1 04 LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY. 



III. That the greatest possible interval should be introduced 

 in the rotation between plants of the same kind, by the 

 growth of as great a variety of crops as the climate 

 of the country will allow ; thus, instead of the farmer 

 confining himself to wheat, barley, oats, turnips, pota- 

 toes, and clover, he should cultivate beans, peas, 

 vetches, mangel wurtzel, carrots, parsnips, beet, flax, 

 hemp, &c. 



148. Influence of soil upon the quality of the crops ^The 



]-emarkable difference in the quality of the gTain produced 

 upon soils differing in their composition, has long been recog- 

 nised by experienced purchasers. I have been informed by 

 an intelligent starch manufacturer in Belfast, that the wheat 

 grown in the barony of Ards, in the County of Down, 

 and in the neighbourhood of Bangor in the same county, 

 is highly valuable for his purposes, while that grown near 

 Armagh yields in general a much smaller amount of starch. 

 x\nother manufacturer is so fully convinced of the supe- 

 riority of the wheat of the neighbourhood of Bangor, that he 

 willingly gives five shillings per ton above the market price 

 for that produced in the parish of Balloo. The general 

 statement on the subject is, that soils rich in organic matter 

 or highly manured with decomposing animal or vegetable 

 substances, afford a grain which is richer in gluten than that 

 produced by lighter and more sparingly manured soils, and 

 those of the slate formation. The above statement respecting 

 the value of the wheat grown in some districts of the North 

 of Ireland, seems to confinn the statement. 



