SAINFOIN AND LUCERNE 17 



four-course rotation was followed, though the regular 

 cropping was interrupted at intervals in order to take 

 sainfoin, which was left down for a few years. The 

 soil was distinctly calcareous, and sainfoin was highly 

 valued both for the hay and the grazing ; lucerne also 

 grew well, though only small patches were usually 

 sown near the homestead. It is rather remarkable 

 that, despite the prevailing chalk soil, Wilts only 

 grows from 700 to 800 acres of lucerne, and Dorset 

 less than 300 ; in these warm climates one would 

 have expected a greater breadth of so cheaply grown 

 and productive a crop for thin soils. But sheep- 

 farmers always prefer sainfoin to lucerne for grazing, 

 and the high rainfall puts difficulties in the way of 

 making it into hay ; Essex and Kent, two of the driest 

 counties of England, form the chief home of lucerne 

 growing. The wheat looked well, and throughout 

 this district was the best crop of the year ; barley was 

 also promising both for yield and evenness, though 

 recent thunder-rains had laid it rather badly in places. 

 Both crops were in want of sunny, drying weather : 

 one of those easterly spells which had been so remark- 

 ably absent from England during 1909 and 1910 

 would have saved many doubtful crops. In contrast 

 to the other cereals oats were weak and patchy, in 

 many places scant of plant and short of straw, and 

 generally of a poor, unkindly colour. Attacks both 

 of stem eel-worm and frit-fly had been in evidence 

 previously, and the early-sown crops had suffered as 

 much or more than the later ones, though in 1909, 

 when a very severe attack of frit- fly prevailed over the 

 Midlands, it was the late-sown crops alone which were 

 affected. But here, as in several other places along 

 our route, we began to be told that oats had been 

 grown rather too frequently of late ; barley had been 



