HOME MAKUEE. 75 



the plow that is employed, and the plowing should be 

 deep enough to retain moisture about the decaying 

 plants. 



The Sheepfold. — In districts where bare summer fal- 

 lows are adopted, the practice of folding is carried on very 

 differently from where ^en crop cultivation prevails. 

 The method there is to bring the flock from the pasture, 

 where it is fed by day, and fold it upon a fallow by night. 

 When one fold is sufficiently manured, another one is en- 

 closed, the hurdles being shifted daily. 



The flock under this system is a mere working machine, 

 whose chief purpose was that of a manure carrier. It is 

 probable that more, in mutton and wool, is lost in this 

 way than is gained in manure. Nor is that the only ob- 

 jection to this system. It is made the means of enrich- 

 ing one part of the farm at the expense of another ; as 

 Mr. Bake well put it, it robs Peter to pay Paul. The 

 grass land is starved to feed the arable. This is the com- 

 mon practice in the neighborhood of the Sussex downs, 

 where farms include a stretch of the down land as part 

 of their area. 



Another method is to confine the flock altogother on 

 the fallows, and feed with tares, clover, or other forage 

 plant brought to it. The sheep are better off under this 

 system ; but it incurs a great deal of labor in cutting and 

 carting forage ; and it starves the land which grew the 

 crop. Folding is now more generally practised on land 

 under roots or green crop, where the sheep feed at their 

 ease, and manure the ground at the same time. 



To eat off a crop with sheep is theoretically less en- 

 riching than to plow it in green; and if the soil is poor, 

 thin, sandy, and deficient in organic matter, plowing in 

 green crops will be a very advantageous method of im- 

 proving it. But even on such soils, when mutton or 

 wool is an object, it may be better to feed off' the crop. 



