236 BRITISH HUSBANDRY. [Ch. XVIII. 



occasionally crossed from other soils, as the plant is said to degenerate 

 after the second year. The produce, being subject to many casualties, is 

 variable, but an average crop may be reckoned at about twenty bushels, or 

 half a ton per acre *. 



CULTURE. 



Turnips are regarded by all farmers as the most complete fallow crop 

 which can be grown, and are therefore generally introduced upon light soils 

 into that part of every rotation which closes one course, and is intended 

 to commence another. The land must, with this intention, be cleansed 

 from every species of weed, without regard to labour, and should be 

 heavily manured with dung, and also limed if necessary, as thereby afford- 

 ing the best chance of securing an abundant crop, and thus through its 

 consumption by the stock, still further increasing the fei'tility of the soil. 



Upon the introduction of the turnip into our Jicld-systcm of cultiva- 

 tion, the seed was of course sown broad-cast; but although that mode was 

 universally abandoned throughout the northern counties upon the adoption 

 of the drill, it has yet been very generally continued in the midland and 

 southern districts. The reason assigned for this does not, however, arise 

 from any general preference to the latter method in those places where it 

 is followed, but is justified both upon the principle of its liaving been the 

 immemorial habit in which the labourers are the most expert, and that the 

 land is, in many widely extended tracts, so much encumbered with flints, 

 as well as of such a compact and cloddy nature, as to prevent the due 

 application of the drill and horse-hoeing implements t- Tiie latter fact of 

 course opposes a decided objection to the practice, and the force of custom 

 must be allowed to have its weight in other places ; for, as to the per- 

 formance of the work by hand-hoeing, the plants may be every where seen 

 regularly hoed out to nearly equal distances with the greatest accuracy. 

 Comparisons between the produce obtained from the two modes have, 

 indeed, often shown them to be nearly alike ; but the object in view is both 

 to clean the ground, as well as to prepare a crop of winter food for cattle, 

 and the true criterion for determining their merits, appears to us to depend 

 upon the management of the land. On loamy soils, which admit the 

 operation of the horse-hoe, drilling certainly affords the most effectual 

 means of cleansing the ground ; but on such land as that to which we have 

 alluded, it has been abandoned after repeated trials by intelligent and 

 unprejudiced practical men, and it may therefore be justly doubted, whe- 

 ther those great advantages which are in every case ascribed to the drill 

 system would, in such instances, follow any alteration of the established 

 plan. 



Whichsoever system be adopted, the stubbles of the land intended for 

 turnips should be ploughed to a good depth, immediately after harvest, or 

 as soon as possible after wheat-seeding is over. The upper drains and 

 water-furrows should be drawn and opened as soon as the ploughing is 

 finished, and the ground be laid dry, in as complete a manner as if it were 

 under crop. Perhaps on soils of a strong nature, or exposed to lie wet 

 during winter, no mode is more proper than those lands termed " ten-fur- 

 rowed," or " five-bout ridges ;" and if carefully laid up in this manner, the 



* Northumberland Rep. 3r(l Edit. \\ 97. 



f See No. I. of Reports of Select Farms, in the Library of Useful Knowledge, p. 9. 

 and the Surveys of Surrey, p. 249. Berks, p. 22'J, Herts, p. 104. Oxfordbliire, ]«,172. 

 Young's Norfolk, p, 225. 



