The Story of my Boyhood and Youth by John Muir

The Crops-Doing Chores-The Sights and Sounds of Winter-Road-making-The Spirit-rapping Craze-Tuberculosis among the Settlers-A Cruel Brother-The Rights of the Indians-Put to the Plough at the Age of Twelve-In the Harvest-Field-Over-Industry among the Settlers-Running the Breaking-Plough-Digging a Well-Choke-Damp-Lining Bees.

At first, wheat, corn, and potatoes were the principal crops we raised; wheat especially. But in four or five years the soil was so exhausted that only five or six bushels an acre, even in the better fields, was obtained, although when first ploughed twenty and twenty-five bushels was about the ordinary yield. More attention was then paid to corn, but without fertilizers the corn-crop also became very meagre. At last it was discovered that English clover would grow on even the exhausted fields, and that when ploughed under and planted with corn, or even wheat, wonderful crops were raised. This caused a complete change in farming methods; the farmers raised fertilizing clover, planted corn, and fed the crop to cattle and hogs.