MOORS AND SHEEP WALKS 79 



this type are regarded in Germany as the most profit- 

 able of all. 



To what extent similar processes can be extended to 

 the higher-lying peat and bog areas in places like 

 Dartmoor, parts of Wales, the North of England and 

 the Highlands is doubtful, because the climatic con- 

 ditions are often too severe to permit of profitable crops 

 to be grown. For the present, at any rate until more 

 experience has accumulated, it would not be wise to 

 touch land of this kind except by way of experiment on 

 selected favourable areas, as, for example, on some of 

 the cut-over bogs in Ireland. 



(5) Upland sheep walk. In many parts of the 

 country, notably in Mid Wales and the Lowlands of 

 Scotland, lie extensive tracts of grassy uplands which 

 have never been improved in any way, and are held as 

 farms of 1,000 acres and upwards for breeding sheep 

 which are sold away and fattened on the lowlands. In 

 Mid Wales many thousands of acres of land of this 

 type are let at rentals of about is. per acre. They 

 possess a fair mineral soil, though, as a rule, deficient in 

 lime ; the herbage is rough and poor, but consists in 

 the main of grass ; boggy patches occur in which peat 

 has accumulated. Being purely grass land, game are 

 scanty, and the sporting rights of little value ; on the 

 other hand certain commoners' rights often exist, 

 though there are few commoners to exercise them. 

 From the evidence afforded by neighbouring farms it is 

 certain that this land is capable of profitable develop- 

 ment, and that much of it is cultivable when the situa- 

 tion is not too exposed nor the slopes too steep. The 

 difficulty of communication has been the main reason 

 why the land has not been divided into smaller farms 



