438 THE MANGOLD-WURZEL CROP. 



In Scotland the introduction of mangold is progressing 

 slowly but surely, as, notwithstanding the advantage the 

 climate offers for turnip cultivation, the increasing tendency 

 to disease exhibited by that plant has shown the farmers 

 the policy of at once securing themselves against the losses 

 and inconveniences of a decreasing root crop by providing 

 themselves with another, which would take the same 

 place in their rotations, and thus double the interval of 

 turnip cultivation on the same field. At one of the 

 monthly meetings of the Highland Society, 1 the "cultiva- 

 tion of mangold in Scotland " was discussed. The opinion 

 of several of the leading agriculturists present was, that 

 although the climate was less favourable than that of the 

 south for the growth of the plant, in ordinary seasons and 

 in good low- lying soils it might be cultivated very advan- 

 tageously, and that neither in the spring nor in the 

 autumn was it more liable to be injured by frosts than 

 elsewhere ; that it possessed the great advantage of being 

 improved by keeping until after the turnips were all 

 consumed ; and that although, from the character of the 

 climate of Scotland, it could not be regarded as a sub- 

 stitute for the latter, its freedom from disease and bulky 

 produce rendered it invaluable as a supplementary crop. 2 

 In some experimental trials 3 the following season at East 

 Lothian, where mangold was sown in the same field and 

 at the same time with turnips, the results in each case 

 were greatly in favour of the latter. Here, however, the 

 mangold was placed under great disadvantages. It was 

 sown a month later than it should have been, in a soil 



1 Full details of the discussion are given in the High. Soc. Trans., 1856, 

 p. 367. 



2 In the Agricultural Statistics of Scotland we find the area under cultiva- 

 tion in mangolds thus given : 



1854, 1946 acres. 



1855, 2299.1, 



* Hi^h. Soc. Trans., 1857, p. 552. 



1856, 3531 acres. 



1857, 2S03i 



