J 36 Mr. Curwen on ihe Means of 



a few remarks upon tVie subject, which I trust will not be deemed irrelative, or 

 wholly unconnected with that immediately before me. 



Previous to entering into this discussion, I must beg to state, in addition to the 

 saving made in feeding of cattle, there are annually forty acres or upwards of 

 potatoes planted upon the same farm for feeding of horses, and given as a substi- 

 tute for hay. An acre of potatoes produces upon an average fourteen hundred 

 stone. Two stone of steamed potatoes, mixed with cut straw, are given daily to 

 each horse : thus, an acre of potatoes produces food for one horse for seven hun- 

 dred days. Computing one hundred and sixty stone of hay to an acre, and allowing 

 only a stone and a half to be given per day, with a small abatement for waste, an 

 acre would feed one horse for a hundred days; the scale of comparison therefore, 

 in feeding, between potatoes and hay, will be as seven to one. Agreeably to this 

 calculation, forty acres of potatoes are equal, in point of feeding horses, to two 

 hundred and eighty of hay ; and have the further advantage that, under proper 

 management, the wheat after potatoes will not be inferior to a fallow. 



By this system of tillage, in a farm of six hundred acres, a saving is made of 

 three hundred and forty acres, above one half of the whole; which, supposing it 

 were cropped with wheat, would supply bread for the consumption of above a 

 thousand persons. There were likewise cultivated upon the same farm four acres 

 of carrots, which, in feeding horses, equalled thirty acres of oats. 



Besides the stimulus arising from individual emolument, which has hitherto been 

 derived from this system, I have been strongly impelled to an extension of it, 

 from the decided opinion I have long entertained, that nothing could contribute 

 so essentially to the welfare and security of the empire, as being enabled to raise a 

 sufficient quantity of grain for our support, and thereby to emancipate us from our 

 dependance on foreign aid. 



1 lament, in common with many others, that the recent pressure so severely 

 felt by the nation, did not lead to an immediate inclosure of all the wastes in the 

 kingdom, 



Indcpendant, however, of eight millions of acres of wastes, which are supposed 

 still to remain, and from which little profit is derived, I conceive it to be not only 

 feasible but perfectly practicable, by a change of system, and adopting a plan of 

 feeding horses and cattle in houses and sheds, both summer and winter) to make 



