high a price for as is obtained in any part of the United States, and get the cash; and what he buys he can buy as cheap. Here likewise the small capital of $2,000 may be obtained by any young man by the time he is thirty. Those who have it not at that age among us (with rare excep tions) have either been intemperate, improvident, indolent, or in too great haste to marry.

Our ordinary course of farming is, the first year, to break up grass land, and plant corn. Our average crop of corn, taking 10 years together, when we apply equal to 10 cords of stable dung, of 30 bushels each, to the acre, is 40 bushels. The cost of the manure, if purchased, is $10. Corn has averaged in price in this vicinity, taking the last 10 years together, 80 cents. It has been as low as 67 cents, and as high as $1 25, during that period.

I have given the average crops. The last season, on the application of 10,000 bony fish to the acre, at a cost of $7 50, with the addition of 3 loads of stable dung, at a cost of $3-in all $10 50-I got 55 bushels of corn to the acre. I think my corn costs me 60 cents a bushel to raise it, over and above the use of the land. Corn is a natural crop here. It rarely fails but for want of manure and attention.

The second year, our ordinary course is to plant potatoes. When they did not rot, the average crop was 150 bushels to the acre, if manured with ten loads of good manure to the acre. Since they have rotted, they average about 60 bushels to the acre. The great preventive against the rot with us is, to plant very early, and of the earliest kinds. The price for the last four or five years has averaged 70 cents per bushel; they are now worth here 80 cents per bushel. The third year, we seed down to grass with rye or oats. Our average crop of rye is about 15 bushels to the acre; our average crop of oats, about 25 bushels to the acre. In seeding down our land, we put on eight pounds of clover seed, a bushel of redtop, and eight quarts of herdsgrass, (timothy.) I prefer red-top to any other grass for hay. I do not think clover of much value for hay; and if I could get a crop of other grass the first year after the grain crop, I should not sow any clover.

We mow our land for seven years after seeding down, and then plough again. My hay crop last year was 40 tons, cut on about 36 acres of land. This, with an ordinary quantity of corn-fodder and straw here, is sufficient to winter well 30 head of cattle. The crop of hay last year was about 10 per cent. more than an average. The cost of cutting and of curing a ton of hay, the past season, was about $2 50.

Neat Cattle with us are very healthy. I have never lost one by sickness since I have carried on a farm, now fourteen years, with an average stock of 20 head; nor have I ever had one afflicted by any disease, except the horn distemper, which is easily cured, if taken in time, by boring the horn nearly through with a gimlet on the under side, about three inches from the root.

The value of a cow here now is about $20. In the spring, the value of the same cow, with her calf, will probably be about $28.

I prefer cattle mostly of native blood; say three fourths. I think on the amount of food they get with us, such make both most flesh and milk. The average weight of our native cows, well fatted, is 550 pounds with hide and tallow; they are considered well fatted if they run in a good pasture, without being milked, through August, and are fed plenti

fully with green corn-stalks through September. Such a cow will ordinarily have at least 40 pounds of rough tallow. The average weight of our oxen, which are in a good pasture for 4 months-that is, from July till November-and have, through October, plenty of green corn stalks, is 900 pounds. We rarely give grain to cattle we intend to dispose of before the 1st of December; after that time, beef rises, and keeps up till the 1st of July, when it falls again. Eighty per cent. of our stock fatted for market I think is fatted in the foregoing manner. The common age at which our cows and oxen are sold to the butchers is 10 years.

I do not think that imported breeds of hogs are more profitable to keep than native breeds. The common age of our hogs, when we kill them, is about 18 months; at that age they will average about 350 pounds each. I have mine shut up in the pen about 5 months. In that period, each will consume about 10 bushels of dry corn.

Meal will make pork faster than corn; but not sufficiently so to pay the expense and trouble of procuring it in ordinary cases.

I think if hogs are healthy, have a dry house to sleep in, and are protected from the wind, but not too warm, 600 pounds of corn will make 200 pounds of pork, if fed out in the fall months.

Besides currants, and other small fruits of the garden, the two kinds. of fruit most certain here are peaches and quinces. With me, as yet, neither have failed; and I think I can raise either, at the present high price of labor, at 40 cents a bushel. Pears are quite uncertain here; and as for apples, one year we have the rose bug, the next year the canker worm, and the third, perhaps, (and worse than either of the others,) a small insect very much resembling the southern sand-fly, which eats up the leaves as fast as they are developed. This insect has been so destructive to my trees of late years as to have quite killed several.

Bating insects, both soil and climate here are good for the apple tree. They are often found in our woods as volunteers, and many attain a large size.

