Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1848-09-14

excellent Agricultural PERIODICAL, "lhe
Plough, The Loom and the Anvil" for the
present month Of September, we copy the
following article on the subject of
FARMING IN MARYLAND.
We do not doubt that in Maryland there
IS vastly more of intellectual investigation
applied 10 agriculture than there was thirty
years ago. We of course remember when
there was no such thing thought of as an
agricultural paper, whereupon we determin-
ed, as far as we could command the means,
10 supply defect so dlscredltabie, as we
considered it, 10 those concerned IN the
great occupation wh:t, lies at the founda-
sron of all Others.
Essays appeared occasionally in thenews-
papers of the country, and where read with
avidi,v by all men eager for that most CO.
ve.sbe of all ,hings-knowledge; but no
one thought of regular organ, or channel,
for conveying information as to the practice,
much less the rights of agriculture. In be-
half Of ta,e latter, even now, most of our
Journals are as dumb as so many fish.
Among the papers that made a stir through
on, the agricultural community in the South,
and evlnced all honorable eagerness to learn
what The best experience had taught to be
best, were the papers of .Arator, from the
pen of Col. John Taylor, of Caroline pub
lished originally in Georgetown ID. CO.
paper. 1t is believed there was then no
paper published in Washington. Since that
time hundreds of pens, and thousands of
heads, have been employed in agricultural
discussions, uDll knowledge of what is
most safe and Profitable in the mere pro-
cesses and implements of agriculture, is
widely diffused; and what, as we have else
where said, the cullivator Of the soil now
:snost needs to know, and therefore what he
should mos, especially study to find out,
is, how shall labor he made to do well in
other pursuits, to create demand for every
variety of produce to which agricultural
and horticultural labor can be applied? and
how shall the market, TO be thus created,
be established in the nearest vicinity to the
plough, and be made most reliable These
are the real and true questions now for the
practical farmer and planter, and hence do
we endeavor to manifest our sense Of duty
by endeavoring to show not merely how
the heaviest crops can be made with the
least cost; but how much the profit of FINER
lean husbandry mus, depend on the pros
per,y of american labor. We want to
find, and we want oGr readers to learn how
concentration is to be made to take the place
of dispersion. When state ct things exists
ahat children are seen 10 settle around
their parents that the son Of one neighbor
marries the daughter of another, and the
son Of that other marries his brolher-in-
laws sister, and grand children, and great
grand children are handled on The knees of
ihe old people, then may we be sure there
is something wholesome and prosperous in
abe social and political condition; but when
sons; as fast as they grow up, are seen to
move off to Wisconsin and iowa. 10 Arkan-
.sas and Missouri, or to seek clerkships at
Washington, and the old tenements are get
ting full Of old maiden daughters, we may
he sure there is something unnatural, ''some-
thing rotten in the state of Denmark" 1t
is only where population concentrates and
proving. All the premiums that can be Of
1ered will never improve the face of coun-
try generally, where churches and meeting
houses, are filled with old maids. But to
return to our starting point, the progress Of
improvement in Maryland has been, it is
unprecedented, rather in patches and on par
ticuar estates, than universal and resulting
from well rooted and widely extending in
fuences. Thus while the whole Eastern
Shore Of Maryland has been stationary for
forty years in population, while the mar
rages are few. and the children not increas-
ing, there are instances of individual intel
ligence and energy and improved know
1edge of agriculture, under the influence of
which farms have been made to more than
double their former produce, proving the
effect as we'll of the judicious application Of
capital and labor. as of superior manage
ment generally. Take Talbot county, for
example with an easy navigation almost
to every mans door, her population in 1920
was 14,3S7; in 1910 it had sunk to 1900
loss in twenty years, 23l9. At that rate
how long would it take to exiiDguish the
whole seed, breed and generation and that
in country which every one knows, who
knows any thing of its inhabitants, is no,
excelled in the Union for general intelligent
zee, and especially for intelligence in the
prosecution of their chief pursuit-grain
growing. Does not this show that some.
ahing else besides the knowledge Of plough
ing and hoeing, and sowing and reaping, is
necessary to prevent dispersion to give
life and cheerluiness, animation and hope;
10 keep the sons at home and get husbands
for the daughters What is that something?
Does not the farmer know that if a mistaken
policy forces US TO go abroad for manulac-
aures, fabricated by people who eat the pro-
duce of other countries, tina, all those of
our own country, who ought to be employ