Ch. X.] ON WHEAT. 141 



crop of vvlieat will, by that process, be both more productive in quantity, 

 as well as better in quality, than under any other which he can pursue. 



Notwithstanding what we have said in favour of fallowing, we are yet 

 aware that in many instances finer crops of wheat have been produced 

 after drilled crops than after a bare fallow : this, however, may have been 

 occasioned by the temperature of the air — as in a wet season — being 

 unfavourable to the working of the fallow, while it has been propitious to 

 the growth of the green crops, by the culture of which the land has been 

 got into a good state of preparation for the wheat ; and is no proof of the 

 system being injudicious on stiff soils, though it may be dispensed with 

 upon friable loams. 



There is also much land of so light a nature that, although appropriate to 

 the growth of wheat, a bare fallow — unless rendered absolutely necessary 

 by the foulness of the ground — had better be avoided; as it deprives the soil 

 of its necessary degree of firmness, and better crops will generally be 

 obtained upon one ploughing after a clover-ley. 



The ley should, in this case, be broken up at least a month before the 

 sowing of the wheat ; both that time should be allowed for some decompo- 

 sition of the sward, and chiefly that the land may be allowed to settle. It 

 is also deemed essential by many persons that the second crop of clover 

 siiould be ploughed-in, or at least that the ley should be ploughed up with 

 a good head of grass upon it, in order to give the land the benefit of the 

 green manure ; but farmers generally })refer the immediate profit of the 

 clover to any prospective advantage to be obtained by such mode of its appli- 

 cation. The best mode of performing the operation is with the trench- 

 plough ; the furrows being formed narrow, and turned well over, as the 

 complete inversion of the sod is essential to its perfection. Or the grassy 

 edge of the furrow-slice can be cut away by a skim-coulter plough ; 

 which, if the work be neatly performed, will completely bury the surface 

 of the sward, and will thus both improve the closeness and the cleanness 

 of the tilth. The seed is then sown either broad-cast or by the drill upon 

 this stale furrow, and either buried by a strong harrowing, or by any of 

 the grubbers commonly in use, and the land is afterwards heavily rolled. 

 Greater accuracy is, however, necessary in the performance of this one 

 j)loughing, than when many stirrings are given, and the operation is only 

 usual upon a one year's ley ; for clover which has lain two years upon the 

 ground, and more particularly if it has been pastured, is generally found 

 to require three ploughings to get rid of the weeds. 



Unless the land be uncommonly clean when the clover is sown, a two 

 years' ley will indeed be not only foul, but will be frequently found infested 

 with the wire-worm, grubs, and slugs, which commit great ravages on the 

 succeeding crop of wheat ; and it is, therefore, generally thought necessary 

 to stir the land more than once, both to get rid of the weeds by raking and 

 burning, and to disturb the propagation of those insects. On this, however, 

 it has been thought worthy of consideration, by a well-known and eminent 

 agriculturist, "whether the disturbing the compactness of the furrows, which 

 a rest of one or two years under artificial grasses has imparted to them, be 

 not a drawback to the system, greater than any benefit that can be expected 

 to arise. It by no means follows that those who prefer depositing their 

 wheat upon a single ploughing are at all insensible to the value of a 

 frequent stirring of the soil but they consider that it is then misapplied ; 

 they consider there are other crops for which repeated preparatory ploughings 

 are as beneficial as they are worse than useless for ley land ; and that a 

 soil should be brought into such a state by well-nwnaged previous crops. 



