l8oo. Siitntnef Fallow into Scotland. l6^ 



land, or, In other words, prepared it for a crop by re- 

 peated plougliings and liarrowings during tlie Sunanier 

 months, was John Walker, tenant at Beanfton in the 

 county of Ealt Lothian. Mr Walker was a refpeftable 

 charadler in his profeffion, and was chief of a family 

 long diftinguilhed among the cultivators of that diftridl. 

 He was the intimate friend of the celebrated Sir Wil- 

 liam Bennet, Bart, (to whom the honour of writing the 

 Gentle Shepherd has been generally attributed), who 

 ufually fpent a good part of his time at Beanfton ; and 

 this intimacy affords a flrong prefumption, that Mr 

 Walker h.ad received a liberal education, and poffeffed 

 a larger ftock of knowledge than was then common a- 

 mong the generality of his brethren. 



The circumftance which induced him to attempt this 

 beneficial improvement, as we are informed by one of hia 

 defcendants, proceeded from a converfation with fome 

 Englifii travellers on a tour through Scotland, with whom 

 he fpent an evening, and who communicated the necef- 

 fary information refpefling the method ufed by our 

 fouthern neighbours in the fallowing of land. Refolv- 

 ing, in confequence of their fuggeftion, to try the ef- 

 ficacy of Summer ploughing, he next year left a field 

 unfown, confifting of fix acres of heavy loam, imme- 

 diately to tl)e weftward of the prefent ftack-yard of 

 Beanfton Mains ; and the attention of his neighbours 

 was immediately fixed upon what they confidered to be 

 a newfangled and foolifti experiment. Some of his fa- 

 pient friends concluded that his inind was deranged i 

 while others, of greater prudence, fagely conje£lured, 

 that poverty v/as the real caufe, and that money waS: 

 yanting for purchafing feed. Mr Walker, however, 

 went on coolly with his operations •, .and the field, after 

 being dunged, was fown with wheat, and produced a 

 crop which elTedtually filenced the obfervations of his; 

 neisfhbours. 



The next year, he fuccefsfully increafed the fize or 

 his fallow break •, and the pra6lice, in a fliort time, ra- 

 pidly fpread over all the county of Eaic Lothian. From 

 Maxwell's CoUedions, we learn, that fo early as 1724, 

 k was commonly praftifed upon all the ftrong foils in 

 that county every fifth or fixth year; and to its intro-, 

 dudion may, in d. great meafure, be attributed the ac- 



ktiowU^dged. 



