• 



762 



THE AGRICULTURAL GAZETTE. 



[Nov. 17, 1855. 



and 



just preparing to be fattened. The great use 

 advantage of the straw and treacle is, that it saves roots; 

 and I rarely give more than 1 bushel of roots to young 

 steers, and H bushel to two-year-olds. The molasses 

 sweetens aud softens the straw, and they eat it with 

 great avidity when used to it. In some seasons I have 

 kept lean steers healthy and in as good condition as I 

 wished by 1 lb. of molasses mixed as above in about 

 2 bushels or 3 perhaps of cut straw, aud about 3 lbs. of 

 Rape-cake per day. For fattening oxen, I do not think 

 it right to make this mixture. I have tried it, and find 

 that they do better by a change of food, viz., £ bushel 

 of Turnips at 6 a.m., another 4 bushel before 8 o'clock, 

 and at that hour a feed of cake at the rate of £ peck per 

 head, mixed up with a small quantity of cut hay (about 



only one-fourth ot the usual | A good wholesome loaf of bread may be made fr£ 



.., „ , ,. *L.i. ~., a m i x ture of household flour and sharps, anlcaube 



M If we suppose that 



breadth of Barley land was sown with Wheat, that, on 

 the four course system, would add one-fourth to the 

 average breadth of land under Wheat. . . . There 

 will remain little more than 1,000,000 quarters of 

 Wheat for which we shall be dependent on foreign 

 supply. . . . The result of this estimate is mainly 

 governed by the supposed increased breadth of land 

 sown with Wheat last season. • . . If my estimate 

 should prove accurate, the present price of Wheat is 

 not likely to be maintained." I now propose to examine 

 what this estimate is worth. Barley land and Wheat 



There is a great 



land are two very different things. 



quantity of land growing Wheat which will not grow 



Barley. The proportions may be two to one, or still 



peck), and as much cut Wheat straw as they will eat ; , greater. Yet Mr. Caird assumes that they are equal, 



►wards noon, say 1 1 o'clock, feed with Turnips again, aud that one-fourth of ihe Barley land having been 



a 



toward 



and about 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and then rack up 

 at night with oatmeal and beanmeal £ peck of each, 

 mixed with cut hay and straw, as in the morning feed.'' 



These letters sufficiently prove that hay is not 

 necessary for fattening cattle, and our own expe- 

 rience perfectly corroborates this statement. On an 

 arable farm, where no hay w T as made, 80 to 100 

 head of cattle were fattened annually. Roots cut in 

 slices given twice a day, about 80 lbs. apiece, and 

 straw chaff moistened with hot Linseed soup, and 

 dusted over with beanmeal, given twice a day, were 

 sufficient feeding. The cattle thus had 80 lbs. of 

 green food, 10 or 12 lbs. of straw, 1^ lb. of Linseed, 

 and 3 lbs. of beanmeal each daily, and they fattened 

 rapidly. 



A great deal of useful information was given 

 in the discussion which followed Mr. Wallis's 

 paper, and to some of it we shall hereafter direct the 

 attention of our readers. 



sold by the baker at ljd. under the quality of bread 

 now used, and it is of better quality far than what thev 

 (the labourers) voluntarily consumed some three Years 



i 



Without wishing to advocate any undue inter- 

 erence with the affairs of the labourer, I caunot helo 

 thinking that there might and ought to be some change 

 made as pointed out ; and no better class of person? °T 

 am persuaded, exist than the readers of the Gardeners' 

 Chronicle to persuade the lower classes to make the 

 alteration. A Miller. 



MR. CAIRD'S ESTIMATE OF 



HARVEST. 



THE 



Mr. Caird calculates on the addition of a fourth 

 from increased breadth, favourable seed time, and 

 liberal use of guano. 1st. As to increased breadth, 

 was not the 1854 breadth so large 

 scarcely exceeded it ! 2d. Did not 

 a seed and harvest time as 1855 ? 



that that of 1855 

 1854 enjoy as good 

 3d. If 



guano was 



more liberally used, was not its use in 1855 more requi- 

 site from the severe spring than in 1854 ? From a limited 

 observation I am inclined to think that in the west of 

 England and in the south the increase in breadth of 

 1855 over that of 1854 was not considerable. The 

 increase of breadth in both seasons over 1 853 is doubt- 

 less great, but 1854 had a large breadth. Next, the 

 seed time and harvest of both seasons were equally 

 good, better never known; and lastly, the winter of 1855 

 season was so severe that on the light lands where 



sown with Wheat, that crop was thereby increased one- 

 fourth. And conceding as a fact that one-fourth of the 

 Barley land was sown with Wheat (which many will 

 deny), it does not follow that the yield of Wheat was 

 increased in a like proportion, because Barley land is 

 just that kind of land upon which the extreme severity 

 of laet winter acted most prejudicially. As to the price 

 not being maintained, my information leads me to an 

 opposite conclusion. I think it will be higher. How 

 does it appear that substituting Wheat for Barley can 

 reduce the price of the former in any material degree ? 

