Soil, and Mode of Preparation.—A warm soil is required by the Peanut. A light, porous soil in which sand predominates, but not too sandy, warm and dry, and yet not too dry, but containing some moisture, and open to capillary circulation, suits the Peanut best. In all cases the soil most suitable for the Peanut must contain a certain amount of calcareous constituents. The color of the soil should be gray, with few or no traces of iron to stain the pods. As a rule, the brightest pods bring the most money, and as the color of the pods is always influenced by that of the soil in which they grow, it becomes a matter of importance to select that which is of the right description. Land of the above nature and color may be regarded as first-class for this crop. But let it be distinctly borne in mind, that unless it contains a goodly per-centage of lime in some form, in an available state, no land will produce paying crops of pods, although it may yield large and luxuriant vines. Of all the forms of lime, that supplied by the marls of the seaboard section appears to be the best.

But any soil that can be put into a friable condition, and kept so during the period of cultivation, will produce salable peanuts, provided it contains enough lime to insure solid pods. If it is known that a piece of land will produce sound corn, at the rate of from five to ten barrels per acre, the planter may rest satisfied, without further experiment, that it will yield from forty to seventy-five or eighty bushels of peanuts. As the cultivation extends, and more land is needed for this crop, much of it is being put upon clayey soil, and when well cultivated, it generally produces heavy peanuts. Indeed, more pounds per acre may be grown upon some stiff lands than on any light soil, however calcareous. But clayey land, or such as is dark or tenacious, will impart a stain or dark color to the pods that is objectionable to buyers, and hence soils of this nature are generally avoided. A tenacious soil is also colder and more inert than a light one during the earlier part of the summer, and as the Peanut plant requires a rather long term of warm weather to insure full growth and maturity, a warmer and quicker soil is preferable. Buyers, however, are not now quite so particular as formerly in regard to color, and hence there is more inducement to plant on any ground that will yield good, solid peanuts, and it is being more frequently done.

But the actual or prospective peanut planter, who has an ash-colored or grayish soil, which is sandy and non-adhesive, is fortunate. If he will keep it well limed and trashed, or else rotate every fourth or fifth year with the Southern Field Pea, or other green crop, and marl, he will have land that will continue to produce paying crops of the brightest and most salable peanuts. There is an abundance of good peanut land all along the Atlantic seaboard, from New Jersey to Florida. Doubtless there is much of it in the Mississippi Valley, even as far north as the lake region, and on the Pacific coast from Oregon southward. There is no more reason for confining the cultivation of the Peanut to the narrow belts at present occupied, than there is for limiting tobacco to the States of North Carolina and Virginia.

The quantity of lime or marl to use at one application depends very much on the nature of the soil and the amount of vegetable matter it contains. Generally, fifty bushels of lime, or one hundred and fifty bushels of marl is a safe application, but if the soil is quite thin, and contains but little vegetable mould, more than this at one time would be attended with risk. The safer plan is, to make several small annual applications of both marl, and vegetable matter, continuing this until a hundred and fifty bushels of lime, or two hundred and fifty, or three hundred bushels of marl have been applied. After this, no more calcareous matter will be needed in fifteen or twenty years. Land will bear large quantities of marl with perfect safety, if kept well stocked with some vegetable matter to subdue its caustic effects. But as most of the best peanut soil is deficient in this respect, the planter should begin cautiously, using small quantities until he has deepened his soil and supplied it with vegetable mould by trashing the land or turning in green crops.

In choosing land for a peanut crop, some attention should be paid to the previous crop. The Peanut requires a clean soil, one clear of roots, brush, stones, or rubbish of any kind, and hence it should follow some hoed crop, such as corn, cotton, or tobacco. In Virginia, corn land is generally preferred, and, as in the tide-water section, much of this land has been heavily marled, it commonly produces well.

