350 
Moisture in Turnip-Land. 
The Jiat system, however, has a tlecidecl superiority in a dry 
climate by retaining on an average of seasons sufficient moisture 
in the land to grow a good crop, and for this reason we give the 
preference to the growth of turnips on the flat generally in Eng- 
land. 
Short dung, or " artificials," should be used as manures for 
turnips on dry land. 
Lonfi dung ploughed in, in June, as manure for turnips 
generally ends in disappointment. First, the manure has not 
time to decompose ; and secondly, it renders light soils too 
porous, and permits the ordinary fall of rain to evaporate too 
quickly. Chemists tell us there is much loss by fermenting 
dung very much ; at the same time we know by chemical and 
practical rule, that there is a loss by applying green dung to a 
light soil very long before the crop is to be grown. The de- 
composition of dung in such land is usually rapid. Part is 
washed downwards into the subsoil by heavy rains, and part is 
wasted by evaporation into the atmosphere. It is better, there- 
fore, to cover dung-heaps over with soil when in course of 
decomposition, and just before the turnips are to be sown the 
rotten dung should be applied. In dry land, when it is desir- 
able to grow the roots in " ridges " for the greater facility 
of cleaning and hoeing early, the ridges ought to be rolled down 
immediately after being sown, unless the land be such as would 
bind together and form a hard crust, that the young braird could 
not get through. Whether turnips on dry soils are grown on the 
flat or ridge, the process of manuring and sowing should be as 
rapid as possible over such a breadth as the strength of the farm 
can manage in a day. Rolling, whether on the flat or on 
ridges, alivays does good on dry turnip land in dry weather. 
Young turnips can even penetrate through the track of a cart 
wheel, notwithstanding the great solidity of the soil. 
To retain moisture in dry turnip land it is necessary to plough 
as seldom as j)ossible, and roll as often as the land will bear it, 
without crusting over the surface. If dung is ploughed in in 
dry weather for turnips intended to be grown on the flat, the 
same day the land is ploughed it ought to be rolled. If applied 
in ridges, the ridges should be made, the manure applied, and 
the ridges again reversed on the spread dung the same day ; the 
seed should also be sown without delay, and if at all practicable 
the ridges rolled down. 
The system practised by many of dunging a great breadth of 
turnip land at once is highly injudicious on the average of 
seasons, where it is desirable to retain moisture in the soil ; and 
those who follow such a course fail more generally than they 
succeed in getting a regular plant. It is easy to imagine, and 