 The breadth of Barley being reduced, the crop would 

 be reduced in proportion. By the action of a natural 

 law the price of Barley would rise, and Wheat would 

 follow. W. R. Carter, Pickhurst Green, Bromley, Kent, 

 November 6. 



There appears to be no question now that the Wheat 

 crop of this country is deficient, and that we are not 

 likely to receive supplies from abroad of sufficient amount 

 to reduce the price of bread very materially. My 

 present purpose, however, is not to argue on the amount 

 of corn either grown or likely to be imported, 

 but to point out a matter of some importance 



community at large with respect to the 

 in which what we have to consume is used 



classes esneciallv : and as the 



to the 

 manner 

 by the 



labouring 



especially ; ana as 

 Gardeners' Chronicle is circulated amongst a class of 

 people particularly adapted to persuade and induce 

 economy, I have ventured to call their attention to the 

 useful work before them, hoping they may be willing to 

 point out to all classes, but the labourer in particular, the 

 necessity that exists for economy in the use of bread, not 

 only in the quantity as far as is practicable but more 



in the quality. Being a miller, I am of 



position to know what description of bread 



staple food of the people, and I am 



to find that ud to this time no lower 



particularly 

 course in a 

 forms the 



surprised 

 description than 

 saleable. To 



up 



good household 



bread 

 the 



is at all 



guano or some 

 crop was next 

 neighbourhood 



the clays in 1854 had 

 : and 



a 



bad ciop, in 

 1855 a good one ; and vice versa as to the light 

 lands. Of this there are striking instances; even where 

 doctored with guano, &c, the Wheats, although they 

 recovered in burthen on the light lands, never recovered 

 in yield ; and, instead of good com, a thin chested light 

 consumptive looking grain is the result. On the clays, 

 however, without any doctoring at all a heavy good yield 

 is found. Where coarse Wheats are i^rown, as Rivett's 



point out more fully tne saving in 

 top-dressing was not used, the Wheat adopting the use of a coarser article, I need only tell 



akin to a failure. Judging from this tl * ose P?™ n \ who are unacquainted with the business 



or a miller that to make a sack of flour of a quality 



sufficiently good for the bread I have just spoken of, 



there is a loss to the consumption of the country of at 



least a stone of flour in every quarter of Wheat ground. 



This we call sharps, which are, strange to say, at the 



present moment almost unsaleable, either alone or mixed 



with a proportion of better flour. For coarse bread 



that it is both useful and wholesome I can prove from 



the fact that when the 4 lb. loaf was as low as Ad., the poor 



(advertised as Payne's Defiance) as much as 40 bushels P* P l 5, eagerly bought it up, and even used it mixed 



to the acre and upwards have been grown on land let at wlth Barl Y > lf the r low Pf lce of 1 wa 8 es > which was > l 

 10*. an acre, whilst the delicate " velvet-eared" white ,raa g me > * e cause of the demand for it, then made it 

 Wheats on lands let at 30s. made a sorry sample in I e *toble, ™hy should it not now be consumed when 

 weight and quality, and the yield does not average 24 i there 1S e . viden * cause for every one to economise the 

 bushels, besides tail. T " *' " 



In scarce times, the growth of the 

 coarse Wheats is much to be encouraged as one mode 

 of increasing produce on poor lands, if not on rich. 

 And Rivett's (well baked) makes bread by no means to 

 be despised, and the best of ship biscuits for the Crimea. 

 The statistics of the soil are essential, as the basis of 

 corn statistics, and we ought to know how much light 

 land there is, and how much heavy, and then 

 a general avenge could be better arrived at. 

 The mixture of Barley with Wheat is also to be en- 

 couraged. In the districts of Hols worthy and Stratton, 

 in Cornwall, the bread is extremely good, and yet if 

 one half is not Barley at least one third is. The oven 

 has a deal to do with it, and those used in that country 

 made at the Bideford potteries are the cleanliest and 

 best in use. They are made of earthenware, at a cost 

 of 9s. 6d. to 1/., according to size, and surpass the 

 ordinary brick oven in economy of fuel, and even heat. 

