5:52 



THE AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 



Scientific Farming , 



MR. H. RIDER HAGGARD'S third | 

 article, entitled " Back to the Land," 

 published in the Daily Exp i ens, deals 

 ■with Blount's Farm, Sawbridgeworth, 

 and shows what science has done to turn 

 a loss into a profit. 



Stiff clay soils such as that of which 

 Mr. Haggard writes are uncommon in 

 Natal, and owing to hail wheat growing 

 has gone out of practice, but the article, 

 irrespective of its agricultural informa- 

 tion, points to several morals. 



One of the most deeply interesting 

 agricultural experiments ever carried out 

 over a series of years in England is that 

 which has been in progress since 1861 — 

 more than a generation — upon Blount's 

 Farm, near Sawbridgeworth, in Hertford- 

 shire. When Mr. Prout, the father of the 

 present proprietor, became possessed of 

 his farm of 450 acres it was in such low 

 condition that it was said of it " that it 

 would starve a donkey." Also, it was 

 undrained, made up of small enclosures, 

 and cumbered with many fences. 



Now all this has been changed. Indeed, 

 I never saw a better arranged or, I may 

 add, in its own fashion, a better cultivated 

 holding. The fields are large, averaging 

 perhaps thirty or forty acres, and pierced 

 with convenient roads ; the fences are 

 low and well trimmed, and the drainage, 

 that at the present time is done with the 

 steam mole, a system of which I hope to 

 speak in a subsequent article, is perfect. 

 The peculiarity of Mr. Prout's farm is 

 this. He keeps no cattle and no sheep, 

 he grows nothing but cereals, clover, 

 beans, and some mangolds for the horses, 

 and year by year he sells everything oft' 

 the soil that it produces. Further, he has 

 no scruple about growing wheat or other 

 cereals for many years in succession upon 

 the same field, a thing hitherto supposed 

 to be impossible to do in England at a 

 profit. Nor does he replace the grain and 

 straw sold off the farm by stable manure 

 imported from elsewhere. Yet he farms 

 at a profit. 



Calling in the Chemist. 



The experienced reader will naturally 

 ask how this can be done. Here is the 



explanation. Four years after Mr. Prout, 

 senior, who had farmed in Canada for 

 ten years, took the holding in hand in a 

 desperate condition, the happy thought 

 occurred to him to consult the late Dr. 

 Augustus Voelcker, perhaps the greatest 

 agricultural chemist of his day. In 1865 

 he submitted to him samples of the soil 

 of Blount's Farm. Dr. "^^oelcker analysed 

 these carefully, and in his report pointed 

 out what elements should be added from 

 time to time to ensure the permanent 

 fertility of the land while producing suc- 

 cessive crops of cereals. Accordingly the 

 chemicals were added in the proportions 

 which he advised, and, with the excep- 

 tion of deep and thorough tillage and 

 draining, every other recognised rule of 

 farming was set at defiance. 



In 18^7, after twelve years of constant 

 corn growing, and the annual sale of every 

 stalk of straw, the land was again anal} sed, 

 and found to be richer in all necessary 

 constituents than it was in 1865. Nor, 

 although as many as eight corn crops 

 have been taken consecutively, does the 

 yield lessen by a single bushel. From 

 1865 to the present date the same extra- 

 ordinary system has been carried on with 

 precisely the same results, nor does there 

 seem to be any valid reason why it should 

 ever stop. In short, the fertility of the 

 soil is quite unimpaired. 



Science that Pays. 



Up to the year 1879 it was the custom 

 of Mr. Proirt, sen., to sell his crops as 

 they stood in the held, leaving the pur- 

 chaser to harvest them, but since that 

 time, as buyers no longer cared to specu- 

 late in corn at the prevailing low prices, 

 he and his son have done the harvesting 

 themselves, selling the grain in the ordi- 

 nary fashion, and the straw by auction. 

 Indeed, when we visited the farm such a 

 sale had recently been held, for we saw 

 the tickets still fixed upon the stacks. 

 Here it will be convenient to state that 1 

 inspected Mr. Prout's accounts, which are, 

 however, not for publication. I will only 

 add on this point, therefore, that he is, 

 and in practice always has been, in the 

 proud position of farming at a profit. 



