FLAX SOWN AFTER TURNIPS WILL FAIL. 109 



inferior. The best land for its growth is after grass, to be 

 ploughed VERY shallow early in the winter, and after being 

 rolled with a very heavy roller, to be chopped over with 

 mattocks, sufficiently deep to cover the seed with harrows, then 

 the clods to be broken fine with beetles, and rolled with a light 

 roller. Crops thus served are commonly the best, and cleanest 

 from weeds. The next best is after a lying-down crop of 

 wheat ; and the next, after potatoes, the land being folded with 

 sheep in January and February. Flax will also succeed after 

 barley, oats, and everything but turnips, and the turnip kind. 

 The same land should not be sown with flax oftener than once 

 in seven or eight years, nor should land be thus applied that 

 has been limed within a few years. 



If, as the season for flax -growing approaches, it be very dry, 

 the land should be well kept down by harrowing and rolling, 

 in order to preserve its moisture, that the plants may come up 

 all together, which is a great point gained. It is a mistaken 

 opinion that hemp and flax impoverish land from long 

 experience I have found the contrary; these are crops that 

 make a greater return, as to manure, than any corn crop ; and 

 when flax is spread on grass to be ripened, the quantity of 

 grass is doubled in a short time, the effect, I imagine, of the 

 oil contained in the flax. When it can be obtained, good old 

 earth is an excellent manure for flax, to be laid on in frosty 

 weather, but not when the weather is wet. It may be well to 

 remark, that no crop is so desirable with which to grow grass- 

 seeds as flax, as, in drawing the flax, the roots of the grass are 

 loosened, and thereby encouraged to a great degree, the same 

 being often injured by a corn crop. There is also great 

 advantage to be gained to the farmer by sowing turnips after 

 a flax crop, which should be done immediately after the land 

 is cleared and ploughed ; thus turnips will be produced almost 

 equally good, if not so large, as if flax had not been grown, 

 and will be found useful in the spring, after other turnips are 

 consumed. 



J. B. EDMONDS. 



Stonehouse, Jan. 28th, 1843. 



P.S. As an instance of the risk of sowing flax after 



