520 Report on the Waridchsldre Farm-Prize Competition, 187S-. 
convince my readers that if the farming is exceptional, so also 
must be the land which in the face of such a miserable summer 
could produce such an uniformly respectable result : — 
Yield. 
Price per Acre, j 
Wheat 
Bushels. 
35 
£ s. rf. 1 
10 10 0 1 
36| 
10 10 0 
36 
11 8 0 
52 
12 7 0 
The Horse Work of the farm is performed in a very superior 
manner. Eight cart-horses are kept. Thev are useful, but neither 
remarkable nor showy animals, and the Avhole team-work devolves 
upon them, steam-power not being used. I have mentioned that 
only one ploughing is given for any crop, except under verv 
extraordinary circumstances. The corn-drilling, the horse- 
hoeing, and the ploughing are all splendidly executed ; the 
extreme precision of the drilling in particular could hardly be 
excelled, and this much facilitates the work of , the horse-hoe, 
which is certainly no less admirable. In the drill-work not a 
handshake from one end of the field to the other is visible, and 
the horse-hoe when at work on peas or other crops cuts to the 
very edge of the rows, and performs the operation in a manner 
which could not be surpassed, if indeed it could be equalled, 
by the most careful manual labour. For mangolds and turnips 
jNIr. Lane prefers a swing horse-hoe on a pair of light high 
wheels, which is made by Kitchen, of Stratford-on-Avon. It has 
a light pair of shafts, and, in addition to the shares for roots, has 
a set for corn. It is used also among the wheat and barley, is 
easy to guide close to the rows, and can be put thoroughly into 
the soil so as to gain a good tilth. The same hoe is used for 
the winter-beans the first time, doing a wide row once and two 
of the narrow rows twice at each turn ; but afterwards Carson 
and Toone's hoe is used, as it has no wheels, and therefore does 
not injure the crop when the beans have got to some size. 
Single-furrow ploughs are entirely used (Hornsby's pr Howard s 
being preferred), because with them alone can the skimmer be 
properly employed, and Mr. Lane is very careful on this point. 
To use his own words, " Only by this means and by diligent 
forking can the land be kept clean when it is always in cro]). 
and it is so necessary to put below the surface any secdlinjx 
couch or other weeds introduced by meadow-hay." Three horses, 
at length, are always used in ploughing according to the almost 
universal custom of the county. 
