On Cropping and Cultivating Light Land, 



89 



was 32 bushels per acre, with fine stiff straw, while that from 

 the adjoining- part not sown with guano was rootfallen, and pro- 

 duced less than 16 bushels. This was a bold step to take ; but 

 as it has been tlie means of producing such a result from an 

 apparently too luxuriant plant, which, without this extraneous 

 help, would have become rootfallen, yielding barely half the 

 quantity, it is an experiment which may be carefully tried fur- 

 ther, and, however paradoxical it may appear on the face of it, its 

 success in one instance at once makes it a question of great 

 interest. 



The intimate connexion between the grass or hay and pulse 

 crops with the succeeding wheat-crop has made us, almost uncon- 

 sciously, step from the third quarter of the four-course system 

 to the fourth. But we must return to the moiety of the third 

 quarter sown with grass. However much we may economise hay 

 by cutting straw with our chaff-cutters, and by different modes 

 of feeding stock, hay is still a very valuable, and it may be said, 

 an indispensable crop ; and it is to the interest of the farmer to 

 apply the same principle to the culture of his grass or hay crop 

 as he should rigidly apply to all others, namely, to groio the 

 largest-possible quantity in the shortest-possible time. The seeds 

 generally sown, such as clover, trefoil, Dutch clover, or rye-grass, 

 produce good crops from good land, well cultivated, without any 

 special manuring. But, as a general rule, some yard-manure 

 spread over the seeds during winter, or from 1 to 2 cwts. of 

 guano sown broadcast in early spring, is found to exercise the 

 same productive power over these crops as those manures do 

 upon all others to which they are properly applied. Upon the 

 sandy soils 2 cwt. per acre of gypsum is often used. Its work- 

 ing is rather mysterious ; sometimes its effects are very marked, 

 at others it has no effect at all. If it works well once in four years 

 it is said to pay for every year's trial. The first crop of hay being 

 removed, if the weather is showery and the land well manured, 

 the clover soon springs up again, and, in a few weeks, an abun- 

 dant supply of green food is at hand, to be cut for cattle in yards, 

 for the farm-horses, or to be fed by lambs or sheep. Even a 

 third crop is often obtained, which lasts till the earliest turnips 

 are ripe. 



We come now to the fourth quarter of the four-course system — 

 to that crop which has always been the English farmer's pecu- 

 liar care, and to the benefit of which he has directed his main 

 efforts. It has now become evident that the wheat-crop must 

 still receive a legitimate share of calculation and forethought, 

 and yet not be of pre-eminent importance ; no traditionary fame 

 must be attached to it, but the economy of perfect cleanness, 

 the culture of green crops, the fattening of stock, the growth of 



