Autumn Cleaning of Stubbles. 
121 
as the weather permits. The land is very heavily manured, and 
great care is taken to preserve the young shoots unbroken. 
Swiedcs are afterwards transplanted, and excellent crops occa- 
sionally obtained in this way." We have no experience of this 
practice, but we think it must be remunerative. 
Those feats of agriculture cannot be performed, except under 
the most favourable circumstances ; but no farmer should lose 
an opportunity of making his land produce the maximum of 
bulk with the minimum of expense of which it is capable ; and 
we know of no way in which these opportunities may be in- 
creased so well and so cheaply as by autumn cultivation. 
In conclusion we must say that the limits of this essay have 
not enabled us to exhaust the subject, for instances might be 
adduced from every part of the country in favour of the 
" autumn cleaning of stubbles." It has not been our task to 
add much to the stock of information already accumulated ; but, 
in attempting to reduce this to general principles, we hope we 
have not laid ourselves open to the charge of dogmatism. We 
have given the practices of the best farmers as far as we know, 
and have pointed out to the best of our ability the conditions 
under which they may be followed : knowing that no rule can be 
laid down applicable to all cases, we leave it to the judgment of 
each to discern how far they may be adopted on a particular 
farm. We take as a proof of the utility of the system the 
rapidity with which it has spread. So recently as the year 
1847, Mr. Pusey (whose mind is ever on the alert for the ad- 
vancement of agriculture) had to call the attention of agricul- 
turists, the ' South-country farmers ' more particularly, to the 
' Autumn Clearing of Stubbles on Light Land,' as described by 
Mr. Raynbird.* We venture to assert there is not a farmer of 
local notoriety in the south of England, and we may add in any 
of the arable districts of England, who, in the year 1855, does 
not possess some implement for autumn cultivation. 
* Report of Suffolk, Vol. VIII. Society's Journal, 
