_Will it Pay?_—Will the benefits accruing, year after year,—in wet seasons and in dry,—with root crops and with grain,—with hay and with fruit,—in rotations of crops and in pasture,—be worth $5 an acre? On this question depends the value of tile-draining as a _practical_ improvement, for if there is a self-evident proposition in agriculture, it is that what is not profitable, one year with another, is _not_ practical. To counterbalance the charge of $5, as the yearly cost of the draining, each acre must produce, in addition to what it would have yielded without the improvement: 10 bushels of Corn at .50 per bushel. 3 bushels of Wheat at $1.66 per bushel. 5 bushels of Rye at 1.00 per bushel. 12-1/2 bushels of Oats at .40 per bushel. 10 bushels of Potatoes at .50 per bushel. 6-2/3 bushels of Barley at .75 per bushel. 1,000 pounds of Hay at 10.00 per ton. 50 pounds of Cotton at .10 per pound. 20 pounds of Tobacco at .25 per pound. Surely this is not a large increase,—not in a single case,—and the prices are generally less than may be expected for years to come. The United States Census Report places the average crop of Indian Corn, in Indiana and Illinois, at 33 bushels per acre. In New York it was but 27 bushels, and in Pennsylvania but 20 bushels. It would certainly be accounted extremely liberal to fix the average yield of such soils as need draining, at 30 bushels per acre. It is extremely unlikely that they would yield this, in the average of seasons, with the constantly recurring injury from backward springs, summer droughts, and early autumn frosts.