VI] CHEQUERED CAREER OF THE CLAYS 89 



of soils which pay to cultivate when prices are high, 

 but are unprofitable when prices fall; they then 

 bring disaster on the holders and soon go out of 

 cultivation. These soils occupy in the aggregate a 

 pretty considerable area of the country, and their 

 history is extraordinarily interesting, because it so 

 accurately reflects the chequered life of the agri- 

 cultural community. 



Many of these borderland soils first came into 

 cultivation during the Napoleonic wars when prices 

 of wheat rose to the highest level ever reached. In 

 the years of depression between 1813 and 1836 they 

 went out of cultivation and were commonly allowed 

 to cover themselves with weeds and grasses, and afford 

 miserable grazing for unfortunate live stock. After 

 they were drained in the early 'forties they became 

 once more productive, and during the prosperous years 

 of the 'fifties and 'sixties they were in great demand. 

 Then when the bad times came, culminating in the 

 disastrous season of 1879, the clay lands again fell 

 out of cultivation. With a return of prosperity they *;- 

 were once again cultivated, and now-a-days we find ? 

 them converted into good pasture for dairy cattle or 

 fatting stock and into arable land growing wheat, 

 mangolds, cabbage and, where possible, potatoes. It 

 needs but little foresight to see that in the next 

 wave of depression some of them may again go out 

 of cultivation. 



