DIVISION VIII. 



PEINCIPLES AND PEACTICE OF MODERN ENGLISH FARMING. 



CHAPTER I. 



LINES OF COMMUNICATION ; NECESSITY OF LABOUR ; THE FECUNDITY OF WEEDS ; AGKICULTUTJAL 

 EDUCATION ; THE LITTLE SMITHFIKLD CLUB ; TURNIP CROPS ; THE ROTATION OF CROPS ; ARTHUR 

 YOUNG ; THE EARL OP LEICESTER ; ARTIFICIAL FATTENING. 



LINES OF COMMUNICATION. 



'• Of all inventions," says Lord Macaulay in 

 liis Sistory of England, " tlie alphabet and 

 the printing press excepted, those inventions 

 which abridge distance have done most for the 

 civilisation of our species." Every improve- 

 ment, he adds, of the means of locomotion, 

 benefits mankind morally and intellectually, 

 as well as materially. Of the truth of this 

 remark, every one who has, whether from plea- 

 sure, choice, or business, had to traverse the 

 primitive cutllngso^^ British colony in its semi- 

 iufautine state (as the present writer has had 

 to do), must be conscious. There, as a general 

 rule, there is nothing but difficulty to the 

 traveller. If his excursion is commenced in 

 love, he soon finds that it must be prosecuted 

 with toil ; and if he set out with the intention 

 of viewing the country, he discovers that he 

 must first see through the wall of an intermin- 

 able forest, the immediate trees of which 

 extend their branches over his head, and, for 

 the greater part of his journey, shade the 

 narrow way upon which he is proceeding, 

 even, in many instances, to the shutting out 

 of the light of the sun. He does not proceed 

 easily and gaily over the smooth and level 

 surface of a macadamised road, but over a 

 sort of mud swamp, hardened— when it may 

 happcu to he hard— by the broken and decay- 

 ing branches of the neighbouring trees ; pre- 

 senting no other sign of an approach to civili- 

 sation than that of its having been rudely cut 

 by the hand of man. It is evident that where 

 there are difficulties of this kind in the way of 

 communication between different parts of a 

 884 



country, its progress must be slow indeed 

 towards the goal of an advanced civilisation. 



The earliest maker of roads, of which his- 

 tory has given us any information, was an 

 Egyptian Pharaoh, who, by forced labour, 

 constructed a gigantic causeway, to enable his 

 workmen the more easily to convey materials 

 for the erection of a useless pyramid, which 

 has certainly immortalised his folly, notwith- 

 standing that the name of the founder is a 

 subject of doubt. Herodotus has handed 

 down to us the cruel edicts which this despot 

 passed for the purpose of compelling the un- 

 fortunate creatures subjected to his power, 

 to carry out his fanciful caprice, and the 

 curses with which they loaded his memory. 

 On this remote effort at road-making, how- 

 ever, it is here unnecessary to dwell, when even 

 road-making, especially through the most popu- 

 lated parts of Great Britain, has, in a measure, 

 been put out of fashion, in order that railway- 

 raakiug may apparently take its place. But 

 it must be long, if it is ever to take place, 

 before the railway can be made subservient to 

 the requirements of every portion of an agri- 

 cultural district. There, if farming is to 

 thrive, good roads must still be preserved in 

 a state of repair. " It is well known," says 

 Sir John Sinclair, " that the best cultivated 

 districts are those which possess the greatest 

 facility of internal communication, without 

 which agriculture languishes in the most 

 fruitful soil ; and, with it, the most ungrateful 

 soil soon becomes fertile." The truth of the 

 last clause of this sentence is remarkably 

 verified when we look at the efi'ect which the 