The preparation of the soil for the Peanut is the same as for corn, or any similar crop, except that more pains should be, and generally are taken, to get it in fine and mellow tilth. If it breaks up rough and turfy, as much land previously in corn is apt to do, it should be harrowed or dragged until it is fine. Generally, Virginia planters do not plow quite so deep for peanuts as they do for corn. This practice the writer believes to be unsound. Land should be plowed deep at the outset for all crops, whatever their nature or manner of growth. Deep plowing is a corrective of dry weather, and as drouth sometimes tells heavily on the Peanut plant, as was the case in the season of 1883, it is always well to plow deep, and give the moisture of the subsoil a chance to rise upward, and reach the roots during a dry spell. The formation of a fine, mellow seed bed, is all the preparation a peanut soil requires, previous to planting time, apart from the application of manures, which is spoken of elsewhere.

The Seed.—With the peanut crop, more than with almost any other, good seed is a matter of paramount importance. The seed sometimes fails to germinate well; before this fact can be discovered, and the ground re-seeded, unless the first planting was made quite early, the best season for planting will have passed, and the crop planted late will never be so good as it might have been. On the other hand, a very early planting doubles the risk of failure, in fact almost challenges failure by committing the seed to a soil too cold for germination and a quick growth. It is highly important, then, to have good seed, and to wait until both weather and soil are favorable for speedy germination and growth.In order to determine whether the seed will germinate well or not, let the planter begin to test them early in the spring. Let him take a dozen or two kernels that appear to be in quality a fair average of the whole lot of seed on hand, place them in a tumbler with some dampened cotton, or a piece of sponge, and set the tumbler in a warm place, where the heat is uniform, and high enough to start the germ in a few days. In a day or two, if the seeds are good, they will begin to swell, and the embryo plant will soon begin to grow. Thus, according to the number of seeds that have germinated out of the number tested, the planter can calculate the probable per-centage of good seed. A glass of peanuts growing thus in dampened cotton, presents an interesting study, and is a pretty ornament for the sitting room.

But the planter must not rest satisfied with one trial. As soon as the out-of-door temperature will admit of it, he should try quite a number of the seeds in the open ground. Selecting a warm, sunny spot, he should plant from fifty to one hundred kernels, and shelter the place as much as possible from the cold winds. If these germinate well, the seed may be relied upon as good, and no further trial need be made. It is in this way that the Virginia planter tests his seed every season. About the first of April there is a great testing of the seed peanuts, and, although nearly every planter endeavors to save his own seed, the quantity of doubtful seed is generally great enough to cause a brisk demand for good seed at advanced prices. The method of saving seed peanuts will be given in a subsequent chapter.

Some weeks before planting time, the Virginia farmer, who plants from fifty to a hundred bushels of peanuts, starts about having them shelled and assorted, preparatory to planting. This must be done with care, and females are mostly employed to perform this work. The pods are popped open with the fingers and thumb, care being taken not to split or bruise the kernel; all shrivelled and dark colored kernels are rejected. After they are shelled, the seed must be put into bags or baskets, a small quantity in each parcel, and set where there is a free circulation of air, until wanted for planting. If a large quantity is bulked together after being shelled, or if put in a close box or barrel, even in small quantities, they are liable to heat, and be prevented from germinating. This fact is the result of some costly experience on the part of many planters. Thus it becomes necessary to handle the seed with great care and circumspection throughout. From a bushel to a bushel and a half of peanuts in the hull, or pod, is estimated to be enough to plant one acre of ground, the quantity depending on the quality of the seed and the distance apart they are to be planted.

Time of Planting.—In Virginia, the first twenty days in May is regarded as, in the main, the most suitable time for planting. Some plant as early as the last week in April, and the seasons frequently favor this early start, and the crop does well. More, however, plant in June than in April, and sometimes planting is delayed until the middle or last of June. On warm and dry land, there is no great risk in planting the first week in May, but on colder land, the planter should wait until the ground has been warmed by the sun, say the latter part of the same month. If the farmer has reason to hope for a week or ten days of mild, fair weather, he may risk a planting quite early, as in that time the seed ought to germinate, and come up sufficiently to make it sure that it will grow. Once up, the plant will hold its own, and though cold rains or winds may retard its growth, and cause it to turn yellow, it will start anew with the first spell of sunny weather, and rapidly change color to its normal green. The above dates apply to the latitude of Virginia. In the far south, peanut planting begins early in April, while north of Virginia, the first half of June would, in most seasons, be quite early enough to commit the seed to the earth. It should not be done anywhere until all danger from frost is passed for the season. A very slight frost will destroy the Peanut.

