as the standard of comparison. One of the lots should be fed on timothy for three weeks, the other on Kentucky grass-the weight of the milk of each cow and the richness of the cream, as indicated by a lactometer, should be carefully ascertained and recorded; during the next period of three weeks the food of the lots. should be reversed, the first lot being fed on Kentucky blue grass, and the second on timothy-the weight and richness of the milk being noted as before. During the third period of three weeks the food should be again reversed as in the first trial, and during the fourth period the food should be as in the second trial. The weight and richness of the milk yielded by each kind of hay would thus be indicated in terms which would be perfectly reliable, and the relative values of the two kinds could be accurately expressed in dollars and cents. In trying the values of the different grasses for fattening purposes, the same method should be adopted, except that the weight of the cattle should be taken at the commencement and at the end of each period of three weeks. Systematic attempts should forthwith be instituted to determine the question. If twenty farmers should each undertake to determine the comparative value of timothy and some other grasses, no one would be greatly burthened, and information of incalculable value to the whole agricultural community would be elicited..

5th-The meadows on a farm should be so arranged as to come successively to maturity. There is always a sudden augmentation. of the demand for labor when the season of haying and harvesting comes on, without a corresponding augmentation of the supply. This state of things greatly enhances the cost of securing the crops, and causes much haste and carelessness which would not otherwise take place. The increased number of hands, greatly increases the labors of the farmer's wife and daughters, indeed, many a broken down female constitution traces its origin to the extra labor of haying and harvesting.

We have seen too that the grasses must be cut when in the flower if we would obtain their maximum value, every day that they are left standing after this, diminishes their nutritive matter. It follows from this that much of the grass on the meadows of large farmers who are restricted to one or two kinds, must suffer great loss from want of labor to cut it in its best condition.

To prevent these sources of waste and inconvenience, the grass lands on the farm should be divided, and stocked with grasses

coming to maturity at different periods so as to diffuse the labor over a much longer period than at present, so that part may be cut in June, part in July and the remainder in August. Slight additions to the labor of the farm will thus enable us to secure all the hay at the best possible periods.

In the stocking of pasture grounds, a much greater variety of grasses is desirable than can be admitted into meadows; it is of little consequence in these at what time their flowering season occurs as none of the culms should ever be permitted to blossom. The great principle to be observed here, is to provide such grasses as will be in their highest vigor during every week from spring to autumn, the earliest and the latest should be mixed with those whose period of luxuriant growth is during the middle of summer. In meadows, those species are most desirable which send up the greatest amount of flowering culms; in pastures, on the contrary, culms are not desirable, but the radical leaves possess the greatest value. Hence timothy, so valuable in a meadow, is of little use in a pasture, being far inferior to Kentucky blue grass, and meadow fox-tail, which put forth radical leaves in abundance. With these two exceptions, the laying down of pastures is conducted on the same principle as meadows.

I trust the five principles which I have just laid down all commend themselves to your enlightened judgments. I do not believe there is one among you who will refuse his assent to any one of them. Yet there is not one of them which is not habitually neglected in the practice of most farmers. I have examined the statements of over 200 of them as recorded in the transactions of State Society of New York, and in the agricultural journals, and all, except about a dozen of them, sow no other seed than timothy and clover. Of the exceptional dozen, one sowed a small field with orchard grass, three of them mixed the seed of red-top with their timothy and clover and the remainder were accustomed to mix in the seed of the Kentucky blue-grass. Several of them are aware of the advantage of cutting while in flower and strongly commend the practice, but none of them advise the seeding of meadows with such plants as will enable them to accomplish the object, on the contrary, most of them sow clover and timothy together notwithstanding they vary so widely in the period of their efflorescence. None of them seem to be aware of the wide difference that exists among the different species with regard to their nutritive properties, nor is there any allusion to the necessity

of diffusing the labors of hay-making over a longer period by stocking different meadows with varieties coming into flower at successive perjods of time.

The arrangement and classification of the grasses with reference to the soils which are suited to them cannot be completed in the present state of our knowledge, but as a nucleus for experimental trials I venture to offer the following table which you can improve and enlarge as experience shall dictate from time to time:

For light, sandy land and mowing in June. Orchard grass, Red clover, Annual spear grass, Kentucky blue. grass, and Meadow fox-tail.

For clayey or calcareous loams and mowing in July. Timothy, Red-top, Crested dog's-tail, Tall fescue, Italian rye grass, Perrennial rye grass.

For clayey lands and mowing in August. Wire grass, (Poa compressa,) and fowl meadow, (Poa serotina,) hairy brome grass.

For dry gravelly soils. Agrostis vulgaris, (red-top,) Arrhena- therum avenaceum, (tall oat grass,) Holcus mollis, (soft grass,) Poa pratensis, (Kentucky blue grass,) Festuca rubra, (red fescue.)

For blowing sands. Deposit turf at regular and short intervals and between them sow the seeds of Ammophila arundinacea and Elymus arenarius, by mixing them with clay attached to small pieces of straw rope and dibbling them into the sand; for which purpose from fifteen to twenty pounds per acre will be sufficient. To prevent the encroachments of sands, dibble in the plants of the ammophila at short intervals making a bed in front of the advancing sands from twenty to one hundred yards width according to the circumstances.

