VI] CHEQUERED CAREER OF THE CLAYS 91 



Grasse, but also superioiir to the more and greater 

 part of the same." The antiquity of this process was 

 demonstrated " by the innumerable Marie pits digged 

 and spent so many yeeres past, that trees of 200 or 

 300 years old doe now grow upon them." 



Paring and burning was also a common method of 

 amelioration. The top two or three inches of soil 

 were pared off, collected into heaps and burned. (The 

 agricultural labourer has a wonderful facility for 

 setting fire to the most unpromising material.) The 

 process was so managed that the clay was not baked 

 into brick, but sufiiciently heated to disintegrate it 

 and partially decompose the organic matter. Then 

 the heated material was spread over the land and 

 was found to be very productive. In some of the 

 eastern counties Blith's draining method was early 

 applied ; thus Vancover in his Report on the Agri- 

 culture of Essex in 1795 refers to much of the stiff 

 clay as being "hollow drained" and dressed with 

 chalk, after which it continues to give good crops for 

 20 years or more. Wheat and beans have always 

 been the most suitable crops for clay farming, and 

 a common Essex rotation was : fallow, wheat, beans, 

 wheat, or, where greater diversity was required, 

 fallow, oats or barley, clover and rye-grass, wheat, 

 beans. But the implements were cumbrous ; in bad 

 weather it might prove impossible to get the crops in, 

 so that a season would sometimes be missed So 