How to Plant.—I come now to consider the mode of planting. Here no very inflexible rules can be given. Practice varies greatly, almost every planter differing more or less from his brother planters. The chief points are, to get the seed into the ground at suitable distances apart both ways, to have the seed, after it is planted, raised slightly above the general level, and to have the soil so free from clods that there will be nothing to hinder the young plant from pushing through after it has started. Any mode of planting that will secure these ends will effect the purpose.

If the ground has been once plowed in the early spring, let it be plowed again only a few days before planting time, and if at all rough, or cloddy, have it harrowed until in fine tilth. When ready to plant, draw furrows the same as for corn, two and a half or three feet apart. If the land is fresh and strong, and never before in peanuts, make the rows at least three feet apart. After a year or two on the same ground, peanut vines will not grow so large as at first, and need not be so far apart, either from row to row, or from hill to hill. When the land is thin, some plant as near as twenty-seven inches from row to row, and twelve inches from hill to hill.

If any fertilizer is to be used, let it be put in the furrow before the ridge is formed; a man or boy following the plow and spreading the fertilizer by hand. A small ridge is then formed by lapping two furrows over the drill with the turn plow, after which the knocker and dotter follow, one leveling the ridge, and the other dotting the row by making little depressions in the soil the proper distance apart for the seeds.

The Knocker and Dotter.—Sometimes the knocker and dotter are combined in one, and it is withal a unique implement. Always home-made, it partakes of all the native roughness and varied ingenuity of the Southern planter. The engraving, figure 2, will illustrate the mode of constructing this implement. Two pieces of timber are sawed from a log to serve as wheels, such wood being selected as does not split easily. The diameter of the wheel is made the same as the desired distance between the hills, and three wooden pins are inserted equi-distant in the circumference, so that the wheels will make three dots, or signs, for planting, at each revolution. These wheels are connected by an axle, and set the same distance apart the rows are to be asunder. Two shafts are pinned to the axle, and braced in front of the wheels to keep them steady. A piece of heavy scantling, or a log of wood, six inches in diameter, is secured to the under side of the shafts just in front of the wheels. This is the knocker, and serves to level the ridge before the wheels. Properly adjusted, it does beautiful work, and leaves a flat, smooth ridge, in fine condition for the seed. The wheels pass along on the leveled ridge, making the dots, as shown in figure 2. Handles are fixed to the implement to enable the plowman to keep it in proper place, and for convenience in turning. One horse is fastened to this implement, and two rows are prepared for planting at the same time. This utensil would be troublesome to use in an orchard, or on stumpy ground. Peanuts, however, should always be planted on open ground clear of all impediments. Instead of the knocker and dotter combined, many planters omit the wheels, and make a separate implement with one wheel and a handle, to work by hand, as represented in figure 3. This can be run among trees and stumps. It resembles a wheelbarrow without the body.

Hands—women, children, or men, follow the dotter, dropping a seed in each mark or depression, and carefully covering it with the foot, by pressing enough soil into the hole to just fill it. The holes are made one and a half to two inches deep, and the hands are cautioned not to get the seed covered deeper than that. One inch is deep enough to plant, if the soil is moist, but if quite dry the seed may be put deeper. Proceeding in this way, covering first with one foot and then with the other, the planters get on quite rapidly, although the hills are so near together. The planting is not at all tedious after one gets the knack of it, and is light and pleasant work. Some planters put two kernels instead of one in each hill, to insure a stand, but this practice increases the cost considerably, and is by no means general. After the seeds are planted they are very slightly, if at all, above the common level. In a week or ten days from the time of planting, the seeds will begin to heave or crack the ground, which shows that the germ has started, and greatly relieves the anxiety of the planter. Then, by counting the number of signs in a hundred hills, the farmer readily calculates what kind of a stand he will probably have.

