Report on the Farm-Prize Competition o/* 1886. 649 
rule in the eastern counties, but is seldom seen elsewhere. 
Tenacious clay soils possess the properties of expansion and 
retention in a much greater degree than that of transmission, 
and hence, however well the land may be drained, when a 
considerable and continuous rainfall occurs, these properties so 
prolong percolation, that unless an escape by the surface is 
provided, the young plants inevitably suffer more or less. A 
headland holding water, being sown when too wet, and so 
perishing the plants, is a circumstance familiar to most practical 
men ; and something like this, but in a less marked degree, 
takes place on clay land when laid on wide flat ridges 
without water-furrows, to obviate which the Suffolk farmer 
ploughs up as aforesaid into stetches about 9 feet wide. 
Mr. Smith's land is all cultivated on this stetch, and in a neat 
and most workmanlike manner. After ploughing, the horses 
I are not allowed to travel on the stetches, but all the after- 
i cultivation (dragging, harrowing, and drilling) is done from the 
furrows. Some farmers have drills wide enough to cover one of 
them, and in this case the horses walk up the furrows on each 
, side, with the drill between them. Others, like Mr. Smith, use 
a drill covering half the stetch only, and here they go up one 
furrow and down the other to cover it. After sowing, a double- 
breasted plough is run up the furrows, rffording a free waterway 
for such water as does not filter to the drains. In spring, the 
j breasts are taken off the plough, and skim-knives are attached, 
, and again passed along the furrows, cutting up the weeds, and 
, by mouldering down the sides, facilitating the working of the 
reaping-machines at harvest. 
Clover Seeds. — The mixtures for these are various. This 
I year 6 acres are seeded with a mixture of clover, trefoil, and 
rye-grass ; 14 acres with 1 peck per acre of red clover only, and 
6 acres seeded with sainfoin, at the rate of 1 sack per acre ; 
8 acres of red clover were cut for hay, the second crop would 
probably stand for seed, and 5 acres of mixed grasses were fed 
on the land. None of the grass-land was mown this year. It 
is only of poor quality, and kept up by folding on sheep eating 
cake, 
I The fences are good, and very neatly kept, the banks are 
trimmed, and the ditches are in good order ; in fact, an air of 
neatness and order pervades the whole farm. Mr. Smith lets 
the trimming of his hedges, banks, and ditches, the following 
1 prices being paid : for cutting hedge and trimming ditch and 
' bank, \d. per rod of 5^ yards ; for fence and bank, ^d. • and for 
brow or border only, \d. per rod. 
Some cottages with clay walls exist here, the framework being 
wood filled in with clay. The outside surface requires skimming 
VOL. XXII,— S. S. 2 U 
