acre. This
was drained at a great cost, nearly $30 per acre. The first crop after
this was 83 bushels and some odd pounds per acre. It was weighed and
measured by Mr. Delafield, and the County Society awarded a premium to Mr.
Johnston. Eight acres and some rods of this land, at one side, averaged 94
bushels, or the trifling increase of 84 bushels per acre over what it
would bear before those insignificant clay tiles were buried in the
ground. But this increase of crop is not the only profit of drainage; for
Mr. Johnston says that, on drained land, one half the usual quantity of
manure suffices to give maximum crops. It is not difficult to find a
reason for this. When the soil is sodden with water, air can not enter to
any extent, and hence oxygen can not eat off the surfaces of
soil-particles and prepare food for plants; thus the plant must in great
measure depend on the manure for sustenance, and, of course, the more this
is the case, the more manure must be applied to get good crops. This is
one reason, but there are others which we might adduce if one good one
were not sufficient.

"Mr. Johnston says he never made money until he drained, and so convinced
is he of the benefits accruing from the practice, that he would not
hesitate,--as he did not when the result was much more uncertain than at
present,--to borrow money to drain. Drains well laid, endure, but unless a
farmer intends doing the job well, he had best leave it alone and grow
poor, and move out West, and all that sort of thing. Occupiers of
apparently dry land are not safe in concluding that they need not go to
the expense of draining, for if they will but dig a three-foot ditch in
even the driest soil, water will be found in the bottom at the end of
eight hours, and if it does come, then draining will pay for itself
speedily."

Some years ago, the Rural New Yorker published a letter from one of its
correspondents from which the following is extracted:--

"I recollect calling upon a gentleman in the harvest field, when
something like the following conversation occurred:

'Your wheat, sir, looks very fine; how many acres have you in this
field?'

'In the neighborhood of eight, I judge.'

'Did you sow upon fallow?'

'No sir. We turned over green sward--sowed immediately upon the
sod, and dragged it thoroughly--and you see the yield will probably
be 25 bushels to the acre, where it is not too wet.'

'Yes sir