Ch. VII.] ON THE ROTATION OF CROPS. 103 



sometimes rafter-ploughed in the autumn ; then ploughed again in the 

 spring, and very generally sown broad-cast. Beans are, however, fre- 

 quently planted on the strongest portion of the soil, and are then more 

 commonly drilled, and followed by oats. 



On the cold thin clay and flinty chalk, the common courses are — 



1. Fallow, folded. 



2. Wheat. 



3. Peas, upon one ploughing. 



4. Tares, cole, or turnips, fed off. 



5. Oats, or barley. 



6 and 7, Clover ; or, in some cases, sainfoin left for five, six, or 

 seven years ; and then 



8. Wheat, pared and burnt, for turnips. 

 The preceding are some of the most usual rotations on the different 

 soils incumbent on chalk, and where the upper soil is sufficiently light and 

 open to admit of turnips, they may be considered as generally calculated 

 to preserve the land in proper condition, and to secure tolerable crops. A 

 farm, of the average quality of such land, under this management, and 

 with a proportionate quantity of ground in sainfoin, must, with any thing 

 like proper attention, be carried on with little difficulty or labour at all 

 seasons. The sainfoin should, however, be in a larger proportion to the 

 size of the farm than appears in the statement above given ; for it requires 

 a long period to intervene before it can be grown with advantage a second 

 time, and it consequently cannot be made to enter into every course * ; 

 neither can peas be repeated, with much probability of obtaining a fair 

 crop, more than once in ten or twelve years. On the strong and compa- 

 ratively deep red clay, which is not unfrequently found at the bottom of 

 the chalk-hills, wheat might perhaps be taken, with safety and advan- 

 tage, more frequently ; and, as its greater depth and soundness fit it 

 better for beans than the thinner clays, tares, beans, and clover, might be 

 with great propriety alternately sown between the wheat-crops, with the 

 occasional substitution of a fallow instead of clover. On those chalky- 

 clays where flints abound, it would, however, be difficult to suggest any 

 advantageous alteration in the mode of cropping, for the nature of the land 

 is there an almost insurmountable impediment to the use of the horse-hoe. 

 The dry and sandy-loams, being everywhere peculiarly adaj)ted to al- 

 ternate rotations of white and green crops, are very generally cultivated 

 with little variation under that system ; though some farmers occa- 

 sionally " cross-crop " their land for the purpose of pocketing the imme- 



* See the Reports of Select Farms in North Hampshire, and on the Gloucestershire 

 Hills, Nos. I. and IV., published in the Farmer's Series, by the Society for the Diffusion 

 of Useful Knowledge. 



On the extensive farm of Beverston, in the calcareous range of the Cotswold 

 Hills in Gloucestershire, a great part of the arable land is under a course of turnips, 

 — barley, or oats, — clover, trefoil, and rye-grass, every two years, being mown the first, 

 and pastured the second ; then wheat, and lastly oats, succeeded by winter-vetches fed off 

 in the spring by sheep, and then sown for turnips. On this Mr. Hay ward, tbe very 

 intelligent farmer who holds the land, says, "The las,t crop of this course, it may be 

 supposed, ought not to have been taken ; but having had clover for two successive 

 years before the crop of wheat, he not only thinks himself entitled to a crop of corn 

 after the wheat, but believes he gets better crops by this rotation, upon such poor thin 

 land, than he covdd get by having the crop of wheat after the first year's clover, or by 

 putting a green crop of any description between tbe wheat and the oats, or barley. 

 Sometimes, however, the crop of wheat is taken after one year's clover ; and if the land 

 is firm enough for wheat, it succeeds very well : indeed, we have seen it succeed much 

 better than after the second year's clover^ upon land given to land-grass." 



