Consumption of Corn in Great Britain. 301 



ing is done by hand, much more effectually than it can when sown broadcast ; the 

 ensuing year the rows of corn are of course transferred to the space unoccupied 

 before, and so on alternately. Mr. Cotes conceives his method, instead of being 

 more tedious, to cause a saving of labour ; the land may be manured at pleasure, 

 either down the hollows or afier splitting the ridges ; should ihe land be suspected 

 of growing foul, Mr, Cotes has extended the rows to double distance, to make 

 room for more horse hoeing, .with very little deficiency in the crop ; but, if the 

 business be well conducted, this will rarely be necessary. 



I thought it proper to name this system here, as having succeeded in the hands 

 of a very respectable cliaracter, and engaged the attention of some ingenious agri- 

 culturists; but whether the practice is likely to spread or be more generally adopted 

 I am not informed ; nor am I convinced that it is better than an alternate svstem 

 of grain and green crops, which furnishes the means of supporting a large live st'ck, 

 and thus increasing the quantity of manure for forcing large crops of grain ; Mr. 

 Cotes has other means of doing this from a large live stock kept on grass land in 

 his occupation. 



Soiling, or supporting live stock in stalls, by green food. — If this practice were 

 generally applied to all the heavy kinds of stock, it would greatly increase the 

 national resources ; it has before been observed that a horse may be well sum- 

 mered, with a good acre of vetches or lucern in this method ; and a good crop of 

 broad and red clover is equally productive, and equally applicable to the practice, 

 but I believe not quite so staple an article of food. The late Joseph Wilkes, Esq. 

 of Measham, Derbyshire, extended it to mowing grass with great advantage ; he had 

 the mown grass carried to the stalls, to his horses, and the horse manure carried 

 back to the land immediately, so soon as the horse litter was wetted or moistened, 

 without waiting for fermentation ; and' he assured me that the manure went farther, 

 and made more improvement thus, than in any other way, and that it quickly dis- 

 appeared, and got into the soil. He was of opinion that all farm-yard manure 

 ■was wasted by much fermentation: " put it on the ground, and let the land and 

 the muck settle it," that was his expression ; and I have frequently remarked that 

 the litter and dung arising from foddering cattle on grass land in winter, after 

 dressing it slightly over, soon disappears in the spring. Mr. Wilkes was of opinion 

 that if mown grass be carried to the stables, and the manure made from eating it 

 were immediately returned to the land, such land would regularly and progressively 



