158 Rural Economy of the Netherlands. 



The peat-bogs that fill the hollows of this region give rise 

 to a special kind of farm management. No man lives there, 

 indeed he can hardly move about them without danger. The 

 neighbouring farmers therefore lease, or as they express it, pur- 

 chase the land for twelve years. In the spring they dry the 

 surface of the bog by making drains in it, then they cut the 

 turfs, which are left through the summer to dry. In the spring 

 of the following year they .set fire to the dried turfs, level them 

 with a harrow, and sow buckwheat. The land so treated pro- 

 duces five or six crops in succession, ; after the third, the 

 yield begins to fall off; from the fourth, spurrey, a plant not 

 native to the peat-bogs, makes its appearance, and gradually 

 overruns the land, so that in the sixth year spurrey and buck- 

 wheat together are cut as forage for cattle. When the land is 

 completely exhausted it is again abandoned to the natural 

 herbage. Twenty-five or thirty years must elapse before the bog 

 is restored, so as to offer a seed-bed for cultivated plants. The 

 area burnt every year is so great that the thick columns of 

 smoke, driven by the north wind, spread over the half of Europe ; 

 a special odour, says M. de Laveleye, accompanies the appear- 

 ance of this singular phenomenen, which the people call dry, 

 or northern mists, without questioning their origin. 



We have got very far away from the pastures of Holland and the 

 gardens of Westland. These wild regions, whose aspect carries 

 us into ancient Germany, as described by Tacitus, abound in 

 those singular monuments which the Celtic race have every- 

 where left behind them. We refer to the enormous blocks of 

 granite, placed one upon the other, like gigantic tables. They 

 are called in the locality the beds, or tombs, of the Huns, and 

 according to popular tradition, they were set up by the hordes of 

 Attila ; but it is quite evident that their origin is the same as 

 that of Carnac stones in Brittany, or of Stonehenge in England. 



Happily the sandy tract is not everywhere equally barren. 

 M. de Laveleye \ states, that in the other provinces the best 

 systems of cultivation have been introduced. More import- 

 ance is given to green crops, rye is less frequently repeated, 

 clover is grown, and some approach is made to the alternate 

 system of cropping. Both the practice and the products of hus- 

 bandry are then nearly the same as in Belgium. One portion 

 of the province of Liinbourg, which is naturally more produc- 

 tive, is exceedingly thriving. In the peaty tract of Groningen, 

 peat-farming has given rise to real colonies, that furnish one of 

 the brightest pages in the agricultural history of the country. 

 The work of settlement proceeds at the present time. The city 

 of Groningen, possessing a large extent of unreclaimed peat, 

 has made a canal, and opened the way to new settlers. The 



