360 THE EAPE CEOP. 



when they assume a dark red or brown colour, after which 

 it is not safe to leave them standing any longer. 



The crop is always cut with a broad, stout hook, care 

 being taken not to shake the plants and thus disturb the 

 seed-pods, which are then left lying on the ground in small 

 bundles. They should be turned every day, so as to 

 get perfectly dry and to allow the lower pods to perfect 

 the maturity of their contents. It is always better, if 

 possible, to thrash out the seed on the field, in the man- 

 ner described for turnip seed ; where the quantity, how- 

 ever, is large, or circumstances do not admit of this being 

 done, it may be tied up in small sheaves, stocked, carted 

 with sheets at the bottom of the vehicle to catch the seeds, 

 and stacked in the usual manner ; and then, at a suitable 

 time, thrashed out by the flail or by the ordinary machine, 

 which requires to be set to a greater width than when 

 the ordinary farm crops are being operated upon. When 

 thrashed out fresh on the field, the stems are readily eaten 

 by horses and cattle, which are very fond of them; if kept 

 any time in stack they get too dry and woody, and are 

 then only fit to be picked over by the cattle in the litter 

 of the courts or straw-yard. 



The produce of seed is about the same as from tur- 

 nips from 25 to 30 bushels per acre on the average. It 

 is at present grown but to a very small extent in this 

 country, as there is a general prejudice against it, as being 

 what is termed an " exhausting" crop; while, at the same 

 time, owing to the increased facilities of commerce, it has 

 to compete in the markets with the produce of other 

 countries, where it enters more constantly into the system 

 of cropping, and where the same fears of its effects on 

 the soil do not exist. Formerly it held a different posi- 

 tion in our crops, as at the beginning of the present 

 century we read that no less than 9000 acres of the 

 Great Bedford Level, equal to about one-thirteenth of 



