KOTATION OP CROPS. 29 



"As an instance of the risk of sowing flax after 

 turnips, I will mention, that a friend of mine, some 

 years since, had a fancy to sow a field alternately (in 

 alternate stripes is meant) with turnips and white peas, 

 from each of which he had a good crop ; in the following 

 year, he appropriated the same field to flax, but at the 

 harvest his field was in stripes ; the land on which the 

 peas grew having produced good flax, whilst the flax 

 which followed the turnips proved good for nothing.' ' 

 Yon Thae'r gives his ideas on the subject as follows : 

 "In those districts where the three-year course of 

 husbandry prevails, flax is almost always put upon the 

 fallow, or made to follow it immediately. This place 

 appears to me exactly the most unsuitable that can be 

 assigned to the crop. It is difficult, especially for early 

 flax, to find time to put the land into that state of good 

 cultivation which ought to precede the seed-time, espe- 

 cially when the soil has been poisoned with weeds and 

 foul grass by several successive crops. Flax is considered 

 to be a bad preparation for winter corn; and every 

 practical agriculturist ought to reckon beforehand upon 

 a diminution of the produce of whatever grain is made to 

 follow flax. In the three-year course, I should much 

 prefer to make the flax follow the spring corn, because it 

 will be much more easy to prepare the land properly for 

 its reception, especially if the fallow which preceded the 

 winter corn has been thoroughly worked ; if, in addition, 

 the fallow has been well manured, the land ought still to 

 retain a sufficient degree of fertility. In this case, as 

 soon as the winter corn is carted off the land, the stubble 

 ought to be slightly ploughed, and later in the autumn a 

 deep ploughing must be given. If the land appears to 

 require additional manure, during winter I would cart 

 the stable-muck, fresh as it was made, upon the land, and 

 would spread it, after having first given it a harrowing. 

 The manure should remain in this state until, in spring, 

 a spell of dry weather allowed me to rake off the straw, 

 or, what would be easier on large occupations, to gather 

 it into ridges by means of a drag-rake, when it could be 



