THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



467 



had been, in times past. Far too generally the 

 stubbles were neglected until the wheat sowing was 

 finished, unless it happened to be very wet ; and 

 when the land was not fit for the horses to go upon 

 it, they were sent in to " poach," tread it down, 

 and plough. Then in the month of February it 

 was customary to cross-plough, and work the land 

 as they could in the spring; and they all knew 

 that they could not work when they would, at that 

 season of the year. But after a variety of cross- 

 ploughing, scarifying, and harrowing, the work 

 was carried on somehow or other so as to get the 

 crop in during the month of May, or perhaps not 

 until June or even July. Mr. Fusey, in the Royal 

 Agricultural Society's Journal, gave a description 

 of the old system in much better terms than he 

 could : 



" The usual method has been to let the sheep 

 range over the grassy stubbles in autumn, and give 

 the land a winter ploughing towards Christmas. 

 In dry, spring weather it is again ploughed to 

 bring the couch uppermost, drag-harrowed with 

 three or four horses to break the furrows, scarified 

 with four or five horses to bring up the long roots, 

 heavy rolled with three or four to squeeze the clods, 

 light harrowed, light rolled again, light harrowed 

 again, then all the hands turn out with rakes to 

 gather this unravelled network, heap it, and burn 

 it. But if the ground be really foul you have not 

 done yet. After a few days you see fresh blades 

 of grass shooting up over the bare ground, and 

 find the enemy still left behind, so that the plough- 

 ing, harrowing, rolling, raking, and burning 

 must begin over again — very likely be repeated a 

 third time." 



Mr. Darby observed he did not mean to say that 

 a few years since it was as bad as this in every 

 case ; but still on heavy soils it was a very fair 

 description of what the old method used to be. 

 Now, this system had many disadvantages. As 

 he had said before, if the stubbles were ploughed 

 when too wet, they were " poached," and the surface 

 did not present that presence to atmospheric agency 

 which they all liked to have throughout the winter, 

 so that the atmospheric air could get in and dis- 

 integrate the particles of the soil, Then again, 

 from the uncertainty of the weather in spring, the 

 after-culture was hurried in a manner it ought not 

 to be, and this was a very great disadvantage in 

 the old method of treating stubbles. From the 

 same cause the crop was often put in very badly, 

 and the land not properly cleaned ; then they found 

 couch grass spring up among the turnips, which 

 was never got rid of, and the land got fouler and 

 fouler, until it came to turnips again. The sowing 

 was likewise often thrown backward, and the crop 

 endangered altogether. Another great disadvan- 

 tage was that the weeds were left in the soil 

 throughout the winter, where they grew, and 

 robbed the land of that ammonia which ought 

 to be stored up for the future crops. It was now 

 an acknowledged axiom that if the land be properly 

 cultivated, it gets throughout the winter from 2 

 cwt. to 3 cwt. of ammonia from the atmosphere. 

 Then another serious disadvantage of the old 

 method was, that it very often interfered with the 

 sowing of other crops. He now came to the ques- 



tion of expense. It had been proved by all who 

 had tried the two systems that the old way of 

 treating the soil was a very expensive one (Hear, 

 hear). Mr. Pusey, in the article which he had 

 quoted, gave an estimate of the expense of the 

 operations under the old system at £2 9s. Cd. per 

 acre; but although this was stated to be on 

 heavy land, he (Mr. Darby) thought it a rather 

 exaggerated estimate. He tlicuglit few of theai 

 who had tried the old way of treating stubbles 

 would consider they had over expended much above 

 £2 per acre. But tliat was a great expense to in- 

 cur in the prepararation of land for turnips ; and he 

 should suppose that the cost of autuiini cleaning 

 wovdd )iot be above £1 or £1 5s. per acre at the 

 outside. Well, these disadvantages had in many 

 cases led to gradual improvement. Years ago they 

 were felt so much that many excellent farmers wrote 

 on the subject, and endeavoured to prove that stub- 

 bles ought to be ploughed as soon after harvest as 

 possible ; but still after plougl.ing they allowed the 

 laud to remain all tlic winter just as it was before, 

 and although it presented a better surface to the at- 

 mosphere, yet there were the same objections to be 

 made to the after-culture in spring. He now came 

 to the new system of autumn cultivation for root 

 crops. Most of them knew what it was ; but still, 

 in order to make tlie opening of the subject more 

 complete, he supposed a short description would be 

 necessary. The modern system was to go over the 

 stubbles, where foul, with some cultivator, either 

 Beutall's or Coleman's, as soon after harvest as 

 possible : some farmers who were willing to go " the 

 whole hog " had actually performed tliis work while 

 the corn was on the lanS. They had cut the corn, 

 put it in " stetches," raked the hand, and commenced 

 this work of scarifying before the crop was carried. 

 Few of those present, however, commenced quite so 

 early as that ; but the argument in favour of the 

 plan was, that while the fine weather lasted they 

 ought to take every fine day they could to perform 

 this work, and it was stated that when cutting corn 

 there were generally some horses thrown out of 

 work which ought "to be thus employed. But al- 

 though it might not be convenient for all of them to 

 do this, the general practice was that it should be 

 done as early as possible in September. Of course 

 the expense"of this new system depended upon the 

 foulness of the land, and whether" it was of a light 

 or heavy character. Sometimes merely going over 

 it once would be sufficient, followiu^g after with the 

 harrows, then raking it up, and burning it. Indeed, 

 some farmers were in the habit of first goiug with 

 men to fork out the couch whcic it is not very foul, 

 and afterwards merely giving the land a little sur- 

 face scratching ; it all depended upon the state of 

 the stubbles. But to lay down a rule, of course 

 the new system meant that all the surface should be 

 cleaned, and the land worked as early as {jossible in 

 the autunm. Mr. John Grey, in a discussion on 

 weeds at the Hexham Club, said : — 



" He began, as soon as the crop was stored, or as 

 soon as possible, with skim-ploughing the surface, 

 harrowing and raking it together, and carting it off, 

 putting il into the fold -yard to be the nucleus of the 

 manure heap for next year. He then gave the laud 

 a deep ploughing, harrowed it, and put it into drills 



