Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 May 1874 — Keep the Best Soil at the Surface. [ARTICLE]

Keep the Best Soil at the Surface.

Judging from the numerous communications and editorials on the subject of plowing, there is still an immense lack of knowledge. Whatever the ground may be it will always be the better practice to keep the best part of the soil on the surface. J. S. Bowles, an Ohio farmer, writes that according to his judgment “ the true use of plowing is merely to bury the rubbish out of the way. The surface of the ground, if it has not been trodden, can be made fine enough for seeding with the harrow. From past experience lam convinced that the best time to plow for corn is the previous fall, and the best time -so plow for fall grain is as early in the summer as possible. These are 1 * the facte. My theory is that the ground being solidified by lying so long after plowing becomes more as though it had not been plowed at all, excepting that there is no rubbish in the way. “ Experience proves, that in this part of Ohio more wheat can be raised, following corn, by drilling it in the com alleys without plowing than by cutting off the corn and breaking the ground up and then seeding.” All this may Ito correct on soils of a certain character; but if the soil is heavy and compact it will require deeper cultivation.—N. Y. Herald. A Kentucky paper reports what it denominates a livipg wonder. It says Dora Chambers, born on Skeggs Creek, Warren County, Ky., on the 11th of August, 1871, is thirty-seven inches high, ten inches around the wrist, eighteen inches around the calf of the leg, twentyeight and three-fourths inches around the thigh, forty-eight inches around the hips, forty-two inches around the waist, and weighs 118}£ pounds. The parents of this child are said to be delicate, small persons, the father weighing 127 pounds and the mother 144. There was nothing extraordinary about the child at its birth, but when about three months old he began to grow fat, and at the age of two and one-half years had gained the proportions above stated. The other day a bright little boy, son of one of the clerks in the Hartford Postoffice, was visiting in Norwich., A theatrical company had been giving a performance in the city, and one of the actors, being a friend of the family, was stopping with them. The little boy’s lively ways pleased the actor considerably, and he remarked, in stage parlance: “ I wish I had this little boy; J think there’s money in him.” To which promptly responded the child: “ I know there is, for I swallowed a cent wbeg I was at grandma’s the other day.”