414 HORTUS GRAMINEL'S WOBURNENSIS. 



excellence in a degree superior to those species now mentioned, 

 for the Alternate Husbandry, nevertheless, it appears to have a 

 greater variety of merits for this purpose than almost any other 

 grass. It soon arrives at maturity ; it bears cropping well, is very 

 productive, and its nutritive powers are considerable. It is much 

 less impoverishing to the soil than rye-grass, and when ploughed 

 in affords a greater quantity of vegetable matter to the soil. It 

 has been objected to cock's-foot, that it rises in tufts, and is apt to 

 become coarse. But the objections will apply to every grass that 

 is not sown sufficiently thick to occupy with plants every spot of 

 the ground, and that is not afterwards sufficiently stocked to keep 

 the surface in a succession of young leaves. It is the practice of 

 thin sowing, and the strong reproductive powers of the plant, that 

 occasion it to appear a hassocky grass. If one species only is 

 therefore thought preferable to several in the Alternate Husbandry, 

 there is scarcely a species to be preferred to the Dactylis glome- 

 rata. But with respect to an early and certain supply of the most 

 nutritious herbage throughout the season, it will be found a vain 

 labour to look for it in one species of grass, but only where Nature 

 has provided it, in a combination of many. It will likewise be 

 found, that the Dactylis glomerata, from its more numerous merits, 

 should constitute three parts of a mixture of grasses adapted for 

 the purposes of the Alternate Husbandry. The different species 

 most proper to combine with cock's-foot, are such as possess in a 

 greater degree the properties of which this grass is deficient. For 

 this purpose, none appear better fitted than the Festuca dnriuscula, 

 Festuca pratensis, Poa trivialis, Holctts avenaceus, Phleum prafense, 

 Loliiim perenne, and white clover, which should be in a smaller 

 proportion. A combination thus formed, of three parts cock's- 

 foot, and one part of these species just mentioned, will secure the 

 most productive and nutritive pasture in alternation with grain 

 crops, on soils of the best quality ; and even on soils of an inferior 

 nature, under the circumstances of unfavourable seasons, will 

 afford nutritive herbage, when otherwise the land would have been 

 comparatively devoid of it, if one species of grass only had been 

 employed. 