Fertilizers.—We have already intimated that a calcareous soil is indispensable to successful Peanut culture. If the soil is not calcareous by nature, it must be made so artificially. Hence the proper fertilizer to use is one that contains a large per cent. of lime in some of its forms, as the carbonate, the phosphate, the nitrate, or the sulphate, or the chloride of calcium. Recently, the sulphate of lime (gypsum), has been employed, even on limed or marled land, and its use has been attended with good results. Animal and nitrogenous manures are not suited to the crop. Such fertilizers produce a heavy growth of vines, but there will be no full, solid pods unless lime in some form is also present. Marl has been found to be the one specific fertilizer for the Peanut plant—better than any other form of lime; and the chief element of value in marl has been shown to be the carbonate of lime. Some Virginia marls contain as high as seventy-five or eighty per cent. of the carbonate, and all of them range over twenty-five or thirty per cent. Now, marl is plentiful and cheap all along the Atlantic seaboard, from New Jersey to Florida, the beds lying side by side of, and intersecting, the very land that is the best adapted to the Peanut—a rare and fortunate coincidence, that planters are learning to fully appreciate. And were it not that the New Jersey land-owner finds it more profitable to raise fruits and vegetables for the two great cities that lie on either hand of him, even he would find the Peanut to be a paying crop. With his warm, light sand and green marl, he could easily raise them. I mention this as one of the possibilities of the Peanut, though not likely to be realized for the reason named.

Replanting.—In about two weeks from planting, if the weather has been mild, the young plants should be large enough to show where replanting is necessary. The planter goes along the row, making slight depressions with his heel at all the missing hills, drops a pea therein, and covers it with the foot, the same way as at the first. Instead of making depressions with the heel, some use a long stake, an inch or two in diameter, to the lower end of which is affixed a piece of plank, fastened two inches from the end, and four or five inches long (fig. 4). This is used for punching the holes, and the piece of plank near the end prevents it from making the impression too deep. This is another of the inventions of the Virginia Peanut-planter; so true is it that "necessity is the mother of invention," a new crop calls for new devices for its successful and profitable cultivation.

In replanting, it is well to put two or more kernels to the hill, as the season will be getting late, and no time should be lost in securing a good stand. There can be no subsequent replanting with any profit.

Moles and other Depredators.—The Peanut-planter has to contend with many enemies. In many cases moles are exceedingly destructive to the planted seed, burrowing along the rows, and eating the seed, hill by hill. Often raccoons, foxes, and squirrels grabble them up. And everywhere the larger birds, such as crows, doves, and partridges come in for a share of the seed, and annoy and hinder the farmer very much. There is no remedy but ceaseless vigilance. The planter must go armed at every turn to protect his crop. Sometimes planters tar the seed to prevent the moles, etc., from destroying them. It perhaps has some tendency to check the depredations, but does not prevent them entirely. Coal tar is oftenest used for the purpose, a half pint being enough to smear a bushel of seed. The seeds are afterwards rolled in dry earth to prevent adhesion and trouble in planting. Traps, guns, and scarecrows are resorted to with varying success, but if the depredators are numerous, the planter is generally the vanquished party.

The Critical Period.—The first four or five weeks after the planting of this crop is its most critical period, and nothing but a good stand and the approach of warm weather will relieve the planter of his anxiety. At the first, many fears are reasonably entertained that the seed will not germinate well. And even should a pretty fair per-centage of the seed come up, cold and rainy weather may still seriously retard the growth of the plants, or the numerous depredators that have been named may so far reduce the number of hills as to greatly curtail the yield per acre. The very young Peanut is among the tenderest of plants, and a very slight mishap will serve to destroy or permanently injure it. Several days of cold weather at this period will make the struggling plants look pale and sickly, and if warm suns are too long delayed, many plants will fail altogether.

Backward springs are a great drawback in the cultivation of this crop, and cause many farmers to delay planting until it is certain warm weather cannot be many days off. If the planter could always be sure of his seed, this would be the better plan, but if these late plantings fail to come up well, the season is too far advanced for replanted seed to make a crop. Further north than Virginia, however, it would, we think, be decidedly better to put off planting until both soil and air are warm enough to insure quick germination, and then, instead of replanting the missing hills with Peanuts, plant beans or field peas instead. If the planter can get through the first month successfully, he lays aside his fears, and enters upon his work with renewed hope and energy. To a recital of this work—the work of cultivation, we now invite the reader's attention.