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the farmer, unexperienced in this branch of improvement, not to 

 feed with sheep in the autumn ; for, though it may he done with the 

 utmost safety in the spring, it is frequently fatal in the autumncd 

 months. 



The farms in this division are rather less than in the last, biyt 

 the husbandry is much the same, only there is more land in tillage. 

 The mountainous lands are uncultivated, and are depastured with 

 sheep and young bullocks. 



In the vicinity of these uncultivated hills, viz. at Bicknoller, 

 Elworthy, Brompton Rolph, and Old Cleeve, oats are the princi- 

 pal corn crop, barley and wheat are grown but on a small scale. 



The rotation of crops varies from that of Taunton Dean. Here 

 wheat is generally sown on the ley, and none but very stiff land is 

 fallowed. Turnips are much cultivated, but they are very lavish 

 in the consumption, giving too large a space of ground to the sheep 

 at a time, making thereby great waste. 



There are many coppices (chiefly of Oak underwood) on the de- 

 clivities of Quantock and other hills, but they are under no system 

 of management. Their value, at present, of twenty years growth 

 is from four to ten pounds per acre. 



Many considerable manufactories of different kinds of woollen 

 goods are carried on with great success, and afford employment to 

 the inhabitants in every stage of life, but they are accompanied 

 with a gradual increase of the poors rates. 



FENCES. 



The beech hedges, around Dulverton, Dunster, &c. are not 

 •nly beautiful to the eye, and an excellent fence and shelter, but 

 are a source of annual profit to the proprietor. 



The banks on which they are planted, are six or seven feet high, 

 and between four and five feet wide at the top ; the mouldering of 

 the sides is frequently prevented by a dry stone wall, four feet high. 

 There is no ditch, and the hedge consists of three rows of beech, 

 planted on the top of the bank, at about one foot distance. Their 

 growth is very rapid, and they seem to defy the destructive quali- 

 ties of the sea breeze, so fatal to the white thorn and most other 



plants j 



