Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1880-12-16
Restoring Worn Out Lands.-No. 2.

should not ruin them and need not,
and will not il the farmer is true to
his calling. Take the case of these
fields is the voice of nature and of
God to every tiller of the soil to keep
his lands in good heart and to hand
them over improved to him that fol
lows in the ownership. Stewardship
is the truest words among the
highest responsibilities of the bus
bandman. When God binds bur
den upon the shoulders, He gives the
means, that is, the strength to bear
it. To find aneuse these means is the
problem before the farmer-if well
answered fair fields and prosperity
if i'll answered, wasted, Scared,
blighted fields and poverty. The
nearest and greatest help is found in
the waste material which follows the
use of the products of the soil. When
grain is grown straw and chaff are the
waste; when straw, chaff, hay or
grain is fed the manure dropped is
the waste. ALI the operations OF
nature, in both the vegetable and
animal kingdoms, leave waste matter.
that is, materials used for the support
and development of plants and
animals, and having answered it's pur.
pose is thrown aside; for example
the leaves of trees and the dropping
Of animals. This waste matter &C.
cumulating for centuries, constitutes
very largely the soil beneath our feet
1t is one of natures universal meth
ods of enriching the earth. 1t is s
method too that we can and must imi
tate. And by the way, the only
method oe natures that we can imi-
tate to any great extent, and every
where and in all the vained condi
tons of farming. We can't grow
plants by gas light, nor even by the
dazzling brilliance of the calcium
The sprinkling pot is only an in
finitesimal imitation of the thunder
cloud and the drenching rain, bu
the waste everywhere aecumulatins
FROM our crops and in our stables
barn yards, etc, and I may add tx
these the slops and waste of th'
kitchen should be made use Of in fer
tiliizng our fields. Here we may imi
tate nature on every farm and 4
every garden in the world. That w
do this is part Of natures plan ant
by obedience we crown the cart
with fairer beauty and unlimited
productiveness. The power tha
committed to our hands the harvest
of earth not only requires of US grea
care in tending the growing crop an,
securing it when ripe, but we mus
prepare for it beforehand. The sav.
ing and applying manure, taking al
things into account, is the most In
portant. Right here may as wei
emphasize the truth that lands mus
be fed. Every growing crop take
some of the plant food from the soil
Our washing rains, and especial
when lands are in corn, take ava
another and sometimes larger POI
/ ton than is taken by the crop, an
whatever is best to the soil fror
these or any other cause must be re
turned to it or the land goes doWr
The fact that many of our lands ar
so worn that they are 'thrown out,
and more still going that way gives
present end pressing intensity to th
truth that I am now urging, an
further the very general disre
gard shown to this prime necessity {
good husbandry adds, if possible, t
the immergency of the call for pres:
ing it upon the attention of the farm
ers of East Tennessee. When I ca
the attention of my brother farmer
to the fact that lands in Indian corr
by all odds the most exhausting Gro
that is grown in East Tennessee, NJ
more than one acre in every thousan
receives any barnyard manure and {
that in English grain not more tina
ten acres in a thousand; in a wore
barnyard manure is not factor
the ordinary and average farming c
East Tennessee. Need we wondt
al the worn and SCARED fields, tn
grinning hillsides, the gaping gullies
the unsightly sedge and the springin
pines that one meets in all our othe
wise beautiful wales? Every scienc
is based upon some tundament'
principle or principles, and until "
discover them science in that direct
| ion is impossible. All that we su,
mise and do is simply guessing an
experimenting. 1t may have its va
ne. Lucky hits may be struck in I'll
dark. Happy guesses and real I'D
vance may be made even when W
have neither chart or compass, bt
when fundamental principles are a.
certained success becomes certaint
When we walk in their light 1 belies
I may announce as among the fund
mental principles of the science
agriculture the two following, viz
1st. That whatever is taken from I'll
soil by the crop grown upon it mu
be replaced in order to keep the lar
good; and End, when the cultivator I
the soil restores to it simply Il
I waste, or it's equivalent that follow
the use of the products of the soil
does his part towards restoring
the land the loss incurred by the cr'