128 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



easily pushed into a hard subsoil than the continuous end of a 

 spade ; secondly, it does not bring up so much of the subsoil as 

 the spade, but mixes the earth more, a great portion slipping 

 through between the prongs ; thirdly, the bottom is left more 

 uneven and broken by the fork, which I consider a great advan 

 tage. One great objection to the plough is, the smooth, glazed 

 surface which it leaves below, and which presents a resistance 

 to the delicate fibres of the plant. If it is correct that, in most 

 instances, the present surface soil is nothing more than a portion 

 of the subsoil improved by cultivation, it must be right to 

 increase the quantity of corn-growing earth by subjecting more 

 subsoil to the same operation. &quot; 



&quot; An instance is given of the spade husbandry of a farmer in 

 Worcestershire, who has cultivated four acres of very stiff clay 

 land, two acres of it for seventeen years, and two acres for 

 twenty-seven years. He grows, annually, wheat and potatoes, 

 with about one quarter of an acre of beans, the crop being- 

 shifted alternately from one division to the other. His mode of 

 cultivation is as follows : As soon as the wheat is off, he ploughs 

 his stubble-ground, raking up the stubble to litter his pigs j he 

 then digs it over with a fork, and plants on it potatoes in the 

 following spring ; this crop being kept clean, the land needs no 

 further preparation for wheat. He does most of the labor him 

 self j but he estimates it to amount to about 4 6s. per acre: 

 his average produce has been rather more than forty bushels of 

 wheat and twelve tons of potatoes per acre. The system he 

 follows, as regards the cropping of the land, therefore, is evi 

 dently of the most trying description ; and this is not all, for he 

 sells all his produce, even his straw, excepting a few potatoes 

 and beans, which he consumes in annually feeding about thirty 

 or forty score of bacon for his own consumption. He litters his 

 pigs with the potato haulm and stubble ; and the manure from 

 this source, and from his privy, with some clay out of his 

 ditches, which he gets occasionally and burns, is all that he has 

 to fertilize the land with. 



&quot; Leaving out of consideration the small quantity of beans 

 raised and bacon fed, valuing the wheat at 7 s. per bushel, and 

 the rest of his produce at the price he obtains for it, we shall 

 have something like the following account of his farming : 



