THE TURNIP CROP. 295 



freeing of it from weeds, thus in another way ministering 

 to the welfare of the grain crop, fo. a good rotation, 

 turnips should not be too frequently taken off the same 

 soil, but should themselves be alternated with some other 

 crop which can be cultivated as a fallow or soil-cleaning 

 crop, such as the mangold or the beet. 



95. The soils best adapted for the turnip are what are 

 technically called " free and deep " that is, soils which 

 are easily pulverised and rendered friable, or quickly brought 

 to what is called a good tilth, and which can be deeply as 

 well as easily stirred, in order to insure a soil into which 

 the rootlets can easily penetrate. Such is the mechanical 

 condition of the soil required, and which is generally met 

 with in what are called loamy soils, and what, by the way, 

 are distinguished as turnip soils by way of contradistinc- 

 tion to heavy or wheat or bean lands. The chemical con- 

 dition of the turnip requires that the soil in which it is 

 grown shall have certain constituents. These are best 

 met with in those soils which lie upon, or are produced 

 from, " clay beds of the argillaceous formation." It so 

 happens, that while the chemical conditions of the turnip 

 soil are best met with in the soils above named, the me- 

 chanical conditions are best met with, on the contrary, in 

 the lightest description of soils lying upon or produced 

 from the " siliceous beds of the sandstone formation," so that 

 a contrariety of interest is brought about in the choice of 

 a soil. That choice, however, is rarely given to the farmer, 

 being dictated by circumstances of locality and the like; 

 but it is so far well ordered that, where a soil does not 

 meet all the requirements, mechanical and chemical, of the 

 plant, it may, by proper cultivation and the addition of 

 manure, be brought from a comparatively low to a com- 

 paratively high condition of cultural efficiency. It should 

 be noted here that the turnip, in one of its two chief 

 varieties, the white and the yellow, is much better adapted 

 to soils of the lightest class than the swede, which can 

 nourish better in those of the heaviest class. 



96. Professor Tanner, in his paper on the " Mechanical 



