Book I. AGRICULTURE IN IIOLLx\ND. 77 



9. Wheat. n. Wheat. 



10. Oats. 1.5. Hops, with abundant manure. 



11. Turnips. - "? This last crop remain.s generally five years, and the ground 



12. Rye. is afterwards nt for any kind of produce. 



13. Tobacco, three times ploufihed, and richly manured. 



448. In another part of this division, where hops are not grown, the following rotation 

 is observed : 



1. Potatoes, with manure. 9. Wheat. 



2. Wheat. 10. Oats, 1 _. ,.,_ 

 ?>. Beans, with manure. 11. Turnips, J '^""^ .'^'^ 



4. Rye. 12. Fallow, without manure. 



5. Wheat, with manure. 13. Rye. 



6. Clover, top-dressed with ashes. 14. Tobacco, richly manured. 



7. Turnips, with manure. 16. Wheat. 



8. Flax, highly manured with urine and rape cake. 



449. In addition to those crops in some part of the district, particularly in the line be- 

 tween Woomen and Ypres, magnificent crops of rape are cultivated, and are relied on 

 as a sure and profitable return. Flax is also a crop upon which their best industry is 

 bestowed, and their careful preparation of the soil is scarcely to be surpassed by that of 

 the neatest garden. 



450. In the fourth division the soil is a good sandy loam, of a light color, and is in a 

 superior state of cultivation; it yields a similar, produce to the foregoing division, with 

 the same quality of hay ; but plantations are here more numerous. The succession is 

 as follows : 



1. Wheat, with dung. 10. Clover, with ashes, seed sometimes saved. 



2. Clover, with ashes, seed sometimes saved. 11. Oats, without manure. 



3. Flax, with urine and rape cake. 12. Flax, with urine and rape cake. 



4. Wheat, with compost of short dung and various sweepings. 13. Wheat, with dung. 

 .5. Potatoes, with farm-yard dung or night soil. CBeans, with dung. 



6. Rye, with urine. 14.< Beet root, with rape cake, or 



7. Rape seed, with rape cake and urine. t Tobacco, with rape cake in great quantities. 



8. Potatoes, with dung. Turnips are also grown, but are taken as a second crop after 



9. Wheat, with manure of divers kinds. ": " rape, flax, wheat, or rye. 



451. Passing over the other divisions to the eighth and ninth, we find the reporter describes 

 them as of considerable extent, and in the poverty of their soil and abundance of their pro- 

 duce, bearing ample testimony to the skill and perseverance of the Flemish farmers. The 

 soil consists of a poor light sand, in the fifteenth century exhibiting barren gravel and 

 heaths. The chief produce here is, rye, flax, potatoes, oats, buck-wheat, rape-seed, and 

 wheat in a few favorable spots ; clover, carrots, and turnips generally. 



452. On the western side of these districts, and where the soil is capable of yielding 

 wheat, there are two modes of rotation : one comprising a nine years' course, in which 

 wheat is but once introduced ; and the other a ten years' course, in which they contrive 

 to produce that crop a second time ; but in neither instance without manure, which, in- 

 deed, is never omitted in these divisions, except for buck-wheat, and occasionally for 

 rye. The first course alluded to above, is as follows : 



1st Year, potatoet or carrots, with four ploughings, and twelve 5th Year, oats with clover, with two ploughings, and ten tons 



tons of farm-yard dung, per English acre. and a half of farm-yard dung, per English acre. 



2d Year, Jlax, with two ploughings, and 105 Winchester 6th Year, clover, top-dressed, with 105 Winchester bushels 



bushels of ashes, and 48 .hogsheads, beer measure, of of peat or Dutch stshes, per English acre. 



urine, per English acre. 7th Year, rtye, with one ploughing, and 52 hogsheads, beer 



3d Year, wheat, with two ploughings, and ten tons and a measure, of night soil and urine. 



half of farm-yard dung, per English acre. 8th Year, oats, with two ploughings, and 52 hogsheads, beer 



4th Year, rye and turnips, with two ploughings, and ten tons measure, of night soil and urine. 



and a half of farm-yard dung, per English acre. 9th Year, buck wheat, with four ploughings, and without any 



manure. 



453. Of the Flemish mode of cultivating some particular crops, we shall give a few ex- 

 amples. The drill husbandry has never been generally introduced in the low countries. 

 It has been tried in the neighbourhood of Ostend, forty acres of beans against forty acres 

 of drilled crop, and the result was considered to be in favor of the system. But the row 

 culture, as distinguished from the raised drill manner, has been long known in the case of 

 tobacco, cabbages, and some other crops. 



454. Wheat is not often diseased in Flanders. Most farmers change their seed, and 

 others in several places steep it in salt water or urine, and copperas or verdigrise. The 

 proportion of verdigrise is half a pound to every six bushels of seed ; and the time in 

 which the latter remains in the mixture is three hours, or one hour if cows' urine be used, 

 because of its ammonia, which is considered injurious. The ripest and plumpest seed is 

 always preferred for seed. 



455. Rye is grown both as a bread corn, and for the distillery. In Flanders fre- 

 quently, and in Brabant very generally, the farmer, upon the scale of from one hundred 

 to two hundred acres of light soil, is also a distiller, purely for the improvement of the 

 land by the manure of the beasts, which he can feed upon the straw of the rye, and the 

 grains of the distillery. 



456. Buck-wheat enters into the rotations on the poorest soils, and is sown on lands 

 not got ready in time for other grain. The chief application of buck- wheat is to the 

 feeding of swine and poultry, for which it is pre-eminent ; it is also used in flour ; as a 

 constituent in the liquid nourishment prepared for cattle and horses ; and bears no incon- 

 siderable share in the diet of the peasant. Formed into a cake without yeast, it is a very 

 wholesome, and not a disagreeable species of bread ; but it is necessary to use it while 



