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The Country Gcntlcinan^s Magazine 



which can be effected in cereal cultivation, on all ex- 

 cept the heaviest soils, can only be permanently 

 carried out in proportion to the numbers of live stock 

 kept upon the area to be improved. If these decrease 

 to any appreciable extent, to that extent is improve- 

 ment in cereal cultivation put a stop to. For a time 

 artificial manure may be substituted, but in the long 

 run the want of cattle will surely be felt. I have 

 nothing to say against artificial manures— they are 

 good auxiliaries, and, as stimulating root crops and 

 bringing them up to the hoe, they are admirable. 

 They are, however, or ought to be, only auxiliaries, 

 and as the following facts are somewhat remarkable 

 I give them for consideration, leaving others to draw 

 their own conclusions : - 



1st. On my own cultivated area no artificial manure 

 is used. 



2d. There has never been on that area either 

 pleuro-pneumonia, foot-and-mouth disease, or rinder- 

 pest. 



3d. Sheep coming there with the old lameness only 

 have speedily become quite sound. 



No doubt the area in question is exceptionally cir- 

 cumstanced and obtains an extra and very unusual 

 supply of farmyard and cattle manure, though if there 

 were still more of it I should be better satisfied. The 

 general consequence of this method of cultivation is 

 that the further it is carried the better is the result, as 

 well for cattle of all kinds, as also for every kind of 

 cereal crop and artificial grass, except Italian rye- 



grass, which latter, being poisonous to a succeeding 

 wheat crop, I do not permit. 



Allowing, then, for varieties of seasons, up&n which 

 we are all dependent, my experience leads to the con- 

 clusion that the cultivation of cereal crops in Great 

 Britain is very much dependent upon the numbers of 

 live stock maintained upon the land ; and if this be so, 

 the cattle question and the bread question will not 

 long be far separate ; for, depend upon it, a decreasing 

 English wheat crop will not always be met by cheap 

 foreign supplies. 



The way out of the difficulty seems plain enough, 

 but both questions would have to be dealt with as 

 very intimately connected ; and when so dealt with 

 might not, until the result became apparent, be very 

 palatable to any but men born to face difficuU'es and 

 achieve results — a very small minority of the people 

 concerned. The result, however, to be accomplished 

 is the great increase of all kinds of English cattle ; and, 

 consistently therewith, the great improvement of 

 probably three-fourths of the soil of Great Britain. 

 Surely this is worth attempting ! 



The writer gives his name and address, 

 ]\Ir Albert Wilhams, East Ilsley-hall. We 

 wish he would make known his ideas as to 

 how best to set about increasing our stock. 

 This on:iission we hope to see him shortly 

 supply. 



HOW TO INCREASE OUR FOOD SUPPLIES. 



DEEP cultivation by steam; hedge-row^s, 

 fostering rabbits and destructive birds, 

 uprooted, and table-cloth plots of ground 

 transformed into 40-acre fields, would, ac- 

 cording to Lord Dunmore, assure an addition 

 of from ^28,000,000 to ^37,000,000 per 

 annum of food to the community. These 

 operations, carefully performed, would enable 

 us to live much more independent of corn 

 and stock from abroad than we can at present. 

 We are indebted to the foreigner for these 

 commodities to the extent of ^44,714,000 

 a-year, and under the conditions set forth by 

 Lord Dunmore, he calculates that we should 

 only have to pay from about a-third to a-sixth 

 of that sum. 



Lord Dunmore has gone very minutely 

 into his calculations, and the probabihties, 



in absence of actual test, are in favour of 

 their accuracy. The advantages of steam- 

 ploughinghis Lordship doescertainly not over- 

 rate. A six-furrow plough can turn over about 

 as much in a day as two dozen horses, and 

 at two-thirds of the cost. Then the shares can 

 be made to penetrate the ground to a much 

 greater depth than ploughing can be ac- 

 complished by horses. Then, again, steam 

 being so much speedier than horses, can be 

 taken advantage of ever a greater breadth of 

 land in the autumn than horses can be. It 

 does its work at the proper time in Septem- 

 ber, when the land is dry and the sun hot 

 enough to kill the weeds which have been' 

 uprooted by the cultivator. The steam 

 plough makes level the surface of the 

 land. Ridges and furrows disappear before 



