THE CLOVEE CROP. 



WE now have to enter upon another division of our sub- 

 ject, the cultivation and treatment of those plants generally 

 used in a green state for "feeding" or "forage" purposes. 

 This division of our " Farm Crops," like that which has 

 preceded it, is only met with in systematic operation in 

 those countries where agriculture has assumed an advanced 

 position, and where the policy, nay the necessity of a 

 regular system of cultivation for the supply of food, animal 

 as well as vegetable, for the people, has been acknow- 

 ledged. We have hitherto been treating of the cultivation 

 of plants bearing on substances more or less directly used 

 as articles of food by ourselves. Such were the cereals 

 and other seed- producing crops. The fallow crops, as tur- 

 nips, carrots, cabbages, potatoes, &c., although consumed 

 largely as food materials by ourselves, are less directly 

 cultivated as food substances for ourselves than for our 

 cattle, while the present division, " forage crops," never 

 enters directly into human use, but is always grown for the 

 purpose of providing food for our flocks and herds. 



If we look back at the early period of our history, we 

 find that although flocks and herds were emblematic both 

 of riches and of power, and although frequent mention was 

 made of the various grain-bearing and other plants neces- 

 sary for the food or,raiment of the people of those days, no 

 attention seems to have been paid to the cultivation of any 

 of those plants upon which their animals had to rely for 

 their supplies of food. As civilization advanced and popu- 



