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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



this becomes more especially applicable upon those 

 portions designed for grain crops in the following year. 

 It might even be advisable to carry out the system 

 upon those lands designed for roots, keeping in mind 

 that the plough is to follow as soon as it can be intro- 

 duced. 



From the harvesting a crop of early rye in the middle 

 of Julj', to the conclusion of the harvest by the end of 

 August, much labour will be required upon a well- 

 cultivated farm. The rye land will come into early cul- 

 tivation for the swede and common turnip or coleworts, 

 and it will be necessary to complete this business in a 

 fortnight at furthest. Then will follow the preparation 

 of the land for the reception of the early rye by the first 

 week in September. Land in beans and peas will have 

 to be cleared from surface weeds, ploughed, and sca- 

 rified as a preparation for the ensuing wheat crop. Land 

 designed for mangold-wurzol, early swedes, and pota- 

 toes, will require from one to two ploughings per acre 

 before November, with repeated scariiyings and har- 

 rowings, to eradicate the couch and root weerls. All the 

 land designed for oats, peas, or beans should have a 

 scarifying and harrowing; so that in addition to the 



labour arising from the carrying on manure for the 

 wheat crop, the greatest activity must prevail until 

 the period arrives for putting in that crop. All this 

 cannot be effected unless the plough teams are kept 

 constantly going during the whole of the harvest month. 

 At that busy season the operation of the plough and 

 scarifier should never cease. The ploughmen's services 

 ought never to be engaged in harvest work excepting 

 at the times of carrying the corn, or whenever the 

 horses are required at other descriptions of work that 

 cannot well be deferred. The old practice used to be 

 for the ploughmen to commit themselves for a month 

 or five weeks to harvest work entirely ; during which 

 period the horses were unemployed except when actually 

 required in carrying the corn. By this neglect of the 

 menus at the proper time, the land was necessitated to 

 the operation subsequently of a whole summer's fallow. 

 Now, however, that the theory of cultivation becomes 

 better understood and has been reduced to practice, it 

 is not found necessary to allow lands to remain for a 

 whole year in iallow, to the loss of a valuable root 

 crop, and a greatly increased outlay both in time and 

 labour. 



THE EDUCATION OF THE FARMER VIEWED IN CONNECTION 

 WITH THAT OF THE MIDDLE CLASSES IN GENERAL: ITS 

 OBJECTS, PRINCIPLES, AND COST. 



What a fine comprehensive term that same 

 '■^farmer" has gradually become! Would any 

 one now dare to define exactly what it does, or 

 what it docs not mean ? Farmer, a tiller of the soil 

 — who tills three thousand acres, who has capital 

 in proportion, and headpiece to match — who imites 

 with the position and manner of the gentleman the in- 

 nate heartiness of the English yeoman. Or, farmer, a 

 poor hand -tied struggling man, in social rank and in- 

 telligence hardly one whit superior to his own labourer, 

 who contrives to just "live on" the small holding 

 he has somehow or other got into. Or , farmer , again, a 

 dashing, scientific man of business, who carries all be- 

 fore him by a coup-de main— who teaches people their 

 own trade without ever deigning to learn it himself, 

 and shows them how to live well by it, whilst he lives 

 by something else. We have all these, and many more, 

 varieties at present flourishing on English ground. In 

 fact, agriculture never before was so much in fashion. 

 Men talk it and preach it continually. Next to telling 

 you what a horse is worth, or a prime minister should 

 do, there is nothing we all speak to with so much com- 

 placent self-satisfaction as to what a farmer is, or what 

 he ought to bo. 



In a word, this bringing the man up to what he 

 ought to be is the great point. How shall we educate 

 the English farmer? And hero in a moment w^o fall 

 back, faint at the very vaguene? s of the title. To fit a 

 young gentleman for such a state of life, must still 

 surely be no such great difficulty after all :— -Three or 



four years at a good public or private school ; then a 

 term or two at Cirencester, or witli Mr. Nesbitj and 

 after that, as a finish, two or three jears more with 

 Mr. Hudson of Castleacre, Mr. Ilutley of Witham, 

 Mr. Barthropp of Woodbridge, or any such well- 

 known man, who will not refuse to take a pupil or so. 

 Keep him a good horse to ride, so that he may go to 

 the market, and have a day occasionally with the 

 hounds ; encourage refined tastes and liberal notions ; 

 and start him, just by way of a trial, at three or four- 

 and-twenty, in a three or four hundred acre farm, with 

 ten pounds an acre to "do" it, and something more to 

 play with. And so you have the promise, at least, of a 

 farmer, who shall be no disgrace to his brother the 

 vicar, or his cousin in " the Forty-sixth;" and who, if 

 he really aspire to it, may marry one of his landlord's 

 daughters, or dance at the Cricket Club Ball with the 

 Lady Lord- lieutenant herself. 



Now, shift the siding, and take another picture. Let 

 us look to the farmer who can scarcely afford to give 

 his son any education whatever — who requires the 

 services of the lad the moment they are worth having ; 

 and who, if he docs send the boy to any place at all, 

 feels that the workman's child at the Charity or 

 National School has often the better of him. Or, 

 consider the perhaps more general medium between 

 these two — the young farmer who is sent to a " Com- 

 mercial Academy," and who is educated with no more 

 attention to his ultimate position and pursuits than if 

 he were intended for a clerk, a shopkeeper, or a mer- 



