CROPS. 475 



midity in the soil, so that the seed may come up the better. 

 When the seed is two or three inches high, it is then manured 

 again, with a copious dressing of liquid manure, so that the field 

 is in a condition to bear a crop of potatoes or of turnips the 

 same year. Where the liquid manure is from the privies of the 

 town, it is necessary to dilute it with water. The roots of 

 barley spreading upon the surface, rather than descending 

 deeply, it is not necessary to bury that or the manure deeply, 

 although where barley is sown in the autumn, it is generally 

 advised to plough it in with a light furrow. The crops in such 

 cases are very large, averaging more than sixty bushels to the 

 acre. The general cultivation in Flanders is most remarkable 

 for its carefulness, its most abundant labor, and its liberal manur 

 ing. I do not know where I should go to find that which is 

 superior to it ; and, indeed, it would be difficult to produce its 

 equal. The farmers of the United States would be startled at 

 the amount of manual labor bestowed upon their lands by the 

 Flemish. A redundant population gives them the means of 

 doing this with great advantage. 



It is well established that barley may succeed wheat, but 

 wheat does not well follow barley. Turnips are often taken 

 after barley, and a crop of rye after the turnips. Beans, likewise, 

 follow with advantage a crop of barley. 



5. OATS. Oats can hardly be said to be largely cultivated 

 in France. They are grown exclusively for the use of horses. 

 This, however, is more in the north than in the south. The 

 stimulating and exciting character of oats, as feed for horses, 

 renders them much more useful in a cold than in a warm climate. 

 Oats are supposed generally to be adapted to almost all soils and 

 climates ; bat, like other products, they repay a careful and lib 

 eral cultivation. It is pretended, by some persons, that a crop of 

 oats ameliorates rather than exhausts the soil. This may be the 

 case where oats are grown upon a turfy soil newly turned up 

 that is to say, it may be the best crop by which to reduce such 

 a soil into a condition for cultivation : but that it otherwise 

 enriches a soil can hardly be believed. It is the opinion, how 

 ever, of many farmers, that sooner than any other crop, it avails 

 itself of the nutritive parts of the soil, and reduces arid extracts 

 manure from ligneous matter contained in the soil, and that it 



