The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1878-07-18

Permit me to reply to certain queries
propounded to me through your columns by
a correspondent who signs Farmer"
Farmer does me but Justice in believ-
ing that am fully alive to the importance
of arresting the downward tendency of the
agricultural interests of our section. 1 be-
lieve this can be done only by giving more
Of our acres to grain and grasses, and by di-
versifying our labor on many crops locking
to the supply Of our home wants, instead of
looking to one crop alone to supply all
these. Even this change will not save Us
unless we adopt a system of rotation i'll our
crops, with the settled determination of put
ting back into the soil with two renovating
and stock subsisting crops lin rotation OF
five years. more plant food (Or fertility
than will be extracted therefrOm by the
other three so-caIIed money crops This is
the whole secret Of prosperous farming in a
nutshell. Relying upon cotton exclusively
has well nigh ruined US and our lands. If
this is true, when our lands had more fertil-
ity in them, and were more capable of max
ing Us support than now, what promise
have we in still further prosecuting the IN
profitable and ruinous practice of looking
to cotton alone, and giving the largest and
best acres of the farm to its production
Think seriously of this, and then answer, is
it not time that we should begin to look TO
different system of farming and try if we
cannot change a losing into a prosperous
one?
Farmer certainly misunderstands me if
he thinks am opposed to raising any cot
ton at all on the farm. Ny position has al
ways been, plant but little cotton, and that
on level ground. Manure these acres and
make more cotton than you would on twice
the quantity of thoroughly exhausted land
Give the acres saved from cotton to grasses
and small grain, but better still to peas
Use the peas to fertiiizc the land upon
which they are growing, by blowing the
vines under, or feed them to stocll-the
stock to furnish Us food for the support OF
family, whilst the manure they drop sup
ports the land. Manure (either vegetable
animal or mineral, on all combinedl is the
foundation stone of prosperous farming
How much of this does the purely cotton
worshipper maker He scarcely saves prov
ender enough for stock to kepp up his
mules and his wife's mich COW; hence, hav-
ing but little sstock he has but
little of the foundation stone, ma.
nure. Let me here state that do not con.
slider cotton great exhauster of the soil, Of
itself. And yet, sterility follows its constant
cultivation upon the same land, because OF
the clean culture it requires This pro
notes the teaching out of the fertility OF
the soil by every rain from January to De-
cember. Hence the reason for planting on
| level lands, or for horizontal rows, on roll
ing land. What we need is to supplant til
lage with husbandry. The lands in the
Northern States are not half so numerically
titled as ours. There only corn and a few
root crops are titled, whilst much Of their
soil is given to grasses and small grain. In
this you may find the reason why fertili-
ty remains in the soil much longer with
them, than within the South. Let me state
another agricultural truth it would be well
for our Southern cotton, tobacco and sugar
planters to reflect upon. 1t is this: No ag-
ricultural country where crops whether
cereal or textiIy with the fertilizing ele-
ment of the soil bound up in them) are an
nually exported and consumed abroad, can
long prosper. We are violating nearly
every principle Of safe and successful farm
ing in drawing the same elements Of fertil-
ity from the same soil, by the same crop
year after year, and Farmer does not err in
believing that I feel much solicitude for the
welfare of our section. Now to secure this
welfare, we must to a grent extent abandon
cotton. We have already run cotton upon
our lands so persistently that they are so re-
duced they scarcely return crop enough to
pay the cost of producing it. Is not this
in accordance with Farmers observation?
Does he KNOW of any cotton planter (who
sticks to cotton and corn alone) and whose
land is not improved by either vegetable or
money? If there is no money in our pres
ent mode of cotton farming, and if the
practice Of persistently running our lands
in cotton renders the soil less and less able
to produce remunerative crops, can we be
worsted in substituting some other crop for
cotton; or rather substituting many crops
for one: which one, by the universal admis-
sion OF our farmers, Is said to be proftless
under our present mode of tillage? The cot
ton crop can only be made profitable by
bringing up the yield per acre through the
application Of manure to the land. There
Is an uninstructed negro near Bolivar, who
from his own statement, Corroborated by ir.
teIligent gentlemen, has made for the past
two years zone of which was a bad cotton
year. three bales from three and a halt
acres OF land. This pays, and pays we'll
1t was done by manure Adopt the same
means, and l am an advocate for raising
cotton, because it then pays, and the land i,
benefited instead OF injured There is more
good teaching in this one practical exampIs
than could be enforced by volumes OF writ.
ten theory We should Diversity our labor
more than we do. Where one crop only
/ las cotton) is relied upon, should any calam.
+ ity happen TO it, for that year we are about
ruined, and il takes two more years to re
pair the damage we have sustained in get
ting behind in our expenses. But when tn,
number Of acres Of cotton is reduced the
more ground is left for other crops; tho
more stock can he taken care Of, the NOR,
meat and bread will be made; The large: