Agriculture of Nottinghamshire. 
161 
A great portion of the remaining part of the forest of Sherwood 
has been enc losed and now grows abundant crops, and many sheep 
of an improved breed are now reared and fed thereon. 
A considerable quantity of oak timber has been grubbed up 
on day-laud in Epperstone, Ossington, Norwell, and Winkburn, 
which now produces abundant crops ; and many plantations of 
larch in Blidworth and elsewhere have been converted into fertile 
arable land. The owners of the very poorest sandy and gravelly 
land, who planted larch thereon more than sixty years ago, derived 
great benefit from the produce ; and where the ground has been 
cleared the laud has become so fertilized by the vegetable matter 
<lerived from the larch as to be worth more than double its former 
value and to produce good corn and green crops, although formerly 
it would not repay the expenses of cultivation. The best and 
most profitable mode of treatment of such soils is to fallow, use 
artificial manure, and take a crop of turnips to be eaten off bv 
sheep, and then trench, dig, or double-plough the land and plant 
it with larch, which, after such pieparation, grow rapidly, and 
the thinnings soon repay part of the expense ; the trees attain a 
good size in much less time than when they have been planted 
in holes without stirring the rest of the surface. Although such 
method is expensive at the commencement, it is more economical 
and profitable than the common mode of proceeding, by which 
considerably more plants and much more time are required before 
a plantation is in a thriving state. 
A short time previous to the present century an act of parlia- 
ment was obtained for the embankment and drainage of an 
extensive tract of land at the northern extremity of the county, 
which had been covered with water yearly in winter, and two 
subsequent acts have been found necessary to authorise the com- 
pletion of the works. Two powerful steam-engines are erected, 
and the land has become valuable and productive. 
The banks of the Trent and Devon have been made effective 
for the prevention of summer floods in many parishes. A con- 
siderable district adjoining the river Idle, between Retford and 
the Trent, might be very materially improved by drainage and 
embankment. 
With reference to the cultivation of lands whereon turnips may 
be advantageously eaten by sheep : about the year 1800 there 
were several recent improvers of light sandy land, in the district 
between Retford, Worksop, and Bawtry, who had adopted a 
regular course of cultivation ; but autumnal cultivation for fallow 
was not then practised, and corn and turnips were chiefly sown 
broadcast. Swede turnips were not then grown, and all spring 
corn was harvested in a loose state. In most other parts of the 
county, and especially on the best sandy and light loamy land, 
VOL. XXII, M 
