Vermont telegraph. [volume] (Brandon [Vt.]) 1828-1843, 1839-08-28

Have you attempted any improvement
upon your bog meadows
No-sometimes have thought would.
My neighbor J. B. has redeemed eight or
ten acres, and now gets two tons and a
half to the. acre, herds grass and clover
and red top fthe best quality, where for
merly he got scarcely any thing; but then
it cost him at least twenty or twenty-five
dollars an acre to drain and manure it,
and he will have to top dress it at least
once in five years or it will never hold
out. Then, 100, he has put on at least
half bushel or more of grass seed to the
acre; and grass seed which used to buy
for twelve cents pound or two dollars
and half per bushel, is now twenty cents
a pound, and herds grass three dollars per
bushel. Then too, labor is SO high, |
cannot afford to hire. 4
Have you plenty Of manure2
No; that is a great want. / have a
bog hole where Isuppose could gel two
hundred loads year, but then should
have to go more than mile for it, and it
is wet work. | have not any of the adj
vantages which the farmers who live with.
In six or seven miles of Boston, and can
go in and buy load of good dung when
ever they want.
do you know what these farmers have
to pay for manure in Boston
Why, yes have been told they have
to give sometimes from three to FIVE dol
lars cord at the stables. Sometimes our
tavern keeper sells a few loads, but he
asks five dollars a cord.
Have you barn cellar!
No. | have often thought it would be
a very good thing, and my barn is we'll
situated for one; but then it would cost,
besides what work | should do with nv
own team, full fifty dollars to make one.
Do you'keep cows2
Yes, | keep some just to eat up our
coarse fodder but our women folks do
not like diary work, so we buy our butter
and sell our milk to the milk-man for
eleven cents gallon
DO you keep swine2
Only one or Two for our own pork
We do not have any skim-milk or butter
milk for them. Besides there is no great
profit in iatting hogs. They will not
much more than pay for what feed they
VIII eat. | know they will make large
quantity of manure, but then you must
cart in great deal of stuff into their pens
or else they can't make any. But come |!
| must show you sow have got; she
is only fifteen months old, and [ sold her
pigs for more than forty dollars. l sup.
pose shall make her weigh four hun
dred in the fall
Do you raise your own grain and po-
tatoes?
Not all. raise about three acres of
corn and about as much rye, and about
SIX hundred bushels of potatoes. We sell
hay and buy Genesee -four. We have
tried wheat, but sometimes it is blasted -
and it don't make white flour; and our
women folks say they cannot make hand
some pie-crust or white bread with it.
How many have you in your family2
have wife and eight children, and
my father lives with me.
Have you any trade2
No; ! have nothing but my farm.
| Does your farm support your family
and pay your labor?
Why, yes! have nothing else, except
ing little interest that comes from some
money which received for the sale of
wood from the farm, sometime ago, which
! came to about FIVE hundred dollars, and
! which l put out at interest We sell
enough produce from the farm to pay our
hired labor, which costs about hundred
dollars per year, and our sore bills and
taxes.
We have very much abridged this con.
versation, and we shall leave it without
farther comment. But here is a husband
man on farm valued at four thousand
dollars, not producing more than one-third
of what 1t might be made to produce, vet
supporting family of eleven persons and
paying all expenses, excepting the labor
and superintendent of one man, and the
farm gradually increasing in value by ey-
cry expenditure, however small, for its
improvement; this man too, not working
half the time, and he and his family liv-
ing in the enjoyment of all the luxuries,
if they choose to have them, which they
can reasonably ask. Let such man if
ne will, take his two hundred and forty
dollars income and labor no more hours
than he does in the country, and go into
Boston and try to support his family there.
The end of the year would show him
result which would make him ashamed to
complaia of his present condition. His
whole money income of two hundred and
forty dollars would scarcely pay for his
fuel, his taxes, and the rent ola ten-footer.
VIVA. an evil it is that our farmers do not
know their blessingsl Fl. C.
From the Genesee Farmer
Observations ON the Culture of the Strayy-
( - berry,