 Their general use is fast gaining ground. At Barn- 

 staple, aud generally in North Devon, the admixture of 

 Barley is increased, and there the household bread is 

 less palateable but certainly better than that mixed with 

 alum and London bakers' compound. The"navvie" 

 requires meat and the best and finest W beaten flour, 

 and those who will work like a "nawie" have a 

 right perhaps to use it. But let not only the seden- 

 tary Londoner be Hie mechanics generally leave off 

 the use of •* firsts," and condescend to seconds baked 

 at home. And if they find their children healthier, as 

 they assuredly will do, they will also find their flour 

 bill considerably less ; and if Wheat should continue to 

 rise, try a little Barley, at any rate do not reject the 

 Revett's. Who knows to what extent a general economy 

 of this kind might benefit the community 1 Simplex. 



In your Paper of Monday last is a letter by Mr. Caird 

 on the late harvest, in which are the following passages : 



consumption of flour \ Since harvest I have done all 

 in my power to get the bakers to sell it, but up to the 

 present time to no purpose ; in two instances this week 

 I have had it returned. 



There is just one argument in favour of the use of 

 good bread — other articles of food, such as meat, 

 cheese, butter, &c, are all 

 little of those come now to 



The following are extracts from the correspondence 

 of the Times on the subject : — 



"Mr. Caird says that during last autumn every acre that 

 could be got ready was sown with Wheat, aud when spring 

 came Wheat was substituted for Barley wherever it was prac^ 

 ticable ; and he adds that if we suppose only one-fourth of the 

 usual breadth of Barley land was sown with Wheat, that on the 

 four-course system would add one-fourth to the breadth of land 

 under Wheat. It is quite true that when land was in high con- 

 dition, or where the tenant was needy or grasping, this substitu- 

 tion of crops might occasionally be made, but I hold that this 

 could only be done to a very limited extent. Farms in regular 

 course of husbandry can seldom be taken out of that course 

 without ultimate loss to the occupier, and so well is this under- 

 stood that most good farmers altogether ignore such a practice. 

 I may here state that a land agent of great respectability told 

 me yesterday that on one of the estates under his care, contain. 

 ing over 2000 acres, there were not 5 acres sown with Wheat 

 where Barley should have been. As Barley at this time is only 

 worth about Is. 3d. per stone, and Wheat is worth more than twice 

 that rate, one cannot believe there exists any such scarcity of Bar- 

 ley as the supposed reduced quantity of land sown with it should 

 show. I do not therefore think that any very large quantity of 

 Wheat can safely be calculated upon as coming from that source. 

 I am also obliged to differ from Mr. Caird in his estimate of the 

 defect in the yield. Having threshed over 30 acres of Wheat 

 of this year's crop, and most of it very little lodged, I find the 

 deficiency much greater than that assumed by Mr. Caird. From 

 my own observation, and from answers to inquiries among the 

 numerous agriculturists with whom I have discussed this point, 

 I am led to the conclusion that there is at least one-sixth defi- 

 ciency when the loss in yield and weight in taken into considera- 

 tion. Mr. Caird quotes the quantities of Wheat delivered in the 

 week ending on the 6th of October in the years 1853, 1854, 

 and 1855, and, finding that the delivery in the latter year 

 is greatly in excess over that of 1853, draws the extraordi- 

 nary conclusion that therefore a greater breadth of land had 

 been in Wheat. I venture to give a different explanation. 

 Since- 1853 locomotive steam threshing machines of great 

 power have been extensively employed, and by their agency 

 large quantities of corn have been threshed and afterwards 

 marketed. Under the old system this could not possibly have 

 been accomplished, as the horses could not have been spared at 

 this season from the other important operations on the farm to 

 work the horse threshing-machine. In my opinion, the employ- 

 ment of this new machine is the chief reason why there has 

 been so great a delivery of Wheat so early in the season. The 

 present crop has one great advantage— it is all perfectly sound; 

 hence it can all be used for human food. There is also a very 

 great crop of Potatoes, and but partially diseased. Barley, too, 

 is in g. neral over an average crop, and, no doubt, a good deal ot 

 it will be mixed economically with Wheat, aud ground tor bread- 

 meal. If the winter prove severe, there will, I fear, be mucfc 

 privation and suffering among the poor ; still 1 cannot out tinnJc 

 it better that the truth should be told and the strictest economy 

 advised, rather than that persons siiould be lulled into raise 

 security by erroneous, though friendly statements. 



"II. J. Turner, Richmond, Yorkshire, lSov.7. 



