31 



Besides the great value of the manure which cows 

 so fed and well littered, must produce. — Manure 

 makes the farmer's wealth, and yet from mismanage- 

 ment of this important article the greatest loss is fre- 

 quently sustained; in hot weather particularly, there 

 is a great waste of dung from the injudicious habit 

 of leaving cattle in the fields, where gad fly and heat 

 drive them to madness unless they can find the cool 

 security of a river or pool, in which they will unpro- 

 fitahly stand for hours. 



I prefer red clover to vetches, but if you cannot 

 have the former, as will happen when you are first 

 entering on an * iU managed farm, sow vetches (which 

 yoTx can Iniy for aliout 2*. a stone) at the rate of 3 

 bushels to the acre, if sown bi-oadcast — by being 

 carried to the cow house or stable where Utter should 

 be plentifully supplied, cattle are made to contribute 

 to their own support, by making the manure for suc- 

 ceeding crops. The quantity of clover seed necessary 

 for an Irish acre is, from l^st. to 2st. but when ground 

 is perfectly clean by a regular course of drilled green 

 crops, as in Flanders, lOlbs. wiU answer. If any of 

 you-, however, try this quantity, your crop ^vill be 

 miserably thin, because your ground is so abomina]>ly 

 dirty. It is only in land repeatedly ploughed and well 

 manured, in which no weed is suifered to exist, that 

 this wonderful saving of seed can be attempted. The 

 clover plant in such land will tiller uninterruptedly 

 and possess itself of the whole surface. Every one 

 of you should save a little of the seed from the second 

 crop ; if part of the first crop be cut in May or June, 

 the second will be ripe in September, which in Ireland 

 is generally a dry month. In truth no man without 

 clover for summer feechng should presume to call him- 

 self a farmer at all. Is grazing to be put in compe- 



* In exliausted or very ligrht lands sow grey pease for soil- 

 ine: — they will flourish to a certainty where other crops would 

 faH. 



