874 



THE AGRICULTURAL GAZETTE. 



are scattered so unequally through the soil, that such ] is pulverisation carried deeper thau the ordinary furrow- 

 investigations are encompassed with fallacies and uncer- slice in ploughing. The system of parallel drainage is 

 taint?; and even if their combinations most favourable or efficiently carried into operation in some cases ; but even 



adverse to fertility were certainly determined, which they 

 are not, still the discovery of their eiisience in one patch 

 of ground would be no guarantee of their presence a yard 

 beyond it. 1 allude not so much to those palpable dif- 

 ferences which may be observed by the eye, such as the 

 alternations of sand and clay, which are not uncommon, 

 but rather to those minute homce >j>athic doses of some of 

 the rarer ingredients, which, it may be, are essential to 

 fertility, and of which the quantity, and sometimes the 

 existence, can only be detected by long and laborious re- 

 search ; and yet all this expense of time and money and 

 toil would be useless (unless it could be repeated for every 

 rood — I had almost said every rod — of land upon a farm), 

 to prove that the facts so discovered were not coufined 

 to some trifling locality. Nor, if some prevailing defi- 

 ciency were discovered, would it alwa)s be easy to apply 

 a remedy ; for the operations in the laboratory of nature 

 materially vary from those which we employ, aodthe in- 

 gredients might not be combined, in any addition which 

 could be made, exae'ly in the same proportion which is 

 necessary for the production of the same effec's. Never- 

 theless, although the farmer must not expect immediate 

 assistance from this quarter, yet I am fully convinced 

 that ultimately, by long perseverance and many analyses 

 of the most fruitful soils, patiently and skilfully con- 

 ducted, »h; chemist will arrive at some general truths, 

 which will throw important light upon thoae principles 

 of agriculture which are now involved in obscurity ; and 

 with a vii w to present benefit, if he can only show within 

 what limits and in what forms line and iron are essential 

 to fertility, they being easily within the grasp of a rude 

 analysis, the fa' mer will soon see his way more e'early into 

 the causes of plenty or bane-.ness in his fields, and will 

 be more ready to avail himself of the means within his 

 reach to cure defects which are not beyond his compre- 

 hension, nor beyond the hope of remedy. — L Veinon 

 Harcourt, West Dean House. 



SKETCHES OF EAST LOTHIAN HUSBANDRY. 

 Conclusion, — The reader who may have honoured 

 these cursorily-written Sketches with a perusal, must 

 have perceived that my object has not been to hold 

 up the system of farming pursued in this locality as a 

 model of judicious husbandly for general imitation, or as 

 suitable lor introduction into districts dissimilarly cir- 

 cumstanced. I have throughout, for the most part, 

 contented myself with a simple statement of fac.s. 

 This course 1 considered more satisfactory than that so 

 frequently adopted by touri&ts, of publishing extraor- 

 dinary and often extravagantly enormous statements of 

 produce and profi's, without at all entering into the 

 details of the grand system of cultivation by which such 

 startling result* are represented to be realised. East 

 Lothian i>, no doubt, a h'ghly-cultivated district, and 

 occupied by respectable and enterprising farmers; but 

 Still the system of management adopted there is in many 

 respects susceptible of great improvement. The state- 

 ments of produce given in connection with the cultiva- 

 tion of the different crops may strike many of my readers 

 as contrasting strangely with the ideas they had pre- 

 viously formed on the subject ; but after diligent and 

 repeated inquiries, as well as from personal observation, 

 they wi'l be found to be perfectly correct. On anotht r oc- 

 casion I hope to be able to place before the readers of ihis 

 Journal a statement of the actual results obtained from 

 individual farms on each of the several classes of soil 

 into which the county is naturally divided ; and in this 

 paper I shall introduce a few general remarks on the 

 system of management which I have hitherto so minutely 

 desc ibed. 



