THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



27 



them. He said, " We, gentlemen, are not always our own 

 masters, for, as I wrote you word, it was my own and my 

 man's intention to have forwarded some beet and turnips 

 for show, but my man was so put out with the weather, and 

 he was not able to get his beet-root up, and his wheat in, 

 of which he had nearly sixty acres to dibble, that he could 

 not attend to shows this year ; therefore I should not be 

 much surprised if they were not sent; and I have not been 

 there since Saturday last. I can tell you how the beet was 

 grown, and it was the best piece about. The land was 

 ploughed the middle of the harvest 18.59, and laid until the 

 spring, when it was split open, and about fourteen loads of 

 good farmyard manure put on. The turnips were ploughed 

 for in the spring, and drilled on the ridge with muck. I 

 think they were hoed three times ; but they are fair for the 

 year, and will be clamped this year. The rotten muck ap- 

 pears to do better than that out of the yards (long-muck). 

 P.S. I do not know whether it is generally known, as I gain 

 it privately, that a great part of the butter consumed in 

 Australia is sent out from Ireland and England packed in 

 tin cases ; therefore at present it mast keep up." 



Mr. Gordon said he should like to make one observation. 

 He thought Mr. Partridge would remember that he said at 

 that table last year he thought his (Mr. Gurdon's) mangold 

 would have been better if, instead of growing it thirty inches 

 from row to row, and thirteen from plant to plant, he had 

 grown it twenty-seven and fifteen inches. He took his ad" 

 vioe this year. He did not know he was at all wrong ,as to 

 twenty-seven inches, but he wished he had planted it thir- 

 teen from plant to plant, as he had lost two-fifteenths in the 

 number of plants. With the smallness of roots this yesr he 

 had a great loss. If they had been large roots, Mr. Par- 

 tridge's would have been good advice. If they asked him, 

 he would stick to twenty-seven inches ; and fourteen inches 

 from one plant to the other. He thought fifteen inches 

 more than sufficient. If there was a year of small plants, 

 they had a number of plants to make up ; whereas if there 

 were a few plants, and it turned out a year like this, then 

 they were left behind. With respect to dibbling, he believed 

 Mr. Garnham would tell them that the moment he got the 

 dibble from the blacksmith he sent his drill home ; and he 

 thought that nothing would persuade him to use the drill 

 again. He thought a man would be able to dibble six acres 

 in a day. They knew what the cost a mau would be to drag 

 the wheel ; he was accompanied by four boys to assist, and 

 these five could do sis acres a-day ; and half the seed was 

 sufficient — 2lbs., instead 41bs. Putting the seed at Is. per 

 lb., there was a saviqg of 12s. ; and he left it for more prac- 

 tical farmers than himself to say what was the result of that, 

 in point of cheapness, between a drill and horse, and two 

 men to attend the drill. Let them set one against the other, 

 and look at it in a pecuniary view. He was sure the dibble 

 was an instrument which would hereafter be generally used 

 for mangolds. He had, however, seen a gentleman this 

 year from the Ipswich Club, who had told him he had tried 

 the dibble, and given it up. He (Mr. GurdonJ tried the 

 dibble with a cone last year, and did not like it. This year, 

 instead of having a round cone, he had a blunt edge, three 

 inches long. 



Mr. PosTANS was quite sure Mr. Gurdon was correct in 

 what he had said about it having been an advanti ge this 

 year to have plants rather thicker than usual ; he found 

 this was the case with Mr. Norman's. His were all drilled, 

 put in very regularly with the drill, There was a great 

 difference in the way in which seed was put in by the drill. 

 Mr. Norman's drill was one of Pratt's ; this dropped the 



seed in a regular manner. Ho thought it was not generally 

 an advantage to be too sparing in seed. With respect to 

 Mr. James Norman's, the number of roots was found to be 

 102 or 103 in the red: this would insome measure account for 

 the great weight he had : as the roots this year did not grow 

 to the usual size, his bemg thicker than others who had ex- 

 hibited, accounted for the increased weight. Most ot their 

 neighbours he thought had exploded the dibbling system in 

 the common way, making the round cone, especially on 

 land rather heavy. Where they made the round cone on 

 land which happened to be wet, a considerable quantity of 

 water came up, and the whole of the plants came up yellow 

 and weak. He thought the plan suggested by Mr. Gurdon 

 an excellent one — to use an iristrument making a hole in a 

 wedge-like form. 



The Chairman said most of those present probably had 

 sufi'ered this year from the disease in potatoes, and perhaps 

 at this moment some of them had very few. He heard 

 from many growers of potatoes, who had made considerable 

 money in the trade, that they found that the fluke potato 

 (none of which had been exhibited that day) appeared to 

 be the least diseased of any sort grown. They had heard a 

 great deal of the Scotch potatoes that had arrived both at 

 Ipswich and Colchester, and that they were not diseased ; 

 but a lady who had bought some at Ipswich told him that, 

 out of a sack, before she consumed them, a great number 

 were diseased; therefore, they must not believe all they 

 heard about those imported, but at the same time some were 

 very good ones. 



Mr. Gordon said his fiukes were the only sort not diseased 

 this year. 



The conversation here became complimentary, and the 

 meeting shortly afterwards broke up. If farmers would, 

 however, always speak out as they did at Hadleigh, what 

 stores of practical information would be opened up ! 



FARMERS' CLUBS IN THE EASTERN COUNTIES. 

 — A great number of agricultural gatheringa have re- 

 cenely been held on the eastern side of the country. The 

 Coggeshall Farmers' Club used to be generally rendered 

 rather famous by a discourse from Mr. Mechi; but this 

 yeat the worthy Alderman failed to put in an appearance, 

 and the great authority of the evening was Mr. Fisher 

 Hobbs, who, in reply to a question whether he considered that 

 land dug with the spade to the depth ot thirteen or fourteen 

 inches was in a better condition than land ploughed to that 

 depth with a steam plough, said at present there was a great 

 diversity of opinion as to the beat mode of applying steam- 

 power to the cultivation of the soil ; but he believed everyone 

 would admit that at all events for root crops the deeper land 

 was broken up the better. The Coggeshall district was a 

 neighbourhood in which spade husbandry was carried out to 

 the greatest advantage; but, of course, if the furrow-slice was 

 turned over, it did not signify whether it was done by manual 

 power, by horse-power, or by steam. If the implement was 

 the same, and would turn the furrow-slice over at the same 

 angle, there was little difference, except that horses trod the 

 land down the most. The great advantage of steam was that 

 it enabled farmers to do a greater amount of work at one par- 

 ticular period of the year ; and he had no doubt that ultimately 

 steam-power would be used soon after harvest, for eighteen 

 hours out of the twenty-four. In Suffolk the farmers' clubs 

 appear to be very numerous — meetings of this description 

 having been held at Ipswich, Fraralingham, Hsdleigh, Eye, 

 and Debenhara. At Eye, Mr. R. Bond came out with a paper 

 on "The Past, Present, and Future of Agriculture." At 

 Ipswich, Sir Fitzroy Kelly did not turn up ; but the chair was 

 well filled by Mr. Manfred Biddell, and a pleasant and ia- 

 ctructive evening was spent. 



