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FIFTY YEARS OF HOP FARMING. 
In 1870 it was stated of hop planters in this Journal that 
they " are now generally making vigorous efforts to improve 
their system of cultivation and management, so that it may be 
said that in no previous decade in the history of hop-growing 
has such intelligent attention been paid both 'to the scientific 
and practical phase of the question as in the years from 1860 
to 1870." 1 
Since 1870 there has been further improvement in systems 
of cultivation and methods of management, equal to that which 
has taken place in other branches of agriculture, and looking 
back to 1840 it will be seen that great progress has been made 
in the past fifty years of hop farming in every detail connected 
with the production of hops. 
This progress, however, has not brought in its wake pros- 
perity to the planters, who as a body groan under the burden of 
agricultural depression in common with the cultivators of most 
other crops, and, perhaps, with more vehemence, as the expenses 
of hop cultivation are very great and the losses proportionately 
high. But hop cultivation always was more or less risky and 
speculative, on account of the delicacy of the hop plant and its 
liability to affections of insect and fungoid nature,, together with 
the vagaries of a market liable to " rings " and " corners,'"' 
whose price fluctuations are sharp, sudden, and sometimes 
astounding. 
The History of Hops. 
Before an account is given of the principal improvements 
that have taken place in hop cultivation and management during 
the last fifty years, it will be interesting to trace rapidly the 
history of hops in this country from the earliest date, which seems 
to be about the beginning of the sixteenth century. According 
to an old couplet, 
Hops, Beformation, Bays, and Beer, 
Came into England all in one year. 
Another has it that, 
Turkeys, Carp, Hops, Piccarel, and Beer, 
Came all to England in one year. 
There are records proving that there was a hop garden at 
Bourne near Canterbury in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and 
1 " On Recent Improvements in the Cultivation and Management of Hops." 
By Charles Whitehead. Journal of the Iloyal Agricultural Society of England, 
Vol. VI., Second Series (1876). 
VOL. I. T. S. — 2 y 
