and the ordinary purposes of cookery, I do not hesitate to express my opinion, that for all other uses, sweet apples are entitled to the preference. The best cider I ever tasted in this country, was made wholly of sweet apples. They afford also a nourishing food to man and all domestic animals. What furnishes a more delicate repast than a rich sweet apple baked and eaten with milk? I recollect the observation made to me by an observing farmer, before the American revolution, that nothing would fatten cattle faster than sweet apples. ”

“ Irrigation, beautiful, elegant, profitable irrigation, or the watering of grounds, by turning upon them streams that have been wont to run waste, and pour their unused vegetative powers into navigable rivers, is a great example. The venerable and judicious Arthur Young wrote to his compatriots in England, from the districts of Piedmont and Milan, the best irrigated parts of the valley of the Po, that such was the perfection of that branch of agriculture and the connected branches of working and neat cattle, dairies, rice, &c. ”

“ The effectual bearing of the productions of the south upon the profits of the farming of the middle, northern and eastern states, will always render the actual or new culture of our great southern district of sugar, rice, indigo, cotton and grape vines, deeply important us; because the cultivation of those and other productions, adapted to their climates, will prevent their attention, as principal objects, to those things which must always be produced by our cattle, grass, apple, vegetable and grain farms. ”

“ We further propose that the society recommend to each of its practical members, regularly to enter in writing, the preparation and state of the ground, at the time of sowing or planting each crop, the quantity and kind of manure and seed per acre, particulars relative to the weather, the process of culture, the times of sowing and gathering, and the amount of produce per acre, with such other particulars as may be thought worthy of notice, each part of which to be annually laid before them, in order that such facts as are deemed worthy of preservation, may be laid before the society. ”

“ Deep ploughing begins to be more general than formerly. I should state five inches to be the most approved practice, on turning up the sord for corn. With respect to deepening it for other crops, after the sord is broken, it depends upon the nature of the crop and the resources of the farmer, and also the state of his soil. My own rule is never to lay down land to grass until it has been turned up to the depth of fourteen inches. But my practice is peculiar, as I carry a regular succession of, 1st corn, 2d potatoes, 3d carrots, 4th grain, 5th grass, over my whole farm ”

“ In a word, the sexual system exists in plants as well as among animals; only in plants the male and female are generally united in the same plant; as in Indian corn, the male impregnating dust (the farina) is in the tassel or flower, at the top: the ear is the female, and from every cell of the future grain proceeds a thread, which together constitute what is called the silk, on which the farina falling causes the cells to fill, and become, when ripe, kernels of corn. In most fruits, as the apple and pear, the male and female are in the same flower. ”

“ When the mortar is thus well made, a moderate quantity of wheat, to make firmity, is to be put into the mortar, in the upper part, as it stands on the end, and the grain is to be moistened with a little warm water, to make the skin or bran come off easily and perfectly, by the beating. The pestle is then to be used by a man so as, by striking in among the grains of wheat, from the top to the bottom of the parcel, from time to time, and repeatedly, to skin the grains of wheat, which it will do effectually. ”

“ The Flemish practice, with regard to a change of seeds, has long prevailed in Scotland, not only as to potatoes, but as to wheat, barley, oats, and all other grain. The Scotch potatoes have always appeared to me superior to those raised in England, where the same attention is not shown to the choice of seed. It is a fact, also, well known in these countries, that the barley raised in Scotland, though greatly inferior in appearance to English barley, and raised in a colder climate, contains more saccharine matter, or nourishment. ”

“ There is nothing in which the honourable fame and steady prosperity of our country, and the best interests of its inhabitants, are more deeply involved, than in the promotion of agriculture. With one hundred and twenty millions of acres of cleared, or natural, strong, unwooded land, and a population computed at nine millions of persons, we have more soil already prepared for plantations, farms and grazing, in proportion to our numbers, than any other civilized people ”

“ It will be seen that wheat never succeeds to clover: it almost always follows flax, hemp, cole-seed or potatoes. Clover greatly encourages the growth of dog grass, which, if not completely torn up, with all its roots, the least fibres of the latter which escape, will each produce a new plant, greatly to the prejudice of the wheat. In England the fields are [306] always more or less infected with this pest, while the practice pursued in Flanders completely protects them against it—Wheat is also materially benefited in Flanders, by the repeated digging up, and hoeings, which potatoes require ”

“ With us, the early sowing of winter grain is of the first importance, to insure a full crop, early ripe, and most secure from mildew. The husbandry of Mr. Ducket, already described, justifies the practice. I know it is already common amongst us; but without the deep tillage which enabled him to put in seven crops with only four ploughings. With such complete tillage, of a soil so enriched as to yield forty or fifty bushels of Indian corn to the acre, grown on a level, without hills or ridges; and if, in harvesting the corn, it be cut close to the ground ”