The soil and situation of any distrct properly exercise 

 an important influence in determining the precise course 

 ' of management which can be most profitably adopted, 

 the former consideration, for the most part, determining 

 the class of crops to be cul ivated, and the latter the 

 manner of their disposal. Wheat has besn seen to be 

 the staple crop of the East Lothian farmers, the strong 

 tenaeiou oil there abounding being peculiarly suited to 

 the Wheat plant; but by the more general adoption o! 

 the various improvements recently discovered, it is 

 btlieved that not only might an increased produce be 

 obtained bat a greater diversity of cropping might also 

 be introduced. Tnough naturally very fertile, thi gene- 

 ral character of the soil is a stiff, tenacious clay, in its 

 present state difficult and disagreeable to labour ; com- 

 monly requiring four or five ploughings, and an endless 

 number of rollings, harrowings, grubbings, &c, even in 

 favourable season, before it can be sufficiently pulverised 

 and prepared for a Turnip crop ; while in adverse sea- 

 sous, such as that of last year, it is almost impossible to 

 labour it to any degree of perfection. In its natural 

 state it retains water lrke a sponge, and when once tho- 

 roughly saturated with it, requires a long time to 

 become dry and ready for working. Hence draining and 

 subsoil-ploughing are important primary operations 

 before the sources of the soil can be fully developed ; 

 but although the former of them has been long practised 

 to a greater or less extent, the great and essential im- 

 portance of perfect drainage, and a thorough pulverisa- 

 tion of the soil, is not so generally appreciated or 

 carried into operation as it is desirable that it should 

 be, and hence a principal cau.«e of the compara- 

 tively low produce frequently obtained, notwithstanding 

 the superiority of the management in other respects. 

 In too many cases, the system of drainage effected by 

 . cross drains and open furrows is still the only method 



here erroneous ideas seem to prevail in reference to the 

 means by which these effect the desired purpose. 

 Wherever this system of draining is required, the action 

 of the subsoil-plough is necessary to injure perfect dry- 

 ness, it being no less necessary to provide the means for 

 the Wit r to enter the drains than to carry it off after- 

 wards. The general prevalence of erroneous ideas on 

 this subject can alone account for the trouble taken after 

 drainage, even when it has been properly practised, to 

 insure the open furrows of the field being directly over 

 the drains, to facilitate thereby the water finding its way 

 into them, as described in n.y paper on the subject in the 

 Gazette, p. 395. 



It is almost incredible that subsoil-ploughing has made 

 so little progress among the East Lothian farmers, espe- 

 cially when it is considered rhtt their soil, of all others, 

 is ih it likely to benefit mo>t from the operation. The 

 use of the subsoil-plough may, indeed, be regarded as 

 among the most important improvements which h ve re- 

 cently been effected in British agriculture ; for without 

 i', as already observed, drainage is incomplete. When 

 this circumstance is taken into considerat on, it will not 

 be regarded as surprising that the summer fallow should 

 still be regarded so essential as a preparation for the 

 Wheat crop — a process which, whatever may have been 

 its advantiges under former management, is now very 

 properly regarded as unnecessary wherever the use of 

 the drain and the subsoil-plough is properly understood. 



The necessity of deep pulverisation to facil tate the 

 escape of moisture contained in the soil into the drains 

 has on former occasions been so forcibly brought before 

 the readers of the Gazette, that it is scarcely necessary 

 to enlarge on it here. An important result of the re- 

 moval of superfluous moisture from the soil — the pro- 

 duction of increased temperature in it — does not, how- 

 ever, seem to be generally understood. 