I have apple trees containing a cord of wood each. Lime and plaster are considered no fertilizers with us. Ashes are considered very valuable. Ten bushels of dry ashes per acre I consider equal to 30 bushels of the best stable-dung. I have tried African guano on corn, at the rate of 300 pounds to the acre, at the cost of 2 cents per pound. I did not think it paid at that price. This was in 1845. Market-gardening is carried on as extensively here, perhaps, as farming proper; but I have confined myself, as you will see, to the latter entirely.

Yours, &c.,

To the COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS.

BELTON A. COPP.

NEW YORK.

POTSDAM, ST. LAWRENCE Co., NEW YORK.

SIR: Your "Agricultural Circular" has been put into my hands by my friend, the postmaster here, with a request that I answer it, so far as 1 can; with which I cheerfully comply.

Wheat.-Guano is not used in this county in the production of wheat, or of any other crop, unless it may be for the purpose of experimenting on a small scale. It would not pay cost. The principles or specific food of plants contained in guano manure are yet abundant in our almost virgin soil, and neither this fertilizer nor plaster will ever be much required in most parts of this county, if farmers do but husband what resources they have. The average product of wheat per acre is probably not far from fifteen bushels. The surest crop is the spring variety, and this is much the most raised. The most profitable method of raising either spring or winter wheat, is to sow it after clean hoed crops of either corn or potatoes. The next best method is to follow after peas. My own method is to plough but once for wheat or any other small grain, after corn, potatoes, or peas-the depth six or more inches; but am governed somewhat by the depth and nature of the soil and subsoil. The time of sowing fall wheat is from the 1st of September till November; but the earliest is surest and best. Spring wheat is sown from the 1st of April until June, and here again the earliest sown is surest and best. The last sown, in both cases, may have the largest growth in straw and chaff, but the earliest will exceed the other in quantity and quality of wheat. The harvesting of winter wheat is in July, and of spring in August, with some little variations. The seed is best prepared by first selecting from any given variety the most perfect of its kind, either by screening through our grain-cleaners or mills all the small or imperfect kernels, or by casting out-throwing from one end of the barn floor (30 or 40 feet) to the other-and thus, at the extreme end, obtaining, of course, only the largest and heaviest grain. I am convinced that, in order to keep up the healthy character and productiveness of any variety of wheat, and in fact any other vegetable with which I am acquainted, we must use for the seed the most perfect of its kind. The quantity sown varies from one and one-fourth to two and one-half bushels per acre. The quantity raised is evidently less than formerly, when compared with the increase of population, mostly for the reason that the West can afford to undersell us. We cannot compete with the West. Their cheapness of lands and facilities of raising it prevent it.

The best remedies against the weevil or Hessian fly, or any other insect or disease of any kind, is-first, use only the pure and perfect seed in clean and suitable soil, in good season; and, to insure against smut, wash it in water; then let it stand from six to twelve hours in a brine of common salt, dissolved to the point of saturation; after which, mix from two to four quarts of fresh slacked lime with each bushel of wheat; and thus let it remain for a few hours. The price is, this year, 87 cents in this market. The average price heretofore has been one dollar.

Corn. The average product of corn may be made forty bushels per acre, but twice and thrice that figure are sometimes raised. The cost of production, as usually made, is probably fifty cents. The best system of culture is to plant on green sward, and the best soils are found on our clayey, loamy, or gravelly, black, sandy ridges of land. We do best to break up the soil to a depth of six or more inches in September, in narrow furrows, breaking and turning over every foot of the land. Upon this, by the 10th or 15th of May following, we put our barn-yard manure-from ten to twenty cords per acre, as we have it, or as the field requires it—in heaps so near that, when spreading it, every part of the

field can be readily reached by the spreading operation. When this is well spread, it is finally harrowed in with a light harrow; thus intimately mixing the manure with the soil on the surface. The surface is thus mellow and rich, and should be at once planted. The soil below is not and should not be disturbed, either in this operation or thereafter,. throughout the after-cultivation; and the best instrument to be used is the horse-hoe, or the horse harrow; the surface should be kept clean and mellow by the frequent use of the said cultivator and the hand-hoe. A good crop is easily obtained by such process, and the ground is in good order, with one more ploughing, for a crop of wheat. With the wheat we again lay down to grass.

The best method of feeding corn to hogs, is to first grind and then cook it. If to be fed alone, in the form of pudding, I have found it profitable to mix it with pumpkins, apples, and refuse potatoes during the first weeks of feeding.

Oats.-The yield of oats is also about forty bushels per acre; from two to three bushels are used for the seed. Of peas, we generally get about twenty five bushels per acre, and sow two bushels or more per acre. I consider oats to be exhausting to land-considerably more so than peas. I believe the manure made from peas and their vines, or fodder, to be of the most valuable kind. As a food for man or animal, and as a crop preparatory to either corn or wheat, I am confident it is not appreciated as it should be by St. Lawrence county farmers.