“ If any of the seeds fail, and there happen not to be an even crop, the roots where they are too thick are drawn out before the hoeing takes place, and transplanted to fill up the vacant places, and ensure a full crop; which is always certain, inasmuch as 99 plants out of 100 thrive and do well. In transplanting, care is necessary to prevent the point of the root from turning upwards."
"The weeds, while the plants are young, are kept hoed; but after the head of the plant has once spread, no weed can live under its shade ”

“ This last mode of milking is always practised when it is intended that a cow should be rendered dry.
Additional quantity of Milk to be gained by keeping Milch Cows in the house.—In the management of cows, a warm stable is highly necessary; and currying them like horses, not only affords them pleasure, but makes them give their milk more freely. They ought always to be kept clean, laid dry, and have plenty of good sweet water to drink. Cows treated in this manner, have given ten gallons of milk at a time, when within ten days of calving. ”

“ If man has no moral right to take the life of his fellow, government can have no moral right to oblige him to do it; and they who obey the law, in preference to their conscience, are traitors to their God. ”

“ Of the Mangel Wurtzel I would select large and fair roots of a red colour, whose bodies have grown most above ground, and with a moderate, if not the smallest, quantity of leaves; for although these are valuable for stripping, the roots are much more valuable; and I am inclined to think those with small tops are least liable to rot.
Of Carrots, large and fair roots of the deepest yellow colour, and with the smallest tops in proportion to the size of the roots, are to be preferred.
With regard to the Ruta Baga, Mr. Cobbett says, it is apt to degenerate, if the seed be not saved with care. ”

“ This great produce cannot fail to astonish many persons living in this country. But let them recollect, that the upper layer of the soil, from which the crops are produced, is never changed here; that this layer, having been so often used, must have lost part of its ancient fertility; that dung is not spread in abundance with us as in Flanders; and that it is possible the species of potatoes grown here have degenerated.
[12] It is well known, that vegetables will grow in pure sand, by watering them, and that it is not till they blossom, or rather till they produce seed, that they perish. ”

“ A committee on Domestic Animals. To inquire after and introduce the best kind, to endeavour to ascertain the most economical and the best methods of rearing, managing and feeding them, together with facts on the relative advantages of the employment of horses and oxen for labour.
6th. A committee on grasses, grains and roots. To inquire after and recommend the best and most profitable kinds, the time and manner of sowing and planting, with the most proper quantity of each per acre, also the previous preparation of the ground and seed, together with the best method of culture. ”

“ In England, they appear to be most commonly grown in rows 27 inches apart, with the plants at a foot distance in the rows. But William Cobbett, who in a small book, published in New York, has minutely described his own practice, both in England and America, asserts, that the largest crops are attainable by growing the Ruta Baga in rows four feet apart, with the plants about 10 inches or a foot distant from each other in the rows: and in this mode of culture, he has raised, in England, 30 tons to the acre. ”

“ The common cattle-stalls of our country are so ill contrived, and so straitened in their dimensions, that the cattle are constrained to lie down, in part in their own dung. This dries and forms a thick coat on their hind quarters, from which they are not relieved till they shed their hair in the spring. They are thus rendered uncomfortable; to be uncomfortable is to suffer some degree of pain; and no one will suppose that animals in pain can thrive, or preserve their plight, with the same food, equally with others perfectly at ease. ”

“ There are two ancient very wholesome and pleasant dishes, which are much used in the states south of Pennsylvania, to which the middle and northern states have not yet paid sufficient attention. The first called FIRMITY, is made of WHEAT. The second, called HOMINY, is made of Indian corn, or MAIZE. The grains of wheat and Indian corn are prepared by beating in the same manner in a wooden mortar, with an iron pestle, filed in crosses or ridges at the bottom, like a modern stamp or seal for letters. ”

“ So likewise the Mangel Wurtzel intended to bear seed, should not be set near any other seed beet plants. It may not be amiss to add, that for the same reasons, pumpkins, squashes, melons, cucumbers, in all their varieties, in order to preserve them in purity, should be planted at some distance from each other.
Pumpkins, as food for domestic animals, seem closely connected with the roots before-mentioned. Every farmer knows their value for milk cows, for fattening cattle, and for swine. ”

“ I have met, on the shores of the Orinoco, herds of fifty to a hundred wild oxen: a chief always marched at the head, and another at the rear.
The people of the country have assured me, that the wild asses, when they travel, observe the same discipline as the horses; but the mules, though they also live in troops, are continually fighting with each other, and it has not been observed that they have any chief. ”