THE VETCH CROP. 



THE VETCH or TAKE claims precedence of all our forage 

 crops, as being the earliest of which we have any record 

 in the annals of agriculture, and as having been in culti- 

 vation in this country long before the clovers or plants of 

 more recent introduction were known. All the principal 

 Roman authors refer to the crop, and agree very closely 

 in their recommendations as to its cultivation and mode 

 of consumption. Cato and Columella advise that it be 

 sown at two periods, in the autumn and early in the 

 spring, in order that the cattle may have a second supply 

 ready when the first is consumed. Pliny recommends 

 three sowings ; the first early in the autumn, which is to 

 be fed off at the end of the season, and then allowed to 

 stand for a seed-crop the next year, and the second and 

 third at the periods already alluded to. They all appear 

 to agree as to its good effects on the land, and class it with 

 lucerne and lupines in that respect that, if cut green 

 and used for soiling purposes, it rather benefits than 

 exhausts the soil. 1 We could readily subscribe to this 

 opinion were the crop consumed on the ground, or were 

 the resulting manure returned from the feeding sheds or 

 yards to the field; otherwise our modern ideas of the 

 manurial debtor and creditor account between a field and 

 its crop would look upon the balance as being rather 

 against the field where the crop was carried off, and only 

 the roots and stubble returned to the soil. The concluding 



1 "Et vicia pinguescunt arva." Plin. Nat. Hist., lib. xviii. c. 15. 



