16 A FARMER'S YEAR 



with the result that a pasture sown with them looks as though it 

 were infested by a crop of peculiarly vigorous docks. The best 

 remedy for this unsightliness is, about midsummer, to send a 

 man over the field with a scythe, charged to mow them down 

 after all, no great or costly task. 



This year the field No. 19 is to come for hay ; and I hope to 

 record in these pages the details of its progress, and of the success 

 or failure of the crop. This pasture has now arrived at that age 

 when, according to the prophets of ill, it might be expected to begin 

 to die away, and its future is therefore of interest. I may add that 

 it has never been manured, as have most of the new pastures here 

 at Ditchingham, of which I shall speak when I come to write of 

 this Home Farm, for the reason that we have never had any muck 

 to spare. Most of it, however, has now received a coating of mud 

 dug out from ponds and ditches, the best that I have to give it, 

 and a great deal better than nothing at all. 



Bordering my land is other land. I know not, or have for- 

 gotten, who farms it or owns it, but on this land are fields which, 

 as I presume, have been * laid down.' To me, looking over a 

 neighbouring lane, the herbage seems to consist chiefly of water 

 grass, black grass, elm suckers, and various weeds whereon even a 

 rabbit would scarcely find a living. So far, at any rate, my new 

 meadows are better, although the soil, presumably, is the same. 



The truth is that in these parts, and under the present con- 

 ditions of farming, it is, in many cases, quite useless to entrust 

 the laying down of permanent pastures on difficult soils to tenants. 

 The landlord finds the seed, no light expense, for it costs 305-. the 

 acre, the tenant sows it, but from that hour nothing goes well 

 Perhaps the land is not clean or drained, and with wet weed- 

 infested soil a pasture is doomed from the beginning, for the 

 moss and water grass will kill out the finer herbage. More pro- 

 bably, however, it is remorselessly mown, or sheep and horses 

 are turned on within the first year or two, which bite and nibble 

 the crowns out of the springing grass plants, causing them to die. 

 Cattle only should be allowed to feed young pastures, for they 



