126 THE PRINCIPLES OF 



character as we find naturally in a clay soil. Wheat can be 

 put into light land in a very wet state ; it may be muddled 

 in, plastered in, and in the spring of the year we shall find it 

 come up strong and well. 



I will give you another example. On light land we are in 

 the habit, in my district, of driving our sheep over the young 

 wheat. The reason that the practice has gone out to some 

 extent is the increased value of the sheep ; they are too 

 valuable to be used in this way. The older-fashioned farmers 

 of the west country moved their flocks backwards and 

 forwards over the wheat fields with the same object in view 

 to consolidate and " firm " the ground. Before ploughing 

 up land for wheat the grass should be eaten off as bare as 

 possible, because otherwise it lies too hollow; but if the 

 grass is eaten off bare the furrow packs closely. Again we 

 shall find that farmyard dung on light lands should be 

 applied in the well-rotted state. It should be short for light 

 land, because we do not want the ground to be lightened up 

 with strawy stuff it lets the drought in. 



I have given enough examples to show that light lands are 

 cultivated upon the principle of consolidation. Light land is 

 easily over-cultivated or over-tilled. We may " plough the 

 life out of it " ; the strength out of it. Provided we can get 

 light land clean, the less we do to it the better. If light 

 land is clean we may always depend upon its being fine, and 

 if we do not touch it we may rely upon it being moist. 

 Tillage is often carried on at a great sacrifice of " sap " or 

 moisture in the soil; therefore, one ploughing, or even one 

 cultivation, in the case of a piece of clean light land will be 

 quite sufficient, and there is no object in ransacking the 

 ground about for the purpose of dividing it, as is the case 

 with clayey ground. 



Now we approach the subject from another point of view, 

 which we have a little anticipated, viz. with regard to the 