Grasses. The grass-seeds mostly used are the timothy (herdsgrass) and red clover. White clover is indigenous to most of our section of country. The usual quantity per acre for hay is, of timothy one peck, and of red clover one or two quarts, as the farmer chooses to mix. The quantity of hay per acre will average about one and-a-half ton. "The best fertilizers for meadows and pastures" are the most simple form of rotating crops, as I have before described, especially where lands will admit of it. Moist meadows, not bearing to be ploughed, should not be grazed except by sheep; and such meadows, and those pastures on which only sheep run, will admit of having plaster, one bushel per acre annually.. Permanent meadows may be kept so, and their fertility kept up if not grazed at all, provided one bushel of plaster annually be sown in August or September. The price of good meadow lands will average perhaps twenty dollars per acre, and farms are worth from ten to forty dollars per acre, depending of course much upon position and circumstances of soil and buildings.

Dairy Husbandry -This county is fast becoming a great dairy county,scarcely behind any in the State, and we have but just begun in the business. It is well adapted to the rich grasses, and it is, most of it, well watered. The climate for a dairy business is also equal to the best. I believe that now there is only one county (Herkimer) ahead of us in the dairy products, although it is but a few years since our farmers have turned their attention to it. I have travelled over, and have eaten of butter of several of the northern, middle, and western States, and have not anywhere found so rich and yellow butter and cheese as we make here in the months of June and July particularly. During that season many of our pastures and other fields abound with a large proportion of the dandelion plant, the nutritive properties of which, together with the coloring principle in the plant, when eaten by the cow, impart to the

In

milk that rich flavor and color which I have nowhere else seen. stances are frequent where the avails from a dairy of cows will average thirty dollars each. Dairies of good cows will make 225 pounds of butter per cow. This is, to be sure, rarely done; but there is no difficulty in doing even beyond this where the farmer has good cows and proper facilities for making. Cows are worth, in the spring, twenty-five dollars; in December, fifteen dollars. Three-year-old cattle are worth from twenty to twenty five dollars each. Butter is worth, until September, fifteen cents; thence, until December, fourteen to fifteen cents. Cheese is worth, in the fall season, five to six cents per pound. It is mostly sent to the Boston and New York markets.

Horses. The growing of horses is profitable here; good horses always sell readily from $75 to $125 each; ordinary horses are worth from $50 to $75. The price per acre for the pasturage is about $1; and hay is worth, on the average, $5 per ton. It can, therefore, be easily determined by any one, whether the growing of horses is or is not profitable. Sheep and Wool.-As to wool growing, after having had some experience in the business, I have no hesitation in saying, if there be any profit in it, it is much less than that of raising horses or cattle, or in dairying. The large breed of sheep are most profitable for their carcass, and more than for their wool; yet their wool sells nearly as high as do the finer grades. Their flesh is better, and they tell on tallow better. They are more hardy, and their increase more to be relied on. One hundred hardy, coarse woolled ewes will raise 100 lambs where the Saxon will raise 25 and the Spanish merino 50; each having equal care. The Saxon will shear 2 pounds, the old-fashioned merino 3, and the coarser varieties we have here will shear 5 pounds of wool. Buyers here make but few cents difference. For 10 years past, the price per pound will average closely upon 28 cents-only the average price of 2 pounds of butter; and the average value of a fleece of wool is not greater than for 8 pounds of butter.

Hogs. Pork-raising is profitable under certain circumstances only. United with dairying, it is a good business; but the calculating farmer sees to it that no greater number of hogs are kept than can be well kept on the refuse after the butter or cheese. Pork is worth from 4 to 6 cents per pound, according to weight of hog, and also to quality.

Root Crops.-The cultivation of carrots is on the increase, and their raising and feeding are found profitable. The raising of turnips has declined; with us it never can supplant the potato. The average yield of potatoes per acre varies much in different years, without regard to the soundness or unsoundness of the crop. The average in the county last year, so far as my information extends, was 200 bushels per acre; this year it does not much exceed 100, even where there was no disease. Up to the year 1849, our farmers could raise potatoes for 15 cents per bushel, and do quite well; since then, our near facilities for market permit us to sell for from 25 to 35 cents per bushel. There has been some disease, or rot, with the potatoes in this county for several years past, but it has been far less than at the east, or in older portions of this State. I believe that one reason why we have had less of the rot than most other portions is this: their value has been so low, and the quantity raised so great, that there has been no inducement here, as a general practice, to scrimp in the seed. The farmer living where their value