or
dried up, we find at harvest-time that the promise has belied the
fulfillment; that, after all the fine show above ground, the season has
been too wet, and the crop is light. We frequently hear complaint that
the season was too _cold_ for Indian corn, and that the ears did not
fill; or that a sharp drought, following a wet Spring, has cut short the
crop. We hear no man say, that he lacked skill to cultivate his crop.
Seldom does a farmer attribute his failure to the poverty of his soil.
He has planted and cultivated in such a way, that, in a _favorable
season_, he would have reaped a fair reward for his toil; but the season
has been too wet or too dry; and, with full faith that farming will pay
in the long run, he resolves to plant the same land in the same manner,
hoping in future for better luck.

_Too much cold water_ is at the bottom of most of these complaints of
unpropitious seasons, as well as of most of our soils; and it is in our
power to remove the cause of these complaints and of our want of
success.

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves."

We must underdrain all the land we cultivate, that Nature has not
already underdrained, and we shall cease complaints of the seasons. The
advice of Cromwell to his soldiers: "Trust God, and keep your powder
dry," affords a good lesson of faith and works to the farmer. We shall
seldom have a season, upon properly drained land, that is too wet, or
too cold, or even too dry; for thorough draining is almost as sure a
remedy for a drought, as for a flood.

_Do lands need under draining in America?_ It is a common error to
suppose that, because the sun shines more brightly upon this country
than upon England, and because almost every Summer brings such a drought
here as is unknown there, her system of thorough drainage can have no
place in agriculture on this side of the Atlantic. It is true that we
have a clearer sky and a drier climate than are experienced in England;
but it is also true that, although we have a far less number of showers
and of rainy days, we have a greater quantity of rain in the year.

The necessity of drainage, however, does not depend so much upon the
quantity of water which falls or flows upon land, nor upon the power of
the sun to carry it off by evaporation, as upon _the character of the
subsoil_. The vast quantity of water which Nature pours upon every acre
of soil annually, were it all to be removed by evapo