OF CROPS USUALLY CULTIVATED. 293 



quent hoeings, the stirring which the ground receives when 

 they are gathered, (sometimes perhaps more than is neccs* 

 ary) 5 and the favourable period of the year when they are 

 taken up, are excellent preparations for the culture of that 

 important grain. Wheat after potatoes, therefore, is al- 

 most universal, wherever both are cultivated on an exten* 

 sive scale. But this plan can only be followed near great 

 towns, where alone potatoes can be used in great quanti- 

 ties, and sufficient muck purchased to raise them. In 

 those parts of Berwickshire, Roxburghshire, and East 

 Lothian, at a distance from town manure, potatoes are not 

 approven of as a preparation for wheat, farmers consider- 

 ing them as little better than a nursery for weeds, and on 

 that account they are often planted upon clover leys, that 

 the whole may be cleaned by fallow or turnips, the ensuing 

 season. It is very difficult to raise a clean crop after pota- 

 toes, as they must be planted too early for spring cleaning, 

 (unless a scuffler is repeatedly made use of), and they must 

 be earthed up too early for summer cleaning. From the 

 time of earthing up in July, the root-weeds cannot be dis- 

 turbed, but retain full possession of the ground, for at least 

 two months of the most growing part of the summer. There 

 are some fields near Edinburgh, which, in consequence of 

 these circumstances, contain a shameful abundance of weeds 

 after potatoes, even where no dung has been given to the 

 land, either with the potatoes or the wheat. 



4. The culture of potatoes, is very much increased by 

 two practices: 1. That of farmers giving a certain portion 

 of land for raising potatoes to their servants ; and, 2." By a 

 practice of farmers in the neighbourhood of towns and vil- 

 lages letting land to the inhabitants for the same purpose, 

 they furnishing both dung and labour, at least in so far as 

 regards the cleaning processes. Near Cullen, in Banff- 

 shire, they get a fall of ground for a load of dung, which, 



