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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



commend, by means wliereof I obtained a more 

 flourishing garden at Bishop's Hall, in a most bar- 

 ren and unfruitful plot of ground which none of 

 my predecessors could ever grace or beautify either 

 with knots or Howers. I have had good experience, 

 with singular good success, by strewing the waste 

 soap ashes upon a border of summer barley ; malt 

 dust may here also challenge his place, for four or 

 live quarters thereof are sufficient for an acre of 

 ground; and sal-ammoniac, being a volatile salt, 

 first incorporated and rotted in common earth, is 

 thought to be a rich mould to plant or set in. 

 Dogs and cats and other beasts, and generally all 

 carrion, buried under the roots of trees, in due 

 time will make them flourish and bring forth in 

 great abundance." 



Up to this time wheaten flour was a comparative 

 luxury, being served only at the master's table ; 

 and we gather from Tusser that wheat was only 

 partially grown, for he writes — 

 " In SufTolk again, whereas wheat never grew, 



Good husbandry used, good wheat land I knew." 



And an old writer of this time, the Rev. W. 

 Harrison, adds that labourers and artisans were 

 driven to content themselves with horse corn, 

 beans, peas, oats, tares, and lentils; and the same 

 writer, describing the manners in Elizabeth's time, 

 states, " There were few chimneys even in capital 

 towns; the fire was laid to the wall, and the smoke 

 issued out of the roof, or door, or window. The 

 houses were built of clay, and all the furniture and 

 utensils of wood. The people slept on straw pal- 

 lets, with a log of wood for their jiillow : the 

 filthiness of their habitations and the slovenliness 

 of their persons abridged the duration of human 

 life." 



The civil war against Charles I. ])roved another 

 disastrous period for agriculture. The farmers' 

 produce was cut before it was ripe : his sheep, 

 cattle, and corn, were stolen by the contending 

 forces ; and he, poor fellow, very often cruci- 

 fied between two sets of thieves. "With such a 

 state of things, no wonder that farming languished, 

 for men were not inclined, even if they had the 

 knowledge, to do much to enrich the soil. 



The agricultural writer of this reign was one 

 Gabriel Plattes, who has the credit of introducing 

 the first drilling machine ; he, poor man, like 

 many more, had laboured for the benefit of others, 

 80 that he became destitute of the necessaries of 

 life, and fell down in the streets of London, and 

 died of hunger. 



Oliver Cromwell bestowed some little favour 

 upon agriculture, for he pensioned Uartlib, the 

 agricultural writer of that day ; he was, however, 

 forgotten at the Restoration, and he, too, it is 

 believed, died in great poverty. 



Towards the close of the seventeenth century 

 important improvements were introduced, particu- 

 larly the cullivation of clover and turnips ; these 

 had long been known, but not cultivated in the 

 field, and then only on a very limited scale. The 

 first notice wc have of feeding ort" turnips is in 

 1684, when it was observed that sheep fattened 

 very well upon them. And that invaluable root, 

 the potato, which has atlbrded so much comfort, 



and, in importance, comes next to bread to the 

 working man, although introduced by Sir Walter 

 Raleigh in 158(5, was not generally cultivated until 

 the close of this century. 



" It was not, then, until the establishment of 

 complete order, sometime subsequent to the Revo- 

 lution, that there ajipears to have been any mate- 

 rial improvement in the ordinary practice of hus- 

 bandry; though, no doubt, the extent of land 

 devoted to agriculture must, from the growing 

 amount of the exportation of corn during the early 

 part of the eighteenth century, have been con- 

 siderably increased, and, in consequence of the 

 comparative prevalence of domestic quiet, many 

 landholders turned their attention to a subject that 

 was so closely allied with their welfare." * And 

 agricultural societies were formed, and our Scot- 

 tish brethren led the van in this particular, for in 

 1723 one was formed, designated the " Society of 

 Improvers in the Knowledge of Agriculture in Scot- 

 land." And about this time in England, noble- 

 men were found who took a lively interest in this 

 subject. Lord Tovvnsend, on retiring from politi- 

 cal Ufe, " and which," says a writer, "went on none 

 the worse without him," spent eight years of his 

 life in improving his estate : to him we owe the 

 introduction, on a large scale, of turnip husbandry; 

 for this, he met with great prejudice and ridicule, 

 and was called "Turnip Townsend." He sur- 

 mounted these, for he had sagacity to see that this 

 crojj was the foundation for all future crops ; and, 

 from its introduction, land that was not worth 

 previously 2s. 6d, an acre, now readily lets for 308. 

 This nobleman was ably supported in all his efforts 

 for the improvement of the land by Jethro TuU, 

 who flourished at this time, viz., in 1730, and wbo 

 conceived the idea of drilling crops in rows at 

 wide intervals, and also introduced horse-hoe 

 husbandry ; and it has been observed by his bio- 

 grapher that his system completelely revolution- 

 ized the whole practice of husbandry ; and that 

 his name will ever descend to posterity as one of 

 the greatest luminaries, if not one of the greatest 

 benefactors that British agriculture has the pride 

 to acknowledge. This last improvement was pecu- 

 liar only to Norfolk, no other part of the country 

 having to any extent adopted it. And about this 

 time that system was introduced which has so 

 eminently raised the farming of England — I allude 

 to the four-course, that is : 1st, turnips; 2nd, bar- 

 ley ; 3rd, clover ; 4th, wheat. The Norfolk culti- 

 vators were never tempted to take two corn crops 

 in succession ; they had learnt the importance of 

 alternating grain with other crops. They soon 

 found the advantage of barley following turnips; 

 the clover the barley; and wheat the clover These 

 changes were wrought from 1730 to 1760; "and 

 the next step," says Mr. Sidney, " was to break 

 down the ])arriers which separated the farmers of that 

 day, and which left them nearly as ignorant of 

 what was going on in every district besides their 

 own, as of what was passing in -China or Japan. 

 The active agent in this good work was Arthur 

 Young, the son of a clergyman in Sutlblk; he ap- 

 j)ears to have been one of those who could write 



Dudgeon Roy. Ag. Soc. Jour, vol, i. 



