Soils. 
249 
Butler's Wood, Anfield Wood, Cianbury Park, Bambridge 
and part of Tvvyford Park, Stroud's Wood, Waltharn Cliace, the 
Forest of Bere, and, west ol" Portsdown Hill, llidge and other 
coppices. It is almost a continuous line of wood and coppice. 
This country ought to be called " tlie South Hants Woodlands." 
This No. 1 soil is heavy indeed and dark coloured, but in its 
bettor parts, where mixed with a sandy loam and a reddish brick- 
earth, it forms rich loam. The good soil increases in breadth of 
surface, and the loam in depth, as you go eastward, and approach 
the coast and the valleys opening out on it. To this tract of 
country belongs that heavy ground, which has already been 
mentioned, between the chalk of the South Downs and that of 
Portsdown. 
The southern slope of Portsdown, and the alluvial soil stretching 
thence towards the sea, is of much better quality. From Bed- 
hampton, at the eastern end of the hill, to Fareham, at the western, 
there is a fine tract of corn land, nearly eight miles long, and 
with an average breadth of nearly one, which for good farming, 
large open pleasant fields, and the earliness of its produce (the 
harvest is said to be ten days in advance of other parts), is not 
surpassed in the county, except it be at Bishopstoke. 
Much serviceable land is situated to the east of the Southampton 
Water, stretching in a broad band fi-om Romsey, south and east- 
ward, in what may be called the Bracklesham country, as far as 
Gosport and Portsmouth ; but the extension southward is soon 
checked by the poor soils of the New Forest block. The con- 
stituents of the soil do not seem very different from those of lands 
of this class in the north, but are better mixed. There are some 
fields with a good staple between Botley and Bishopstoke ; some 
much thinner about Netley, Horton, and Chilworth ; but the 
large proportion of this block is, as soils go in Hampshire, very 
useful land. Titchfield, for instance, is a noted agricultural 
parish. About Romsey, in the valley of the Test, there is a rich 
black alluvial soil, peaty perhaps in parts, of which some field- 
allotment gardeners appear to make good use. But some of the 
best working land in this whole district, and it may be almost 
said in the county, lies in the adjoining valley of the Itchen, 
about Bishopstoke Railway station. The farmer has there a 
loam, as deep as the plough can go, resting on a gravelly subsoil, 
excellent for all grain, strong enough for beans, and light enough 
for turnips. This loam thins out to the southward in the direc- 
tion of Millbrook, Southampton, and Netley Abbey, till the 
gravel comes to the surface. It was about midway in this tract, 
between Bishopstoke and Southampton, at Swathling, that the 
trial of the light-land implements took place, on the occasion of 
the Society's show in 1844. 
