33a HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE 



As arable land has suffered much more than grass from foreign 

 imports, it was inevitable that this country should become more 

 pastoral; in 1877 the arable land of England amounted to 

 13,454,017 acres, and permanent grass to 10,858,016. By 1907 

 this was practically reversed, the permanent grass amounting 

 to 13,807,860 acres and the arable to 10,777,595. In corn 

 crops the great decrease has been in the acreage of wheat, but 

 barley, beans, and peas have also diminished, while oats have 

 increased. In green crops there has been a great decrease in 

 turnips and swedes, compensated to some extent by an in- 

 crease in mangels, and a sad decrease in hops. The changes 

 in thirty years can be gathered from the tables of the Board 

 of Agriculture given on p. 331. 



In 1877 no separate return of small fruit was made, but in 

 1878 the orchards of England, including fruit trees of any kind, 

 covered 161,228 acres, which by [907 had grown to a total 

 area under fruit of 294,910 acres, among which were 168,576 

 acres of apples, 8,365 of pears, 11,952 of cherries, and 14,571 of 

 plums. Much of the small fruit is included in the orchards. 



' Other crops ' were further divided into : 



Acres. Acres. 



Carrots .... 11,897 Flax .... 355 



Onions .... 3,416 Others . . . 97,020 



Buckwheat . . . 5,226 117,914 



The average yield per acre of various crops in England for 



the ten years 1 897-1 906 was : 



Bushels. 



Wheat 31-15^ 



Barley 32-88 



Oats . . . . . . . . . 4i'38 



Beans 29-28 



Peas . . . 27'i5 



' In 1907 the average wheat crop was 33'96 bushels per acre in 

 England and 39- 1 8 in Scotland. The average yield per acre of wheat 

 in Holland is 34-1 bushels ; Belgium, 34 ; Germany, 30-3 ; Denmark, 

 28>2 ; France, 197. 



