THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



135 



Table II. 



The comparative table (No. Ill) is pregnant with matter 

 deserving of very careful consideration ; and, first, we 

 remark that amongst that class of landlords and tenants 

 who may be termed Conservative Rotationists, no creed 

 in husbandry is more implicitly believed, than that as a 

 field crop the turnip is to be regarded not only as 



guilty of no tendency to deteriorate the soil by any 

 undue drafts on the nutritive elements of the land, but 

 that in every respect a turnip crop leaves the staple in a 

 bettered condition for the plentiful growth of the suc- 

 ceeding members of the course. Here it is impossible, 

 without transgressing reasonable limits, to trace the 

 origin and rise of this fallacious belief: suffice it to say, 

 firstly, that those evidences usually cited by the ortho- 

 dox upholder of rotative practice in support of this 

 theory are really due to the immensely improved methods 

 of working the land which contemporaneously have 

 sprung up with the spread of alternate husbandry ; 

 secondly, that, in point of fact, there is more than 

 double the amount of vegetative nutriment withdrawn 

 from the soil by an average yield of cattle crops than 

 by an ordinary produce of corn; and, thirdly, a very 

 convincing instance will be cited from the experiments 

 under consideration, of the injury to the succeeding 

 barley, actually caused by the excessive voracity of the 

 turnip as a plant of field culture. In support of these 

 three propositions, it would be inconvenient at present 

 to enter on any argument. In evidence of the second, 

 the following analytical table is appealed to : 



Table IV. 



Showing, by the Analysis of the ordinary crops of a Four-course Rotation, that a produce of Turnips and Clover of 

 average amount withdraws more vegetative nutriment from the soil than is withdrawn by the two corn crops of the 

 course. 



Inorganic 

 matters in 

 the crops. 



Silica .. 



Potash and soda 

 Lime and magnesia 

 Oxide of iron .. 

 Chlorine 

 Phosphoric acid 

 Sulphuric „ 

 Carbonic „ 



Inorganic matter in excess in turnips com- "1 

 pared with barley .. .. J 



Inorganic matter in excess in turnips com- \ 

 pared with wheat . . . . J 



Inorganic matter in excess in cattle crops "1 

 compared with corn crops . . J 



Organic t 

 matters in the 

 crops. 



Water 



Organic matter in excess in cattle crops compared with corn crops 



