252 On Farm Management hePwixt Fr^'^^ ^'^^ Tyne, Aug, 



affairs, which, within a fliort perior^ will probably engage the 

 whole of it. Your valuable Magazine has, therefore, attracted 

 my particular notice. In it, as well as in other agricultural 

 publications, I obferve that Tome authors have pointed out that 

 di(tri£l which lies between the Tyne and the Frith of Forth, and 

 extends from the fea, through Northumberland and Berwicklhire, 

 into a confiderable part of Roxburghfiiire, as a pattern of per- 

 fection in agriculture and live ftock. Having lately had occafioii 

 to pafs through that part of the country, I arranged matters fo, 

 as to have leifure to make many renfhrks and inquiries relative 

 to the management purfued in moft parts of it; and it is with 

 great pleafure and fatisfa<i!!lion that I found nearly realized, 

 what I conceived exifted only in the imagination of fome 

 warm and zealous advocates, Wz. a perfedl: fyflem of rural 

 management. There, the farms, generally largcy are nearly all 

 held under the fecurity of long leafes, occupied by enlightened 

 tenants, pollefTrng abundant capital, a£livity, and enterprize, and 

 cultivated in a mallerly flyle. There, we behold the plough 

 sfcending the fummits of Iteep hills ; which, among tenants at 

 will, or thofe holding by fnort leafes, would be doomed to eternal 

 ilerility. There, we not only behold great crops of corn raifed 

 on inferior foils, farmed at from 25 to 30 (hillings an acre, (which, 

 in feveral other parts of the kingdom, notwithitanding their pro- 

 ximity to better markets, would fcarcely bring one half of thefc 

 rents), but even a greater proportion of them taken to market, 

 than when eilates are divided into fmall farms. There, certain 

 political economifts and arithmeticians may be fatisfied, that, 

 though rhe farmers have decreafed in num.ber, the country has 

 rapidly increafed in improvement and population ; and there we « 

 find what is really obferved in our bell rmu2L^iti\ f out hern dijlriEls^ 

 namely, that to confiderable theoretical and fcientific knowledge, 

 the cultivators of the foil join excellent praEl'ice ; and that the 

 bell tillage farmers are nearly all adepts in breeding, rearing, 

 and fattening live ftock. In that diifri^l, Sir, I have aJfo ob- 

 ferved that the cultivation of turnips is more fuccefsrully purfued 

 than in any other I have feen ; and this, in my mind, ariles, in a 

 great meafure, from the almoll univerfal practice of fowing the 

 feed in rows on fmall ridges, (containing all the dung in their in- 

 fides, with broad intervals of 26 to 28 inches), and to the facility 

 which that mode atlbrds of giving the moil cheap and eflicacious 

 and frequent hoeings. The pvopriery of this mode of cultivation, 

 however, has been controverted by fome of your correfpondents, 

 but I perfectly coincide in the opinion you have exprefled upon it. 

 ^nd herd muH beg leave to remark, that though * the fharp nib* 



of 



