Ijaying Down Stiff Soils. 25 



strong shrub like coffee, bow mucb moi'e must they tell 

 on tender-rooted grasses, and bow much, further, must 

 such deficiences tell in a climate like ours, which is so 

 much subject to changes which tend to run the soil 

 together, and so injure its physical condition. And if, 

 again, a planted-out plant of coffee is, as we have seen, 

 liable to fail from being put down in a defective nest, 

 how often, too, must grass seeds fail from a similar 

 want of a proper home to germinate in, and how fre- 

 quently must the tender, newly-grown grass plant fail 

 from the want of suitable conditions for establishing 

 itself in the soil. I think, then, that a little considera- 

 tion of these points will show that I may safely declare, 

 as I have in the beginning of this chapter, that one of 

 the most important points connected with the whole 

 subject of laying down land to grass, either to lie for a 

 period of years or permanently, is the disintegration of 

 the soil, and the intermingling with it of a sufficient 

 portion of vegetable matter, so that, after being dis- 

 integrated, it may not readily again run together. The 

 question which naturally occurs is this — How can such 

 conditions be most economically provided] And, first 

 of all, let us take the case of laying down land to 

 permanent pasture. 



When laying down land to grass, the usual practice 

 has hitherto been to do so after a crop of turnips, and 

 when the land has, in the course of its previous culti- 

 vation, been regularly supplied with farm-yard manure, 

 and so with applications of vegetable matter, and is of 

 a quality that does not readily run together, and so 

 becomes tough and hardened, there is nothing to be said 

 against so doing. But where the land has not been well 

 supplied^ with vegetable matter, or is of a quality which 

 soon loses whatever physical condition has been im- 

 pai'ted by tillage, I have now reason to think, from my 

 own practical experience, that it is decidedly best to lay 

 down permanently, after first of all growing a turf 

 mainly composed of deep-rooting plants, and plants 