The first and most obvious result produced by per- 

 fect drainage, by means of the frequent drain system and 

 the action of the subsoil-plough, is the comparative faci- 

 lity with which the usual operations of husbandry can 

 afterwards be performed at almost any season, and with- 

 out any injury to the soil, unless while rain is actually 

 falling, or immediately after. How often is the proper 

 period for sowing unavoidably allowed to pass before the 

 seed can be got deposited in the ground, o ring to the 

 unfavourable state of the soil ! This is a circumstance 

 with which the East Lothian farmers are familiar; and 

 it is scarcely necessary to edd, that it is almost invariably 

 followed by a scanty crop ; but even on wet soils, when, 

 through the intervention of a favourable season, th^ seed- 

 time may not be unnecessarily delayed beyond the proper 

 period, how often may the crop afterwards be seen to 

 languish and assume a sickly hue, in consequence of the 

 saturated state of the soil on which it is produced ! In 

 dry seasons the value of perfect drainage is not so fully 

 appreciated ; nay, in such cases, it is too commonly sup- 

 posed to aggravate tke evils of drought ; but the reverse 

 of this is the fact. The evils of drought on the growing 

 crop are greatly aggravated by the fissures thereby pro- 

 duced in tenacious soils, which still further contribute to 

 facilitate the escape of whatever moisture may still re- 

 main in them ; but it will be invariably observed that 

 land saturated with moisture during the winter has the 

 greatest tendency to suffer from this cause in the sum- 

 mer. Perfect drainage, therefore, instead of aggravating 

 the evils of drought in the summer season, contribute 

 more than anything else to alleviate them. 



But one of the most; important results of dryness in the 

 soil is the increased degree of temperature thereby pro- 

 duced, the beneficial effects of which on vegetation, as 

 contributing to increase of produce aud early maturity, 

 are sufficiently well known. As rain falls from the 

 heavens it must eiiher escape by subterranean channels 

 or by evapora'ion. On certain geological formations, 

 such channels are formed by nature, the substratum 

 abounding in innumerable natural fissures, through which 

 the water is carried off almost as quickly as it falls ; and 

 whatever may be the natural fertility of such soils, they 

 are invariably distinguished by the comparatively early 

 period at which the crops produced on them are ready 

 tor being harvested. Wherever such channels do not 

 naturally exist, they must be formed by art before the 

 produotjve powers of the soil can be fully developed. It 

 should be constantly borne in mind that the smallest 

 portion of water cannot escape from the soil by evapora- 

 tion without the abstraction of heat. Every one must be 

 familiar with this effect in the case of allowing the hand 

 to become dry by evaporation after immersion in water, 

 and the sensible degree of cold thereby produced ; and, 

 If alcohol or ether be substituted for water, the cold 

 produced by evaporation will be much increased, in con- 

 sequence of the rapidity with which these substances 

 pass into vapour ; indeed, so great is the degree of 

 cold produced by the evaporation of ether that it may 

 readily be made to convert water into ice in the warmest 

 day in summer, the water in ti. is case being merely placed 

 in a thiu glass tube, and the ether being made to fall on 

 the outside in drops. Water evaporates more slowly 

 than ether, and hence its effects in causing a diminution 

 of temperature are not so apparent, the loss of heat being 

 extended over a greater interval of time. 



The maximum degree of heat in the soil is therefore 

 produced when the greatest possible facility for the escape 

 of the moisture contained in it has been secured. In a 

 well drained field a day will, in most cases, be sufficient 

 to carry off the water which may have fallen the pieced - 



• • • t • I. . . 1 . > V ~ . 



[Dec. 28, 



Lion ; but in undrained tenacious claya, where evar ora- 

 tion is the only means of carrying off the moisture, the 

 soil will often be completely saturated for week* after 

 heavy rains, and while it is in this state none >f the 

 ordinary operations of tillage can be performed on it, 

 without imparting to it a degree of tenacity whicL it will 

 require much subsequent labour to remove. 



There are many of the details of East Lothian hus- 

 bandry well worthy of imitation, and which might be 

 advantageously introduced into other parts of the king- 

 dom ; but in the department of agriculture, now the 

 subject of consideration, there is no question but the East 

 Lothian farmers have much to learn, and considerable 

 exertion to make before they are on a par with less highly 

 favoured districts. If the subsoil- plough had been judi- 

 ciously employed in conjunction with the drain, not only 

 would the position of the furrows of the field, in relation 

 to the drains, be a matter of perfect indifference, but 

 open furrows would, in fact, be altogether unnecessary, 

 the whole being in that case advantageously laid quite 

 flat, wi'hout the intervention of ridges of any kind. The 

 waste in cropping occasioned by open furrows, as well as 

 the diversity in the quality of the produc.; thereby occa- 

 sioned, are familiar to every farmer. Occasionally, it is 

 true, a field so laid down may be seen in this district, 

 but the practice is not general ; nor, in fact, can it be so 

 until more effectual means are extensively employed for 

 drying the soil. Much of the soil of East Lothian was 

 draiued with tiles before the use of the subsoil-plough 

 became generally known, and the drains then made being 

 seld :>m more than 20 inches in depth, the use of that 

 implement was afterwards inadmissible without destroying 

 the drains ; and hence a principal reason of so much of 

 the surface of the county being now in an imperfectly 

 drained state. 



