534 General Results of a Garde7ihig Tour : — 



with verdure ; but we were informed that the two large pro- 

 prietors to whom Sohvay jNIoss belongs, not living in the 

 country, take very little interest in it or the surrounding 

 lands, farther than receiving such rents as they may get. In 

 this case, as in many others, agricultural and general improve- 

 ment will remain at a stand, till some circumstance shall 

 compel the division and sale of estates now much too large. 

 One of the greatest stimuli that could be given to asrricultural 

 and general improvement would be the removal of the law of 

 entail, and the imposition of such a tax on landed and funded 

 property', for the purpose of gradually paying off the national 

 debt, as would compel non-residents, and those who had their 

 estates deeply mortgaged, to bring a portion of them to market. 

 We find this opinion very generally expressed by the middle 

 and poorer classes throughout the country, and more especially 

 in the large towns. ITie result would be of the greatest ser- 

 vice both to commercial and serving gardeners, because the 

 consequent building and planting of farm-houses and villas 

 would occasion a great demand for nursery articles, now a 

 drug in most nurseries, and supply places for many indigent 

 gardeners- 



The art of making hav does not seem to be miderstood in 

 the north of Lancashire or in Dumfriesshire any more now, 

 than it was in most parts of Scotland twenty-six years ago. 

 The hay is put into cocks, which are left in the field till the 

 outside, by alternate rain or dew, and sunshine, is burned to 

 a dusty woody matter, and the interior is rendered too dry to 

 undergo the proper degree of fermentation when put in the 

 rick. Indeed, in Scotland the fermentation of hay in the rick 

 did not use to be considered necessary, any more than the 

 fermentation of the liquid food of pigs before giving it to them, 

 or of liquid manure before applying it to the soil. Yet, though 

 the Middlesex very superior mode of making hay does not 

 appear to be yet prevalent in the north, we observed the bad 

 Middlesex practice of dunging the meadows and grass lands 

 with rotten stable dung, and composts of dung and lime, 

 adopted in the park at Lowther Castle, and at several places 

 near Lancaster. Mr. Ogilvie, an extensive Scotch farmer at 

 Mere, near Knutsford, manures his grassland only with liquid 

 manure, fermented in tanks in the Dutch manner, before 

 being carted out ; and this we consider to be by far the best, 

 because by far the most economical, mode of manuring grass 

 lands. The practice of forming compost heaps, by mixing 

 quicklime with putrescent manure, or even with soil con- 

 taining much vegetable matter, is contrary to all science, as 

 was long ago shown by Lord Meadowbnnk. The lime is 