For marshy grounds and those occasionally overflowed. Agrostis stolonifera, Festuca elatior, F. loliacea, Glyceria aquatica, Glyceria fluitans, Phalaris arundinacea, Poa trivialis, Lotus major.

For pasture in orchards and other shady places. Anthoxanthum odoratum, (sweet vernal,) Dactylis glomerata, (orchard grass,) Festuca duriuncula, F. elatior, Lolium italicum, Lolium perrenne, (perrennial rye grass,) Milium effusam, Poa nemoralis, Poa trivialis, Trifolium pratense, T. repens.

For permanent pastures. A lopecurus pratensis, Dactylis glomerata, Festuca duriuscula, F. elatior, F. pratense, (meadow fescue,) F. rubra, Lolium italicum, Lolium perrenne, Phleum pratense, (timothy, herdsgrass,) Poa nemoralis, P. pratensis, (Kentucky blue grass,) P. trivialis, Agrostis vulgaris, (red-top,)

Trifolium pratense, (common red clover,) T. repens, (white clover, creeping honey-suckle,) Anthoxanthum odoratum, (sweet vernal grass.)

Having now determined on our selection of seeds for the particular soil which we may desire to convert into meadow, the next most important question is, how shall we best insure the germination and growth?

I have no doubt that most of you can bear witness that this is a serious and important question. Unless you have been more fortunate than your brethren, you have been often obliged to seed your meadows several times before you could form a decent sod, and even then you have had to wait several years before the sod became thick and the meadow profitable. Many a farmer has bewailed the loss of interest on his land, the taxes and the wasted labor which unsuccessful grass seeding has imposed upon him.

To avoid this difficulty you must bring your soil as nearly as possible into the condition of our richest and best meadows. It is quite impossible to make plants as delicate as young grass grow in lands full of lumps of hard earth, stones and a tangled mass of weed roots and bushes such as we often see on lands which pretend to be prepared for meadows. A careful examination of our best meadows shows that the roots of the grass are surrounded by a fine dark mould, the fertility of the meadow being always proportional to its fineness, depth and darkness. This dark, fine mould is supposed by many farmers to arise from the gradual decay of the vegetation during a long succession of years; this doubtless is not without its effect but a little reflection will show that it is very trivial. Prof. Johnson estimates the weight of the stubble left in the ground at about one-fourth of the weight of the hay taken off; half a ton of these substances would therefore be a very large estimate for the substances left behind, this amount reduced to powder and spread over the surface would not, if it all remained, form a deposit of half an inch in a century, but when we reflect that much of the matter left by the roots and leaves is absorbed by the growing crops of subsequent years we shall see that the fine mould of our old meadows is not derived from this source, at least to any considerable extent.

This view is farther confirmed by the fact that this mould is uniformly laid on the top of the soil. When two fields adjoin each other, one being an old meadow, the other a ploughed field, the latter will be covered with stones, while none are visible in the

meadow, the mould having been spread over the top. "A field which fifteen years since was waste land, was plowed and drained and then well covered with marl and cinders; it has not since been disturbed, and now supports a tolerably good pasture. Cutting down with the spade into this soil, the section presented the following appearance: Turf one-half inch,-mould two inches and onehalf a layer one and one-half inches thick of fragments of burned marl, (conspicuous by their bright red color,) of cinders and a few quartz pebbles mingled with earth; lastly, about four and one-half inches beneath the surface was the original black peaty soil." This state of things shows conclusively that this mould must have been, in some way, laid upon the surface of the soil over the first dressing of cinders and burned marl. The explanation of this covering of mould is simple. You have often seen a smoothly raked garden bed covered over in the morning with little hillocks of earth. These are caused by the common earth worms, which swallow the earth through which it moves, and after extracting whatever of nutriment is contained in it, throw out the remainder mixed with the mucus of its digestive organs on the surface of the ground. This is the origin of the little mounds upon the garden beds, and the annual accumulation of these mounds in the meadows forms the mould whose origin we are seeking for. This agency is more powerful than might be at first supposed. Mr. Johnson gives us the following illustration of the extent of this. activity of the worms in grass lands: "A bowling green fortyfive yards long by thirty-two yards wide, was watered by a solution of corrosive sublimate, after which 434 lbs. of dead worms were taken from it, which is at the rate 1,466 lbs. per acre." With this illustration of the immense number of worms at work, and remembering that they are casting up these mounds in the meadows every night during the summer, you will see that we are furnished with an adequate cause for the production of all the mould we find in them. Worms are not only useful in forming mould, but the subterranean galleries which they form in their ceaseless journeys through the soil and subsoil, admit the air, and thus set on foot that train of chemical transformations which are essential to the growth of the grass, and without their assistance could never be effected. From all this it is plain, that if we would succeed in our sowing, we must artificially prepare a seed bed as nearly resembling this worm-mould as possible, and we must encourage the continued travelling of worms through the soil.