THE SAINFOIN" CROP. 



SAINFOIN is another of our "forage crops/' belonging to the 

 same order as the foregoing, and greatly resembling it in 

 its agricultural character. It is a perennial, deep-rooting 

 plant, with branching, spreading stems, and leaves consisting 

 of many pairs of oblong-pointed leaflets, which are some- 

 times a little hairy on their under surface. The flower- 

 stalks attain a height of from 2 to 2J feet, and stand out 

 beyond the leaves, carrying spikelets of pinkish-red flowers, 

 which are succeeded by flat, hard pods containing the 

 seed. It is said by some to be a native of this country, as 

 it is found growing wild on the calcareous soils in different 

 parts of the country, and it is also commonly met growing 

 under the same conditions in most of the countries of 

 Middle Europe. It has been long cultivated on the Con- 

 tinent, but was only introduced as a field crop into this 

 country about the middle of the seventeenth century. 

 Aubrey mentions it as a crop well known in his time 

 (1673). It was introduced from France, and was first 

 called " French Finger -grass." Several of our earlier 

 agricultural authors speak of sainfoin, and describe the 

 soils and mode of cultivation best suited to it. Tull gives 

 a long account of it, and speaks in high terms of the advan- 

 tages it offers on poor light soils ; Boys, in his Survey of 

 Kent, addressed to the Board of Agriculture, enters some- 

 what at length into its cultivation ; Arthur Young, in his 

 Communications to the Board of Agriculture, says that, 

 on soils proper for its cultivation, no farmer can grow too 

 much of it; and Marshall, in his Rural Economy of the 

 VOL. II. 43 



