Mr. Young, in his travels in France, in 1787, 1788, and 1789, in which time he visited every in terefting part of the kingdom, for the purpose of obferving the state of its agriculture, mentions the cul tivation of Indian corn (there called maize) in its fouthern provinces. "Maize (fays he) is an object of much greater confequence than mulberries.* When I give the courses of French crops, it will bẻ found, that the only good husbandry in the kingdom (fome small and very rich districts excepted) arifes from the poffeffion and management of this plant. Where there is no maize, there are fallows [naked fallows ;] and where there are fallows, the people starve." Volume ii. page 41. Again, in page 140, he fays"The line of maize may be faid to be the divifion between the good husbandry of the fouth, and the bad husbandry of the north, of the kingdom. Till you meet with maize, very rich foils are fallowed, but never after. Perhaps it is the most important plant that can be introduced into the agriculture of any country whofe climate will fuit it."-" A country whofe foil and climate admit the course of ift maize, 2d wheat, is under a cultivation, that, perhaps, yields most food for man and beaft, that is poffible to be drawn from the land."-In the fame page, Mr. Young fays, that in the fouth of France, in Spain, in Italy, the cattle are in high order; which he afcribes to the food afforded by Indian corn; as it furnishes "a rich mea dow a confiderable part of the fummer; the leaves being regularly ftripped for oxen, affording a fucculent and most fattening food-in fituations that seem

* Mulberry trees are grown for the feeding of silk-worms.

+ Although the climate of England is milder than our own, the heat of summer is insufficient to ripen Indian corn.

to deny all common meadows." These are burnt up, in thofe countries, in the heat of summer.

The improving of our husbandry, in New-England, is to be expected, not from a rejection of Indian corn, as the ruin of our lands, but by a better management of that crop, in order to render it, as it appears it may be rendered, the beft preparation for a crop of wheat, and other small grain.

Every farmer knows how eagerly cattle devour the entire plant of Indian corn in its green ftate; and land in good condition will produce heavy crops of it. Some years ago, just when the ears were in the milk, I cut close to the ground the plants grow. ing on a measured space, equal, as I judged, to the average product of the whole piece; and found that, at the fame rate, an acre would yield twelve tons of green fodder; probably a richer and more nourishing food than any other known to the husbandman. And this quantity was the growth of less than four months. The ground was rich, and yielded, at harveft, upwards of fifty bufhels of corn to the acre. The green ftalks of our northern corn are incomparably sweeter than those of the fouthern ftates; at leaft when both forts are grown in the north. Perhaps the greater and longer continued heats of the fouth may give a richness to the fame large plants which thefe cannot attain in the north. The stalks I have grown, rofe to the height of 13 or 14 feet, and many of them weighed above five pounds. To fupport this height, they are neceffarily thick, and woody in their fibres. My cows ate a small part of them-reluctantly-while they would devour the ftalks of our northern corn. It has appeared to me that the fort called sweet corn (having a white fhrivelled grain when ripe) yields ftalks of richer juice

than the common yellow corn. It is alfo more dif pofed to multiply fuckers,—an additional recommen. dation of it, when planted to be cut, in its green ftate, for horfes and cattle, and especially for milch cows; and its time of planting may be fo regulated as to furnish a supply of food, juft when the com. mon paftures usually fail. I am inclined to doubt whether any other green food will afford butter of equal excellence.

WHEAT.

Although no idea appears to me more vifionary than that "New-England could furnish bread-ftuff for the whole of the United States;" yet I am ready to believe that her husbandry may be fo improved as to render her independent of the southern states, for every species of bread of common confumption. I fay of common confumption; because even New-York, an exporter of wheat and flour, imports Richmond flour for use in her cities; because Virginian wheat makes whiter flour, and of a fuperiour quality to her own.

I have scarcely seen or heard of any spring wheat grown on the fea-board of old Maffachusetts or NewHampshire, that has not been more or lefs infected with fmut; fo as generally to require washing to fit it for bread. Some Spanish wheat lately cultiva ted by Nathaniel Gilman, Efq. of Exeter, is the only exception. This is a wheat of fingular excellence; and hitherto, Mr. Gilman informed me, has been perfectly exempt from fmut and mildew. The fize of the grains, and their weight by the bufhel, are moft extraordinary-the latter rifing (if I mistake not) to 67 or 70 pounds. In the last year, he fup.

pofed one hundred bufhels were raised in Exeter. All proceeded from a fingle ear which an American failor plucked in a field near Malaga, and brought to Exeter. It fortunately fell into Mr. Gilman's hands, by whofe attention its product has been thus increased.

In the District of Maine, especially by the aid of its new lands, probably much more wheat will be grown than will be required for its own con fumption: its climate being better adapted to the growing of small grain than of Indian corn: although I fhould think the fmall Canada corn might fucceed in all but the more northern parts, or where the foil is clayey and cold. In fome parts of New-York, eastward of Albany, where at the first clearing off the wood fine crops of wheat were grown, they now fuffer extremely, or fail. The foil is clayey-heaved by the winter's frofts, by which, and alternate thaws, the roots of the wheat are gradually thrown out, and the plants perifh. Such was the information given me by a farmer refident there. While the land was fresh, enriched and warmed by the coat of vegetable manure which for ages had been accumulating on its furface, the wheat was exempt from this difafter. The abundant manures attainable by a greatly improved fyftem of husbandry, may leffen or prevent the continuance of the evil.

WINTER WHEAT.

For a year or two after the purchase of my little farm, I effayed the culture of barley and wheat: but finding the ground infefted with the feeds of annual weeds which fprung up with fpring-fown grains,

and nearly choaked them, I gave over the purfuit, until the condition of the land fhould be changed; growing only a little wheat, rather by way of experiment than for a crop.

Winter rye fown early I found fucceeded very well. The annual weeds which afterwards vegetated, had not time to ripen their feeds. The ryeplants got poffeffion of the ground, and fubftantially maintained it until the enfuing harveft. This induced a desire to try winter wheat; hoping that, by the like early fowing, it might efcape mildew as well as early fown winter ryc.. And as the Virginian white wheat was faid to ripen a fortnight earlier than other kinds, I concluded, if it would ftand our winter's cold, it would be in little hazard from mildew-the formidable evil which, it was understood, had caufed the growing of winter wheat, in this part of the ftate, to be long fince abandoned. I procured enough for the experiment. It was fown in drills, that it might be kept perfectly clean. It flourished admirably during the autumn; and not a blade was hurt by a smart froft about the middle of November: but in the following fpring, not a fingle plant was alive.

I intended to renew the attempt with fome winter wheat growing farther north; and yet neglected it until the last year, when I procured a fmall parcel which had grown in New-Haven. Half of this I gave away, for an experiment to be made in the county of Worcefter. The refidue I defigned to fow in Auguft, at the time of fowing my winter rye. It was put in on the 22d: but I was neceffarily abfent, and space enough was not left for the whole. The remainder was fown the 10th of September; the whole in rows, to admit the hoc, to