the season subsequent to its application be unusually wet. Its effects in other directions will compensate for its cost.

Ashes, too, are among the best dressings that can be given to dry and leaching soils. I need not enlarge in regard to this; every farmer has seen their effects on a larger or smaller scale, and will not be so blind to his own interest as not to apply all the ashes he can secure to his cultivated fields. Plaster and the phosphates may also be used as preventatives of the effects of drought. The use of the articles named leads us to carry out the idea of stimulating or enriching the soil by the application of stable and other manures, from live animals and decaying vegetation. In a word, we would adopt high farming as the very best antidote to drougths. I would plow deep, and, so far as practicable, I would spade or trench the soil, assured that no better practice can be adopted to keep the land moist, to a reasonable depth. I would use all the animal and artificial manure I could command, and work it thoroughly in the soil. The difference in the appearance of a piece of land cultivated in that way and another tilled in the ordinary manner is wonderful. I have, at this moment, in my mind, garden lots deeply plowed, spaded to the depth of eighteen inches and made rich with the manurial products of the barn-yard and hogpen, which were covered with a luxuriant growth, while other lands, side by side with them, that have not been thoroughly tilled, yielded to the influence of the weather and were profitless. 'High farming," which means abundant manuring and deep stirring of the earth, we put down as the first and chiefest measure to be adopted to prevent the destructive effects of drought. Deep and frequent plowing, thorough pulverization of the soil, must be practiced, if we would escape the baneful consequences of the past season. Autumn plowing, as well as that in springtime, the turning in of green crops and sub-soiling, should all be resorted to in order to prevent consequences like those we have just suffered.

The influence of forests on the humidity of the atmosphere has been fully discussed at agricultural meetings, in our own state, by men who have made the matter a subject of study, and need not be named here.

Underdraining, which we would naturally think would be serviceable on wet lands only, has proved to be of equal value in seasons of drought on dry soils. It drains the land of collections of water, and makes it more porous and capable of letting the

moisture up, on the principle of capillary attraction; there is the strongest practical testimony on this point.

The results of farm management this year should teach us to adopt early planting, especially of potatoes and such crops as need much moisture to produce a compensating harvest. Adopt the earliest varieties that are reasonably productive, and we shall be more certain, ordinarily, of a harvest. Take, for instance, the Early Rose potato, or the King of the Earlies, and a fair crop will be the result; while late varieties, late planted, will almost invariably prove a failure in amount, or are worthless for the table. Many of us this year would not be driven to the necessity of using inferior potatoes had we adopted the practice recommended.

Thus, gentlemen, have I been over the ground suggested by my theme. I have touched many points and very likely omitted some, which will not escape the keen eye of the practical farmer present. Trusting that you will complete. what I have commenced, I leave the question in your hands.

FERTILIZERS.

MANURES - ANIMAL AND ARTIFICIAL.

The policy of investing the hard-earned money of the agriculturists of the country in commercial fertilizers has been so thoroughly discussed during the past year, that there remains but little more to be said upon this question. Yet it is one of the utmost importance, for if our interest demands their manufacture and use, it is none too soon to know it; while, on the contrary, if they do not supply the requirements of the soil, and consequently the wants of the farmer, we should ascertain it now, and cease spending our money for that which is unprofitable.

The discussion of the subject shows that many of our best farmers put but little faith in these fertilizers, while a very large majority in New England will not put their seed into the ground, unless accompanied by some concentrated fertilizers, in the shape of "bag manures," as its opponents are often pleased, sarcastically, to designate them.

One thing is quite certain, that this enormous trade in concentrated manure has not sprung up in a night or a year, but, on the contrary, from small beginnings, has assumed a proportion which causes us all to reflect, and to ask, "Does our interest demand its continued manufacture and use?

