52 AGRICULTURE IN THE 



not indeed doubt that husbandry made notable progress in 

 the seventeenth century, especially towards its close, but I 

 am pretty certain that Markham's suggestions remained for a 

 long time mere theories. 



Markham tells us, as Fitzherbert said more than a century 

 before, that the custom of marling land had gone out of 

 fashion, unquestionably because a tenant on a short or pre- 

 carious holding could not venture on so costly a risk as that 

 of enriching his landlord's property without any security that 

 he would get the benefit of his outlay. But in this edition of 

 his 'Farewell/ the author gives his own account of marl and 

 marling, and of the benefit which the operation is to most 

 land. He is alive to the advantage which comes from the 

 liberal use of sand, chalk, and especially lime, on stiff clays, 

 especially if the sand be procured from the beach. He knows 

 also what is the use, as manure, of woollen rags, of horn- 

 shavings, of hoofs, of soap ashes, hair, malt-dust, fish-manure, 

 and the blood and offal of cattle. I refer to these, because 

 Markham is the first writer on husbandry who dwells par- 

 ticularly on manures, other than that of the stable and farmyard. 

 He knows how useful bush harrowing is to mossy and uneven 

 pasture, and the best means for treating artificial water-meadows. 



The preservation of corn in the straw, or after threshing, is 

 a subject on which Markham dwells at length. He teaches 

 the farmer, in places where farm buildings are scanty, to 

 build his ricks on such a frame as shall keep the stack from 

 damp and vermin. In Ireland he tells us, ' where war rageth,' 

 it was the custom to keep the ears in wooden hutches, or to 

 thresh the corn, and store it without winnowing it; and advises 

 the building of the garner of plaster and small stones, and of 

 placing it at the back or side of chimneys, so as to keep the 

 grain moderately warm. He then describes the silos of the 

 Azores, which he declares that he has seen, and refers to the well- 

 known story of Pliny as to the use of these pits on the eastern 

 coast of the Adriatic, recommending the adoption of the 

 system in England. 



