The Planters' banner. [volume] (Franklin, Attakapas Co., Lou.) 1849-1872, 1853-11-10

! iIFC, lSdFlilS tuG IeSluu0 Untouched,
don't you think you would have har-
vested larger crop27 "Well, per-
haps | should" was the poor farmers
response. 1t seemed never before TO
have occurred to him that he could let
alone part of his land. Had he pro-
| gressed SO far, he might have ventured
thence to the conclusion that it is less
expensive and more profitable to raise
full crop on five acres than half a
crop on ten. ] am sorry to say we
have a good many such farmers still
left at the East, though the advanced
prices of land and the impoverished
condition of the soils they inherited
with their slovenly modes of cultiva-
ton, have driven the greater share of
them to the West. Here, on your deep
virgin soils, they renew their round of
exercises in false husbandry, wasting
their manures because "this land IS
rich enough" and exhausting their
soils by one grain crop after another,
until they run down their capacity from
80 bushels per acre of wheat to ten Of
corn or five of rye, when they will be
off again for Iowa, Missouri or Oregon.
When they shall have got so far West
as 10 find land that doesn't need nor re-
ward fertilizlng, and will not be worn
out by their mode of farming, | trust
they will come to fDll stop and send
for all their relations.
Let me be rightly understood: l do
not condemn a man for owning more
laud, in new country, where land is
cheap, than he is now able or willing
to cultivate. | know perfectly well
that the system OF thorough culture that
succeeds so admirably in Belgium is
not yet adapted 10 Indiana Where
good fenced pasture may be bought for
So or $40 per acre, you cannot afford 10
keep up your cattle and cut all their
food though that is excellent policy in
its place. II ensures the keeping of a
much larger stock on given area, be-
sides enriching the land far more rap
idly, But it requires vastly more Ia
Dor, and where weeks work Is worth
an acre of arabic land, ii won't pay.
What | insist is simply this: Land
worth cnltivating at all is worth cult
vatlng 2reH.
Ipresume careful would
discover the existence of pretty gene
raj law of proportion between the
marker value of 4 farm and the amount
of labor that should be annually de-
voted 10 lis cultivation, apart from en-
during Improvements. Let rs suppose
a farm of 100 acres TO be WORTH this
year $40 per acre, or $1,000 in all
then we will say one mans labor or 800
days work per year, worth $500 in all,
might be as much as could be proita-
bly, bestowed on Its mere cultivation
But roads and markets imptove, until
this land is worth $50 an acre, or the
farm $4,000; and now much more of
il may be taken out Of forest or pasture
and devoted TO grain and vegetables,
involving an increase of the labor ex-
pended on it to three nen'S steady
work, or 5000 per year. So, as the
value increased to $50, $40, aud at
length 500 per acre, the labor en-
ployed thereon should be CORES pond
ingly increased, whether By division |
of the farm or otherwise | do not pro- |
fess 10 indicate the precise proportion |
Of present labor to valuation of fixed |
capital, but only that there is such a
and that economic science
will yet ascertain and declare it.
1t is not necessary that land should
be cultivated in or,ter 10 be productive.
The young, growing wood is earning
money for its owner, as well as the
corn-feld He who has land that he
does not need, yet wishes to keep for
his children. can hardly serve them
better than by inclosing it effectually,
planting it with locust, hickory, and
other choice timber, and leaving it un-
disturbed till his sons may require it
But, even left in open, naked common,
and generally tends 10 improve from
he renovating influences of the at
nosphere alone, as the reclaimed "old-
ields" of the South bear witness. 1t
$ only poorly farmed land that is
blight to its possessor and discredit to
he country. If all the labor now de- I
-oted 10 farming throughout the Union :
we're wisely concentrated on one-half I
he land, our annual product would be s
much larger, our lands would appear |
ar more productive and valuable, {
Vhile the timber that we are now {
Fasting and destroying, though Proph- f
Miller's speedy confagration Of the |
rorld were a demonstrated verify, |
'ould be gradually re investing the a
arth with beauty and graceful ma /
,sty which Cabot or John Smith may r
ave realized, but of which our chill a
rem seem destined to have none but t
earsay evidence. e
The farmer, who perfectly compre- $
ends the value of science in the con- I
ruction of bridge or chimney, Of r
N seems not 10 appreciate so vividly n
$ Importance in his own vocation t,
is unexpressed but acted-on ideaj b
ould seem to be that, while other in Il
astral callings require Instruction, q
ethod, abstract knowledge, farming t.
a matter of instinct, or mechanical o
1itation. He seems TO think knowl- h
lge of its principles and laws comes a
! nature,n as Dogberry supposed read a