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The fact that the sales are largest in those localities where the land is most fertile shows that it has bravely stood the test, beside stable and composted manures. In addition, the fact that it is the best class of farmers who use it most largely, like Col. Clough of Canterbury, Judge Roberts of Rollinsford, J. B. Walker of Concord, Col. J. W. Pierce of Greenland, and John L. Kelley of Franklin, and the fact that nearly all the crops which have won our premiums have been grown by its use, is evidence of its appreciation

by the first agriculturists of the state. In the single town of Hatfield, one of the best farming towns in the whole Connecticut valley, and whose soil is cultivated by some of the most intelligent agriculturists of the nation, the sum of $35,000 was expended last season for commercial fertilizers, and the farmers say that it not only pays for them to invest so largely, but that it is the only course for them to pursue, to sustain themselves in these days of high-priced labor.

Many years have elapsed since we learned our first lessons in agriculture of the English farmer, and those lessons have, in the main, been mostly profitable ones to the agriculturists of our country. Long ago the cultivators of Great Britain found that their crops were depreciating, and, upon an investigation of the causes, discovered that their continued and uniform system of cultivation, the constant raising of cattle and the produce of milk, had extracted elements from their soil which were indispensable to its successful cultivation. Ever quick to apply an efficient remedy, England immediately began to save and collect the bones and other fertilizers within her reach at home, and for more than half a century the whole world has been a field, wherein she has been collecting bones and ammoniated manures, to restore her soil to its original fertility. England's fields are to-day more green and productive than in the palmiest days of English agriculture. Do not our interests demand that we profit by her example, and not wait until we are in the condition she once was in, but commence immediately to use all the means within our power to restore our soil to something like its original fertility?

Sufficient experiments have already been tried, not only by agriculturists but by scientific men, to demonstrate that ground bone and the phosphates not only produce as satisfactory results upon this side of the water as the other, but are absolutely indispensable here as well as there, upon land which has been cultivated a long series of years, and manured entirely with animal manure. A deep-seated prejudice has arisen against all commercial fertilizers, because some have proved worthless. Until, by recent legal enactment, the manufacturer was compelled to put a label setting forth the analysis of the article he was offering for sale, upon each package, the purchaser had no protection from the tricks of unprincipled dealers. Even under our present law, the analysis is printed so learnedly as to be understood only by the chemist.

We, who do not thoroughly understand even our own language, cannot tell by looking at the little paper tacked to the cask, whether we are buying a really scientifically prepared article or highly ammoniated swamp muck and coal cinders.

The putting upon the market of such poor mixtures has induced many of our agriculturists to experiment in "home-made superphosphates," with more or less success, though we question the ability of our farmers to successfully compete with the established manufacturer, in the production of an article, where means, facilities and thorough chemical knowledge is so necessary to the manufacture of a really valuable article.

We do not believe, as it is sometimes asserted, that the introduction of these special fertilizers has an effect to lessen the amount of other manure manufactured and applied. But we do believe in saving and making all that is possible, and in the use of proper absorbents; and also in the policy, profit and necessity, even, of purchasing commercial fertilizers, for the conclusive reason that a large proportion of our hay crop and other products are carried from us to the cities, from which consumption there no equivalent or fertilizer is ever returned.

Our pastures are even more worn than our fields, and we predict that the time is not far distant when these fertilizers will be applied to them, or our grazing lands will become worthless, simply because we have for a century been extracting from them the phosphates necessary for the growth of our animals and the production of milk, without returning anything to produce the like again.

More than half a million dollars are annually expended for commercial fertilizers in New England alone, while at the south they are still more extensively used. Not only the warehouse of the wholesale merchant is filled with it, but no country "storekeeper," upon the "backroads," considers his stock of goods complete without a few barrels or tons of superphosphate in his assortment, and the money of the busiest laborer upon the continent, the farmer (too often of limited means), is cheerfully drawn to pay for a good article, considered almost indispensable to his success.

No law was ever enacted which visited too swiftly or severely a class of manufacturers who would put upon the market an article for these workers of the soil which is spurious and worthless. That there are manufacturers of these articles who are honest