122 THE PRINCIPLES OF 



that clay lands will grow fine turnips, swedes, or mangolds. 

 But another difficulty besets us later on, and that is the 

 disposal of the crop a very serious difficulty indeed upon stiff 

 clay soils. What are we to do with this turnip crop after it is 

 grown ? We may have twenty or twenty-five tons or more per 

 acre of material to dispose of. What are we to do with it ? If 

 we put sheep upon it we shall find that neither the sheep nor 

 the land are benefited. Sheep will not thrive upon clay land 

 in winter. If we could contrive to feed them off in summer 

 the case would be perfectly different ; but sheep will not do 

 on heavy clay land in winter, and the land suffers even more 

 than the sheep. Now we know perfectly well, as an economic 

 fact, that the turnip crop is not often grown at a direct 

 profit. The reason why we grow turnips is that, although 

 they are grown at a loss, yet they prepare the land for the 

 succeeding crops. The following corn crop is grown very 

 cheaply after turnips. It may be barley, which again is 

 followed by clover, grown very cheaply, and that again by 

 wheat, grown at comparatively little expense ; so that the 

 turnip crop, although grown at a slight loss, is profitable, 

 taken in connection with the succeeding crops. The turnip 

 crop is a fallowing crop, is a substitute for the bare fallow, 

 and is much cheaper than the bare fallow. We cannot bare- 

 fallow land under 5 per acre, and if we can grow turnips at 

 a loss of 1 per acre, we do neither more nor less than fallow 

 our land for 1 an acre, which is cheap work. All depends 

 on whether we efficiently fallow our land with the aid of 

 turnips. Upon light soils we do so. Upon light soils the 

 turnip crop is in every respect a substitute for the bare 

 fallow, and more than a substitute. It is better in all 

 respects. A turnip crop consumed upon light land at once 

 imports into the soil a mass of organic matter and material 

 derived from the atmosphere, and a mass of available material 

 collected from the sub-soil. It likewise insures the thorough 



