r produced four hundred bushels of
potatoes per acre; and that the few bushels of small tubers that they do
dig from an acre, are produced at considerable loss. "Men do not gather
grapes from thorns, nor figs from thistles."

To make potato-growing profitable in these times of high prices of land
and labor, it is absolutely necessary that the soil be in every way
fitted to meet any and all demands of the crop.

It is said that in the State of Maine, previous to the appearance of the
potato disease, and before the soil had become exhausted by continued
cropping, potatoes yielded an average of four hundred bushels per acre.
Now, every observer is aware that the present average yield of the same
vegetable is much less than half what it was formerly. This great
deterioration in yield can not be attributed to "running out" of
varieties; for varieties are extant which have not yet passed their
prime. It can not be wholly due to disease; for disease does not occur
in every season and in every place. True, we have more insects than
formerly, but they can not be responsible for all the great falling off.
It is traceable mainly to poverty of the soil in certain ingredients
imperatively needed by the crop for its best development, and to the
pernicious effect of enriching with nitrogenous manures. Any one who
will plant on suitably dry soil, enriched only with forest-leaves,
sea-weeds, or by plowing under green crops until the whole soil to a
proper depth is completely filled with vegetable matter, will find to
his satisfaction that the potato can yet be grown in all its pristine
vigor and productiveness.

To realize from potato-growing the greatest possible profits, (and
profits are what we are all after,) the following conditions must be
strictly adhered to: First, the ground chosen _must be dry_, either
naturally or made so by thorough drainage; a gently sloping, deep, sandy
or gravelly loam is preferable. Second, the land should be liberally
enriched with humus by some of the means mentioned, if it is not already
present in the soil in sufficient quantities, and the soil should be
deeply and thoroughly plowed, rendering it light, porous, and
pulverulent, that the air and moisture may easily penetrate to any
desirable depth of it; and a proper quantity of either wood-ashes or
lime, or both, mixed with common salt, should be harrowed into the
surface before planting, or be applied on top of the hills immediately
after plantin