" I entirely differ from James Caird as to the breadth of land 

 under Wheat being greater than last year or o^™ 1 ™ *f°2 

 than an average, for, owing to the comparatively small q^my 

 sown in 1852-3, the largest extent of land * P/oper rotation <X 

 crops will allow of was applied to Wheat in 18W-4»and there ore 

 could not a in be planted with that grain in 1851-a. a mm 

 this is corroborated by the present abundance ana reiau™ 

 cheapness of Barley, notwithstanding the cessation or impoiij, 

 averaging near 20,000 quarters per week since 1846, an d altD0 "|" 

 we have now some export to Holland, &c.; likewise a large 

 quantity in some districts is being ground with \V heat, vu j 

 own farm, with every desire to sow as much Wheat as po » , 

 I was unable, for the for, going reason to plant as many 

 (of Wheat) in 1864 as in 1853. As to the yield, 1 nave m« 

 week threshed four fields of Wheat, one of red Lamias, ano 

 of Mummy, a third Talavera, the fourth Scotch wliite. *» 

 average produce is 14 imperial bushels per acre, against ao u 

 per acre last year; and, as I own a travelling steam w 

 log-machine, I have an opportunity of knowing ** f ^ 

 is not an exception in the neignoournooo 



At the 



in the 



time I freely admit that J know of some good crop* m i 

 counties of Worcester, Gloucester, Salop, Northamp t0 J * 

 which have been proved to be so on threshing ; but in0 " f l ' what 

 instance does the produce amount to within 10 per cen t. 

 was grown on the same farms last year. James Laira stai 



v?ry dear, and perhaps 

 the share of the working 

 man ; bread, then, is his real staff of life, and if he is 



he must be well fed. 



to do 



work 



was grown on iub saiue iaims ihsi yem. «»•»"•■ ^ . ] ..r the 



deficiency may be made up from America and Egypt, l " 

 export from the latter is prohibited after the 6th JtfWS, 

 The extra quantity returned as sold since harvest^* 

 entirely to more „ ..«- — . 



point I fully agree 



ttribute 

 tht 





a good day's 

 So much for the labourer himself, but he is not the only 

 consumer by any means ; how about those five young; 

 "brats!'* — they eat the larger share of the weekly 

 supply, and are called upon to do no work ; cannot 

 some, if not all, their share be of a coarser description ? 

 This requires looking into : we are called upon as 

 farmers to pay high wages to the labourers, and most 

 cheerfully have the farmers responded to the call, but if 

 the extra pay is only to be spent in what really 

 has now become a luxury, it is really doing no good ; 

 the family, in fact, who spend the whole in extra- 

 vagant articles of food when they might save, are 

 making a bad return to the employees, by being 

 applicants to the unions for relief immediately any bad 

 weather or other cause throws them out of work 

 whereas economy would enable them to lay by for a few 

 days of lost work, and enable them to avoid debt and 

 dependence on poor rates, a tax which it is by no means 

 necessary to increase ; ail other burdens are daily 

 becoming heavier, and although there is a prevailing 

 idea that farmers are earning great profits, I beg, with- 

 out giving vent to an agricultural grumble, to inform 

 those persons that it is not all gold that glitters the 

 price of Wheat is not the index of the pounds per acre 

 which latter are likely, in many instances this year to 

 be inadequate to the increased expenses we are called 

 upon to pay. 



pressure having been put by the Excise (1 .^ 

 collectors of returns. In one point I fnily agree with J <ini^. 

 —that is, the decrease in consumption in consequence ot uwj ^ 



price, and I think his estimate from this cause is less th * n an 

 reality, which alone may prevent prices going ™ cu » \ blf L 

 higher. Charle* Sturg*, of the firm of Joteph and Charles oi y 

 Birmingham, XX th month, 6. 



THE KEYTHORPE SYSTEM OF DRAINAGE. 



The ploughing and draining matches in comieC [*°* 

 with the Leicestershire Agricultural Society took pi 



on the 1st instant on the farm of Lord Berners, 



twitb- 



of bis 



thorpe. The local attendance was numerous, no 

 standing the wetness of the weather. As guests 

 Lordship at the Hall there were present the folio* * 

 gentlemen from other districts, viz., M. Trehonnai*, 

 celebrated French agriculturist, who is actively , en ? * 

 in connection with the French Government in the i 

 duction of the English breeds of cattle and J^j- 

 system of cultivation into France ; Mr. Meciu, 

 tree; Mr. Bullock Webster; Mr. Baker, of v>p ' 

 Mr. Wilmot, and Mr. Trimmer, who had been tne ^ 

 to draw public attention to the Key thorpe s}st ^ 

 draining, and to explain the principles on win 



Success dej>*nds. , . #£ 



The wetness of the weather afforded a comply ^ 

 of the efficacy of the system. There had been 4» ^ 

 of heavy and inceasant rain, and yet upon the string .^ 

 loams of this farm, with a substratum of ]ia f , C ^ sU ok 

 which in their undrained state a horse would bat^ 

 fetlock deep, there were assembled 26 ploughs 



OB* 



