A Joint-Slock Farm in the Netherlands. 
189 
per annum (20 to 25 guilders per hectare). In addition to this, 
the owners of the Wilhelmina Polder, having a contingent 
interest in the maintenance of the East Beveland Polder, are 
taxed to the extent of about is. 3d. per acre per annum for the 
maintenance of the latter. 
The farm is divided into rectangular fields of from 20 to 25 
acres each, separated by neatly trimmed thorn-hedges, and they 
present a perfect picture of agricultural neatness and symmetry. 
The absence of the ditches, which are so general in the ]S ether- 
lands, and several other features which will appear in the 
following pages, made one think more of Holderness than of 
Holland ; but I was assured that I was the first Englishman 
who had ever visited the Wilhelmina Polder. 
Of the 3600 acres of land belonging to the company, about 
3000 are under the plough, and the remainder in permanent 
grass, with the exception of the small portion required for 
labourers' cottages, gardens, and potato ground. 
W hen first reclaimed, colza (rape-seed) is generally the crop 
first taken ; but in some cases the land is so salt that it must be 
pastured for some time. Afterwards, the rotation on the lighter 
land is a seven-course, viz. (1) turnips, (2) chevalier barlev, (3) 
vetches, (4) rye, (5) potatoes, (6) beans, (7) rye. Between 30 
and 40 acres of lucerne are also sown on the light land in the 
beans, and the crop remains down 7 years, then going again 
into the rotation. 
The heavy land is cropped on a course of 21 years' duration, 
including 2 years' seeds and 2 years' red clover, the following 
being the usual succession of crops : — (1) peas, (2) wheat, (3) 
roots, (4) beans, (5) wheat, (6) oats and red clover, (7) red 
clover, (8) peas, (9) winter barley, (10) beans and carraways, 
(11) carraways, (12) carraways, (13) peas, (14) wheat and red 
clover, (15) red clover, (16) oats, (17) roots, (18) beans, (19) 
wheat and artificial grass, (20) grass, (21) grass. 
The mixture of seed sown is about 35 lbs. per acre, of which 
one-half is clover seed (viz. a little red, but mostly white, 
hybrid, and yellow), and the remaining half is a mixture of rye- 
grass and Timothy. About 25 acres of the grass is mown 
annually, and the rest pastured by cattle and sheep, the former 
being on from May until the end of July or beginning of 
August. Each shift on the heavy land consists of about 135 
acres, so that the light arable land cannot measure more than 
about 170 acres. The "root-crops" consist of 112 acres of 
mangolds, 15 to 18 of turnips and swedes, 50 of flax once in tht 
rotation, 20 of maize, a few acres of cabbage, 7<) to 100 of 
potatoes, 35 to 50 of sugar-beet, and 50 acres let to the labourers. 
The sugar-beet is sold to the sugar factories, and in 1879, 
