pay to summer-fallow. He has taken a run-down farm, and a year ago last
spring he plowed up ten acres of a field, and sowed it to barley and
oats. The remainder of the field he summer-fallowed, plowing it four
times, rolling and harrowing thoroughly after each plowing. After the
barley and oats were off, he plowed the land once, harrowed it and sowed
Mediterranean wheat. On the summer-fallow he drilled in Diehl wheat. He
has just threshed, and got 22 bushels per acre of Mediterranean wheat
after the spring crop, at one plowing, and 26 bushels per acre of Diehl
wheat on the summer-fallow. This, he said, would not pay, as it cost him
$20 per acre to summer-fallow, and he lost the use of the land for one
season. Now this may be all true, and yet it is no argument against
summer-fallowing. Wait a few years. Farming is slow work. Mr. George
Geddes remarked to me, when I told him I was trying to renovate a
run-down farm, "you will find it the work of your life." We ought not to
expect a big crop on poor, run-down land, simply by plowing it three or
four times in as many months. Time is required for the chemical changes
to take place in the soil. But watch the effect on the clover for the
next two years, and when the land is plowed again, see if it is not in
far better condition than the part not summer-fallowed. I should expect
the clover on the summer-fallow to be fully one-third better in
quantity, and of better quality than on the other part, and this extra
quantity of clover will make an extra quantity of good manure, and thus
we have the means of going on with the work of improving the farm.

"Yes," said the Doctor, "and there will also be more clover-roots in the
soil."

"But I can not afford to wait for clover, and summer-fallowing," writes
an intelligent New York gentleman, a dear lover of good stock, who has
bought an exhausted New England farm, "I must have a portion of it
producing good crops right off." Very well. A farmer with plenty of
money can do wonders in a short time. Set a gang of ditchers to work,
and put in underdrains where most needed. Have teams and plows enough to
do the work rapidly. As soon as the land is drained and plowed, put on a
heavy roller. Then sow 500 lbs. of Peruvian guano per acre broadcast, or
its equivalent in some other fertilizer. Follow with a Shares' harrow.
This will mellow the surface and cover the guano without disturbing the
sod. Follow with a forty-toothed harrow, and roll ag