Rural Economy in New England 327 



year course, alternating grain, grass and fallow, a system reminding 

 one of the three-field agriculture of the Middle Ages. The first crop 

 in this case was usually maize, followed by rye, oats or barley. It 

 was the practice to sow one of the latter grains in the fall after the 

 maize crop had ripened. After this second crop had been harvested, 

 the ground was laid down to grass, or more regularly left to "sow 

 itself;" which meant simply that it was allowed to grow up to weeds, 

 producing the much-condemned weed-fallow. This primitive prac- 

 tice was varied by the extension of the alternating crops over a period 

 of several years each, and also by the occasional interjection of other 

 crops.^ The Massachusetts Agricultural Society summarized the 

 answers from its correspondents on this subject as follows: "The 

 answers from our other correspondents agree in stating the general 

 succession of crops to be Indian corn and potatoes for one or two 

 years; then either rye, oats or spring wheat; sometimes flax and when 

 the land is laid down to grass, it is usually with barley. It may be 

 inferred from the replies that the land is usually broken up after 

 being in grass three or four years; and that it is usually ploughed 

 about three years, and then laid down as above stated."^ There 

 had been practically no improvement along this line since the Revolu- 

 tion, for in 1775 the author of American Husbandry had written: 

 "They (the farmers of New England) sow large quantities of maize, 

 some wheat, barley, oats, buckwheat, pease, and beans, turneps, 

 and clover: hemp and flax in small parcels. And these they throw 

 after one another, with variations, so as to keep the land, as well 

 as their ideas permit, from being quite exhausted; which they effect 

 by the intervention of a ploughed summer fallow sometimes. When 

 the land has borne corn for several years, till it threatens to yield 

 no more, then they sow clover among the last crop, and leave it 

 as a meadow for some years to recover itself. But all this system 

 proceeds too much on the plan of the worst farmers of Great Britain, 

 to get corn (i.e., grain) from their fields as long as ever they will 

 bear it."' In general we may say that some farmers were making 



' According to the Rev. Mr. Goodrich, the rotation of crops practiced in Ridge- 

 field was: 1st year, buckwheat or rye; 2nd year, Indian corn; 3rd year, flax or 

 oats, followed by rye sown in the fall; 4th year, pasture. After remaining in 

 pasture a few years the land was broken up and the same routine was repeated. 

 Statistical Account, p. 6. 



* Papers, II. 28. 



' Op. cit., pp. 75-76. Clover had been introduced in some parts, but not to 

 any great extent, before 1800. It was valued rather as making good hay than 

 for any appreciation of its service in recuperating the soil. Deane wrote in 1790: 



