Land to Permanent Pasture. 63 



of writing on the subject in a satisfactory manner ; in 

 other words, there is no means of proving what courses 

 are most suitable for the varying climates of these 

 islands. For instance, after studying the methods 

 recommended by Arthur Young, I am strongly inclined 

 to agree with him in thinking that to lay down with 

 buckwheat, after taking a crop of winter vetches, would 

 probably be the best plan; but though this would 

 evidently be, from Young's experience, a suitable plan in 

 the eastern counties of England, I have no means of 

 knowing whether it wo\zld be profitable to lay down in 

 the South of Scotland with this plant. At almost every 

 point, then, connected with this subject the writer is 

 sure to be confronted with difficulties arising from the 

 want of that information which might, and should, be 

 provided by local experimental farms. But though the 

 means for writing positively for the various localities do 

 not exist, it is clear that success may be attained in 

 various ways, and it will be useful to enumerate them 

 here in one group. 



There are, to begin with, the methods of Arthur 

 Young, who, as we have seen in the preceding chapter, 

 approves of sowing the seeds alone in August as being 

 the best method; secondly, of sowing them in July 

 with buckwheat ; thirdly, with rape in August, on 

 soils not liable to bind with treading; fourthly, of 

 sowing them with wheat early in September ; and 

 lastly, the worst method in his opinion, sowing them 

 with spring com. Of the agriculturists whose opinions 

 are quoted by him one sowed with beans, which he 

 found more successful than any plan he had tried ; 

 while another sowed his grass seeds amongst turnips in 

 the spring as the^ were fed off by sheep, and found 

 that the grass "flourished beyond any other." Then 

 there is the system successfully practised by the late 

 Mr. John Wilson in Berwickshire for many years, and 

 of which he gave a full account in the North British 

 Agriculturist of January 21st, 1885. His original practice 



