THEORY AND PRACTICE. 75 



which every farmer has told, as a new discovery 

 of his own touching bare fallows, from the time, 

 three centuries ago, when Sir Anthony Fitzherbert 

 wrote ; and for three centuries before, perhaps. 



But it is trying work, no doubt, to see the fields 

 around you teeming with richest vegetation nature 

 all alive in every direction with the bursting wealth 

 of present produce and maturity, and to toil on 

 nevertheless upon the bare and burning fallow, where 

 the very dews of Heaven refuse their evening tear, 

 and the morning ray darts wide in vain search after 

 the liquid Brilliant that it finds on every grass-blade, 

 every leaf, and every flower throughout the rest of 

 Creation. One has heard of ' knocking a man into 

 next week ; ' such a misfortune might chance to befal 

 one inadvertently, and on suitable provocation : but 

 to be ploughing next year for nine months of this one, 

 and three of the last, to see everything around over- 

 taking you as it were by a twelvemonth, leaves 

 growing more juicy and green, and crops getting 

 richer and riper, and you and your fallow, like a 

 sort of converse Oasis, Desert amidst the Green, 

 still dragging behind, 'feeding the air, promise- 

 cramm'd,' a heart-sick waiter upon the deferred hope 

 of next year, It is trying work, no doubt ! 



