Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1845-07-31
REsUSCITATION OF WORN orr

RESUSClTATION OF WORN OUT LAND.
Fourycars ago, two gentlemen of this CITY, bal.
tlmore,) bought each ten acre lot adjoining each
other on the road leading through the Canton
property to Patapsco neck. At the time Of the pur-
chase, these lots were the very picture of povertv
personiied, slightly covered with sedpe-grass of n
slunted growth. Some years previous we had seen
then IN corn, with stalks about the thickness of n
man thunlD as to ears, there were none-of nub-
pms eyen the produce was scarcely worth gather.
ing. The first spring after these lots came into
tne possession OF their present owners, they each
PI0u9hed MS respective lot as deep strong doub-
lie horse teams and good pows could plow It. then
put Oh thirty double horse ciroads to the acre. of
compost formed Of street dirt and stable manure
| men cross powcd the manure in some inches
deep, spread Il hundred bushels of soap boilers
ashes to the acre, broadcast; narrowed and rolled
their ground, listed it feet by g and planted it in
corn putting handful Of plaster and ashes on each
MI; me product was SO bushels of good sound
heIlcd corn to the acre.
The cultivation Of the corn after the first pow-
ny, was with the cultyator and hoe the object of
he proprie'ors being 20 maintain Hat surface.
WIN the view Of seeding the lots down in rrays.
In August after the corn had been laid by, The
harrow was passed through the rows, and peck of
timothy seed and { lbs of clover seed. sown upon
Zach acre. which was narrowed in with LIGHT har.
row.
Pie grass seed took well, and has produced from
Two and half to three tons of excellent hay to the
acre last year and the year before. We saw these
lots few weeks SINCE and from their luXuriant
appearance, we should Judge that their yield the
present year, will be equal 10 that of the two pre-
ceiling years.
To enable the uninailtcd to understand what is
meant by soapbollcrs ashes, we will remark that
they are spent ashes, and generally contain about
TWO hts OF lime in their composition: so that he
VINO uses them, both ashes and lines his land at
one and the same time.
a great horror is generally entertained at buying
worn out lands and, indeed, where means and
plenty OF money are not at hand TO improve them,
this horror is very justly entertained; for no ameli-
Grafton can be produced until you restore to the
soil the elements Of fertility of which it may have
been deprived by long continued and improrident
culture-but where the soil has been once rood, it
IS an easy matter, with the proper kind Of manure
and plenty OF IT. to restore its woned fertility
That such is the case, the lots in question offer the
strongest evidence For from d state Of abiect
poverty, they were brought up, by single manur-
ing to state OF the highest fertilization, and have
now, for the third year thereafter, maintained it.
The facts presented by this instance of rcstor-
ing lands, once good, after being impoverished by
an Improper course Of culture, should not be with
out It's moral, as they hold out inducements to the
owners OF such lands To exert themselves BY all
possible means, to accumulate manures and apply
them 10 their exhausted fields as there are none so
poor but may be brought up by proper applications
[ IN sufficient quantities, Of vegetable, animal aud
mineral manuresand they point too, with unerring
certainly to the proprety Of undertaking the i'm
provemeut of no more land at time than can be
well improved. We are very certain that neither
oil these lots, unaidcd by manure, would have pro-
duced more than bushels of corn to the acre and
yet we see these poverty stricken soils brought up
in single season, to the capacity of yielding ST
bushels, beng over five times that quantity, and