In conclusion, I may be allowed to state that if the 

 Sketches of East Lothian Husbandry, which have now 

 occupied so much of the space of this Paper, shall have 

 had the effect of correcting misstatements, of removing 

 erroneous impressions, or of contributing, in any degree, 

 to the improvement of agriculture in less favoured dis- 

 tricts, my object in their preparation will have been 

 attained. — T. Sullivan. 



employed for the removal of superfluous moisture ; nor J ing one in rain, leaving little to be car.ied off by evapora- 



ON GYPSUM AS MANURE. 



It has been mentioned before, that gypsum is now 

 strewed with great effect over the dung, and ploughed 

 under with it; we may be assured, however, that this 

 operat : on will especially succeed in dry localities and 

 dry seasons ; becausp, as the gypsum requires 450 parts 

 of water for its solution, and the now formed sulphate of 

 ammonia merely ■§- parts of water, the plants will, in this 

 case, be the surer supplied with the required sulphuric 

 acid. It is advantageous, on the same ground, if gypsum 

 (as it is done in some places) is mixed with the duDg in 

 the stables, or in the dunghill. He, however, who 

 asserts that gypsum can only operate if previously de- 

 composed by ammonia, is in error, because it manures 

 well, even when the soil contains no ammoniacal salt 

 which could decompose it ; nay, we see that it acts power- 

 fully, even if merely lying on the leaves, and solved in 



the water of dew. 



It has been also often asserted that gypsum acts 



advantageously on vegetation only, because it constantly 

 attracts water from the air, and thus supplies the soil 

 with it. A trifling experiment, however, can convince us 

 that this assertion is groundless. If a certain quantity 

 of dry earth be mixed with a little powder of gypaum, 

 and another be left by itself, we shall find by repeated 

 weighings, that that portion which has been mixed with 

 gypsum has not attracted any more water from the atmo- 

 sphere than that which is unmixed. Fresh-burnt gypsum, 

 it is true, attracts 21 J per cent, of water ; but it does not 

 give it up to the earth, but fixes it chemically. 



If it is the case at times, that one coat of g/psum is 

 more effective than another, it will be because it has been 

 better burnt ; it is especially important that it be not too 

 much burnt, else it will become virrefied, and soluble in 

 water with difficulty. The few useful substances which 

 it contains are of no consequence, because as only 80 

 to 90 lbs. of gypsum are used on the acre, the former 

 cannot exercise any important effect on vegetation. It 

 is, however, possible that gypsum, which contains 

 much sulphuret of calcium, may be one of striking effect, 

 as plants can then assimilate the sulphur and cal- 

 cium without previous de-oxidisation. Some assert, 

 also, to have found by experiment, that the sulphuret of 

 calcium, which is formed by the influence of the carbon on 

 gypsum, during the process of burning, improves vege- 

 tation to a considerable degree. It is natural that the fine 

 dust of gypsum will dissolve easier in water than its 

 coarser grains, as the former affords more poinis of contact 

 to the fluid. It therefore is another instance of one sort 

 of gypsum acting more powerfully than another; this 

 may be caused by its different degree of pulverisation. 



As it acts especially on the formation of leaves, the 

 crops of Beans, Peas, and Vetches, which have been 

 manured with much gypsum, will yield much straw buc 

 little additional grain, as the former will grow onwrthouu 

 producing any husks ; for the sake of avoiding which, no 

 more than 20 lbs. of gvpsum ought to be used on some 

 sorts of soil. Gypsum will avail most plants belonging 

 to the families of the Leguminosse and Coniferee, wnjcii 

 is easily explained by their containing many vegetable 

 substances, into whose chemical composition sulphur 

 enters to some amount. It is less useful to the Cerealia, 

 and Buck-wheat does not derive any benefit from U a 

 all ; to Maize, on the other hand, it is very useful. » 

 operates very quickly, because Clover, manured wiiu 

 gypsum, can be recognised even after eight days, by u 



