226 HEMP AND FLAX. 



loses half its value. The Smeeth Is now full of these 

 iStacks, and the season has proved highly favourable. It 

 is threshed in the autumn, being left for a sweat, which 

 improves the colour. A good crop, such as they have 

 got this year, amounts to six or seven coombs an acre, 

 and the present price at Lynn is 20s. a bushel. From 

 this accouHt it is not surprizing that the Smeeth of 1500 

 acres, letts at 3I. The price, however, is sometimes so 

 low as 7s. 6d. to I OS. a bushel. They intend, according 

 to the common practice near Wisbeach, ike. to sow four 

 crops in succession ; the second is usually as good as the 

 first : and after four years mustard, a crop of wheat, then 

 fallow. 



In old cultivated lands, four or five coombs a good crop. 



SECT. XVII. — HEMP AND FLAX. 



Mr. Algur, of Buckenham, had a three-acred piece 

 under this course for many years : 



1. Hemp, dunged for, 



2. Wheat; 



and the wheat was always very good ; more apt to be too 

 great than too small a crop. Most of the cottagers in that 

 vicinity have a patch of hemp, which is a great relief to 

 them : it is very profitable, and finds tlie families much 

 employment. 



As an instance of the inefficacy of the bounty, Mr, 

 Algur, though long a hemp-grower, never applied for 

 it. 



This culture, in the vicinity of Diss, has greatly de- 

 clined ; there is scarcely one-tenth grown of what there 

 was some years past : this is chiefly attributed to the high 

 price of wheat. Forty stone from the break, an average 

 crop ; bunching and heckling now 2od. a stone, and a 



good 



