AGRICULTURAL REPORT, 463 



stock of two important stores beer and bacon. In the most fertile and for- 

 ward counties harvest was finished by the middle of this month, one or two 

 backward crops excepted, which were then in hand. The first week of next 

 month is expected to exhibit a universal finish. In Ireland, as usual, they pre- 

 cede us by a week or ten days, but we do not receive from thence such magni- 

 ficent accounts of the crops as have been circulated in this country, they even 

 report this year's crop of wheat inferior to the last in quantity and quality. As 

 we had taken for granted, and for the reasons which are assigned in our last, 

 the farmer generally have raced with each other which should be first at the 

 ending post of the market ; this, joined with the import, has contributed to a 

 considerable reduction of price, which some say will not be permanent, but the 

 constant import of corn, seeds, &c. from the Continent, from Ireland and Canada, 

 will no doubt prevent any considerable rise of price, and should the next be a 

 plentiful harvest, we shall subsequently see wheat and bread at lower prices 

 than have been witnessed of late years. The crops on the best parts of the Con- 

 tinent have been good, and the farmers, like our own, and probably for similar 

 reasons, have been alert at furnishing the markets, even by forced sales at auc- 

 tion, in the mean time their stocks of old corn are considerable. The harvest, 

 in their earliest counties, finished early in the present month, but we are not 

 aware as yet of any import of whe^at from thence. 



The superior samples of new wheat outbid the old in price, but there is a 

 considerable quantity in a soft and moist state, and otherwise damaged and unfit 

 for grinding, the case also of the barley, that crop, however, seems to have been 

 generally abundant. As to the wheat on the best soils, experience and the state 

 of the markets have, in a great degree, confirmed the general opinion of a rich 

 crop, and in certain of those favoured districts which we have before pointed 

 out, they boast of carrying from the harvest field ten loads of wheatsheaves per 

 acre. This surely promises from the richest soils upwards of a load of wheat 

 from an acre of land. We lately adverted to the error of cutting wheat green, 

 and have since been informed from many quarters, particularly westward, that 

 the practice, in the present season, has prevailed to excess, and been attended 

 with serious ill consequences. 



The crop of oats appears equal to our former good opinion, and they have 

 suffered less injury than other corn from the late unfavourable seasons. Tares, 

 though plentiful in the market, are in general demand, as also seeds, our defi- 

 cient quantity of which is made up by the foreign supply, which, however com- 

 plained of by our farmers, has been of late years, arid is always, to a certain 

 degree, literally indispensable for the support of our greatly encreased popula- 

 tion. Our stock of old wheat seems proved to be full as low as has been gene- 

 rally stated, had it been otherwise the markets would have had a fall indeed. 

 This year's wheat crop has also been superior in the number of acres, and such 

 is the report from Ireland, and materially from the Continent. Another favour- 

 able turn of fortune's wheel the week's rain before adverted to in a different 

 sense, have so benefitted the lost turnip crop, that the roots are improved to 

 such a degree as to promise even an average upon the best soils ; the case also 

 of the mangel wurtzel, whilst those pasture lands w r hich had been fed bare, and 

 burned up by the solar heat and by drought, are now in a flourishing state. 

 Rape and summer cletches, particularly in the western counties, are unproductive. 

 Potatoes are a fine and productive crop, though slightly specked with blight. 

 Peas, every where a short crop, are of fine quality. Beans, perhaps an average on 

 the best lands, come to market in a soft state. On hops we must wait for in- 

 formation ; on some sheltered situations they are improved, on the exposed, co- 

 vered with blight and vermin. Independently of a former opinion of public 

 forbearance in the consumption of fruit, it has proved that the crop is generally 

 productive, of vegetables eminently so. 



As usual, our markets, town and country, have been amply supplied with 

 live stock, with some slight autumnal depreciation. Notwithstanding our very 

 considerable losses of sheep by the rot, during several seasons, there need be 

 no apprehension of a scarcity of mutton ; at the great fair of Wilton there 



